Finally accepting I married a serial cheater

I've been in denial so long.........A little less than 2 weeks ago the walls in my head finally came crumbling down.

It's funny/ironic, it was an old text message exchange that did it. Just over a year old actually. I found it on his phone. She sent him pictures like they were newly dating, they talked about my home town, he shared things with her that I had told him on some of our first dates about where I grew up (meaning she was local), he then told her he was in an open relationship, talked about our kids, our marriage, shared secrets about us in the bedroom, asked to meet up with her...... I'd never read a full exchange between him and one of these women before....

I know some people don't consider online or sexting to be "affairs", but I did. I made it clear so many times over to him. I guess in some ways it was my fault I didn't walk away sooner. The first time I even found anything was because I was pregnant, and I was snooping on his phone. We weren't married, but I thought we were committed, together for over a year and about to have a baby. He was sexting a "friend" who was going through a tough time. Exchanging nudes, telling her sweet things. I felt so guilty for snooping, and I guess scared that this was happening between us with a baby on the way, that I let it go way too easy.

The second time, a woman contacted me shortly after our daughter was born. We fought, he lied, and ultimately, I didn't believe the woman; I obviously didn't want to. A few months later another woman contacted me. We fought again. It was Covid, life was stressful. He claimed it was his form of porn, interactive porn. He got off on sexting women, asking for nudes and then never talking to them again. I argued that these women found me through Facebook, it wasn't just porn, it wasn't ok, it had to stop. It crossed a line. I thought we had worked through it. I thought maybe we just didn't establish clear boundaries at the beginning of our relationship. He said he would stop, he said he understood.

We got married, had another kid. I even thought I saw him snap chatting with a girl once and he swore up and down it was some fishing thing (showed me) and said he didn't do that anymore. He lied. Again.

This past January our 4-year-old accidentally opened up his phone in front of me and his tinder account was right there for me to see. I realized he had been cheating the whole time and never stopped, just hid it better. I cried for a couple weeks, we fought really badly, and I threatened to leave. But I still stayed because he made promises to delete everything, cancel all his accounts, give me his passwords, and let me go through his phone whenever I wanted.

I don't know what possessed me to look through his phone for the first time two weeks ago. And for him to have been so thorough in deleting everything except this one exchange.

6 years of online cheating through all major social media (snap chat, Instagram, Facebook, and many many online dating apps) with hundreds of women. He claims he never met up with them (despite lying about even asking to meet them), he claims he never sent pics of me (despite lying about sending pics of himself and sharing personal details about me), he claims he never slept with anyone..... and I've known bits and pieces of this for years but pushed it so far down.

Yet a year-old text exchange has finally made me see reality.

I don't know what my next steps are. Reading some of the forums on this site have helped me realized I don't have to know right now. I do know things have forever changed between us. I told his parents what's going on and that I want a divorce. He's sleeping in the spare bedroom now only because I still need childcare while I work (He is/was a SAHD). I've started looking into counseling if just to help us be civil around the children as we navigate this. All I know is I will survive. I have to. For my kids.

8 comments posted: Tuesday, August 20th, 2024