My husband’s affair and serious gambling issue … please help!

My husband will not discuss our divorce and keeps saying ‘he will change’ and ‘give him a chance’… I don’t want to for the following story I will share; it’s a long one. 

I sent it into a podcast I listen to - please share your thoughts on what you read. Despite being an addict, I really believed my husband was a ‘good guy’… I read this over and over, and actually, I believe he is a complete narcissist… what do you think and what would you do? We own a home together… any advice appreciated x 

The Prisoner and the Poet

So, ladies, as everyone quite rightly does, I must start this email by thanking you for quite literally saving my life at over the last five months. What you are doing is so empowering and inspiring, and by sharing your experiences and alongside your listeners and fans stories and dishing out advice, I know you are changing people’s lives, one episode at a time.

Now… buckle up everyone, because I’m taking you on the rollercoaster and it starts by going way back to 2010.

16-year-old me falls pregnant and at 17 I give birth to my beautiful now 14-year-old daughter. Her father is ten years my senior, and in the small town where I am from this is a bit of a local scandal! Baby Daddy M (as we’ll refer to him) hitches up with someone else when I’m eight months pregnant and obviously at the time, this is utterly crushing. We aren’t in a ‘proper relationship’, but given that I’m effectively still a child myself, it’s kind of what I think is one. BUT… dun, dun, dunnnnnn! Be prepared… my eldest’s dad isn’t the villain in this story.

Fairly quickly, things became easy-peasy with this dynamic and I realised almost immediately Baby Daddy M had done me a huge favour - we were never ever compatible - and fast forward to 2012, by then we had, and continue to have, a good relationship all round. There is no ‘bad blood’, and even though he isn’t a huge part of my daughter’s life, they have a relationship and I get on well with the woman he got together with who is now his wife.

JUNE 2018
I’ve not had a successful relationship thus far. My daughter is 7 and a half and doing well; we are a bit of a Gilmore Girls duo after so many years alone together, and I am about to train to become a teacher. I’m desperate to be loved though, and all my experiences so far haven’t led to the ‘fairytale’. My dad’s had ANOTHER affair, that after begging me to, I’ve covered up from my mum (my parents are on their second marriage to each other after all) and in my devastation I’m often making myself sick. I’m the slimmest I’ve ever been though, and finding happily-ever-after will make me happy, right?
So, I join Bumble. I’ve been on a few online dates, never with much luck, and living in a relatively small town, I come across someone I don’t recognise, good-looking and with a funny bio. We match and start to speak endlessly – literally all night long – and before I know it, we’re on a date the next night. I’m child-free so why not? It turns out he lives and hour and a half away and he’s come down to the coast for work.

We’re 3 weeks in and it’s love. All-consuming, can’t-take-our-hands-off-each-other, incessant texting, calling and spending as much time as possible together, love. He tells me he loves me after these three weeks and a week later he’s moved in and I’ve insured him on my car. Absolutely wild.

2025 INTERLUDE
25-year-old me looked at life very differently to the 32-year-old writing this. I had a difficult and tumultuous upbringing; a fair bit of childhood trauma and became a mum very young. I don’t condone my actions now but I was absolutely besotted and nowhere near as emotionally mature as I would like to believe I am now. I was going to be his Blair; he was going to be my Chuck… vomit, I know, but you get the drift. Despite always being a good mother – and trust me, it’s taken many years to have the confidence to say that – I was probably a hybrid teenager-adult. I didn’t know what a ‘narcissist’ was then, and I didn’t understand the magnitude, severity or devastation that can come with being with an addict, but my god I do now, and I am seriously paying the price.

BACK TO 2018
In a very short space of time, because we are so madly in love, this is going to be forever, we’ve both found ‘the one’ and we’ve told each other everything, we decide after four months to start trying for a baby. WILD I know. My partner is a little bit vocal about how I parent my daughter, but he’s being supportive, right? And I’ve got the family dynamic I always wanted. My future husband has told me he is a gambling addict – just like my dad – but I’m the solution. He’s never going to gamble again; he’s found the fix and we’re going to be so happy.

AUGUST-DECEMBER 2019
Our little boy is born; he is perfect. My dad has left my mum again, so she is around a lot and not very able to hide her emotions – frustrating at times as this takes a lot of my joyous moments, but understandable as he has run off with his best friend’s girlfriend who he has spent years calling a ‘thick chav’ – but this experience is so different to when I was alone and had my daughter…
However, in October, my husband tells me he has lost £1000 gambling. My Granny dies. We’ve moved to where my husband lives, all my friends are now ‘his friends’ and I have pretty much cut myself off from all my friends and family. I know I should leave, but I am terrified, and this is one slip up, right? I can’t judge him. He has an addiction. It doesn’t matter that I’ve had a lot going on, he needs support. My daughter needs support. My son is a tiny baby who I am breastfeeding, and I’m trying so hard, but I also need to lose weight because my partner’s given me a six-week limit, but I’ll keep going. I’ll donate milk as well. I can’t leave. I love him. I just can’t.

MARCH 2020-SEPTEMBER 2021
COVID happens. I start teaching in a school and honestly? The school is the equivalent to Crunchem Hall. But we are soooo happy throughout COVID. We live in a tiny maisonette, but we play Ludo all the time, go for the longest walks as a family of four and we are all besties. We have a COVID wedding instead of our Bohemian festival, and instead of spending a fortune on this, we buy a house. By September 2021 I’m working in a ‘nicey-nicey school’, my daughter’s going to the secondary school I wanted her to after acing a drama audition (it’s a state school out of our catchment – I’m not rich, haha!) and we’re going to make our house a home.
My husband wants another baby, but I’m not ready. We go on a mini moon to Ibiza though, and it’s been so wonderful, I agree. It doesn’t matter that I’m trying to establish a career, have two children I care for basically independently already on weekends as my husband plays football every Saturday and then often stays out… it’s what he wants, and I love him, and I’ll love our baby. So, ‘let’s go for it!’ I say, squishing down any apprehensions or gut feelings I have that this may all be too much.

DECEMBER 2022
I have terrible post-natal depression with my new daughter. My eldest daughter is struggling in year 8 and just generally with being a teenager with a new sister and younger brother, plus there’s clearly tension in the house as my frustrations with my husband’s absence after he’s got a promotion grow.
In December 2022, I have my first suicidal episode. I’m not good enough for this world, I can’t cope, and everyone will be better off without me.
JANUARY - AUGUST 2023
No on talks about what has happened. We don’t mention it. Tension simmers, life goes back to exactly as it was and off I pop, straight back to work, not having really processed or dealt with anything. My daughter knows Mummy is unwell. She’s angry. She’s sad. My husband blames her for a lot and my son is struggling at nursery. They reduce his hours and make a referral.
By June 2023, I know I can’t stay teaching. I’m mentally, physically and emotionally exhausted. My husband agrees I can leave, but I MUST find a job with the same salary. I hand my notice in, with nowhere to go and no plan, but a financial insistence.
I manifest my dream job. I live near the airport, so I decide it’s what I want to do. I want to work for an airline, and I bloody well get the job. It’s amazing. Salary quota, tick. Oh, and we’re in the process of remortgaging – hasn’t that worked out well?
Something’s off though. My husband is behaving suspiciously and constantly on his phone. I know he’d never cheat on me though, so it can only be one thing…
‘You’re crazy.’
His post comes through the door, and I can’t stop myself. Four thousand pounds – the price our new bathroom is going to be – down the drain. The crying starts. The begging. We’re going on a family holiday in three days with his dad. I have three children. I want to leave. I want to leave so badly – he’s selfish, lazy, never plans anything, and now this – but I can’t. It will destroy the children. How would I survive? How will I cope financially? I’ve built my whole life around him. I think I love him, still. We’re best friends. I can’t leave.

OCTOBER - NOVEMBER 2023
My son is diagnosed with autism 2 weeks into Reception. How was I a primary school teacher and I missed this? The diagnosing paediatrician says mothers are often blinded by love, but here is another area in which I’ve failed… NOT because my son is autistic, but because I didn’t know. How could I not know!?
Another suicidal episode. I can’t do this anymore. Maybe I’m the problem? Maybe everyone WOULD be better off and even though they would be sad, in the long run, I can’t seem to get anything right and therefore something needs to change… maybe that change is my existence.
*Please let me point this out: often, when you genuinely feel suicidal, you don’t talk about it. Suicidal ideation and being suicidal are two different things. I had gone past the thoughts, and I wanted to act and writing this now makes me feel so strong that I have been able to come away from that, and also, so blessed that my actions were unsuccessful. *
DECEMBER 2023-AUGUST 2024
My mental health struggles overshadowed my husband’s gambling. They were never really ‘dealt’ with – but I do now take medication which has helped massively, and I also walk regularly and try to read a lot – but we muddled through and by April/May, things were seemingly a lot better for everyone, or at least at surface level. My daughter moved schools, I loved my job, my youngest was growing beautifully and I was hammering away at getting my son an EHCP (this is a document that supports funding and support for special needs) which is gruelling and relentless… but things seemed… ok. My husband’s selfishness continued to infuriate me, and he started to refuse to show me his bank account again, but maybe I do treat him like a child? Maybe I should trust him… after all, he’s really proved that I should, hasn’t he?

AUGUST 2024-OCTOBER 2024
5 days before my son’s birthday, my husband’s work laptop was on the table, and I saw an opportunity. His computer wasn’t locked, and I was able to check his emails. You can’t even begin to imagine the can of worms that opened at this point, but my life has not been the same since.
When you read ‘email a prisoner’ and have no idea what is in front of you– your head goes to so many different places. I was completely perplexed; utterly confused. But that was exactly what had been going on… my husband had been emailing a prisoner; my husband was having an affair with a prisoner.
My husband had known this girl for ten years. They had coached his younger sister’s football together and, unbeknown to me, they had been in touch on and off, through the duration of our relationship. When the woman in question – who I should add has a daughter 5 months older than our youngest who is two – went into prison, she had no friends to contact, so chose my husband… and instead of coming to me, explaining the situation, he struck up a relationship with this woman.
He's an opportunist, and he took his opportunity… and he always called
The woman in question was only in prison for the month of May. I still don’t know the real reason why she was released so quickly, but I don’t believe a lot of the story I was told.

Instead of ending their dalliance then, once released, my husband and her started meeting up with her child in tow; going for cups of tea at her house (she lived with her parents at this point) all whilst I fought tooth and nail for my son to get an EHCP (for anyone that doesn’t know what this is, is a document for children with additional needs and is bloody gruelling to get) and raised my girls and worked full time shifts.
We had to been Barcelona alone for two days in the July, had the most amazing time, and hadn’t felt so ‘in love’ in a long time.

After discovering the emails, the police were called as chaos ensued, and the next day my husband took our children for three days to his mother in Wales. He wouldn’t tell me anything, communicate with me or give me the truth, and I felt absolutely bereft… I had never been away from my youngest for more than our two nights in Barcelona.
I managed to get hold of the ‘other woman’ by contacting her dad after finding his number online. She explained that my husband had been a ‘source of support’ as she had no one else to turn to and he had ‘always been there for her’ (the first I had heard of this, might I add!) and he had confided in her about his difficulties with our son’s autism. He had also told her that our marriage was over and we slept in separate beds… clearly failing to mention that I regularly slept with our son due to his sleeping issues.

OCTOBER 2024-DECEMBER 2024

Between this period, there was so much back and forth it was untrue and still feels like a constant nightmare. Both of them claimed they had never slept together in the beginning and were ‘just friends’. My husband would beg for me back, then say he needed to spend time ‘working on him self’. I kicked him out straight away, and he moved into his dad’s box room. In mid October, a day before his 35th birthday, the ‘other woman’ told me she had also been the reason for him and his ex breaking up… as he had given me a very different sob story when we first met, I was desperate for answers. This resulted in another altercation involving the police and my husband spending his birthday in a cell. I hadn’t wanted the police to arrest him, but the altercation had involved him twisting my arm, trying to grab the key - I also admitted I had kicked him in the balls! - but because of the sequence of events, they wouldn’t not arrest him.
After this, I filed for divorce. He was hideous and said ‘whatever he did, whoever he was with, there was nothing I could do to stop them meeting the children.’ Despite the hideousness of it all, I started working on myself and by mid-November, was really getting somewhere. My husband really started going hell-for-leather at this point, begging for me back and my forgiveness, but also admitting he had started sleeping with this woman, going on dates with her and playing stepdad to her daughter.
In December, after a trip to Paris with my teenager, I decided to give him a ‘proper chance’… after a week however, we went to London for me to take part in an open mic poetry night and I realised that I could never forgive him. He made a joke about being ‘so funny’ and something inside of me snapped.

Christmas passed and it was hideous. Boxing Day I got so drunk after handing the children over because I felt so lost, (not my teen as throughout all of this he had ditched her) and ended up drunk calling him. He said that I had ended things and how could I not expect him to have run back to her - pathetic - but the back and forth began again. I gave him another chance - but knew deep down this was INSANE - and yet again, got a phone call from the other woman, who, SHOCK, he had still been seeing.

In the last 5 months, I have found out his mother who I was always close to, met the woman a week after his arrest - and her daughter - before attending a solicitors appointment with him. I found out, through looking into his google search history, that he had googled ‘can a prisoner send nudes’ a day after the woman had contacted him, had researched day hotels, had sent her money and had also visited her in the prison she was in… less than a mile away from our son’s school. He had been looking at Cam Chats in November when he was sleeping with us BOTH and he had also borrowed a mattress from the woman for our daughter to sleep on when staying with him to be ‘cosy effective’, yet in two months between October-November he has run up 6k of debt on a credit card and payday loan.

My husband moved in with the woman and her daughter for a week mid January. I was so strong, didn’t contact him - only about the children - but after realising the grass wasn’t greener, he came back again to beg for my forgiveness. After hearing the story involving the midwife, it inspired me to literally ‘give them my blessing’ and say they should give it a go because I am fully out and I know my husband is incapable of being alone. He claims this is absolute not what he wants, however keeps going back and sleeping with her now I am committed to not doing that at all, am trying to set firm boundaries and proceed with the divorce which he refuses to discuss in any depth.

My husband is an addict, and I truly believe infidelity became his new ‘addiction’. I also believe, and I am aware I am not a doctor, he has a full blown personality disorder. His behaviour lacks such logic, empathy and consideration for others.

I am juggling three children, a shift job, and my mum recently being unwell and having to attend hospital visits to determine if anything is majorly wrong. Poetry is my therapy but I definitely need to start DOING THE WORK in full, and this starts this weekend.