My husband has affairs and I tolerate it because I don’t want to give up my luxury lifestyle
Last summer I reached what surely must be the nadir of my marriage.
During the annual village party my husband and I hold at our home, I found myself helping his beautiful 40-something mistress who had drunk too much and was vomiting in my cloakroom loo.
As I held back her long silky hair, she told me how much she loved my husband, what a lucky woman I was to have him and how devastated she was that things had cooled between them of late.
She was totally unabashed, seemingly confident that I knew all about her — and indeed I did.
But I certainly wasn’t going to indulge her with a conversation about how “lucky” I was.
Instead, when she had finished, I popped a glass of water with two paracetamol on the side of the sink and suggested she fix her make-up.
I closed the door behind me, feeling a mixture of seething anger and resignation.
You could be forgiven for thinking I’d taken leave of my senses in looking after such a woman. I’m sure most wives would have sent her packing, at the very least.
But she isn’t the first and she certainly won’t be the last woman my husband has had an affair with.
Gideon, 54, and I have been married for 30 years and over the past decade there have been at least six other women that I know of.
Not that we have ever discussed his multiple infidelities openly — although there is a tacit acceptance that he strays.
Certainly, he hardly bothers to hide what’s going on any more.
On one occasion, our 25-year-old daughter practically walked in on him in flagrante at his veterinary practice.
Gideon tried to talk his way out of it, claiming the woman he was with was a client who’d visited after hours.
But she didn’t believe a word of his excuses — at least, not until I told her I was sure everything was all right and firmly backed him up.
Does she know the truth and think less of me? I really hope not.
You might think that our sort of ”arrangement” no longer exists, consigned to history as women have gained equality in law and financial rights that mean we can leave a failing marriage.
For years, I believed I was alone in tolerating my husband’s infidelity.
But recently I learned that our situation is increasingly widespread and is being vaunted by some experts as normal and acceptable.
There’s even a trendy new term for turning a blind eye to your partner’s affairs, while remaining faithful yourself: tolyamory.
The word is a blend of “polyamory” — which denotes those who have more than one sexual partner — and “tolerating”.
Sex expert Leanne Yau has said that this is probably the “most common form of non-monogamy”.
t’s seen by some as a win-win for both halves: an empowered new way to embrace a non-monogamous relationship.
But I can tell you that tolyamory is just a fashionable word for betrayal.
I’m not numb to the pain of my husband’s affairs. I’ve simply made a conscious decision that it is a price I’m willing to pay for our marriage and the life we’ve built together.
As a result I’ve kept my handsome husband who has supported me so much in my life, along with my standing in the community and my beautiful home.
Camera IconI tolerate my husband’s affairs. Credit: Photographee.eu – stock.adobe.com
But living this way has also eroded my self-worth to the point where I no longer feel I have the strength to start again on my own.
The truth is, I don’t want to leave my home, my life — why should I have to leave because of his behaviour?
My husband and I met at university when we were both in our late teens. Gideon was kind and funny and we shared a love of animals.
He went on to become a vet, while I took charge of our smallholding in Warwickshire.
While he’s seen by our social circle as the intelligent, charismatic one in the marriage, I’m behind the scenes keeping everything running.
The fact he’s an extrovert — with, yes, an eye for the ladies — hasn’t prevented him from digging deep to support me over the years.
We married in 1994 and I counted my blessings that, despite cripplingly painful endometriosis, I was able to become pregnant and have our daughter.
In our 20s and 30s, there were times the abdominal pain was so awful I’d have to take myself off and sleep in our guest room for days.
Gideon would do the school runs and sort supper, all while working a 60-hour week. And he never complained.
When our daughter left home for university in 2013, however, our once lively sex life began to wane.
I started spending more time in our guest bedroom due to bad perimenopause symptoms including night sweats, restless legs and insomnia.
On one occasion when Gideon tried to initiate sex, I batted him away.
I was feeling tired, bloated and utterly out of sorts. But instead of being understanding, Gideon let me have both barrels.
He said we’d only had sex a handful of times that year. I was honestly surprised he’d been keeping count.
He frowned in frustration and said: “Well, I hope you don’t expect me never to have sex again.”
At the time I didn’t think much of it but now I realise that this was his way of telling me he would be satisfying his libido elsewhere.
At that point, aged 44, Gideon was still very much in his prime. An attractive man with thick, blond hair and blue eyes, he’s always kept fit in our home gym.
Three months later, around Christmas, Gideon embarked on his first extra-marital affair … that I know about.
We were in the middle of renovating a property we owned in a nearby village. Gideon isn’t the type to get his hands dirty but he sees his role as overseer, motivator and champion of his workers.
So when his weekly visits to the building site started to become a bit more regular, I initially had no reason to be suspicious. But then he started effusing about an antiques dealer in the village who, curiously, had popped in to introduce herself.
He told me they hit it off and what started as coffee dates turned into long lunches.
I was a complete innocent, listening to him eulogise about how intelligent and well-travelled she was — he had never spoken about another woman like this before.
Curious, I googled her shop. Her Instagram page showed a woman in her prime. Athletic body, gorgeous complexion and, I noted, very single.
One day I decided to see for myself how the renovations were progressing. Gideon was nowhere to be seen. When I asked where he was, the workers muttered something, clearly embarrassed — but not as embarrassed as I was.
I walked over to the antique shop and noticed it was closed for the afternoon. What a coincidence! There was no concrete proof, but I feared they were together at her pretty cottage nearby.
I went home in a panic. But that evening, I didn’t ask Gideon where he’d been. I’m not the type of woman who enjoys confrontation and so I simply acted normally as he waxed lyrical about what marvellous progress was being made at the building site.
Perhaps you think I should have confronted him. But, genuinely assuming it would cool off, I decided to bite my lip and count my many other blessings.
So he was having a fling, just this once? I could get past it.
It wasn’t easy. I lay awake in bed for hours at night blaming her, unfairly, for his behaviour.
During this time Gideon was warm, attentive and very loving, arriving home on more than one occasion with flowers.
Guilty conscience? Absolutely.
By Easter the renovations were done and Gideon curtly told me the property was now in my hands. There was “no need” for him to visit any more.
Relief washed over me as I realised that, if he had been having an affair, it must be over.
But just nine months later, enter a glamorous company director working on marketing material for the veterinary clinic.
So shoddy of Gideon to mix business with pleasure — but then, I’ve learned that he’s too lazy to look far. He just laps up whatever someone puts in front of him, with little effort at discretion.
One expensive lunch after another soon evolved into evening meals. There was a night in a hotel too.
The penny dropped when Gideon began wearing different clothes and staying out later than usual. There was also a strange calmness about him. This time I knew for certain the reason was another woman.
This liaison lasted for more than 18 months and hurt so much more than the first infidelity.
Again, I had to put up with him talking enthusiastically about her, as if asking me to sanction his behaviour.
It ended abruptly when she wanted to move things on to another stage. On the grapevine, I heard she caused a bit of a scene at the clinic one morning. She turned up (according to the cleaner) demanding to be allowed in to see Gideon.
Then, going through home accounts on our office computer, I noticed Gideon had left his email tab open.
Unable to help myself, I looked through his emails and saw a long chain of communication between them. The casual intimacy, the “thinking of you, love” and “take care angel” made me feel sick.
When Gideon got home from work that evening, I left his personal email account open on-screen so he knew I’d read the messages.
Even so, he didn’t have the politeness (or courage) to address it with me.
I cried myself to sleep that night. Humiliation and anger (curiously, mostly with myself) surged through my system. So why didn’t I kick him out, or leave? It’s something I have asked myself on numerous occasions over the years.
At first, I repeatedly told myself that if I carried on as normal the affair would eventually end and my happy life could continue ticking along.
I’ve since realised I’m scared to destroy an existence that is comfortable in so many ways.
In choosing to stay, I have opted for stability and a certainty about my future. I’m not financially independent so I elect not to rock the boat.
Whenever I get miserable, I remind myself how awful it would be having to admit to our loved ones that I’d been aware of this for almost a decade. The judgment, the ridicule would be too shameful to contemplate.
But there’s no doubt tolyamory has killed part of our marriage. Even when Gideon isn’t in the grip of yet another dalliance, we have kept to our separate bedrooms since he started to be unfaithful.
When I have occasionally slept with him, on a handful of occasions over the years, I’ve had misgivings about doing so for weeks afterwards. Does he compare me with other women and, if so, how do I compare? The trust and intimacy of a faithful marriage have gone for good.
I couldn’t have put up with the situation if it weren’t for the unending support of a small group of girlfriends who know all about it. Five years ago, one tactfully raised the elephant in the room by saying she’d seen Gideon with a woman at a restaurant.
While I hated her for it at the time, I now realise what a protective friend she was to do so.
There is comfort in the black humour of being able to refer to Gideon’s “lady friends and their lunches”.
Whenever I moan and say ‘what choice do I have?’ my friends tell me I do have choices — that I could just leave him. But to me, it’s not as simple as that.
When we married I never envisaged that this would be our future.
Deep down, there is the young woman I was before Gideon and marriage. She would be appalled at the compromises I have made for peace and security.
But I’ve had a decade of this now — and I know that the life cycle of each affair is never more than 18 months. And in every other way, we always get along well together.
At times, I still chastise myself for not making an effort sexually. And yes, I’ve considered that one day he may be so overwhelmed by a woman that he will leave me.
But I have come to the conclusion that Gideon is happy with the set-up. Like me, he loves our rural life, his family, our detached four-bedroom home on a substantial acreage of land.
He doesn’t want to split. And he enjoys the sexual freedom. So here we are.
On one level, I’m at peace with it. My libido isn’t what it was and I enjoy going to bed surrounded by my dogs instead of an eternally randy husband.
I am now through the menopause and feel saner and live life with more clarity than I have done in a long time.
I put some of this peace down to my decision to remain with Gideon despite his affairs, rather than destroying my own comfortable life in order to get revenge.
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