A
female
age
51-59,
*a va vroom
writes:I met my husband when I was 17. I told him I was a virgin but I wasn't. Below is the story. Its a bit long but you need to understand the circumstances. Please bear with it I really need some good advice.At just 16, I met a 23 year old guy and the third time I was with him I was stupid enough to get into the back seat of his car and he date raped me. I'd wanted to be virgin bride, I couldn't accept what had happened that I could have lost it so meaninglessly, so I went back to this guy, tried to fool myself we had a relationship and he just abused me, we had sex two more times and I wanked him off a few times under awful circumstances before it stoppedI then a met a 19 year old guy, who I really liked, who treated me like a girlfriend and who I thought liked me. I got carried away in the heat of the moment and I allowed the sex to happen. It then turned out he was married. I never saw him again. we only had sex once.Next, now 17, I met a 20-something guy while on holiday with my mom, he seemed nice enough until 2 days before the end of his holiday I got blind drunk and he date raped me too. I didn't want anyone to know so I continued with him as normal. We'd met a bunch of people and they were having a goodbye party and I got into a situation where although I still didn't want to I had sex with him again.My husband finds all this unbelievable. He feels I'm lying about the date rapes. I look back now through 42 year old eyes and even I think how could I have been so stupid, how could I have not fought harder, why did I go back. It seems crazy to me now.Having had too many bad experiences too young and it not being what I wanted, because I wasn't the sex mad slut my husband now thinks I am, I then met my future husband who was 19. Who also wanted to have sex. I didn't want to so soon. But I really liked him and was scared of losing him. I didn't feel I knew him well enough to tell him the truth so I told him I was virgin and he would have to wait. I had no idea we would get married so I never thought he would find out or that it would matter. I could never bring myself to tell him and as time went by it was all a distant memory. 25 years later one drunken night it all came out.My husband was devastated, by the lies on which our marriage had been based and the news he wasn't the only one. Its been 3 months since he found out and almost on a daily basis he calls me a vile, lying, slut and whore. He has demanded second by second accounts of everything, but alot of the detail I can't remember so he says I'm lying. He says he can't believe anything I say. He interogates and cross examines me daily. He keeps asking who had the biggest cock and I really don't know, so then he says I'm a lying slut. He is very angry that he had to wait so long and the married one didn't. Usually after the anger he tells me he loves me still, but as time goes on it gets harder for me to believe. And lately there seems to be more anger than love. He has just finished calling me a lying slut again and I don't know what to do anymore. I can't even phone my best friend because he thinks we are colluding and she is covering up my lies. He is also going to tell my mom, she is in her 70's and I worry what it could do to her health and her sister is having cancer treatment currently. We are seeing a counsellor but he says she is doing nothing for him and she doesn't understand. I've said I'd see a male counsellor but he doesn't want to.I love my husband and I don't know how to help him deal with this, our marriage is falling apart, yet for 25 years I have been totally faithful to him. He was my best friend and soul mate. Sometimes I think he loved my virginity more than me. I feel so lost and lonely and desparate. I'm crying as I write this - has anyone got any advice at all? We have two kids and my parents split when I was 8 - I don't want that for them.Please help me
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male
reader, groundzero  +, writes (12 May 2009):
My mother gave me some really good advice..She told me that anything that happened before i said "I Do" doesnt matter and i need to just let it go.So because i love my wife thats what i did...I dont know if this helps
A
male
reader, groundzero +, writes (12 May 2009):
I agree do not let him abuse you though you have been abused enough and his b.s isnt helping you heal your pain or his.
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (8 May 2009): What if it was your daughter who was raped. Would you want her father to call her a lying slut and a whore? Divorce him. He is not WORTHY of you.
He is obviously so scared of being inadequate that he has turned into an abuser himself. He thinks that they abused you and you took it...so if he abuses you you will take it too.
DO NOT LET HIM ABUSE YOU. Do not let him poison you and your childrens lives with hatred.
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male
reader, groundzero +, writes (5 May 2009):
see i am going through something similar to this..My wife was raped by her cousin and her dad..she had sex with a couple of guys and then cheated on me once..Of course i found out about it and started asking questions..Each time she gave me an answer on something or told the story it changed drastically...I am sad about the rapes..I hate that she had sex with other guys and cheated on me...But the past is the past as i wasnt a virgin when we married either..but the trust is a big issue..she has lied so much..how do i believe her now when she says what she is saying is the truth...oh and last night during a conversation her story about a bf changed again..AM i overreacting??????How can I deal with this????
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female
reader, woman warrior +, writes (20 November 2008):
first, I am not sure of your beliefs but I am a Christian woman and I believe that we should do all we can to make a marriage work...saying that I will say that you should not of lied to your husband and I understand why he would be hurt that is a long time to keep a secret from the person you love but on the same note he has no right to treat you so terribly. He is expressing his anger and hurt in all the wrong ways. Just because you made a mistake in the past, and the date rape is not your fault, that does not in any way make you a bad person. why you went back to these guys? well I can answer that because I did the same type of behaviors... a woman wants to be loved and accepted and when a man shows interest in her sexually it makes her feel speacial even if the man is doing this in an inappropriate way we crave the attetion and acceptance.
so, basically what I am trying to say is yes you were wrong in lying about your past but if your husband really loves you, and I'm sure he does after all these years, he needs to learn to forgive you as hard as that may be...pray to God about what you should do and speak to your husband full heartedly about how you feel.
May God Bless
my thoughts and prayers are with you
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (3 October 2008): Quote: “My father always told me I had to marry a virgin.”
I have said many times that I believe that the way we are brought up causes us to have conflicts between what we know is reasonable and what we were taught. The things that we were taught in our early years, including even our 20s, make very deep impressions on our thought processes. The only way to allow reasonableness to overcome the unreasonable or outdated teachings is to talk and think deeply about them. Discussion with someone is most important. This person can be our spouse, girlfriend, close friend or counselor. For Yos and I, it was discussion with our wives. Those discussions were not easy for either me or my wife, but she was there for me when the thoughts resurfaced after many years.
Your wife probably doesn’t want to talk about it because she may not be very proud of some of the things that she did. She might be ashamed or feel guilty about some of her behavior. You might be judgmental of her and that will make it difficult for her to talk. It was 28 years after we started dating and my wife told me about her past soon after the first date that we talked about it. She was probably ready to talk a few years after we started dating, but I had buried the thoughts in the back of my mind and had no need to talk at that time.
How do you come to peace with her past? First of all, I think that you have to be nice enough to her so that she will be more willing to talk to you about it. How do you know about it in the first place? Did she just tell you or did you ask her? If she just had to tell you early on then it was probably because she liked you very much and felt that she had to be honest and may have had a need to confess about something that she did not like herself. If that is the case, then she is probably still trying to feel good about herself and it hurts her to talk about it. It still hurts my wife after more than 30 years to talk about her first year of promiscuity after she left her first husband. She still is not proud of the things that she did, but now she is very proud of the woman she has been since meeting me and she should be. That feeling overpowers her guilt of how she acted in her first couple of years after her failed marriage.
You also say that you want to know about your first girlfriend’s past. WHY? What is the difference? There is no reason to care about her. She cheated for 7 years. Forget about her. Good riddance. She is not part of your life now. Your wife is and she is the only one who you should care about and your feelings toward her. It doesn’t matter how you feel about your ex. She is out of your life now.
We all would like to marry our perfect picture of a life partner. However, that person doesn’t exist. We have to settle on someone who is less than our perfect picture of what we want in a husband or a wife. My wife isn’t my perfect wife and I’m not her perfect husband. However, we both believe that the other is darn close to our picture of perfection. We both have our faults, but so much of the other person is so close to what we would want in the perfect person that we have learned to live with the faults. Neither of us feel that we could have done better. Both of our experiences with past partners tells us that, even though we had the opportunity to date a couple of good people, that none were as good as what we ended up with. I would imagine that your wife feels the same about you.
What are the reasons for your sexual relationship changing so much? I can’t tell, but you must have some clues. Do you argue now that you are together every day? Have you quit showing her affection because of how you feel about her not being a virgin? Are there any financial problems? Only you and her can sort this out, perhaps with a marriage counselor. My wife and I still had an excellent sex life after marriage, but there were times when it was not that great. There were periods when we were both stressed from our jobs and had a greatly reduced desire for sex. It was just too much trouble after a bad day at work. There were times when we would have a hurtful argument and she would have little desire for sex. Those feelings could last for a week, but then we would get back to normal. If there is a hurtful argument, a guy usually forgets about it in a few hours, but women are normally turned off for a few days. This is probably because of how most men and women view sex. For men, sex can be just sex. For most women, it is more about affection and if there is little feeling of affection then there is little desire for sex. Yes, women can just be after sex, like my wife was at times after she left her first husband, but that is usually because of some insecurity, like feeling old, unattractive or just very lonely. I also suppose women who have relatively high levels of testosterone can also be just as horny as men are and behave more like us sexually.
Basically, there is no magic wand that can make you feel good about your wife’s sexual past. You, with her help and hard work by you, just have to look at the good side of the relationship and get yourself to see that the positives overshadow the negatives. That is all that we can hope for in a good marriage – that the good parts are far greater and more important than the bad parts. There will always be some bad in any relationship.
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A
reader, anonymous, writes (3 October 2008): My father always told me I had to marry a virgin.
My first girl friend I dated for seven years, who wasn't a virgin and cheated on me horribly.
I met a great girl who had a boyfriend so we remained friends. She broke up with him and dated me but she cheated on me with him. We married three years later and she is a good woman but I can't get over the fact that she isn't a virgin. She never has liked to talk about the past. We had a fun sexual relationship dating but a terrible married one. The worst is I constantly am tortured wanting to know what exactly happen in her past and my first girlfriend's past. Can I ever come to peace?
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reader, anonymous, writes (15 September 2008): Quote from Yos: "What was productive was to talk about her emotional state at the time(s). Why at certain times in her life she was struggling and had developed a negative image of herself, men and her ability to have a relationship."
Yes, I agree with that. Those discussions were also the most productive for my wife and me. That type of understanding is what made it possible for me to get over her past behavior. As the discussions went on, the understanding got better and better, even from the arguments that sometimes ensued from a discussion that started out calmly. We both learned a lot about each other and ourselves. She had always wanted an answer to why she behaved in a way that she thought cheap and wrong and my thoughts helped her to understand herself, as well as me.
The only difference between me and Yos is how we thought of the details. The details of what she had done were not a problem for me. It was just the fact that she had sex with a guy who she had just met 2 hours earlier. What they did in bed was actually interesting and made us sometimes think of new things to try ourselves. The same is true of what I did with other women. She would laugh at me, as I would start to get an erection when we would talk about what she did sexually with someone and sometimes when we would talk about what I did sexually with another girlfriend. Probably weird, but that is the way it was. The details are still occasionally a turn-on for me, especially now that I have accepted the basic fact of her allowing herself to be cheap at times.
We are all different in how we handle things like this, but I think that Yos's statement that I quoted at the start of this answer is important to almost all discussions on this subject.
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male
reader, Yos  +, writes (15 September 2008):
 Glad I could help.I want to clarify what I said about 'not talking about it'. I think my experience and advice is closer to Troubledtoomuch's than it might at first seem. What I said in my first post was rather general, and hence a bit inaccurate.My girlfriend and I did in fact talk about this, excessively at first. In many ways there were benefits from doing so, in that, amongst the noise, we also established a greater understanding of our respective upbringings and lives. So much of how we have behaved and how we deal with issues like this comes from subconscious assumptions that we have internalised and have no awareness of. In both our cases, it turned out our self-image and the reality was rather different. For me especially so.But in retrospect, a lot of the discussions were also counterproductive.What was a bad idea to talk about were any details around specific situations, moments, individuals or actions. Those just provide additional images which I (and i suspect your husband) will add to his unfortunate mental library of 'your past' and then obsess over. It's adding fuel to the fire. If, for example, she gave me a specific story about an evening and why she had a one night stand, well, that stuck with me very graphically and painfully. And counter-productively.What was productive was to talk about her emotional state at the time(s). Why at certain times in her life she was struggling and had developed a negative image of herself, men and her ability to have a relationship. She spoke a lot about being 'angry at men' and wanting to almost beat them at their own game. That and earlier times when she was young and had just escaped what was a dire home environment. My gradual understanding of this made me better able to appreciate why she behaved the way she did, and made me increasingly sympathetic rather than angry.You could call it "understanding the why rather than the what".I also recommend only discussing this at times when your husband is in a good place mentally. The pattern will likely be that he wants to talk to you when he is upset about it: this is usually the worst moment as he'll be in his judgemental and irrational state, rather than of clear mind. This irrational state (although it seems completely clear and logical to him at the time), will lead him to make judgements that are deeply flawed. His 8% figure is an example of that: his rationality is being warped to where he can make what is clearly a deeply flawed judgement. But a judgement that to him, right now, seems rational, logical and hence indisputably true.Best wishes.
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reader, anonymous, writes (14 September 2008): Va va vroom, you are going through what my wife and I went through at the biginning when her past resurfaced in my mind last year. It also hurt both my wife and me the first 3 or 4 months after we started to talk about it. It was very difficult for both of us and we both cried many times. We tried to help each other with our thoughts, but our thinking was different. As time went on, we started to appreciate the other’s thoughts more and more. The discussions became less hurtful for the both of us, the crying got less and less and the arguments that came out of the stress of the discussions became less frequent.
As you, our sex was actually better than it had been for the past several years. It was always good, but through all the hurt of talking, it was even better. Perhaps we used the sex to show each other that we still loved each other and to forget the hurt that our discussions were causing. When we were having sex or just lying in bed cuddling after sex, all of the discussions of the day were much less important.
We showed our love even more during these times. Those who say that he doesn’t love you are very wrong. If he didn’t love you it wouldn’t hurt him so badly. It is because he loves you that the pain is even greater for him. I’m sure that you both love each other as much as my wife and I think we love each other.
My wife and I both believe that we are the best partners that we could have found, even with our faults. Her past and my thinking about it din’t change that. I’m sure that you are in the same position.
As our discussions progressed over time, we began to understand each other’s feelings more and more. Even the occasional arguments resulted in learning something about the other’s feelings. It took us about 11 months before we both felt like we had reached the conclusion of the problem. The discussions went from many times a day, to daily, to weekly and now perhaps a 2 minute calm talk every other week.
Like your husband, I hated the fact that I was hurting my wife with the discussions and arguments. I hated that I thought of her in the way that I did. However, I decided that the only way to resolve this was to keep on talking and she agreed. I think she felt bad about putting me in this position 28 years earlier when she blurted out all of the hints and told me everything and then refused to help me with it. It was not her fault that it hurt her too much to talk then, but it did make things more difficult for me. She also used the discussions to reflect on why she had acted as she had after she left her ex and began to feel better about herself. The discussions actually helped both of us in our thinking about ourselves and the other.
Like you, we both wish that we could change things about both of our pasts, both things that we did since together and things that we did before we started dating. However, we all know that is impossible. We make mistakes. We don’t like what we have done and our partners don’t either, but that is the way it is and can never change.
There are 2 ways to resolve these thoughts. You can either put them out of your mind as best you can and try to bury them in the subconscious, or they can be addressed right up front and hopefully solved. It is my belief that facing them and trying to resolve them is the best way, but different methods of solving a problem work best for different people. You must decide if you want you and your husband to try to bury the thoughts in your minds or if you would rather go through the pain and solving the thinking now. Perhaps all the talking in the world will not make him feel any better about it, but you will never know if you don’t try. I have no idea how a counselor would approach this, so perhaps it is best to use that avenue. My belief is that if you do use counseling that you go together, at least to start.
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female
reader, va va vroom +, writes (14 September 2008):
va va vroom is verified as being by the original poster of the question
dear Everyone
I want to thank all of you for taking the time to read my very long question and for the time, thought and consideration you have put into your answers. I can't tell you how much it has meant to know that others care, even though I'm a complete stranger, and that I'm not alone, there are people out there giving up their time trying to help me and there are other people going through the same or similar things.
All the answers here have been helpful in some way, they have brought new perspectives, support or advice. So I thank you all.
When I posted my question what I was really hoping for was a male perspective, someone who could explain my husband's reaction so that I might find a way to help him and reconnect with him because I thought our marriage was over. The answer I was looking for came from Yos. Yos you are a mirror image of my husband. Everything you have said, he has said.
He said the anger is because he loves me so much. Hard for me to understand but obviously true.
I told him I'm still 90% me and he said no you aren't you are only 8% you. This shows the difference in our thinking and how big a bridge we have to build. It absolutely kills me when he says his image of me is altered for ever, but its obviously a reality I will have to learn to accept, and I have to recognise he isn't trying to hurt me, its what he has to do to be able to stay with me.
He does find himself trying to change the past, as I do, and its horribly frustrating that we can't.
He continues to want to talk about it. That is hard and I know it worked for troubledtoomuch but it kills me everytime, I don't want to remember it, its horrible and I see how much it then hurts him even more.
Right now we seem to be caught on a never ending roundabout.
The ride starts with love, so much love, its like after 25 years we have rediscovered each other, and falling in love with each other all over again, because somewhere along the way, life seemed to get in the way and we didn't devote enough time to each other. Now though nothing else matters, dirty dishes, who cares they'll have to wait, we spend that time together instead, he tells me repeated he loves me, he wants to be with me, holds me when I cry and we have been having the best sex ever.
But then because he is now so in love with me, everything then hits him again and hits him even harder because it reminds him of how much he lost. And then comes the questions and the jealousy and the anger.
And once the anger is exhausted, he feels awful, he knows he is hurting me and hates it and apologises and tells me its all because he loves me so much, then the love comes back and we go around the roundabout again..
For 25 years he has been the best husband, best friend and soulmate anyone could have asked for, he has supported me through thick and thin and always been there for me and the kids, he'd do anything for us, even when he didn't really want to. And the person I loved the most in the world I have hurt the most and when I see what i've done to him it just kills me. And I hate it. And I don't know how to cope with it. I wish I'd never lied and having done that I wish I could have kept my secret for ever. And now I just feel so awful.
I'm sorry I've gone off on a bit of a tangent. So thanks again to all of you, especially the men who have posted replies as they have given me the greatest insight into my husband. And thank you for such comprehensive answers they've been really, really helpful, well actually a real lifeline and they've got me through whats been a real low point. I don't know what I would have done without them.
And I don't really want the answers or support to end, so if anyone else would like to continue to add something please do.
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reader, anonymous, writes (14 September 2008): That was an excellent answer by Yos. He and I have discussed this many times as answers to these types of questions and I greatly respect his opinion and how he handled this situation. However, I have a different opinion on one of his points:
"You need to agree to stop talking about this."
While this has been the best solution for him, I found that the opposite is what finally worked for me. Early in my wife and my relationship 29 years ago, she told me about her past almost as soon as we started dating. She started to inform me by hints, which was the wrong way to do it. I finally asked her what she was trying to say and she told me about all 10 of her partners. I was judgmental of her one night stands and sleeping with guys she had just met at a bar and she told me to never talk about it again or to leave her. I believe that I may have made the mistake of not trying to bring it up again in a kinder way, but we will never know if that would have been better or not. She couldn't talk about it because of the guilt that she had, but I just kept the hurt inside for 1 or 2 years until I buried the thoughts for the next 26 or so years. They would occasionally pop up again and I would say something and then we would both keep quiet for months until I said something again.
Last year it all came back. I don't know why, but I was diagnosed with low testosterone and depression is one of the symptoms of low T and I felt depressed for several months. Whatever the reason for it coming back, it was even more hurtful than it had been 28 years before. I believe that is because the hurt was just buried and never addressed. We started talking about it. She was now willing, partly because she no longer felt ashamed of her past promiscuity because of the woman she had been for the past 28 years and partly because she recognized what hurt it had caused for me and wanted to help me in any way possible. We spent many hours talking about her feelings at the time that she was doing those things in the 2 years after she left her first husband and why it hurt me so much. I talked about it at length with 2 of the women on this board and that helped a lot. They were not the type that were judgmental of either me or my wife. They were both very kind to me and just discussing it with them by PM was a great help. I guess they were my free counselors. We actually talked for months.
It was this endless discussion that eventually got both my wife and me to understand the other’s hurt, why she did what she did and why I felt as I did. We ended up both understanding both the male and female “species”. This is what has allowed us to be relatively happy with the other’s thinking and able to now discuss anything on the subject without arguing or feeling hurt. Sometimes our discussions would turn into arguments, mostly because of mental exhaustion from a long discussion. One of my friends talked to both of us for hours after one of our more heated and hurtful arguments and got our minds straight that time. At first the arguments were weekly, then monthly, then after 2 months. This resurfaced over a year ago and we have not had an argument for 3 months and very little discussion. Every argument made both of us realize something new and the last one was very beneficial to my understanding of how badly she hurt that first year after she left her first husband. I believe that discussions between both partners and with a counselor are necessary to finally understand the other’s feelings.
When this came back to me after 28 years, it was like it was the first time because we had never solved the problem in the first place. I was feeling the same level of hurt that she had felt after those years of sleeping with various guys where she felt like a slut, was still lonely and felt used. It’s just that our hurt was separated by 30 years. This is the same thing that va va vroom”s husband is feeling now.
I also agree with the anonymous male. There are some women (and some men) on this board who are just judgmental and insulting of the man’s feelings. They basically come across to me and some others as self-righteous. I’m not talking about those who chastise his name calling, as I agree that is not helpful, but those who continually put all of the blame on the man. There are also other men and women who are very understanding and open-minded and want to help both partners. Those are the ones who you need to listen to.
While I can understand why va va vroom might have lied, I can also understand how hurtful that lie is to her husband. Living a lie for 25 years and then finding out make the person think that he has been deceived by the person who he has loved for the past 25 years. To the women who don’t understand, it is the same feeling that you would have if you just found out that your husband had cheated on you and had affairs many years ago after you were married. Try to look at in that light and then maybe you can understand better.
Yes, we all make mistakes and sometimes those mistakes hurt the one who we love the most. We don’t mean to hurt them, but it happens. However, we need to take responsibility for those mistakes and not just try to blame the partner’s response on them entirely. It’s like a man telling his wife that her boobs are too small and trying to understand why she doesn’t want to have sex for the next 5 nights and blaming the lack of sex entirely on her.
In this question, he valued virginity greatly. Most likely that is because of the way that he was brought up by his parents over his teen and perhaps beyond years. When teachings like that are repeated over many years it becomes very important to a person and very difficult to rationalize the reality of the world. Those types of thoughts were still mentioned to me by my mother’s sister even after my mother had died and I was in my 30s. It took me a long time to appreciate my wife for what she really was instead of the unworthy tramp that I was taught to think of someone like her, even if she was depressed and lonely in those years when she slept around. Unlearning those types of teachings is very difficult and not done in a day, a week or even a year. Don’t think that it is easy to look at reality and forget what was taught for many years in a short time. The OP’s husband had no reason to think that she was anything but what he was taught to believe until it all came out after 25 years of marriage. I know that she didn’t mean to be cruel, but that is what she ended up being nevertheless. It is not her fault and it is also not his, so don’t try to make him the horrible villain. She made a big mistake 25 years ago and he is now making his mistake. Don’t place the blame entirely on him.
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male
reader, oldfool  +, writes (14 September 2008):
 Yos's is indeed an excellent reply. You should listen to his advice. It's perfectly true that his nastiness is not caused by lack of love, and to castigate him for this is not right.
He is, as I said, crucifying himself as well as you. He needs all the help he can get to get over this. Yos has pointed you in the right direction.
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male
reader, Yos +, writes (12 September 2008):
Men and women are built very differently emotionally in this regard. I have a great respect for some of the women on this site who have posted here, but honestly I am 100% certain that women can't understand this from a male perspective. I equally recognize that men can't understand this from a woman's perspective. In this regard, we really are different species.
This happened to you 25 years ago. You have had all that time to process and get over the experience. To you it is ancient history. But to your husband, it is as if it happened just the other day. It's as new and immediate as the moment you told him. What is more, he has to cope with the fact that you lied to him, and the feeling that your whole marriage was built upon this lie. He has to find a way to get over the (very new) information that his wife was taken advantage of sexually, and that on some level you were complicit in this. It will feel to him like the ultimate betrayal. In many ways it will feel worse than you having had an affair right now. I know that makes no rational sense, but that doesn't change how it feels to him. He's living in what will feel like a waking nightmare.
I cannot overstate how difficult this can be for a man. When something similar happened to me, it was the most unpleasant and difficult thing I'd ever experienced. I thought i was going insane. In a way I was, the jealousy and anger was utterly overpowering and I became another person altogether. At one point I broke down completely. It tapped into my deepest preconceptions about myself, and fundamentally changed me and my understanding of the human mind.
The people who have said that he doesn't love you are wrong. It is precisely because he loves you that he hurts so much. If he didn't care, it wouldn't hurt. The amount of pain is in direct proportion to the amount of love.
You are right in identifying that a female councillor won't help him. He needs to find a male one, and a good one. This is essential. I had therapy when this happened to me, and it was an essential component of me recovering (which I did thankfully). A female councillor will not be able to empathise directly with him the way a male one will. Additionally, many of these emotions tap into male pride and self-image, something that talking to another man about is both more difficult but also much more effective.
He will be locked in an impossible place: his need to change the past. He'll believe that only by changing the past can he make the pain go away. This is of course impossible: and it leads to desperation and despair. And to terrible frustration, jealousy and anger. Negative emotion that gets directed at you.
He needs to accept that he cannot change the past. That things will never be what they were, and that his view of you will be permanently altered. There is nothing either of you can do to change that.
Then he needs to learn to not think about it anymore. Only by letting go of the need to dwell on and try to 'overcome' this can he overcome it. The harder he tries, the worse it gets. Every time he thinks about this, he'll return to that angry jealous place. Letting go by letting go is the way out.
I recommend the following steps:
- You two should talk when he's in a good mood. Reaffirm that you both want to solve this, and keep your marriage. Even if he can't be positive about this, as long as he expresses his desire to find a way past this somehow, then that is a good start.
- He needs to get a male councillor. It's essential, if he is willing to try to fix this, then he needs to be willing to try. That includes a new councillor. Look for one that has experience with obsessive / compulsive behaviour.
- He needs to recognize that he has a problem. This doesn't mean that he has to admit this is 'his fault', it's not. Rather he has to admit that his pain is something within him, and something he needs to overcome. That pain, and his emotions, are HIS issues. The way past this lies within him, there is very little you can do.
- You need to agree to stop talking about this. All talking does is remind him of it, and then trigger the negative images and emotions. His escape is to learn to not think about it: so every time it is mentioned is a step backwards because it pushes it back into his consciousness. When he brings it up, you need to find a way to change the subject gently as fast as you can. And whatever you do, don't supply him with any more details, or try to 'justify' what happened. All that will do is give him more to be upset about.
- I also highly recommend that he works on improving his mental calmness. There are many different activities that teach people to relax their minds and let go of distracting and difficult thoughts. Again, if he honestly wants to get past this, he needs to be willing to go out of his comfort zone and work at it with determination. I suggest either meditation classes, tai chi, yoga, pilates, or similar. Look for what is available in your area, and pick something that focusses on mind-body connection and guided concentration. Meditation is probably the best, but many people find it almost impossible to learn.
You have my utmost sympathy. I know how horrible this situation can be, and how desperate it can seem because of the lack of any way out. The good news I can give you is that it is possible to overcome, but it's a long road and expect setbacks along the way. But with patience, and determination, it can be done. I wish you the best of luck.
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reader, oldfool +, writes (12 September 2008):
Anonymous male, I agree that a lot of women don't understand how this kind of thing hurts for the man.
But if you read this post carefully, and not just as another opportunity to hold forth on an issue that obviously touches a nerve with you, you'll see that her husband's reaction is far too extreme for the crime. Yes, it's going to take time for him to get over this, and it's going to be a while before he can accept what happened in the past, but he's got to try and make the effort. He's lived with this woman for 25 years, and he's crucifying himself and her over things that happened before he knew her, when she was rather young and stupid. He needs to stop seething for a moment and start understanding how much SHE wishes these things hadn't happened either.
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male
reader, anonymous, writes (11 September 2008): This common response, "He should get over his ego and judge you on who you are today, no who you were in the past"Women, if you understood 1/4th of how badly this hurts a lot of men, the whole sexual culture would be different. Honestly I find it a little insulting that so many women see nothing more to their men's hurt feelings than petty self-righteous moral judgments. Women must really think little of men's forgiveness and acceptance, if they think that kind of petty junk is all it took to make a guy suddenly treat his wife of 25 years like this case. I would hope my wife would at least realize that it took some pretty incredible emotional pain inside me to drive me to such bad reactions. If she's at such a loss to understand and explain any of my actions, then maybe it's time to admit that she probably doesn't have the foggiest notion of the extreme pain I'm going through either. . . . which means, maybe she shouldn't be getting so (self-righteous and preachy) with ME about how I "should be" reacting to the whole thing.
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reader, faydra +, writes (11 September 2008):
I completely sympathize with you for I too am going through it. I can't give advise since I don't deal with my own. My husband says he loves me and he doesn't want to hurt me but he can't get his head around the images he is creating. I yelled at him this morning told him he has no right, it happened to me 14-15 years ago before you even knew I existed. One I don't have memories that can come back as flashback since I was raped unconsious under influence of alcohol and date rape drugs. We have been together now for almost 4 years. I told him about my past before we ever got intimate. MY sister decided she would shed light which I don't know when and he doesn't remember us talking . WE had NO secrets. So why after 3 1/2 years is it creeping back up? He also questions everything and keeps digging. SO I too am going through the same. Before this we had no problems... I put that because someone else answer asked it. We were the perfect couple always loving caring we never call each other hurtful names but this is eating at him the same way as her bloke is. he hasn't asked me specific about it "penis size" or anything. HE want to know thing I just can't remember I chose to repress. How long did the guys get in prison. I don't remember but I vaguely remember after a year they finally got caught, ripped of the military benefits, and went to levinworth, disgraced there families. Isn't that enough to remember. This is his biggest issue. Then his other issue is me not waking. He thinks there is more too it he thinks I am hiding something and I am not. There is more(he doesn't know it took a year nor that the blokes got away with it at first and then one started stalking me and making harrassing calls which is how they evenually found out I was really raped one of the men told all in the phone call which was being tapped by the civil not military authorities, the military thought I was crying rape after feeling guilty of 2 men taking me it was civilian police who followed up and got the truth) but I question whether to tell him knowing how he responded to what he did find out. He wishes I lied and said I don't know what my sister is talking about me I was never raped but I have never lied to him in the past why start.
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female
reader, faydra +, writes (11 September 2008):
I completely sypathize with you for I too am going through it. I can't give advise since I don't deal with my own. My husband says he loves me and he doesn't want to hurt me but he can't get his head around the images he is creating. I yelled at him this morning told him he has no right, it happened to me 14-15 years ago before you even knew I existed. One I don't have memories that can come back as flashback since I was raped unconsious under influence of alcohol and date rape drugs. We have been together now for almost 4 years. I told him about my past before we ever got intimate. MY sister decided she would shed light which I don't know when and he doesn't remember us talking . WE had NO secrets. So why after 3 1/2 years is it creeping back up? He also questions everything and keeps digging. SO I too am going through the same. Before this we had no problems... I put that because someone else answer asked it. We were the perfect couple always loving caring we never call each other hurtful names but this is eating at him the same way as her bloke is. he hasn't asked me specific about it "penis size" or anything. HE want to know thing I just can't remember I chose to repress. How long did the guys get in prison. I don't remember but I vaguely remember after a year they finally got caught, ripped of the military benefits, and went to levinworth, disgraced there families. Isn't that enough to remember. This is his biggest issue. Then his other issue is me not waking. He thinks there is more too it he thinks I am hiding something and I am not. There is more(he doesn't know it took a year nor that the blokes got away with it at first and then one started stalking me and making harrassing calls which is how they evenually found out I was really raped one of the men told all in the phone call which was being tapped by the civil not military authorities, the military thought I was crying rape after feeling guilty of 2 men taking me it was civilian police who followed up and got the truth) but I question whether to tell him knowing how he responded to what he did find out. He wishes I lied and said I don't know what my sister is talking about me I was never raped but I have never lied to him in the past why start.
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (11 September 2008): I am going through exactly the same thing. I was in the military going through a divorce when my unit came on order to go to an excursion to protect the president of/in haiti. My ex came on the orders and i was to stay behind with our 18month baby. He refused I was force to sign temp custody to him being the lower ranking of the two. I returned before the rest of the unit due to developing asthma in haiti to him and my daughter gone. He out process and took early retirement. I panicked got depressed became suicidal not knowing where they were. A friend from another unit tried to cheer me up and took me to a party. My drink was spiked and shortly after arrving I had no recollection of anything the next morning I found myself naked in a strange place and felt violated but don't know anything that happened. I was taken by a unit supervisor to have a rape kit done found out I had been given a date rape drug and lost conciousness. I went through hell for a year. Now 14-15 years later my sister thought she was helping me told my husband and he is having a hard time. Doesn't believe me, say you'd know you'd wake up. Called me names. I don't remember how long the blokes went to prison for and he think I should remember. I went to therapy for years. I put it all behind me. I don't remember a lot of it. But its killing our relationship. I am angry he has no right. He didn't know me then. Why does he have the right to feel this way and treat me this way.
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female
reader, Tisha-1 +, writes (10 September 2008):
 The anger overtaking the love has me very worried for you. The vile names he calls you and demanding all the details and doing this for three months sounds like he's almost enjoying his anger, he's got something he can hold over your head and beat you up with (metaphorically). It's really verbal abuse.
On this site you'll see posts from men who find out that their wives weren't virgins, and yes, they are angry, and they do ask too many questions to get answers that will then drive them crazier. But most of them post here because they want to make it work, they come for advice to get over it. Your hustand does not sound like he's trying to cope with it, at least not in a healthy way.
Granted, yes, you did make a mistake not telling him way back then, but you were young and naive. It sounds like he was pressuring you for sex too, and you didn't want to rush anything and didn't want to have sex right away with him. I can see why you'd say you were a virgin.
As far as the date-rapes and short relationships with men you really didn't want to be with, well, it sounds like you were drinking too much and your judgement wasn't the best. There's a lot I would redo, knowing what I know now.
But his anger seems irrational and it doesn't sound to me like he actually wants to try to heal the hurt and the rift between you. He's enjoying this feeling of power and making you feel awful.
I think you need to list out what you will and won't do and what you will and won't tolerate from him anymore.
I wouldn't tolerate any more name calling. I would continue with counseling whether he goes or not. I expect you've apologized a thousand times and will be doing so forever, IF this marriage survives. I would stop discussing any more details of the previous sexual encounters, he has enough details to grow angry over.
I would remind him that 25 years of love and fidelity and caring more than demonstrates your feeling for him and that you chose him over all others. I would tell him that you regret every single encounter (if you do) and that his bringing them up again and again wounds you almost as much as it seems to have wounded him, perhaps even more.
I would tell him that he has had three months to think about this and instead of it getting better, he seems to be growing angrier and more obsessed and this simply isn't healthy for you or your children.
He has to commit to try to manage his feelings, which I have no doubt are real to him, but I think he's feeding them instead of trying to deal with them in a positive way. He's focused on the negativity. I have a feeling that things weren't so wonderful between you before this drunken revelation and that this may be the proverbial straw, and a convenient whipping-boy. Were things all right up until now, or have there been other issues?
It may be that you two need to separate for a while, so that you're not faced with daily verbal abuse. He needs to understand that you didn't do this to hurt him, that you deeply regret lying to him about this, but you were still a child, really.
So, while I know you and he think that on some level you deserve this abuse, you have taken more than enough. Either he starts to really try to work on this with the counselor, or you're going to leave him. And yes, change counselors if this one isn't helping. It may be that she's a bad fit for him.
And tell him what you've told us. That you think he loved your virginity more than he loves (or loved?) you. That you feel so lost and lonely and desperate. That he has to stop the idiotic emotional blackmail of threatening to tell your mother. That's just cruel to her and frankly a disgusting threat. I would leave him if he EVER did anything to hurt my mother. Period.
Another thing, you DO need support through this. I don't care if he thinks you're colluding with your best friend. You need emotional support, as the one man you thought you could count on for unconditional love has withdrawn his emotional support from you. So PTUI to him saying you can't tell your best friend. Bu**er that. Call her and get a much-needed shoulder to cry.
Essentially, what I'm trying to do is empower you to get a little angry with him and learn to stand up for yourself. Draw the line and don't tolerate abusive behavior. You may have to leave him to demonstrate that you are serious about preserving your own mental stability and that of your children. This cannot be good for them to be around. I think children have ultra-sensitive antennae when it comes to their parents and know when something's wrong. If they see Daddy verbally assaulting Mommy then they begin to think that's normal, that it's okay. Of course it's not.
Yes, you told a whopper of a lie. Yes, you regret it, and if you had to do it all over again, you would. But you can't. You're here now, with a long marriage and two kids and a life you built together. You have to start somewhere, so why not from that point? You may have to revisit the past, but in a structured way and not simply for sheer torture.
Good luck with everything.
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reader, oldfool +, writes (10 September 2008):
It's a pretty visceral thing for a guy, even if it happened 25 years ago. He feels betrayed and the physical side (even if it's mostly imagined) is causing him great distress. That's why he asks irrelevant questions about penis size. He can't bear the thought of other men having had you, and he feels betrayed that you didn't tell him.
But frankly, he's got to let go of this. He's got to get over it and start seeing things in perspective. How can he let things that happened 25 years ago, when you were a giddy teenager (with not a lot of experience in life and not a lot of backbone, either) impact on a 25-year marriage? This is truly remarkable. You have not been unfaithful to him, you have not betrayed him. These are stupid things that you did before you ever met him and that you deeply regret. Your only "sin" (if that's what it can be called) was telling him you were a virgin when you weren't.
I'm wondering, was everything fine with him before this problem struck? Or have there been warning signs? Overprotectiveness? Vindictiveness? Immature behaviour? No matter how hurt he feels by these revelations, a man in his 40s should be able to handle these things a bit better than this. If you admitted to a torrid affair two years ago, we could understand if he went ballistic. But his inability to deal with things that you regret and happened before you met him (men who date-raped you, for goodness sake, what kind of threat is that to him, no matter what size their penis was) suggests that there is some kind of deeper insecurity or immaturity there.
I repeat, he's got to put things in perspective and get over this. It's not worth losing a marriage over.
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reader, anonymous, writes (10 September 2008): Correction; change "24 years of marriage" to "25 years of marriage"
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reader, anonymous, writes (10 September 2008): What about him, was he a virgin for you, when you married him? When it's a unconditional, love, history doesn't matter. When it's not, history does. Clearly, your marriage is not one of two loving, equally sharing, caring adults. If it was, he could look beyond this and see what's most valuable about you, now, and that is, you have grown into this wonderful wife who was always loyal and true to him, loved him, and made a good and happy life with him. You made a mistake in your youth, you made a error in judgement. None of us are usually loved for being perfect--if we are to be loved it's for compassion, thoughtfulness sensitivity and trustworthiness. Does not 24 years of your loyalty and love mean anything to him? That is what should be most vitally important now. , that no man could be this unforgiving, to the woman who was his wonderful wife for so long.
If your husband does not have any interest in you anymore and denigrates you daily, for finding out this information, then he does not deserve you. This marriage has now become one of verbal abuse and domination, because he was lied to about your virginity which in fact, was something you didn't even need to tell him about in the first place. I understand that being a virgin is important to a lot of males, but whatever happened with loving someone for who they are? What about the long standing dedication and life built together, over a 24 year span? Love between you both should have become well seasoned and solid, so that this 'issue' could have been forgiveable on his part. I think your marriage was strained before this and your husband...well, he's milking it for all it's worth. The verbal lobs, the anger, the hurt...it's all his way of bailing on you. Tell him, he is an adult male in his 40's with a wife and 2 kids. He needs to grow up and quit acting like a kid, who suddenly realized the new toy truck he was used goods.
You have two children, the best thing you can do is keep at the counseling to save this marriage. But if he keeps up with the abuse, which it totally wrong, then I would suggest you go visit a lawyer. No woman should tolerate that.
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reader, starismine1 +, writes (10 September 2008):
 You have been emotionally raped by men your entire life including your husband who you mistakely call your soul mate. When someone truly loves you and is your soul mate, they accept everything about you because they understand you. That means they accept your past. Marrying him and pretending to be a virgin, accepting guys date raping you, allowing your now husband to call you a slut, all points to you having serious issues about your self worth. Your husband has probably been a controlling, angry verbal abuser to you most of your marriage. You must start seeing your relationships with men more clearly. I suggest you separate from him and seek abuse counseling. It is essential for you to gain some self esteem, and to stop the continual emotional rape men have dumped on you your entire life. And another side note, so what if you weren't a virgin when you married him? Was he a virgin? No, so his double standard is not acceptable and it is being used to justify his need to have angry rage. The issue is not about what you did or didn't do, it's about his need to control you. Don't continue letting men do this to you your whole life, you deserve to be loved for who you are and not conditionally loved based on the things you do or don't do.
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reader, roxygirl +, writes (10 September 2008):
I know that this might sound a little weird coming from a 20 year old, but the past is the past and if he loves you your past shouldn't be an issue. You've been married for 25 years and have been faithful so there is no reason for him to be calling you a lier. When he says it, ask him if he remembers every single detail from his teenage years... not to mention you were date raped so its also a situation you tried to forget. Life is way too short for arguments about the past, especially over 20 years ago. You need to explain to him that if he truly loves you, you need to focus on the future together. I really hope that everything works out!
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reader, gemz_louise +, writes (10 September 2008):
Love if he loves you he would not treat you this way no matter what! Yes of course we all make bloody mistakes in life,that's how we learn from them dont we?! he has no right to call you a slut and also to ask you such vulgar questions such as who's dick was bigger,he needs to think does he really want to know the answer to that question? this happened a long time ago and yes you kept it from him,only because it hurt you and you liked this guy and wanted a happy future,it isn't something you blurt out on the 1st date now is it! I think you both need to sit down and seriously talk this threw,you kept this from him to protect his feelings because you love him.sounds like he is a bit of a jealous man because he's not the only male that has had sex with you,your not the virgin mary!of course u have had sex before him,what type of girls did he meet before you?im sure he wasnt exactally perfect. If he really thinks your a ''slut'' etc then why is he still with you? And also he is threatning to tell your mother? I think that is ONE HUNDRED times worse than your past to be honest. hope all goes well for you and let me know how you get on love!! xox
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reader, anonymous, writes (10 September 2008): what happen to keeping the past behind u??????????u two were not together when all this happen so husband or no husband he dose not need to know.... i can understand were his coming from cause as i read this the 1st thing that came to mind was that u made it all up, but as i continued reading i believe everything u are say....... ur husband has no right to call u them dreadful names.... ur his wife and mother to his child so calling u them names shows that there is no respect there, i know that he is upset and most probley dont mean what his saying but it will always be in your head that thats what he thinks of you.... if the counsellor is not helping i recammend that you change it,... i think you both need time apart i know it much be hard but it has to be done... ur husband needs time to cool down as this is a big shock to him,,, after so many years he finds this out,,, i honstley think ur husband loves you and wants to be with you, but this is gonna take some time...hope ive helped you in some way.x take care
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