On May 6th, my life changed forever. My husband was working on our house and I was in my third trimester of pregnancy with our second child. I had went to visit my parents next door and came home to hear him praying loudly. We are southern baptist and he often gets touched by the spirit and will pray where the spirit hits him. He was in the kitchen where he was working on our remodeling project and I could hear him outside. So, I decided to wait on the porch for him to finish as not to interrupt this moment for him. Our oldest daughter was with my aunt and I just enjoyed a moment on the porch. About five minutes later, he finished praying and I walked in. He had been crying which wasn't unusual after he has an experience like this. However, this time was different. He grabbed me when I walked in the door and started telling me he was so sorry and crying.

My husband isn't often the type that cries, and it worried me. I waited for him to calm down, and then we started talking about what was bothering him. He told me he had kept this secret from me for four years, and he couldn't hold it in any longer and knew he couldn't be right with God until he came clean. He was scared to tell me what it was because I was pregnant and had been experiencing blood pressure problems to begin with. I kept prompting him to tell me, and finally he came out with it.

Apparently, he had slept with a co-worker a handful of times when he had worked at a job he had spontaneously left. I was instantly crushed and speechless...however, I wasn't angry at him. This was the third event that he had betrayed me, but the previous two events had never become physical. When I was pregnant with or oldest child he had flirted and sexted with a girl I had went to high school with but stopped before anything became physical, and the second time had occurred at work with a different woman and had been innocent flirting and hugging. However, this third incident had been sex at work before anyone got to the store...

I had a panic attack not long after he told me and didn't speak to him for several hours. I kept thinking I was going to have to go to the hospital...it has been three months since he told me, and I have since had our second child. However, she was born early due to my blood pressure issues and I'm not sure if it was related to this.

The strange thing is though that I honestly believe that I knew this had happened all along and had held resentment toward him because I knew he was lying to me. I feel like a huge weight has been lifted off of both of us and that we are stronger in our marriage since he told me about it. However, I am so afraid that I am going to wake up one day and be angry with him. I still don't know how to process all of this information and I still want to reach out to the woman to tell her I Know and to let her know how bad it hurt me. My husband assures me he has had zero contact with her since it happened and he quit the week that they started the affair.

I just have this hatred for her because the way he explains the situation was that she made the first moves toward him and kept telling him I would never find out. It also hurts because she is married too and a mother to five children. My husband told me that the affair started like the other two incidents, innocent flirting and her telling him how terrible her husband was to her.

I just don't know how I should feel...I don't know what to do either as far as my marriage. I love my husband with everything I am...I'm just reluctant because I know I couldn't handle this happening again. My husband tells me he would never do that to our family again because he realizes what he has to lose. He even told me he had put a shot gun in his mouth on several occasions because he knew that I would leave him when he told me and he couldn't live with the guilt. He would stop because I would call or he would think of our oldest child growing up without a father...I just don't know if I can trust him. His justification for the affair was that he was having a hard time as a father and husband and that I was never home. I worked 40 hour weeks on top of going to college full time and being a mom. He says that it wasn't my fault that it was all on him, but I can't help thinking it was my fault...

I guess I am posting this to get it off my chest. I haven't told anyone about the affair because I don't think I could talk about it out loud, and I am honestly embarrassed by it...I really need advice too and prayers...has anyone else experienced this and your marriage survived? We have been together since we were sixteen (12 years)

Religion and Spirituality