Dear Coleen,
I stupidly became over-friendly with a man at work and it nearly blew up my marriage.
We never actually had sex, but we talked all the time and flirted heavily with each other.
I know deep down it would have gone further if I’d let it, but I’ve never cheated on my husband.
The other guy is single (divorced), so he didn’t have anything to lose.
The long and short of it is, my husband got suspicious – it must have been obvious I was hiding something – and he confronted me.
We’ve been together for 14 years and have one daughter who’s nine.
The thing is, I love my husband, but I just lost my way a bit and was very flattered by the attention the man at work was giving me.
It was idiotic and I regret it.
I’ve done my best to show my husband that he can trust me and that I’m sorry, but every so often he’ll have a bit of a meltdown and start questioning me about various things he’s “noticed”, from random notes with addresses to mobile numbers on my call log that he doesn’t recognise.
It’s exhausting and I’m terrified of putting a foot wrong.
The other day, I looked in my rear-view mirror and he was following me on his bike.
I was only going to the shops for some milk and doughnuts for my daughter!
What can I do about this?
Coleen says
He’s lost trust in you and he’s not going to get it back overnight.
He never imagined your relationship would be threatened like this – that you could get so close to another man – so it’s going to take time and reassurance.
I don’t think you should have to reassure him for the rest of your life, but you do have to keep talking.
Equally, he needs to accept that he can’t be following you around on his bike every time you leave the house to buy doughnuts.
Try to be more understanding – put yourself in his shoes.
You’ve really hurt him and put a big question mark over the relationship.
You absolutely can get through it, but you have to be honest about how and why it happened.
You say you felt lost, but what was missing from the relationship? Did you feel undervalued, not desired, bored maybe?
Both of you have to look at how you can make things better, so the relationship isn’t vulnerable.