One woman shares her story of lies, cheating, emotional abuse, and why she stayed
“My husband was the first one for me. I was 20 going on 21 years old when we had sex for the first time. He is the one and the only man I have ever been with,” 36-year-old Toni said. “I was a Christian and in my church. But I backslide because of him. Even my pastor tried talking to me about it but I didn’t take heed and so I left the church for him, because once you get involved with a man and they are not saved the church is against it,” she explained.
Toni, who now lives in the USA, said they had known each other since high school when they were both living in Jamaica. He migrated to America over 25 years ago.
“The night before he came to Jamaica to marry me he slept with a woman. He left her bed, came down married me, and went back up into her bed,” she said.
“She got pregnant for him. After he filed for me and I migrated there, he was still living with her. He only came home on weekends and said based on the work he did he had to spend the week on his job site and could only come home on weekends. That was a lie.
Toni’s Husband Got Another Woman Pregnant While She Too Was Pregnant
But I can tell everyone that prayer works! You just have to believe and trust God. After I got married I went back into the church and started drawing closer and closer to God. That’s what has kept me … and is keeping me to this day.
When he came down to marry me he got her pregnant the night before. I noticed he kept calling a woman but because I had male friends it didn’t bother me. He told me it was just a friend and he was her son’s godfather. Which was true. She has a son and he is the godfather. After all, he was there to marry me, so why would I even think anything of it? But being her son’s godfather didn’t stop him from sleeping with her and getting her pregnant. So they were always on the phone chatting and I thought nothing of it.
while I was in Jamaica after we were married and waiting on the papers to come through, I got a vision that he had a son. At this point, I didn’t know she was pregnant as yet. I called and asked ‘How is your son?’ and he started crying and confessing. Each time he sleeps with someone I could tell,” Toni noted.
She explained that even when he came down to marry her the other woman that he was living with did not know this.
Toni Said Only Prayer and Fasting Could Change Her Martial Situation
When he would come to visit she would call him and could not get him and so she would call his mother who is living in the USA too. When his mother told her he was in Jamaica with his wife she fainted,” she recalled.
“But she wicked too! She started spreading lies on me about how I was calling and threatening her. I never even had her number and never called her once. So I started praying and crying before God.”
The child was born autistic.
But she got pregnant for him again.
It was on my birthday after I went up that he told me that the woman pregnant was pregnant again. But I found out before that. One day he went on the road and forgot his phone. It had a passcode on it and I had no clue what it was. But I can tell you that God literally gave me the code because I don’t know how else I would have got it. I just found myself putting in random numbers and it worked.
Toni Turned To God To Change Her Lying, Cheating, Husband
That’s when I saw the text that said she was pregnant with his daughter.
I held it in. I did not say anything to him. But on my birthday he just said ‘happy birthday, this is your birthday gift, I’m having another child and it’s a girl’, Toni recalled. “I could not tell you how I felt. I mean I ready knew, but the way he said it and on my birthday… You wouldn’t even understand. And you know what? I was pregnant at the time. Remember all this time he would stay out for the week and only came home on weekends. Stating it was work. I had just moved to America so I didn’t know how anything worked. He had rented a basement and that’s where I lived. The condition was awful! Bed bugs would kill me! I never knew bed bugs until I migrated to America. But it wouldn’t bother him because he was never really there. I had to go to the doctor to get treatment for it.
He would come there and just ask me to comb his hair because he had long hair, and he would dress up and leave. He NEVER took me anywhere. So I was just in someone’s basement pregnant and bed bugs sucking me dry. Each time he would ask me to comb his hair it was to go to some party with his baby mother. He would just dress and leave and didn’t say anything to me. When I asked where he was going he would tell me it was none of my business. I was there in the basement pregnant and hungry for days sometimes, something that never happened when I was in Jamaica,” she said.
Toni’s Husband Left Her With Her Young Baby To Be With His Other Woman
My son was a year and a half when he got an ear infection. I didn’t know what to do or where to take him. Remember I knew nowhere and no one. The child was roasting with fever. I called him until I was weak and he would not pick up. I left messages and he would not reply. This was the middle of the week and he only comes home on weekends. So I decided I was going to call the ambulance. I left him a message that I didn’t know what else to do and that I was going to call the ambulance. That’s when he responded to ask who was going to pay for the ambulance. He was with her and he was seeing the phone ringing, seeing the messages, and would not respond until I mentioned something that would cost him money — because I was not working at the time.
But we live in a small world.
My cousin and his baby mother were best friends, but I did not know. I found out on Facebook when I saw that they were friends. When I asked my cousin how she knew her she told me they had been best friends for years.
Toni’s Husband Slept With Another Woman The Night Before They Were Married
When I told her that she was my husband’s baby mother she was shocked and mad. One day when I knew my husband was going to be home my cousin and I made the arrangement for her to come over. He did not know it was his baby mother’s best friend because I always talked about her but I called her a different name from childhood than the one he knows, so he only knew her correct name. When she was on her way and I knew she was close I showed him her picture. He was frightened and nearly pass out! He couldn’t do anything again. She came and told him that he was an idiot and that he had a good woman and was creating me like crap.
The baby mother had told my cousin she purposefully got pregnant with the second child because the first one was autistic and he gave her pretty kids and that he wasn’t staying with me for long. Of course, at the time my cousin didn’t know she was talking about me.
So they stopped talking because my cousin told her family comes first and that what she was doing was wrong.
Despite Being Cheated On Over And Over, She Stayed With Her Husband
I have been going through hell with this man and his cheating and disrespectful ways. Sometimes I wondered why he even bothered to marry me. Plenty times I said I was going to leave but maybe because I’m stupid, or maybe because he is the first and only man for me, I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t even use my married name to tell you the truth. He has done me so many things that were wrong! He would leave me and go to Jamaica and sleep with girls down there. One got pregnant. But apparently it was proven that the child wasn’t for him even though his name was originally called.”
Toni and her husband have been married 13 years and he has never taken her on a date. However, just about every week he would be out with his children’s mother.
Toni said two years ago after much fasting and praying his relationship with this other woman ended. In fact, they are no longer on speaking terms and she does not allow him to even see his kids. Her children are aged 11 and eight, while Toni, who now has three children ages 11, eight, and five. In total Her husband has seven children. Only one was born Before they were married.
Toni Says After Many Prayers and Fasting Her Marriage is Getting Better
“So the two times I was pregnant with my two older children, she was pregnant at that same time too. I don’t know how I stayed but prayer has kept me and I am not stopping until he gives his life to the Lord and gives up that lifestyle. I have told the Holy Ghost to sick him anytime he takes off his clothes to sleep with another woman and make his penis dead because I have had enough! I was fed up.”
Toni said some months ago she started seeing some changes in her husband and he is coming home more often.
“A lot of changes have taken place,” she said. “We talk more and he seems more settled. But I need God to save him fully. But things are much better. We just bought a house and are preparing to move there soon. The only problem I have with him now is that he is not giving me any money and he will only go out if I take him and pay! But we will get there.”
Experts Say:
“Cheating no doubt brings with it deep-rooted unhappiness that can make you want to give up on life itself. It damages your self-esteem, destroys your faith in the opposite sex, and sucks your energy,” counseling psychologist Sandrine Meirwood said. “But like all bad situations, time heals. However, if it has been months or even years and you still find yourself miserable and unhappy after the infidelity and start imagining yourself with life somewhere else, then maybe it’s time to go,” she said. “If you have done counseling and tried working through it together but still finds yourself unhappy then it may be time to consider what next. It may a sign that it is time to go. While I don’t push for divorce as the first option, there comes a time when your mental health comes first.”
Couples Have Stayed Together After Infidelity
Adultery is one of the most common reasons for divorce. In a publication by the National Institutes of Health, 88 % of couples who divorced are due to adultery. Marriage after infidelity statistics provided by the Gallup poll shows that approximately 62% of spouses claim that they would leave their partner after cheating, while 31% would not consider it a problem. At the same time, further research by Divorce Magazine reveals that about 60 to 75% of marriages continue after an affair.
When to walk away after cheating
They Cheated in all Prior Relationships
If your partner has cheated in your marriage, you may want to do some Sherlock Holmes to confirm if this is a habitual thing from their past relationships. If it is, then you may be in for some serious trouble. You may confront them about prior indiscretions and they tell you that they have changed, however, if they did not seek help to unearth the reasons that lead to cheating in the first place it may just be sitting there waiting to raise its ugly head all over again. Once a cheater, always a cheater, may prove to be true in this case. Again you may consider dealing with the matter through counseling and checking for permanent changs.
Relationship Before Cheating
If you had a loving trusting, generally wonderful relationship before the infidelity stepped in, then you may want to revue in dept why cheating took place and seek ways to repair and rebuild trust and stability again. However, if you are in a relationship that is constantly beating you down and one partner is moving from one affair to another with blatant disregard to your feelings, then you may want to seriously consider if this is the life you committed to until death. Like Toni, if you have a strong belief in God and your faith, this is a good time to seek higher intervention.
I hate ’em!
If you find that — like Toni, no matter the hurt and pain that your partner put you through, the disrespect and disregard — that you still love them, and that you are willing to forgive 70 x 7, then you may want to stick around and do all you possibly can to save your relationship. Just ensure that you do not lose sight of your values, your morals, that you do not sacrifice your joy, and what you truly deserve in the process. Do not lose sight of what you signed on for. Like Patty Smyth ad Don Henley said… ‘sometimes love just ain’t enough’.
Cheating Can Cause Hate
How you deal with the situation basically hinges on how willing you are to deal with the situation at hand based on how it affects you, your relationship, and the children, if any are involved. Blatant disrespect and constant cheating are enough causes for you to walk away, especially if there are no signs that your partner is willing to change. Though you may be madly in love, they may not be feeling the same way. Remember, love protects, not destroys.
If you find that you hate your partner to the point where seeing them makes you want to throw up, especially if it has been months since their last confirmed cheating, then it may just be time to walk away.
Serial cheating and blatant disrespect
If you sit on your bed at nights looking through the window, tears running down our face, and you tried talking to them about it but they turn their back and go to sleep leaving you still staring through the window and crying, then they have no remorse for their actions and is not willing to give it up. If instead of comfort, they blame you for their cheating ways and still insist on leaving without telling you where they are going, then you may want to reconsider your relationship. Counseling may not even be effective if they are not willing to receive help.
If however, the pain you feel is etched on their face and they keep apologizing and want to stick by you to reassure and help you through it, while making every effort to mend their way — cutting all ties with the outside woman, getting you involved where financial responsibility for their outside child is concerned and is completely transparent in their action, then this is worth saving.
If He continues To Cheat After Being Discovered He is Not Willing to Stop
It Wasn’t Me…
Even though all the pieces of evidence are there pointing towards the affair — the phone calls, the text messages, seeing them together in compromising positions, the strange underwear under your bed… they still keep singing the tune ‘it wasn’t me’, then they are not ready to change their cheating ways and you either accept this as your life from now on or move on without looking back.
Still Chummy With Their Lover
If you find that your partner is still very much in touch with their lover, this could be a big issue as trust cannot be restored in such a situation. If they are still in touch the chances of them rekindling the flames — if it went out, to begin with— are great. A relationship cannot truly survive if the cheater is still in touch with the cheatee. All ties need to be severed. If contact must be made for whatever reason — for example, to get their lover’s name off the mortgage, then this should include all three parties.
Caught Again!
Caribbean women seem to be famous for giving their partners chance after chance after discovering they have been cheated on. This may be an encouragement to their cheating partners to continue doing what they are doing as they know their women will forgive them — again— if she finds out. Women in other North American countries like Canada and the USA seem to work with the one strike and you are out belief. Maximum twice and then it’s ‘hit the road Jack!’ If your partner cheated on you twice, that is a big red flag. No amount of apology should change the situation because if you forgive them again, without any consequence on their part, unfortunately, they will take it as a sign that you ain’t going anywhere anytime soon and so they can continue having their cake and eating it at the same time. Do not settle for this.
- The name has been changed to protect her identity.