I was wondering if anyone out there has/had the same problem I had with my husband. I was diagnosed with bc 4 years’ ago. Husband is a man of few words, wouldn’t talk about it when all I wanted to do was just that… I remember at one point saying to him it's not catching you know' because when I walked into a room he would walk out. Anyway, it all became apparent following three lots of surgery (inc mastectomy) and just after my first course of chemo I found out he was having an affair (started just before my diagnosis) and he was planning on leaving me. Can you imagine how I felt? Not only had I lost a boob, my hair was falling out bigtime - all my femininity had gone. I felt I was waking up into a nightmare every day, not the other way round, do not know how I got through it. I could not have coped without my wonderful supportive friends. Cut a long story short, she ended it soon after I found out, saying that after the things he was doing for me he must still love me and she couldn't compete with that. We went to marriage counselling. Have struggled on since, but the you know whathit the fan two weeks' ago on holiday when I found a text from her on his phone - then again yesterday. Now that I am well I am nowmoving on’ and ending our marriage. Cannot believe I have been such an idiot. But I am a stronger person now - couldn’t have done all this during treatment. If you can cope with bc and an unfaithful husband at the same time you can cope with anything!!! So the gloves are off - he won’t know what’s hit him… On looking at the various posts it appears that the vast majority of partners are supportive, but is there anyone there who has a pig of a partner like me??
WOW … what a tos*** good on you for taking a stand. Good luck and stay strong. x
CricketDi
Well done to you for coping with treatment and then all of that on top of it !! There was a thread a few months back where ladies were discussing the same topic but I can’t remember what it was called. I hope someone who has been in the same situation as you comes along later who can share their experiences.
You take care of yourself
Lizz xx
hi cricket… what a shite time your having, my heart goes out to you, some things in life make us stronger, but to continue contact with his other woman after all you have been through is really unforgivable. you must have been duberlly devistated… if you really feel you cant make your marrage work then my advice is… gloves off and go for the throat… then the wallet …she ended it … because she cant compete with you… your his wife 4 god sake … she is the bit on the side… you havent been an idiot love… dont think that… you have been ill and perhaps not seeing things very clearly, but it sounds like you have finally found your strength … hold your head up high… slap on the lippy take aim and give the tosser both barrells. oh and smile warmley … as you reload xxx angie
Hi Cricketdi
Been there done that. So hard to cope with everything when the person who should be there supporting you most of all lets you down. My story is very similar to yours. There never was any support of any description from my husband. Fortunately I have absolutely brilliant friends and I really don’t know what I would have done without them.
Although we are still living in the same house for the time being (I’m trying to get a council place) we live our own lives. Although he behaves as if butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth he’s still in touch with one of the women at least.
I too have been ‘under the blankets’ literally when I discovered that he was still in touch with two women after telling me that he wasn’t.
BC does make you stronger and for me much more confident.
We must have been dx around the same time, I had my 4 year annual check up yesterday.
We went to marriage guidance too but he walked out of the first session saying that he was being made to feel guilty.
The best thing for me was counselling I received from a local hospice counsellor at our local cancer care clinic. She was so up front and straight to the point.
Anyway stay strong. PM me if you wish. Sounds like we’ve got a right couple of idiots between us.
Love to you
Jan xxx
Jan, can’t believe there is another one exactly like my husband! Exactly like you, my friends were fantastic. My family live 200 miles away and couldn’t be around, but there were there for me, of course. I have been to counselling too, over all this, and I poured out all my feelings in a letter' to him. He refused to read it. All I wanted was for him to say sorry for all he'd done, but he never has. He had the gall to say to me I’ve done nothing to apologise for’ - I was dumbfounded and that was when I realised the marriage had to end. I still cry when I think back to that awful time - of him literally leaving me, packing his bags to go to be with her, me screaming at him from my sick bed and him showing absolutely no emotion and walking out the door - he did that twice. It still distresses me now, but hopefully I can exorcise him and get on with my life. Maybe finding that text message has done me a favour and made me wake up. I really hope everything works out for you… But as other people have said, this will make us stronger!!
Hi Cricketdi
When I eventually emerged from my bed where I’d been for 4 days, not wanting to carry on totally unable to cope I decided that I would write everything down, really to try and get my thoughts into some sort of order. After I’d written it all down and it took some time, I would re-read it each day and alter things until I felt that I had put everything the way I wanted. Having written it all down it seemed a shame for it just to sit on the computer not doing anything so I sent it to the two women concerned at the time (I found out about them because he failed to close his email down), and also to an agony aunt in a National newspaper. The feeling of release and power I felt as I clicked on ‘send’ was brilliant. There have been many ups and downs since but I have gradually grown stronger and more able to cope.
On the day of my operation my husband went to work, switched off his phones so no one could contact him and didn’t get in touch with anyone and didn’t phone the hospital. I asked him for the truth as to why he went out of his way to do less than nothing on that day. His reply was, ‘For years you are less than a perfect wife, you have a major distaster in your life, and you expect me to be a perfect husband’. I think that says it all. Bearing in mind he was a widower when I married him with 2 small children who I have brought up as my own and I’ve done all the other things like running the house, working to pay the bills etc. Unfortunately I find perfect very difficult.
I hope you can get to the stage where you’re not upset by the whole thing. It’s difficult when you are so hurt and let down. I think I’m about there now. I really don’t have any feelings about him anymore good or bad.
Sad really but that’s life and I have a lot of things I want to do so no time to waste.
Chin up girl. We deserve much better.
J xx
Jan
Absolutely brilliant, sending your thoughts to the two women and a paper! I am so sorry about your husband’s behaviour on the day of your op. My husband is all for appearances - mustn’t look bad in front of othe people - so he did the `right’ things like coming to the hospital every day during my five admissions, flowers etc. There are still a lot of people who don’t know what he did, well, they are going to find out now, he won’t like that - being judged. I still have friends who refuse to come to the house because they don’t want to see him.
I am not at the stage when I will not get upset yet. I know I will, though. Our teenage daughter hates him for what he did to me, she is very protective towards me. They have a terrible relationship so when we do separate I think she will be a lot happier, as I know I will.
My inlaws, who I have always been very close to, I feel, let me down - but blood is thicker than water. My father in law actually met the b***h socially with my husband, I blew my top when I found that out and we didn’t speak for nearly 3 years. He then rang me up out of the blue and apologised for his behaviour. I think the reason for that was his wife (my mother in law) had been diagnosed with bowel cancer and was going through horrendous chemo - I think the penny then dropped and he realised what I was going through when I was having chemo…
We’ve been married for 18 years, he was the love of my life and I cannot believe I was so wrong in my choice of husband - I thought I was a good judge of character, just shows how wrong you can be. I know it may sound really strange, but I actually feel sorry for him…
Yes, we deserve better - and things WILL get better for the both of us!
Cricketdi
Yes it was an empowering moment. I did get a reply from the agony aunt, one of the women disappeared saying that she wasn’t interested if there was going to be trouble and the other telephoned me to explain!! Her explanation was that she had had ovarian cancer!!!
If you met my husband you would wonder what I was talking about, he’s very charming and witty and appears to be a fun person but it’s all surface and that has never been to man I’ve lived with. I think really that I was holding the whole thing together for years and it was only when I couldn’t do that anymore because I was ill that it all went pearshaped. For years he took and never gave anything. When I could no longer ‘give’ he went off in search of someone who could.
Like you he was the love of my life and it’s not pleasant to realise what a bad judge of character you’ve been, but these sort of people are ‘fair weather friends’ and are fine as long as nothing goes desperately wrong, which of course it does eventually.
I think now that we can’t make people do and feel as we want them to. It was his choice to do what he has done, he seems happy with it and has no remorse. I don’t like it and that’s all I need to know. I’m now much more confident in my opinions and with my principals and morals. I don’t find excuses anymore I just decide whether things are for me or not. I don’t doubt or question myself about if any this was down to anything I did, it isn’t, I have done absolutely nothing to deserve the treatment I’ve received. So I get on with my life and let him get on with his.
The whole thing has split the family in half, but that’s not my fault. He’s a very self obsessed man and therefore he’s not interested in the effect anything he does may have on anyone else’s life and that’s not my fault either.
Like you I feel sad and I feel sorry for his kids and grandchildren.
Yes Cricketdi life will get better because we’ll make it.
Jan
I was going to ask you how his two children who you brought up think about it all. They must be ashamed, surely?
It is totally beyond me how you can have an affair with a married man anyway, but when you hear that the wife has cancer, it is unbelieveable. What makes it worse as far as my situation is concerned, the b**ch was a nurse! So she knows exactly what I was having to go through. Lovely woman. She should be so proud of herself.
I saw some texts flying backwards and forwards between the two of them just when I found out, and my husband was telling her that everyone hated him - really??? And she had the nerve to reply `don’t worry, Di is getting the sympathy vote because she’s ill’. How about that one??? Honestly, I could write a book about this - and I bet you could too…
I must say I am glad I put this post up, it’s been great to get so much support from everyone - thank you!!!
I really hope no-one else has to go through the same thing we did.
Di my heart goes out to you. Even though Im now divorced after 28years of marriage, my ex has behaved very badly after my dx. We divorecd because he was having an affair with a thing that worked with him, he kept it a secret from our childrenfor 3 years until I was dx, than he sent emails to them saying I was being over dramatic about my dx, & that each of the 2 times I had to go into hospital with an infection, I probably wasnt ill & not in hospital as it was the same time as they wre all on holiday together!!!. Cant you beleive that, everyone thinks he is a wonderful person, god if they knew the truth. It is hard to go through a split at any time but to have the dx at the same time is just awful.All my friends keep telling me"what goes around comes around".You look after yourself & make him pay for what he has done to you. Take care Lesley x
Hi Cricketdi
Well his children don’t know most of what’s happened. They think the sun shines out of their father’s rear parts anyway and they already lost their mum. His son’s wife had cleared off leaving her 2 children behind just before I was dx and the poor lad was having a bad enough time as it was. My husband will have told them that I’ve over reacted which was what he tried to tell me!! His children obviously realise that there’s something drastically wrong because we don’t have anything to do with each other but they never comment.
My husband never told his women that I had cancer but they did know he was married but there again so was one of them. The thing was too that the one who was married forgot to sign out of her emails (sound familiar?) and her husband found them and read all the terrible things she had written about him to my husband and threw her out!!! I’m not a vengeful person, but that put a small grin on my face. As Lesley says, ‘What goes around comes around’.
Isn’t it strange how all these men have a public face and then the face we had to live with. That must be how we got reeled in in the first place.
Eventually you will be able to look to the future and not be stuck in the past and what has happened. But you have to get all the upset and hurt out of your system first and that takes time.
Onwards and upwards.
Love J xxx
Hello Ladies
Well, it seems to me that our lovely cheating partners have something in common - they have a different persona in front of other people. They all come over as genuine, nice men but in reality we know what they are really like… When the you know what' hits the fan and everyone finds out what my husband is really like some people will be really, really shocked. They will say but he’s such a lovely, generous, kind person’. Yes, right. He will not like that at all, people finding out what he’s REALLY like. Not my problem.
At the end of the day I will be fine, I know that. He won’t be able to cope by himself - he can only leave if he’s got someone to go to - which is the case for a lot of men who leave their wives, can’t manage on their own. If he does go to the madam he had the affair with I can’t see it lasting. From what I’ve heard about her she is a very controlling person and he will hate that after a while, so he will end up on his own and he’ll hate that too. Tough, he made his bed, he can lie in it.
Me? I will be having a fab time - my friends and family will now be able to visit, I will be free to do exactly what I want and not have to fit round him and his moods etc. At the moment I feel like a prisoner but at least there is light at tne end of the tunnel. Things will be difficult for a while but I have to look forward, and of course our daughter will be a lot happier too…
If it’s any consolation, there are lots of us who found out about the unhelpful partner thing even before BC, and it’s not fun. I won’t go into my story - you probably wouldn’t believe it! - but I can completely empathise with your feelings. I’m very glad you are both able to get your heads out of the damaging relationships, and hopefully your bodies eventually. We don’t need to have these people in our lives, so the sooner you’re able to free yourselves, the better everyone will be. Di, I think you and your daughter will find that you grow very close to each other as a result of all of this, I certainly hope so.
Good luck to you both,
CM
x
I thought I would give you an update on my situation following starting this post last month. I have engineered redundancy from my workplace, so with that money I am now able to be free of my philandering worthless husband! Hopefully it will come through at Christmas. So with that money and the proceeds of my half of the sale of the family home I will be able to buy a 2 bed flat for myself and my daughter. Have already started viewing places to get a feel for what’s out there - am so excited! This is the start of the next chapter in my life. I don’t think my husband realises I mean business. A few weeks’ ago he said to me `what do I have to do to make things better?’ I was so dumbfounded I was speechless. Told him it was too little too late…
Good for you! Happy house hunting and enjoy your new life!!
Love Julie xx
Reading your stories ladies makes me realise that moving on from breast cancer has given you the self-confidence to not put up with this behaviour from your husbands - we recognise that life is too short to be worried about appearances and what other people think and expect of us.
Good for you for taking action and moving on.
Good luck for the future.
Hi CricketDi
So pleased to hear you’ve found your ‘escape route’. The very best of luck to you and your daughter in your new home.
Heaps of love
Jan xxx