In the same scenario, would you want to know if your spouse cheated? By same scenario, I mean, she truly regrets it, ended it, and it was a one time deal. While watching this with my wife, I came to the conclusion that I would not want to know in that case. I don't really think it would help anything in that matter. Ignorance is bliss.
share"Ignorance is bliss" is a great topic to discuss in an English class...but in real life its not so simple to generalize like that.
You've adopted a kid...do you tell them when they're older?
Your mother in a nursing home has terminal cancer and will be dead within weeks? Do you tell her?
You just discover that your spouse's grandfather was the murderous leader of a concentration camp? Do you tell them?
What right does anyone have to enforce someone else's ignorance for their own benefit? Or to make someone "happy"?
A friend once told me the advice she gives to divorcing couples who are fighting..."if it wont matter in 6 months, drop it". Its kinda a good life rule to live with....if something isn't going to matter in 6 months then no need to mention it...but if it WILL matter....that's a whole other issue.
I'd want to know. I get the reasoning for not wanting to know, but I don't want a relationship built on a lie.
shareI'm not excusing Michelle at all, but why did she feel so lonely that she turned to another man? I saw David being a friend to her when Brett was practically ignoring her in the kickball episode, and they had trouble after that. She felt alone in a marriage, and that hurts like hell. Again, no excuse, but she told Tina it was "a perfect storm" and she regretted it not just after it happened, but while it was happening.
If they want to even have a chance to get back to good, they need to talk about how they got to such a bad place so it never happens again. If they don't think it's worth trying to fix, Brett needs to man up and tell her now. Running away is a dick move, especially if you're going to act like you are perfect and fault free. But maybe he deserves to be a dick for a while. Go find that lady and sleep in a shrub.
"Are you suggesting that coconuts migrate?"
As much as it was painful for Brett to find out from Michelle, it would have been far worse if he found out another way, like either through David or through clues of the affair. The longer Michelle waited to tell him, the greater the chance of that scenario happening.
shareOf course most people would want to know but would be far happier not knowing, in most cases. She was an idiot to tell him. Tina warned her. She might have been doing it to make herself feel better but she was being selfish, not thinking of how Brett would feel. I hope he doesn't go back to her, not for cheating but for telling him once she'd ended the affair and learned her lesson.
Open the door for Mr. Muckle!!
Totally agree that she was wrong for telling him. She had already worked things out in her mind that she was not interested in continuing with David.
Telling her husband just served to hurt him. It may not have been what she intended, but that was the net effect of what she did. So what was the price for her peace of mind? A damaged marriage.
Honesty is not always the best policy. Silence has its place.
I would not.
I would say I would want to know, if I was discussing it sort of hypothetically with a partner. But I know myself and I couldn't recover from it, I would never ever get past it.
So, if I was in a similar circumstance (married, house, little kids, want to be married to the person still), and the circumstances were the same: a slip up, a one time, regret, no emotional tie to the person anymore, and we had been in a rocky patch that we'd just climbed out of? No, thank you, I would not want to know. Though I hate to think that the other person was suffering so much alone. But I guess that's their penance.
As for the reverse, I don't know if I could keep my mouth shut. I just feel like every single moment was a lie, that I was a liar in the relationship, that there could be no intimacy with this thing looming. But honestly I don't think it's always a kindness to the other person, is it.
Many years ago, my best friend's husband hit on me. Nothing came of it because I wouldn't let it. They split up anyway shortly thereafter, and she and I had this conversation back then about "would you want to know" and she said she would want to know. But I still didn't tell her. I didn't see the point.
share