Search Results: forgiving a cheater

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family of 3

mother earns 50 /hour

sometimes 59/hour

works full time, many times even picks up overtime because she has free babysitting.
spends minimal time with her 2 children because she knows there’s always someone watching her kids who she trusts

father earns less but has a promising future because of inherited business

they were given a home they didn’t have to buy, they don’t pay rent only regular bills like water/ power.

she deprives him of sex for years but the random time they finally have it she gets pregnant.

she voices out that she doesn’t want more kids. that they have debt & want to be able to giver EVERYTHING to their 2 current children.
bringing another child would make it impossible to be taking their two children around the world to enjoy activities from other states & countries

they agree to terminate the pregnancy

2 days later she finds out he had sex with another woman & has a lot of naked videos of other women

he admits his fault & agrees he fucked up but wants to fix the situation

he says he went astray because she was not giving him any sex for a very long time. any attempt to try was rejected repeatedly

she refuses to explain why she was not giving him sex. voices out that she is happy she got rid of the new baby because how can she have another child of this cheater!

she is hurt and feels humiliated

later we discover she had deleted messages of sexual talk with another man from months ago. She gaslit her partner into thinking that that is not cheating because it’s not physical

He wants to fix things, asks for forgiveness

she says she cannot forgive

he says he’s trying to save the family in spite of the errors because nobody is perfect and he only did it because he felt abandoned and Lonley to the point that even she referred to him as a roommate

she says he ruined the family with his actions

he says he committed an error but wants to keep the family together

who is right?

I actually felt sad for this infidelity story I've once read at Reddit. It was written 2 years ago. The woman was 39 (she must be 41 by now) and her now husband cheated on her with a co-worker. He spent some of his wife's money on the affair and took her homemade meals and desserts to secretly feed the other woman. He cheated as a 40 year-old married man with 3 kids. He ended up having a mid-life crisis and supposedly wanted to see what it was like having sex with another woman, even briefly fell in love with the other woman. She forgives and agrees to marriage counseling. She felt she owed him one and clearly wants to save the marriage.

Flashback to 2002 when they were just boyfriend and girlfriend:

When the woman was much younger (then 19 years old), she cheated on her then boyfriend (now husband) with his best friend Tony. He caught her in a compromised position, both asleep in the couch with the TV running on. Supposedly the guy was in boxers and she was with jeans on but only with bra on top. Apparently they had already finished doing the deed by then and there was alcohol. It was an affair going on for 3 months. She's been repentant for all those years, never cheated again and was faithful as a fiancee and wife. She got forgiven and (yes he still proposed 5 years after the cheating incident, claiming he forgave her completely and wouldn't bring it anymore) they still got married.

https://www.reddit.com/r/survivinginfidelity/comments/yozb12/my_husband_40_m_and_i_39_f_are_working_things_out/

On the woman's previous post, she actually is full of guilt all over again and feels she deserved it. Did she deserved to get cheated on 20 years later? She cheated in 2002 as a 19 year-old girlfriend with no kids. He cheated as a 40 year-old married man with 3 children?

If you decide to give them a second chance even though they didn't even confess, is it only fair to cheat back?

If you had to find out through texts, someone else, overheard then over the phone or worse walk in on them with the other person but decide to forgive and stay, can cheating back be more understood? Even justified.

If that cheater is forgiven, is it fair to cheat back? If so they have to forgive (return the same favor) you too since they got forgiven right? Otherwise they would be hypocrites if they didn't forgive.

I'm impressed with my parents' endurance, given their past infidelity decades ago. Obviously I was too young to even form sentences at the time. Actually I wasn't even born when mom cheated first and they weren't married yet. Yup they still got married later on.

Mom got caught (on his couch with his former friend... the journal I read had the graphic details of it, more than what I'm even posting) and dad cheated back years later but at least he felt terrible and confessed himself shortly. I know they worked it out long ago. Though if the cheater got caught, can trust really be regained in that case? If they confess at least there is a small chance since the person came clean but if they got caught, that has to be nearly impossible.

Apart from the hard work they did, I would like to know how is the relationship like if they stay together. Can a human really be capable of forgiving and forgetting that and regain trust if they wanted to? Personally I don't think I can work that, no matter how much counseling sessions, no way I would overcome that.