I think my 20 year relationship has to end. I can’t anymore. My (38) and my husband (39) have been together since we were teens. I made a lot of dumb mistakes in the first 10 years. I call these my eggshell years because it felt like constantly walking on eggshells to make him happy. In summary, the biggest being:

Letting myself get kicked out of my home at 18 because he was arrested for weed and I loved him and stood by him.

Overlooking him hiding/lying about doing weed again a few years later when I asked him not to

Letting him guilt me into believing that a good girlfriend/wife would **** him daily, sometimes multiple times. I should win an Oscar for those early performances.

Letting him drag me from the Midwest to California in our mid-20s because he wanted a new adventure. I didn’t want to come and had to give up a lot, including my oldest dog to come with him

A few times I suspected he might be flirting behind my back but pushed it down as crazy.

Looking back, coming to California was a positive for my career so for that I’m somewhat grateful.


The second 10 years - the first year we were in California was rough. We were stressed, had **** jobs, almost no money, and almost no sex.

I was working at a veterinary clinic and a call came in for me one day. I took it in an office that was a glass box next to a full waiting room. I held it together as an unknown woman told me she was having an affair with my husband and proceeded to give me details about my rubber duck collection that lived in the bathroom to prove it. I don’t know how I wasn’t screaming in that glass box but did break down in the back. Everyone told me to leave him. We talked, he acknowledged it was wrong, we tried to move on

About 6 months later I find a video on his computer of a coworker of his on her knees sucking his **** in our living room. He states it from the time before, admits to seeing both women and I stay again.

A few years pass and I find him texting lovey conversations to a random woman on tinder. He tells me he has never met her and is just wanting compliments from someone else to make him feel good. Fight, makeup, stay.

2 years ago we are parking the car for Vegas and his watch flashes an incoming message from “P” (not her full name but for reference). P is the dick sucking coworker from years earlier. He has spent a week talking to her, telling her things like that he will take her to Vegas next time instead of me, etc… he gives me the same excuse - we have been fighting and he wanted someone to compliment him. He claims he was going to tell me about it after the trip.

Break time - I grew a semi-backbone starting at this time. Our fighting increased but he always made it seem like it was me and my fault. So much so that I thought I had thyroid issues and got checked. When that was normal they switched my birth control thinking that was giving me mood swings.

In may 2023 he goes to Thailand for the 3rd time in 10 years. When he comes home I accidentally get pregnant. By the end of June I am in the ER with a ruptured ectopic pregnancy. He had the balls to tell me the doctor was suggesting surgery because she wanted the money. I also remember him telling me that me having the baby would have been the worst outcome. He has since backtracked that, saying he meant health wise for me and the baby but that’s not the way I remember it being said.

November 2023 - we are in Vegas for a work conference of mine. There is not a single day I don’t go to the conference crying over something he said, including on my birthday. We go out to get drinks one night, his phone shows a tinder message, and he proceeds to again tell me he just wanted to make himself feel better that he could get matches in Vegas and nothing happened.

I am tired and depressed the last night in Vegas and don’t have sex with him. He wakes up pisdy the next morning and tells me it’s because I didn’t want to **** him and I should have - we were in Vegas for me. I lose it and years of feeling like a toy, living sex doll, and sex slave come spewing out. This leads to a shouting fight all 5 hours drive back to California. 2 days later I have to fly to Denver for work. 2 weeks later I’m laid off.


We reconcile again. He goes back to Thailand in Jan 2024 for 3 weeks. He’s more quiet than usual, sometimes going over 24 hours without a checkin. I was depressed and when he returned home I told him my needs emotionally and physically (not sex, but cuddles) were not being met. He made me feel bad because he “just got home and I was dumping on him”. I planned our valentines and his birthday myself.

Feb 2024 - I find more lovey chats on his phone. This time it’s an Asian girl. He tells me it’s talk to boost his self esteem and she’s not even in the country so he thinks it’s fine. I tell him it’s the last time. No more. He cries, I feel bad, repeat. He says the girl is in Japan.

Break time to add - since around Nov 2023 he has been telling me how done is, he’s going through midlife crisis and doesn’t know who he is. I do my best to support him. I have always done all the cleaning, back scratches nightly. Massages, sex daily still (he moved to anal during the weeks I was recovering from my ectopic because he can’t go without. I don’t like anal. At all.) I tried guys…,

Back to April 2024 - he wants to go back to Thailand to find himself. I tell him, don’t cheat. He assures me he won’t. He wants to go to the water festival and celebrate 420 there. Fine. This time he’s also quiet. Few video calls, only voice calls when walking to get coffee, etc. day before he comes back he tells me he thinks he wants to start a family with me. I am happy because I think he has finally figured his **** out.

Yesterday 5/7 - he’s been home 1.5 weeks. We are going to a weed event in La. It’s a long drive. He has recently made a clone of his **** and has been trying to put both his **** and the clone in me. It’s not comfortable but I go with it (as I do) but I do ask him if we can still have regular sex. He gets upset because he says I’m implying what he wants to do is abnormal. I explain that it makes me sore and my torso hurt. I also explain I’m worried he is just trying to get me ready for threesome, orgy, and wife swapping. All of which I have told him I don’t want to do but he tells me that it’s fine if I don’t want to but it’s not fair for me to stop him from doing it. I ask, what if we had a kid? I would exit those wishes to stop, at least until the kid was grown. He thinks that’s crazy y and tells me he could schedule the play around the kids needs. One thing leads to another and I am once more telling him I have a weird feeling - can I see his phone. He refuses and turns the fight into me “always doing this” and that there is nothing going on. I relent but am unhappy all night.

This next part is not my proudest moment but I wait for him to fall asleep and sneak a look at his phone. In the Thai texting app is a long conversation with an unknown girl. Turns out, he was seeing her in Jan and then again in April. There are photos of them drinking together and her with her head in his lap, wearing his shirt with his hand on her thigh. I was livid. I am proud to say I didn’t kick the **** out of him in his sleep but did kick him out of the bedroom. I also let her know I thought he was a ******* ***** - again, not a proud moment.

One thing I thought was so ironic is a text from him telling her he knows she’s still talking to other men and if she wants him, he needs to be the only one. Pot calling kettle much?

Today, after a long talk that included his favorites like “I just wanted the compliments”, he tells me that he trying to find himself and he knew he had a family here so he wanted to see what life with a Thai woman would be like there. But of course she meant nothing, even though he sending her photos I took for him from 2 days ago.

So yeah, I’m going through the stages of grief. I didn’t sleep, barely got any work done (month 3 at new job) and feel like ****. One moment I’m crying, the next I’m ******* the next I’m trying to find a way to make it work. I have had a plan to leaves since November but it’s so hard. I need to get my own bank account, my own cell plan, I have no car (mine blew up in feb), need to pack, divy up the debits, etc…. He was crying today saying he ****ed up, but how many chances do you give?!? I have the best years of my life to this man to have him cheating through all of them. Some of that’s on me for staying but…. I really tried. I think I have no choice. I have to leave.

I should probably also get an StD test.

Oh yeah, and my new job is a 1099 that I love but I don’t have insurance, I’m on his, so that adds another layer of stuff to overcome.

Can someone just tell me it’ll be ok? They I’ll be ok?

You will be alright and come away from this as a better, stronger person.

Moving forward, ask yourself what you want in a partner and if he doesn't match that description, then you have your answer on if you stay or leave.

Finding a good therapist to help you build your self worth is going to be important. Also, you might qualify for state insurance.

Hope you find your happiness.

You deserve to have your boundaries respected. It sounds like he’s been inching further and further towards a life he wants but you are miserable in. Try to look forward to how much better a life without him will be. A life where you can so “no” and be heard.