I (Male 38) a week ago found out that my wife has been cheating on me. I will write down everything here.
We've been together for more than 3 years now, married 1. Before I met her I was against marriage and kids, but since the beginning of our relationship I knew I wanted to have a family with her, have a future together. We spent every single day together, doing everything together, literally. We spent only a few days during this time apart due to work travels. I was living a dream.
She is an engineer and works at construction company and checks quality of construction. Recently (since the beginning of the year) she got a new location in another city. For a month or two she traveled there each day (2 hours drive) with her coworkers, but as sometimes she had to leave work later she got back home very tired and went to sleep after dinner. A couple of months ago her workplace rented an apartment in that city so they could stay there. Worth to mention she's a female 33, and all her coworkers are male. I was fine with it, but with time I noticed she started to distance herself from me, not much, but I've noticed it. Sometimes she "disappeared" for an hour or 2. I started suspecting something is happening behind my back. I knew she was staying there with only 1 co-worker, and I noticed she messaged him while she was with me sometimes. At the beginning I thought they might be just friends, as he attended our wedding.
About a month ago I said I don't like her writing to him while she's with me, as I was lacking her in my life and wanted to spend every weekend with her. I started to dislike that coworker. Then she was switching her phone screen off while I was walking past, but once I saw she sent our dog's picture on her lap. I confronted her, she said she was only getting details about the time when they will leave the next day for work. I said I saw you sending pictures not related to that. We started talking and she mentioned she does not feel sexual attraction to me for a while. I have asked if she is feeling it for someone else, but she declined that.
What's worth mentioning is she suffers from depression for a year now, she's taking meds and going to therapy.
2 weeks ago was her birthday and I wanted to come to that city to stay with her for a week, she said we'll celebrate once she gets back home. I pushed that I want to see her as I feel the distance is growing. Her response was that she feels heavy pressure from me, that she can barely breathe. I let it go and didn't go there. During that weekend we went to the sea. Sat on the beach, it was our wedding anniversary, I made pictures of us from the day we met until recently and suggested we can put them in the album together. She really loved it and said she can imagine how we will show this to our kids.
A week after that she suggested that I can come visit her for one day, to start slow without pressure. I agreed. I arrived with flowers, she ran to me, hugged me, kissed me, she was happy. She gave me the keys to the apartment and went back to work. Once I arrived at the place I looked around. Her bedsheets were removed and freshly washed. That and her coworker shorts with underwear inside were on her bed. I knew what that means.
Once she got back to that apartment from work I confronted her, she didn't try to hide it, said they've been doing it for a month or so, that she developed feelings for him. I said that I'm willing to forgive this affair, but communication with him must stop. She said she does not know if she has the strength or will to try fixing things between us, but she loves me very much and that she can't even compare me and that coworker, but she loves him and there's physical attraction. After some time we agreed to try fixing it and that she will stop messaging him. That she will not stay at that apartment with him, so she will be traveling back home on Mondays and Fridays, and we will go there together on Tuesdays and stay until Thursday after work and go home together.
We went to another country for a long weekend and had some ups and downs, mostly ups. She was happy, she was smiling, holding my hand, we were kissing, we went to swim on a boat, just the two of us, we had a lovely dinner, on the way home we saw a silent disco and went for it. We were happy, at least that's what I thought.
Yesterday she got back home as we had agreed, she was tired, I had made us dinner, she ate and fell asleep. Then I noticed she received a message and it was from him saying "I'm near my place, goodnight honey 🫶". I woke her up, I was angry, sad and hopeless. We had a talk and she said that she had only a couple of messages with him (which of course were deleted). She said she doesn't know how to get a will to try fixing our marriage, although she understands that fixing it would be the most logical and wise decision, but she just does not feel the need. I said I cannot be in a relationship where there's a third person. I told her to file for divorce then, because it's too painful for me to do. Her response was that she will not do it. She knows how much I love her and how much pain this brings me. Last thing she said was that she needs some time to think, that maybe when she will feel that she has lost me she will want to fix everything.
She left this morning, I asked for a hug and started crying as I felt this was the last one with her. My world shattered, dreams vanished. We haven't messages today and it's the longest few hours I've ever been in.
I really want her to realize that she wants to be with me, but I don't know how to handle myself now