love Can you ever really trust a man who is so duplicitous he will spend
years sleeping with one of your friends right under your nose? Read this report as published by Vanguard Newspaper.
Tessy,
married for close to 30 years was flicking through a pile of photographs
she came across in her drawer when she looked closely at a particular
one. It was of her, her husband Tunde, and Joko, a family friend who’d
been in their circle of friends for decades. According to her, the
photograph depicted a happily married couple enjoying a birthday party
with friends. “But my husband has his arm placed protectively around the
back of Joke’s chair with his hand inches from her cleavage as she
beams into the camera. I am the wife whose head can just be seen poking
out behind my husband, as if I’d crashed the photograph!” she said.
“For over six years, Joko was my husband’s mistress. They were
already an item when the photograph was taken. While studying their body
language when I held the photograph, it seemed obvious. I was totally
blind to it at the time. I only discovered their betrayal when Tunde
confessed after being faced with undeniable proof of his betrayal. Most
women would have been outraged.
But hard as it was, I felt so sorry for him I said I forgave him. And
now, incredible as it sounds, I believe the affair was the best thing
that could have happened to our marriage – without it we wouldn’t be
celebrating our 30th anniversary this year. The truth is, we had become
complacent about our marriage, and the betrayal was the shock we needed
to make it work.
“Although I was still married to my first husband with whom I had a
son when I met Tunde, that love had long since died and I had left
several time previously. Tunde was already separated from his wife, the
mother of his two daughters. Within months, I’d left my husband – the
irony that I started out being unfaithful to my own husband wasn’t lost
on me later – and moved into Tunde’s house. We got married a year later.
“Both of us are quick-witted and mercurial. We sparked off one
another and made love three or four times a week. The occasional row was
forgotten as quickly as it had begun. Our marriage felt like a fairy
take. Only 10 years on, a storm was beginning to brew. I was beset with
health problems which wore me down and left me less interested in the
physical side. I was eventually diagnosed with endrometriosis. But we
both found enjoyment in our friendship with three other couples whom
we’d met at our social club.
“While Joko, who was about seven or eight years younger than me and a
travel agent, was a shameless flirt, she showed no interest in Tunde,
at least to begin with, so I didn’t see her as a threat. But as the
eight of us socialised more, I became unnerved by their flirtatious
exchanges. On nights out, Joko would squeeze me out, ensuring she sat
next to my husband in the club restaurant, never missing an opportunity
to brush her hand against his. At the end-of-year-party, she didn’t
leave his side and she’d link hands with him as they went on the dance
floor. Looking back, I can see part of the problem was that I didn’t
fight for my husband’s attention. In the past, he’d always said he’d
never met such a formidable woman as me, and yet, in Joko’s presence, my
self-confidence withered.
“At home, I was no longer fun and playful. Instead, no thanks to my
health issues, I spend a lot of time bemoaning my appearance – my doubts
about our marriage led me to question everything from my hair and
clothes to my figure – even though I was still slim. In the end,
everything came into the open after a fund-raising dinner at the club a
few years back. I didn’t have my glasses on so hadn’t seen Joko mouthing
‘I love you’ at him over the table, but a few other guests saw it to
tell me.
“Back home that night, a row ensued as I confronted him, but he still
denied having an affair. Unable to let it go this time, I woke him up
in the middle of the night and ask him to swear on his mother’s grave he
hadn’t been sleeping with Joko. That was when he burst into tears and
begged me to forgive him.
Many women would have either dealt him a few slaps or sunk their
teeth into him. Instead, despite my shattered heart, I wrapped my arms
around him and we cried together. I knew some of the responsibility was
mine and also that I didn’t want to lose him.
“He was full of remorse. He was adamant that although he cared for
Joko, he hadn’t loved her and had never stopped loving me. While I was
humiliated, hurt and angry, I realised we were both guilty of not
tackling the problems in our marriage which had led to his affair. He
said he had done it because in Joko, he found a woman paying him lots of
attention, telling him he was sexy and fun, while at home he felt
weighed down with stress over money, my health problems and my low
self-esteem. We’d both neglected our marriage and put barriers up so the
only time we communicated was to have an argument.
“Although the affair had gone on for over six years, he said he’d
ended it six months before he confessed. Joko’s marriage had broken up
half way through their affair. He admitted it was only when he began to
fear Joko may reveal all that he realised he stood to lose me – in his
words, ‘the most magnificent woman I’ve ever met.’ What also stung me
was that two members of our group, two people I considered friends, had
known about the affair throughout, and never told me.
“Like a lot of people who discover their partner’s infidelity, I
became thirsty for details, almost masochistically so. I’ve since
discovered the affair had began in the year 2002. They’d met for a chat
at the club after Tunde had told her we were having marriage troubles.
By the time they’d finished their drinks, they’d agreed to meet for sex
in one of the hotels near the club a week later.
Tunde admits he didn’t even feel guilty, that he believed he deserved
the thrill of a mistress as an escape from the misery he felt at home
with me. After that, he met Joko at least once a fortnight for sex. When
the affair was exposed, it split our friendship group up.
“Of course my husband and I didn’t turn things round immediately. It
took several agonising years. While we made love a few days after his
bombshell, I couldn’t shake the images of him in bed with her. I lost a
lot of weight in a matter of weeks, yet I was resolute in my decision to
stay with him. We loved each other deeply and had known what it was to
have a strong and happy marriage. I was adamant divorce was not the only
way.
“Today, we laugh, we make love every week and we’re tactile even when
we’re sitting on the sofa watching TV. And we face up to any problems
before they become insurmountable. The irony is that, today, our
relationship feels more secure and resilient than perhaps it ever would
have done but for Tunde‘s betrayal,”