This is a feeling i think most of have gone through. I know i did and still have those days after 3 years where it still doesn't feel real. Your life has changed so much and it will take a bit of time to get a grasp on it and figure things out. Just take it one day at a time. Make sure you take care of yourself too.

Same here.

Its such a difficult thing to get your head around. For ages I kept questioning how long a dream could last, could you dream a whole year? Wake up and its 2014, none of this happened? It would be nice. I'd then go on to thinking it was like the Truman Show, how could this possibly be real? How could my sweetheart if a husband admit to possessing these horrible things? I was terrified how he would cope in prison but he did, he wasn't the only first time offender there. Many were scared young men who made a bad judgement call. It does get easier, I know that doesn't help today but it does get better x

And I'm angry. We had everything going for us... Both employed, homeowners, he was finishing his mba, a child, one on the way... Life was good. Or so I thought. And now I'm living in this world where I am so far outside my comfort zone. Never did I imagine I would be a single parent. Or that I would possibly get divorced. And I'm angry that I'm put in this position.

Yes I could stay. We could move past this. Had the infidelity been with an adult, life would be different. But would I even know about it?? I'm a public school teacher. My name and address cannot be associated with his. Technically I probably can't lose my job, but who knows?

My kids... My poor babies. They shouldn't have to suffer and be ostracized for their father. My youngest was t even born when this took place! Their lives are too important for me to gamble with.

The whole thing just makes me sad and angry.

Well, obviously SOMETHING happened

DealRMe, that was uncalled for!

Swoopie, I know how you feel, it seems surreal at times. I wish this was nothing more than a nightmare, but sadly it's not.

Well, I am not understanding the post. "Not real" yet her husband is in prison? She says he didn't do anything... How is it not real?

She feels like she is in a bad dream. That she will wake up and find that none of it happened. He has never been in trouble before, yet he is in prison.

Oh OK. My apologies. I totally mis-read what she meant. So sorry. Is there a way to delete my post? :-/

One thing I have thought about many times through the years is how quickly things went from a normal life for my son (and all of us) to a living hell that never ends. In one minute it seems like - a pounding on the door and life as we know it is changed forever.

Swoopie: Whether you choose to stay or go,even if you just decide get out of this mess, to divorce him, change your last name, have your kids adopted by your new husband, Unless you take time to process all this and understand what it was about your relationship, your own accepted beliefs that made all this come as such a humiliating surprise. Without understanding more about this relationship, you might just run back into a marriage with the same sort of "strangely familiar" guy.

What I'm saying is that this is, indeed NOT the life you chose...His betrayal (while similar to adultery) is a betrayal of a child as well as a betrayal of your trust and love. I think it's important that we (as wives and mothers) understand what went wrong in the context of our own beliefs about marriage and relation ships before we jump out of the frying pan into (another very similar ) fire.

Being singled out and blamed by neighbors, family, friends and employers as a bad mother, as a wife "who should have, must have known all along" is, to say the least, devastating. You never thought of yourself as "one of those people" that comfortable prejudice taught you "they" were. Neither are you now the bad person some prejudiced people probably believe you are (married to a child molester etc) It takes time to work through what you used to think the "world" was like and realize what it is now, chose your own path to "Recovery" and get on with the rest of your life.
Don't give up. Don''t despair. You really are not alone. We all support you in what ever choices you make.

Well said Jackie