My 10 year-old daughter recently found out about my affair with an unmarried man. Since then, she has been extremely depressed, disrespectful towards me, and doesn’t speak to me at all. She is threatening to tell her father. What can I do?
Advice 1
You have to tell your husband. It’s completely unfair and unreasonable to ask your 10-year-old to keep this secret for you.
Every day that you don’t tell your husband, you are implicitly asking your daughter to keep the secret too. She will end up with all sorts of problems if you don’t come clean.
10 is a really bad age to be thrown into something like this. At that age, kids think in very black & white terms. She won’t understand the subtleties that undoubtedly led to your affair.
Come clean and accept the consequences. Your first responsibility is to your daughter and you absolutely positively cannot expect her to keep your secret. Tell your husband.
Advice 2
If you are going to discipline your child, do so because she is being disrespectful to you not because she knows about your affair and you are worried she will tell your husband. It’s not her fault you had the affair, so why would you discipline her for it?
If you still want to be with your husband then it is only fair to be honest with him. Whether or not he will forgive you and want to still be with you is another thing.
Every action comes with it’s consequences. When you decided to take part in the affair, you should have thought about what you are putting at risk and what those consequences would be.
Advice 3
You are asking this question because you want an answer other than the obvious one. You want to walk away free of judgement, selfishly.
Admit your wrongdoing to your husband and her, be humble and accept what comes next. Be an example of what you want her to be.
If you try to talk your way out of this, then accept you are risking everything. You may lose your marriage and daughter, and you’ll have no one to blame but yourself.