Can a marriage withstand cheating? That’s the question so many couples ask themselves when infidelity comes to light. But sadly for one person who wrote to the Dear Prudence advice column, it seems like they’ll have to answer that question all on their own. That’s because the Letter Writer has a terminal illness, and after learning that their husband has been cheating with his coworker they’re wondering if they should keep their discovery to themselves.
“I feel like my husband deserves to have someone help him and support HIM through this emotional time,” the dying person wrote.
The letter first appeared in the column in 2013 but recently bubbled up again as a "classic" letter published by the advice column.
At the time, the 32-year-old LW had been diagnosed with a terminal illness about a year earlier so only had “about six-to-eight months left.”
“This has been very hard, but I am starting to come to terms with the reality of the situation,” the LW wrote.
In the letter, the LW described their husband as “the love of my life and best friend" and noted he was incredibly supportive during LW's illness.
The two had no children together and the husband was there for “endless doctor appointments, hospital stays, and sleepless nights."
“On bad days he even has to help me bathe,” LW wrote, “and I know this has taken a toll on him.”
One day the LW was using the husband’s iPad to watch a movie when an email popped up on the screen that changed everything.
“I discovered he has been having a affair (emotional and sexual) with a coworker for a few months now,” LW wrote.
The LW cried for several days “heartbroken at the betrayal,” but slowly started considering the situation in a different light: doesn't the husband deserve someone to support him through LW's death? It made the LW wonder about possibly keeping quiet about the email and allowing the affair to continue, although the issues hadn't been settled in LW's mind just yet.
“Do I confront my husband and tell him I understand?” LW asked. “That although I am hurt, I forgive him and I don’t want him to feel guilty? Or do I just keep quiet and let him continue? If our families find out after I’m gone, I’m worried they will think ill of him, and I don’t want that either.”
Most people were stuck on the whole "cheating-on-your-dying-spouse" thing.
Some people judged the LW's husband for having a secret affair.
"Having watched my dad devotedly and full-heartedly help care for my mother during her three year bout of cancer and ultimate death, I cannot fathom how any full-time care giver could have the emotional energy and time to start a new relationship," wrote one commenter.
"I cannot imagine cheating on my wife, and she is perfectly healthy," someone else wrote. "I could not even look at myself in the mirror knowing I was cheating on her while she was dying. That is a really horrible thing to do. I think my wife would shoot me."
A third commenter put it bluntly: "With the dying LW, I just can't imagine what kind of skank trash agrees to start banging a guy behind his dying wife's back. The husband is POS trash, and so is she."
Other people thought the LW's husband deserved a little understanding.
"I think dying LW can own her feelings," one commenter wrote. "I'd be at first furious at the breach, but then honestly have to look at whether his needs were being met and how caregiving can drain the life out of you, depending if he's really doing the heavy lifting of care and household upkeep, financial and otherwise. If he's just more of a spectator, I'd feel used.
"And if it hasn't been that long, yeah, it hurts," the commenter continued. "And reading those texts by yourself is blind betrayal and shock. I'd likely have to tell him I knew, and let the discussion start there. And if he was in my shoes, [I would want to] know he'd want the same for me, to have a physical relationship outside of the mortal sadness of it all."
"Caregiving for someone who is terminally ill can be/is pure, unadulterated agony," another commenter chimed in. "My mother went through this and it nearly killed her. I could give you a point by point description of all that she went through, the tears, doubt, pain, loneliness, fear, aching exhaustion, 'Am I doing the right thing, am I making the right choice?' and it simply would not cover it all. Unless and until one has gone through it, people, friends, loved ones, need to wait a beat and keep their counsel. You just never know……."
Columnist Emily Yoffee had a sympathetic solution to this heartbreaking mess.
She advised the LW to tell the husband the truth but not to frame the conversation as a “confrontation.”
“I can see you taking his hand one night and telling him that it was by accident, but a few weeks ago you found an email to him from the woman he is seeing. Then you tell him what you told me,” she wrote.
The LW should say that the discovery was painful but admit that they understand that “he needs some relief from this terrible sadness.”
The LW should also assure the husband that he’s been their “rock" to alleviate any guilt he might have.
If the LW’s husband plans on staying with his coworker or if the affair ever comes to light, the LW can key their families in on the arrangement before dying so he doesn’t turn from “angel to devil.”
“You don’t have to tell anyone else about this,” Yoffee wrote. “But as you say your farewells to those closest to you, you can allude to it. Perhaps you can tell your family that you want them to know that life can be so difficult and complicated and that through all of it your husband has been everything you wanted.
"You can say you were lucky that you two never had any secrets," she wrote.
