Ok Rose, roll up your sleeves, this is gonna be a long one!
My first thought is that people CAN work themselves back from a cheating episode, BUT it takes work and a lot of forgiveness on BOTH sides. Even tho S has always been a "cheater", my personal belief is that nothing happens in a vacuum. Your DIL has something to answer for here, too.
I know a gal whose husband has "emotionally cheated" thru the internet, very similar to what S did--that is, IF he never took it to the IRL step. The husband I know, never did. But the thing was, altho he's a nice gut, life of the party, he's never been very ambitious. He earns a decent salary, but his job has a lot of downtime. Other guys in his position work side jobs--he doesn't. Also, he never strived much for promotions. And at home, he's not self-motivated, if you get my drift. Probably undiagnosed ADD; their kids WERE diagnosed, but he was like "That's not me". So his wife, who works a full time job herself, felt like she had another kid on her hands, who'd rather play video games than cut the lawn. And ended up treating him like one. *I* think he found...masculinity...in his online flirtations, and of course, the dumb gals on the other end of the line didn't suspect that the "hunk o' love" pics he sent didn't QUITE accurately reflect his...real self.
Anyway, I suspect S & your DIL are in much the place. I think she emasculates him -- if not consciously, then just by being the breadwinner--and if I know her, rubbing his nose in it, too. And as you said, he has too much time on his hands, & perhaps did not really see what he was doing as "cheating"--IF no body parts ever touched. The husband I know didn't believe "emotional cheating" was really cheating, either. Convenient for him, of course.
And as you also suspected, if both of them have emotional & trust issues, repair is going to be tough. Real repair also has a basis in deep, abiding, ACCEPTING love. Accepting that neither of you are perfect. Understanding that the grass isn't REALLY greener, and that the NEXT spouse will ALSO be on the rag some days, or always leave the toilet seat up, too. I don't know if these kids have that.
I also think they should come home. They have no support there. No one to give them a hand, a shoulder to cry on, or a place to heal in. Sometimes, you just need some space, and instead of going to the bar, or the internet, going to Mom & Dad's for a cuppa is a far better alternative. She's probably just as employable here as there, but back here, they have a chance that friends may help both of them find jobs. Here, he could at least do some odd jobs, help out you & your Dh, keep himself BUSIER.
I WOULD talk to him. I'd tell him that they BOTH need counseling; marriage AND financial counseling. They need face to face counseling, with someone BOTH OF THEM get along with. Seeing someone only one of them likes, will only deepen the divide. Seeing a counselor that only you like, will only end up with the counselor taking only your part in the proceedings, and nine times out of ten, telling you to cut your losses.
Tell him that if he cannot get a job, then he should use his GI bill & get an education. Besides learning something that might really give him a career, he will ALSO get a stipend to live on, which will take some of the pressure off them. That is what *MY* SIL was going to do in Sept, if he hadn't landed a decent job by then. But the federal money is limited, and there are a LOT of people applying! He has to get his name on the list. Tell him to talk to local Community AND technical colleges, and see what he has to do. If his wife doesn't want to help him figure it out, and he can't by himself, post & I'll get the info from my dd. She helped her dh figure it out. There's also a website that helps explain it. Plus, if they are back home, there are more people to help him with his studies if he needs tutoring.
That's about it for now. If I have another idea, I'll post some more. I hope they work it out.
Thanks for the post sabr - honestly, it's pretty much what I expected from you! LOL How long is it that we've "known" each other? :D I really agree with everything you've said... and what you said about moving home really does make sense. They have friends of their own age in NC, but her parents and we are half way across the country away and really hard to access. I don't think her parents are very supportive of her, even now that she's the injured party.
C called me yesterday afternoon in tears and heartbroken. What she told me - lets just say that S kind of glossed over just how bad his internet flirtations got before she found out about them. She says that when she tries to talk to her mom, mom just hands her off to her dad. When she talks to her dad, he pretty much says nothing and says "you need to go to counseling." So she feels all alone and unsupported in the world I suppose... and honestly, I don't know how much better I was in talking to her, because one side of me feels like I'm betraying S if I say too much, but the other side of me feels strongly for her - he behaved like an a$$hole, and I'd have a hard time staying in my marriage if my DH did the same thing.
S called me last night, and we talked for about 45 minutes. He recognizes the need for him to get a job, and at this point he's thinking that it needs to be ANY job, because he feels like crap doing nothing to support them. He is still getting unemployment, but that's not a JOB, and it does nothing to help him feel good about himself. He's thinking about using his GI bill to go back to school, maybe in WI, maybe in NC... I think he's about 50/50 on that one. This time when we talked, C was around, and off and on I could hear her in the background... and it really sounded like she's trying to find the place where they enjoyed each other's company. And he was responding to that in a way that sounded like he wants to go there too. But there was an edge to the whole thing too. I don't know - I'm certain I'm going to be spending a whole lot more time on the telephone in the next few weeks!
I'm going to spare you and everyone the messy and ugly details but let me say I know a thing or two about cheating and here are the truths I have learned:
1. Even people from stable homes, faithful Church goers, great jobs and with wonderful, loving spouses cheat. I think its natural for us as human beings to try to determine "what went wrong" in someone's past that has caused them to cheat. But the cold, hard truth is that the cheater made the choice to cheat because they wanted to. Plain and simple. Its like answering the question "why" with "just because". Its frustrating but its true. So I think its pointless to try to find out why people cheat -- they just do. Your bio children who have no *history* with cheating could just as easily do so.
2. Apologizing and saying sorry doesn't change the fact that a person has cheated. And some people take YEARS to get over betrayal. Many never get over it at all. It a very devastating thing to go through and causes you to question everything you thought you knew and everyone you thought you can trust. There's no overnight fix.
3. A person who has been betrayed goes through all the usual grieving stages. Right now there's alot of tears. Very soon the anger will start. Get ready for that -- it is AWFUL. And you'll probably here some pretty nasty things from your son's wife.
4. Personally I think the best thing a cheater and the betrayed spouse can do is forget about trying to win the other person back and work on themselves. Work on improving their own lives and minds and wellness because we cannot build relationships with others when we don't have a strong relationship with ourselves. Sounds cheesy but its true. When you can't trust yourself how will you trust others and how will you convince them to trust you?
If it were me, I'd support my son's desire to want to come stay with me and I'd encourage him to get the help and support he needs with counselling, career advice, whatever. If you feel your son's wife needs help, give her some hints on how to connect with support groups for betrayed spouses. There are alot out there. And she can share what she went through and work on her own life.
Well, DL, I think it's going to be best of luck to them separately, rather than together... he's back in WI now, and he's told me in the last week that he feels like the relationship is past the point of no return, and he's not even sure if he'd go back if it weren't. He's recognizing that there were things wrong with the relationship for a long time before he strayed, things that DH and I have had issue with for years, but have never said to any of the kids.
The anger has hit, it it's definitely messy. I haven't heard much from DIL, but I've definitely heard my DS's side of it, and it sounds like they're both more than a little angry, and she's out to hurt him as much as he hurt her. I certainly can understand why she's doing what she's doing, but..... he's my kid, she isn't, and it's hard to see my kid hurting so bad.
I have decided that C has her own parents & friends to go to, I can't play both sides of this one. S needs to have his mom in his corner, even though he knows that I thoroughly disapprove of what he did. If C's parents aren't there for her in the way she needs, I feel bad for her, but I need to be there for my own son.
I'm still longing for the days when a bandaide and a mommy kiss were all it took to fix their hurts!
