Dear Roe,
I have been married to a very kind man for 17 years. We have three teenagers and my husband is a great dad. He is very hands on, and helps out with lots of chores around the house. My family and friends think he’s wonderful and regularly say how lucky I am. However, I discovered recently on his phone that he has been secretly in contact with another woman for more than six months.
I was absolutely horrified. I confronted him and he immediately played it down, saying this woman was someone he had known in university. They bumped into each other several months ago and exchanged numbers. A chat started, initially about other old friends. But it has become a much more regular thing. The chat history is full of voice messages talking about their day-to-day life. They never met and from what I can gather the exchange was just about life in general. But I am shocked and immensely hurt. I feel betrayed. I saw in their chat that he asked her to open an account on a private messenger, so I wouldn’t find out. This woman is also married, with two teenagers. He told me that over the last year or so he felt he couldn’t talk to me, that I’m always in bad form and that he just enjoyed the exchange with this woman.
I admit life in our house can be stressful with three hormonal teenagers. He has since deleted and blocked her from his contacts. He has apologised repeatedly, and is trying very hard to make it up to me. However, my trust is now damaged. One part of me can understand why he would talk to someone else, but I also feel that if I hadn’t discovered the chat, it may have developed into something much more. I haven’t confided in anyone as it’s very private and I wouldn’t want anyone judging him or our marriage. So I would appreciate your thoughts. Am I very naive in thinking this was just a once-off, or does it actually show that my wonderful husband isn’t as wonderful as I thought?
I ended my situationship six months ago but I’m still not over him. How do I move on?
Where can my wife and I access porn that is both legal and erotic?
I think I’m in love with my ‘situationship’ but he doesn’t feel the same
‘My brother-in-law wants to move in with us but I don’t think my marriage will survive it’
I’m sorry you’re going through this, and I want to acknowledge the complexity of what you’re feeling – the shock, the betrayal, the loneliness that often comes from holding such a heavy, private truth, and the disorienting realisation that someone you love and trusted has also chosen to cultivate a hidden emotional world outside your shared life.
It makes complete sense that you’re hurt, confused and feeling betrayed by his secrecy. But you are not naive for believing in your husband’s goodness, or for trusting in the life you built together, or for still trying, even now, to make sense of what this all means. In fact, those instincts speak to your strength, your integrity and your desire to understand rather than react in haste.
The truth is, long-term relationships – especially ones stretched over years of parenting, responsibilities, stress and constant noise – often suffer from a slow erosion of connection, not because the love is gone, but because the weight of daily life has crowded out the space where intimacy once lived. You both have been carrying the strain of raising teenagers – a challenge that requires relentless emotional labour and patience – and it would be no surprise if, amid all that, you’ve both at times felt unseen, unheard and maybe even unloved. He said he felt he couldn’t talk to you, and while that may feel unfair and hurtful, it’s not an uncommon feeling in relationships at this stage of life. I suspect that in your own way, you’ve felt that disconnection too.
He sought out someone who made him feel interesting again, someone who was curious about his daily life and made him feel like a person rather than just a co-parent or partner in logistics, and that impulse, while deeply disappointing, is also deeply human. Often, affairs or emotional entanglements are less about the other person and more about reconnecting with a forgotten self – one that felt exciting, adventurous, desirable or full of possibility. This doesn’t excuse the secrecy or the deception, but it does offer a more compassionate lens through which to understand why this happened – not because he stopped loving you, but perhaps because he lost sight of himself, and in doing so, lost his way with you too.
What matters now is what you both choose to do with this moment. It sounds like your husband didn’t seek romance or sex, he hasn’t denied or minimised his actions, but instead acknowledged what happened, explained why it unfolded the way it did, and has taken immediate steps to end it and try to repair the damage. If that’s the case, then perhaps this is less about a fatal blow to your marriage, and more about a long-unspoken disconnection finally being forced into the light – and with light comes the possibility of growth and renewal.
[ ‘I love my husband but I’m also so angry at him all the time’Opens in new window ]
This moment could be an invitation to begin again, not to rewind to some earlier version of your marriage, but to take honest stock of where you both are now, who you’ve each become over the years, what you both need from love and from each other, and how you can begin to rediscover yourselves as individuals and as a couple. Because just as he yearned to be seen, heard and desired, I would bet that you too are hungry for more – more closeness, more appreciation, more laughter, more space to be your full, complex self – and those needs are equally important and equally deserving of expression and care. You acknowledge that parenting has probably been stressful for your partner, but it’s also been stressful for you too, hasn’t it? He references your bad moods as contributing to your disconnection, and maybe they have – but has he been curious about those moods? Has he been curious about what you might need to feel a little lighter, a little more yourself, and has he been turning up, ready to solve the problem like a partner?
If you can talk about these issues openly, with kindness, truth, commitment and ideally a skilled couples therapist who can hold the space for both pain and possibility, you may be able to move towards a new chapter. Not one that pretends the hurt never happened, but one that integrates it, that allows you to grieve what’s been lost or neglected, and to imagine together what a more intentional, connected and nourishing relationship could look like now. No marriage remains static, and sometimes a rupture, even a severe one, can be the thing that finally draws two people back into real contact.
I would gently urge you to check your instinct to not speak to anyone about this. I understand wanting to process and protect your family, and you don’t need to tell everyone – but a supportive friend or confidante will make you feel less alone.
What matters most now is that you are honest with yourself about the pain of this moment but also about the longing – yours and his – that has been quietly shaping your life for some time. If you can start there, not with judgment but with curiosity and care, you may find a path forward that doesn’t deny the past but learns from it – and maybe in time even transcends it.
