It is very confusing when the man you love repeatedly denies the affair that you strongly suspect and yet asks to “move on” or asks for “forgiveness.” This may make you wonder what exactly is there to forgive or move on to.
Someone might say, “I am almost one hundred percent sure that my husband has been cheating on me. Three different groups of friends have seen him date the same woman. When the first friend showed up, my husband totally denied it and said: friend He must have been wrong. However, when the other two people came in on two separate occasions, my husband admitted to dating someone but insisted that she was a co-worker and that they were discussing business without anything inappropriate happening. He did. It was all so innocent, why didn’t you mention it to me? Her response was that she didn’t know she needed to make an announcement to see a coworker. She also said she didn’t think she needed Permission as a child. Her tone made it sound like I was the wrong one. After we had this conversation, we had a few weeks where things got really cold between us. Frankly, I don’t buy into your explanation. I honestly think you’re having an adventure. ra. Even if ‘the sightings’ with the other woman had never happened, he has been acting strange and distant outside of it. So I was hoping that my marriage would start to unravel. But about three weeks after I confronted my husband, he told me that he wanted to move on and that he wanted to be forgiven. Sarcastically I asked him why he wanted to be forgiven, if there was nothing inappropriate and he felt he did not need to ask my permission. He then admitted that things would be easier if he had told me about the coworker, so he would like to be forgiven for that. Part of me would like to do exactly what my husband asked of me and move on. I want things to go back to the way they were. But another part of me thinks he’s getting away with it and if I ignore this, I’m ignoring all common sense. Likewise, if he’s innocent, I don’t want to ruin my marriage. Should he be forgiven if he refuses to admit the affair? “
Well, let’s take things one at a time. He has admitted to having dinner with the other woman at least twice. Most likely, he did it three times, but he didn’t exactly tell the truth the first time this came up. You can and should approach dinners with the other person. Even if you assume it was all innocent, I should have told you. He will certainly want you to tell him if the roles are reversed. It is up to you whether or not you believe that he has done enough to earn you forgiveness for an omission or a lie (depending on how you look at it).
As for the matter, I don’t think you can forgive something that he hasn’t recognized yet. However, affairs have a way of being discovered. So I think if an affair did take place, the odds are in your favor of finding out eventually. The question, then, is what do you want to do in the meantime? Only you can decide if you want to participate in your marriage as before or if you want to explore the falsehoods and omissions a little more.
My suggestion would be this: you have admitted to behavior that is not entirely honorable and this has hurt you and probably changed your marriage a bit. This set of circumstances would make counseling wise. Ask if he is willing to go to therapy to strengthen your marriage. I suspect any good counselor would ask follow-up questions, which is all the more reason for the affair to eventually surface (assuming it happened).
If there was no affair, any married couple can benefit from counseling. You will be relieved, your marriage will be strengthened, and you will have the peace of mind that your husband cared enough for you to seek counseling for the good of your marriage, even if there was technically no affair to admit to. Either way, your acceptance of counseling is a good sign, because it indicates that you want to save or strengthen your marriage independently, or that you have nothing to hide. If you are both against counseling, ask her to participate in some self-help resources. You want to at least see that he is willing to work on this with you in some way.