SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I am not sure what forum to post this on but I'm here because the original betrayal that brought me here was long ago.

That was in 2008. We divorced. I dated a man, G, for 7 years until 2017. We split up after a dumb fight. He was so anxious he heard things I didn't say, and I gave up. Both of us had trust issues. Eventually we salvaged a friendship as I never stopped caring. His mother died and he grieved. G got stage 4 cancer, I took care of him, we reconnected emotionally, overcame past blocks, and even knowing he was dying we got married. We had an amazing wonderful loving 4 months of marriage. He died January 2025.

I am still grieving the loss, and also trying to understand why he was so anxious.

This past weekend I met with his aunt who was his mother's sister and asked her why.

She said there are skeletons in the closet in the family. She told the story of G's mother having an affair when my husband was a baby. She got pregnant, and his Dad took her back and raised G's brother as his son. That was R.

I had not heard this story before. She said she had never told anyone.

My husband G and his brother R were very different. G was an artist, didn't focus on money. R was always wheeling and dealing and became a multi millionaire and has a wealthy lifestyle. My husband was very heartfelt and sacrificed to help others. The brother barely helped at all when my husband was sick and was very distant and disconnected. Cold where my husband was very warm despite the anxiety.

Do I keep this info to myself as the aunt did? As G's parents clearly wanted?
But why should I know and not the brother?

There isn't a way to verify this as both parents are dead. Not sure a DNA test could be done at this time.

My experience with being honest about difficult topics are that then people see me in a negative light when I did nothing wrong and I don't want that drama in my life. I'm inclined to say nothing, as his brother is not friendly to me anyway. He is in his 60s now.

All the same, I know if there was a question about my parentage I would want to know.

I am puzzling over what to do with this bombshell.

I'm open to thoughtful responses. Thank you.

Spicy because it’s difficult to know if the brother doesn’t know it already without risking to shatter his life if he is not.

Not sure how much the Aunt knows about the innermost dynamics of the family.

Are you very close to him?

I think this is an unfair secret passed down by the parents to children (you too as in wife of, you are like a daughter now).

Fallout of infidelity infecting lives even decades after if there was rugsweeping.

He is the son of the affair partner. His dad adopted him as his own (hard thing to do, but he chose to love the fruit of betrayal as his own blood). This is commendable.

Keeping secrets though, never a good idea. The truth has a way to alway come out sooner or later.
This is but one instance of it happening.

He is a victim of his mother affair and her affair partner. He didn’t do anything wrong or bad, he just came to life. He is completely innocent.

The evil of his biological parents is what makes it all a bid land mine now. The secret buried it, and since the parents never told him the truth now his all reality is based on a lie.

He was never given the chance to process it, and if the parents are no more or they are but keep the lie, then you telling him can possibly only cause pain and break him.

I don’t think you should be the person bringing out the truth, unless he is directly confronting you with questions, then the truth is always the correct answer.

But I wouldn’t go searching for him to tell him from your own initiative.

It’s unfair for him, unfair for you, but you have to deal with the echo of his mother’s betrayal, it put this load on your shoulders willing or not.

Thanks for your response, it was helpful. I am not close with the brother. I am working with his wife to resolve the storage unit left by his mother in my state when he lives across the country. But he never thanked me for taking care of his brother when he was sick.

I think given I don't have a relationship with him, and because he was not friendly to me despite all the care I gave his brother, and I'm dealing with the grief of all that has happened in the last few years, I don't think I have the strength to tell him and navigate the fallout.

If he ever has doubts, and wants to ask me if the aunt ever said anything to me, I would tell the truth. He would never ask because he doesn't talk to me.

You're right, it's an example of how infidelity has ripple effects through the decades, even after the affair people are dead and gone.

I would not say anything. Despite the difference in their personalities, it sounds like there's no proof that R was the product of his mother's affair. Imagine if you stir that pot based on rumor, and it turns out that G's father was R's father after all.

If he has kids, it's going to come out at some point when one of them does DNA testing for a genealogy site (I, and several people I know, have found unexpected relatives that way). Let the chips fall without your intervention.

Yes, I think you're right. I have no proof, I am simply hearing a story, and passing on the story is not something I feel like I am being asked to do. I simply was feeling the weight of holding it. Like a hot potato I want to pass it on. But I think I will let it sit. If the aunt ever talks to me about it again I would ask her to be the one to share the news, and if she is not up to tell then it's not my job to tell for her.

R and his son are unlikely to do a DNA test as they have strong feelings about not giving out personal information to companies.

I am leaving it in God's hands.

Thank you for helping me sort this out. Infidelity is an ancient problem that has so many ramifications, it ripples through the decades.

The way the aunt told the story as in the OP leads to believe he is the fruit of betrayal but still adopted as a son.

It’s still second hand information as I understand it was long time ago and probably it was hushed (aunt is related to WW or BH? That could give some hint of how attendible the information is, if the WW told her "I got pregnant from the AP" is less a speculation).

They kept secrets and the man who was unwillingly connecting you with this fallout, your husband, passed.
If he was alive he may have had stakes and the right to know and find out the truth.

You have no ties with the brother, so you are carrying the burden of a secret from an unfaithful mother, but it’s not that you are the one hiding it or perpetuating it.

You feel the weight because this knowledge changes the light over the reality of the man you love (present tense because he passed, but it feels like you still have love feelings), and a close person he probably loved (his brother) realizing they have been living in the shadow of a big lie.

A lie that was probably out of love for both R and the WW, but still a,lie. And truth has the remarkable trait of always surfacing even decades after, it can be found because it is the lies that have an expiration date.

Think about it this way: there’s no dishonesty or connivance with the lie in you.
You stumbled upon a truth about a person who is not present in your life, is a very distant acquired relative that doesn’t seem much interested in acknowledging your existence.

In a different setting and stage of life this information would carry more weight as there can be borderline emergencies where you need to know for sure if two people are blood related, think medical emergencies.

This is apparently no longer a concern, you unveiling this secret to a distant person would be more akin of publishing out on social media than really addressing an important issue with a close person (he chose not to be close).

There’s the other side of the psyche that we don’t like uncertainty, so not knowing the answer to this secret is likely unpleasant for you. But for him and his family could turn out to be reality shattering.

I say that the best decision and the only option left is to ask the aunt to be the bearer of such revelations, as she is in closer contact. And you keeping this knowledge to yourself unless he comes one day demanding answers, in which case you can tell him the truth, he will be then in charge of his agency and not oblivious like he is now.

It sucks but it has o power over you, I wonder if it didn’t awaken some questions or doubts from your distant past as you were betrayed before.
The ripple effects can make you wonder which might exist from your past that you don’t know off.
What I say it could have been a minor trigger, that let you wondering, you may try to address those emotions if that’s the case, to put them to rest and return to the peace without feeling the weight of this burden as much as it did when you learned about it.