There are women who spend their entire youth just learning how to forgive. I am one of those women, slowly uncovering the painful signs of a toxic marriage that I tried to ignore for years.
This year, having just given birth to my second child three months ago, I watched my little angel sleeping peacefully in the crib while tears fell uncontrollably. In my hand was my husband’s phone, displaying a recording of an inappropriate video call he had made the day before on Instagram with a woman I didn’t know. Once again, he was apologizing. Once again, he was making promises. Once again, I heard, “I’m sorry, I will change.”
But my heart right now is no longer aching the way it once did. Instead, I feel strangely empty. I ask myself: “Is it finally time for me to walk away from this marriage, once and for all?”
The Toxic Cycle
This is not the first time we have stood on the brink of collapse. Looking back at the path we’ve traveled, I suddenly realize I have been caught in the same cycle for years.
Years ago, we divorced for the first time. Back then, he fell deep into debt due to an addiction to online gaming and became emotionally involved with a married woman. They texted, called, and cared for each other like online lovers. When I finally confronted him and asked him to choose between his family and his virtual world, he chose the game. I signed the papers without hesitation.
But then, because our first child was still so small, and to be completely honest, because I still loved him so much, we moved back in together without legally remarrying. I thought losing everything once would wake a man up. But no, he went right back to his old ways, crossing another serious boundary with a transgender friend and even staying over at that person’s house. When everything came to light, we walked away for the second time.
During our time apart, out of loneliness and vulnerability, I tried to open my heart and entered another relationship to find support. When my ex-husband found out I had someone new, his possessive side came out. He begged and pleaded for me to come back. Because the feelings I had for him had never truly disappeared, I chose to end that relationship, he cut off his outside relationships, and we reunited.
This time around, it felt like we were falling in love all over again. It was sweet, passionate, and we legally married for the second time and welcomed our second baby into the world. I thought the difficult period had finally passed, and that from then on, our family of four would live in peace and happiness.
When I Started Suspecting Something Was Wrong Again
My husband works as a driver, a job that requires early mornings and late nights. As I entered the pregnancy with our second child, a wife’s intuition told me something was wrong. Many times he returned home late at night, faintly smelling of lemongrass—the scent that had become associated in my mind with the places I suspected he had been visiting.
I secretly tracked him and was devastated to learn that while I was at home dealing with exhausting morning sickness, my husband was out meeting other women. For the sake of the baby in my womb, and because I wanted to keep a home for my children, I swallowed my tears and tried to let it go.
But my tolerance only made it easier for the behavior to continue. He turned to hookup apps and Instagram to meet women. Throughout my pregnancy and even right after I gave birth, I repeatedly caught him flirting with women, asking for inappropriate photos, and having inappropriate video calls.
There was also an incident involving a very young girl that deeply disturbed me. He drove her in his car to a deserted place, and what I learned about the situation made me extremely uncomfortable. Thinking back on it still makes me uneasy. By that point, this was no longer just a disagreement about marital fidelity; it was a serious breakdown of trust and judgment.
Yesterday, when my baby was not even three months old, I caught him again during an inappropriate video call on Instagram. He had carefully recorded the screen. He promised again that he was sorry. But the trust inside me had almost completely disappeared.
What He Said When I Confronted Him
When I confronted him, instead of showing true remorse, my husband uttered a sentence that completely changed the way I saw the situation.
“10 out of 10 men are just like this! If you don’t let your husband go to massage parlors, you at least have to let him go out with girls at karaoke, you have to let him relax a little!”
To me, this was an example of the kind of gaslighting that can make someone question whether their reaction is the real problem. He was trying to make his behavior sound normal and make me feel selfish for expecting different boundaries in our marriage.
I ask myself, since when did betraying your wife and children while she is pregnant and recovering from childbirth become a “normal need”? Since when did loyalty become something a wife was supposed to feel guilty for expecting? No, I am not wrong for being hurt by this. The responsibility for his choices belongs to him.
The Car Loan I Don’t Want to Sign
It didn’t stop there. Currently, he is pressuring me to use all of my personal savings, including my inheritance from my maternal family, for a down payment, while also asking me to sign as a co-signer so he can buy a car on finance. He painted a beautiful picture: “We will have a car to drive for work to make money, and a car to shield the kids from the sun and rain.”
It sounds like it’s for the children, but under these circumstances, I know I need to be very careful before taking on another financial obligation with him.
- Piling Up Debt, Risking Total Loss: He has a history of debt and an uncontrolled lifestyle. If I become a co-signer now, I would be connecting my credit and financial responsibilities to his loan. If he stops making payments, I could potentially be responsible for the debt depending on the loan terms.
- Legal Nightmares in a Divorce: A car purchased during a marriage may involve complicated questions about marital property and debt, depending on where we live and the circumstances of a separation. If we fall apart again a few months from now, dealing with a car loan could become incredibly difficult. I don’t want to risk the money I have saved while also taking on a financial responsibility that I may have to deal with on my own.
I want my children to travel safely and comfortably. But the price of putting the only financial safety net my children and I have at risk feels far too high. I absolutely cannot take that risk right now.
What I’m Thinking About My Family Now
I know every mother wishes for a complete family for her children, one with both a father and a mother. But I have realized a difficult truth: A family that is “complete” only in appearance but filled with conflict, broken trust, and constant worry is not necessarily a healthy environment for children to grow up in.
Our children are highly sensitive. They will grow up watching how their father treats their mother and may use those experiences to shape their own understanding of relationships. I do not want my son to grow up thinking his father’s behavior is normal, and I certainly do not want my daughter to grow up believing she should tolerate repeated betrayal the way I once did.
Forgiveness only has meaning when the person receiving it takes responsibility and makes a real effort to change. When someone takes their partner’s forgiveness for granted and continues repeating the same behavior, another promise becomes harder and harder to believe.
Walking away for the third time—it hurts, and it is terrifying. But I would rather accept being a self-reliant single mother, peacefully raising my children, than spend a lifetime living with constant doubt and disappointment next to someone who refuses to make lasting changes.