SILLY FLING COST ME MY MARRIAGE

Dear Coleen

I’m 44 and I’ve been married to a wonderful man for 16 years. We have two great girls, aged 14 and 12. But my husband works away a lot and last year I lost a lot of weight, retrained as a personal trainer and started a job at my local gym.

I met another personal trainer there who was married with a young baby. He was flirty from the start and managed to get my number from somebody at the gym and began texting me, saying how gorgeous I was and how his marriage was all but over.

I was so flattered I fell for it and soon we were sleeping together. I stupidly thought I was in love with this man and told my husband, who immediately said he wanted a divorce. Then this man at the gym dumped me without any warning.

I’ve since found out he has a reputation for sleeping around with women at the gym. This means I’ve lost everything over a silly fling and I’m devastated. I’ve begged my husband to come back but he’s refusing. How can I make him see I’ve made a huge mistake and our marriage is worth fighting for?

Coleen says

Well, I don’t know if you can make him change his mind because he’s understandably incredibly hurt by what you’ve done, as must be your kids and your family.

The trust has gone from your husband’s point of view, especially as he travels a lot. How will he be able to trust you going forwards after this, especially when he’s not there? All you can do is let him know you’ve made a massive mistake which you’ll regret for ever.

You could try telling him that you felt neglected by all his travelling and flattered that this man showed an interest in you, but I’m not sure how much difference this will make.

After all, he may just think you want him back because this guy dumped you. What if he hadn’t? Would you still be with him?

So I guess all you can do now is learn from it. This is a tough lesson and probably the biggest mistake of your life, but you can’t change it.

The ball is entirely in your husband’s court, but don’t give up if you really want to get back together. However, if your husband doesn’t come back, you’ll just have to learn to move on and the hurt will go away eventually.

You may think that ‘date nights’ – when a married or longterm couple go on a date as they did in the early days – are a waste of time and money. But researchers from Lincoln University have found that couples who have regular date nights are 14% less likely to divorce.