Context: I'll try to keep this easy to read. I'm the one who did wrong, I made a choice that hurt my wife. & Thanks to anyone who takes the time to engage, I feel like this is my last shot at a good direction.
So a couple of months back at the beginning of this year I made an alternate Instagram and used it to look at semi-naked women, lingerie & swimsuits kinda stuff, stuff you can find on Instagram during a night of drinking. (There used to be a lot of those nights before this happened). Afterward, I felt kinda ashamed or a similar emotion bc I deleted the profile off my phone went back to drinking my beer, and forgot it happened, I don't know, it genuinely slipped my mind and I forgot all about it completely until my wife went through my phone one night and found the account after she accidentally logged out of my Insta & I guess I didn't delete it off the saved logins. I had just logged out.
But she checked my phone bc she felt sketched out that I was asking about some messages between her and a guy, so she assumed (obviously correctly) that I was hiding something. I'll touch on this a bit more in the later paragraph. She was 6 to 7 months pregnant when she found this. She confronted me that morning about it, and I immediately took accountability, it WAS my choice, I reassured her she wasn't crazy for being hurt nor was she at fault. In the beginning, she was confused as to whether it was cheating or not since there was no communication between me and anyone. I then said that if she feels betrayed, then it's most likely cheating.
I won't lie, I don't like that terminology for it. I just don't want to try and tell my wife how she should feel after I chose to do something that hurt her. & Honestly, I hurt her more than I ever imagined she could have been hurt. I've been very conscientious about how she views my actions, it doesn't matter whether I believe those actions as comparable to cheating, but she does. So I've been. acknowledging that and her feelings. With that context, we argued once or thrice a week which stemmed from her feeling as though I was being dismissive of what she does around the house, coupled with the feelings of betrayal from my actions.
To be honest, I have been a little hard on her for that. Because she was working for the first four months of our relationship, she never cleaned. Even though I was working, I didn't mind doing the cleaning for her. I guess that meant she would clean the house more, do more housekeeping, etc. I was wrong; even after work, the house still has food strewn all over the carpet and other items lying around. Spills and gooey excrement in the carpet, and sometimes dirty diapers she forgot to throw away. Five minutes after I arrived home from work in the 100+ degree Fahrenheit heat. & I'd be unable to unwind from work because LO wakes up immediately after I get home usually, I have no time to decompress, and my mood gets screwed off. & when she does wake up it's usually an hour or so before I go to bed too. Which causes fights too bc I don't spend enough time with her, and I'm too unloving, she's compared me to the baby daddy yesterday, the same one that would beat her, and verbally abuse the hell out of her, she'd say that she wishes I'd at least act the way he did about her bump, the pregnancy and all that. I get what she's saying in essence, but I'm genuinely excited, I am happy to be having my first kid of my blood. I'm ecstatic, but the concept of a baby in her belly doesn't make me want to pet all over her belly, and sing to it or hold my hand on her stomach for 10+ minutes at a time tryna catch when the baby kicks. In all honesty, pregnancy just scares me, I've been in constant fear of losing the baby, I've told her this before, that I'm just counting down the days until I don't have to be as nervous bc she'd (the baby) be here then. But bc of my actions she claims — and I'll use her words:
"Yeah bro there's a lot of *** that you do that is great but this pregnancy has been miserable. Take the violence and all the bad *** out of the relationship we had & maybe he was just manipulating me, he did everything wrong he did, but the one thing that he did that I wish and have asked you to do you don't and I compare it's the only other comparison I have, but he would talk to my belly, play music, read books, would lay on my stomach, feel her kick, hold my belly, all that extra ***. You don't do that and if you have I've made you. And it sucked that I had such good little moments with someone so ***, horrid, mean, and abusive, but I don't have that with my husband. It hurts and I can't explain it more than that."
I feel as though I've done the very best I could at rectifying the betrayal I engaged with. I was happy to go to couples counseling, I haven't drunk in almost 2 months now I think, oh yeah and the worst part was this all came to light 3 days before our 1st anniversary. I've been very open to her feelings, I don't discount how she feels about it. I consistently reassure her when she's on a tear about how it's all her fault and she should have seen it coming, how she can never trust me again. She's talked about suicide for the last 2 months sporadically, anytime I try to say I love you I don't want to lose you she just resets back to: "If you loved me you'd never have cheated on me and hid it."
I get it, my actions then reeked of anything but love, and I understand that. I hurt her, badly I can very much see that.I just don't know what to do because it all eventually climaxes once or twice a week now where she'll open the floodgates on me and drop 3-6 massive paragraphs through text while I'm at work, or while I'm asleep (bc she hates confrontation, and I also am not the most kind and loving person when it comes to how I speak during arguments, (I'm not too bad I don't think, but I could be much better) Whenever she's messaging me like this, it's always very pointed language, accusatory shade is thrown in how it feels to me. Maybe I fully deserve it even despite my trying to make it right, I'm afraid with the way she's talking about it that it may be something we can't save and that terrifies me. I was raised in a split home from 1 year old, and it was not something I'd ever want for my kids. I want to move forward and be better because of this.
I am sorry this was so long, if you read it all thank you. Please be as blunt and open as you can, I love her dearly and I want nothing more than to fix this. I just have no idea where to start with all she's said since it happened. Thank you so much. 🙏🏼
