Tully, your example demonstrates exactly WHY children need to hear judgments about adultery. It is the job of parents to teach children right and wrong. Otherwise it is gross dereliction of duty. Children are taught that wrong is right by the silence of adults who say nothing when they are exposed to adultery. Do you have any idea how morally confusing that is to children? Do you know how that will screw up their little minds?

Let me explain to you what that is like as a child who was exposed to the same immorality. Children instinctively know right from wrong. When adults do not validate that sense, children become confused and learn to DOUBT themselves. As a child, I was exposed to the same thing. It seemed wrong to me, but since no adult would validate my instincts, I learned that I must be a stupid girl. I grew up in a world of confusion where there was no right and wrong. I bumped through the School of Hard Knocks until I figured out right and wrong ON MY OWN when I was in my 30's.

It was parents job to teach me right from wrong. NOT to whitewash evil to make me think my father was a good man. My father was a despicable low man who caused me enormous moral confusion for most of life. I should have been protected from him at all costs. At the very least, my mother should have taught me that my father was living an immoral life so I would not have been so vulnerable to his immoral teachings.

The notion that we should corrupt little kids in order to whitewash the wrongdoing of a parent is WRONG. It doesn't help the parent and it just screws up the kids.

I completely agree with ML, My DS needed to know that adultery is WRONG...isnt that what parents are supposed to do..Teach them right from wrong...Just because it was his father that did the WRONG doesnt make it RIGHT....That would confuse him even more.

Melody, I happen to believe this is true of my WH. But what child of 5 can possible integrate that? It takes time. I HAVE told her the truth and I have said what I think. I just don't think it's necessary for me to go on about it 24/7. And I think we should allow children time and space to absorb the info instead of forcing them to make judgements of this magnitude on the snap of the fingers. It's hard enough for me to absorb as an adult and I have some control over my life, she had none.

Don't you worry, she won't be morally confused but I just don't demand that she jumps to my point of view instantly. We have a lifetime to come to terms with this and I think explaining gently and slowly is better than attacking the children when they feel they are just defending someone they love.

tully,

I agree with everything that Mel just said to you regarding the above quote. I wanted to add that the very REASON that your daughter came home and told you about WH and OW sleeping in your bed is because INSTINCTUALLY she knew it was WRONG, but as you pointed out, all the adults around her during that time, didn't appear to her to be saying that it was indeed wrong, so what did that smart little girl of yours do? She came to YOU - she asked YOU for validation that what she was thinking [that what her dad was doing w/ OW was WRONG], but as you said, "I let it go"...Tully, I believe you missed a golden opportunity to validate your daughter's instincts and guide her with truth...You underestimated her...PLEASE talk her about that situation...Telling her the TRUTH does not mean that you are "requiring" a particular response to it...it just means that you love her enough to arm her properly...

Lastly, I do not think that tst was implying that it was his children's responsibility to get him to end his adultery...I believe his testimony was meant to show the value of what truth has the power to do when delivered by a loving and supportive parent...

Mrs. W

MY DS never defended his father in what he did...he needs to know that even parents make mistakes...I hate my WH right now..but I tell DS that I love his father if he ask, which he does. I tell him that he doesnt need to ask me to call his father, that it is his father he can call him when he wants. I dont make him take sides, He see me hurt sometimes and wonders why his father is happy and mommy is sad....He knows that his father hurt me.

I truly beleive that this has made my son more compassionate. If he didnt know the truth he would think what his father is doin is okay. I want to raise a compassionate, moral, human being in this world. Not a person who thinks it is okay to cheat and lie to make yourself happy.

You are not giving your child a point of view when you tell them adultery is wrong....adultery is ALWAYS WRONG. Maybe if we teach our children that our society would have gotten rid of this naunchelant(sp)view of adultery.

tully, my "unconditional love" for a corrupt man harmed me and the rest of my brothers and sisters. One of my sisters and my brother are still paying the price today. My brother is with his 2nd mistress since he dumped his wife and autistic son 10 years ago ["son, ya just have to do what makes you happy"] and my sister is still high as a kite on the pain killers my father got her hooked on by being her drug pusher for 10 years. My father showed her "unconditional love" all these years - until his death in 2006 -by sending my sister black market narcotics via Federal Express every month.

Since no one taught me right from wrong, my father was free to teach me how to drink, smoke pot, toot coke, go drunk driving, how to baseball a trifecta at the horse track, how to go bar hopping in Juarez and pay off the Mexicales if they hassled me all at AGE 13.

I lived with he and his wife [#4] at that time and we got kicked out of there and moved in with his OW, whom he eventually married. After he married OW [#5] she got me up in the middle of the night and we drove to wife #4's house and I watched from the car while wife #5 beat up my drunk father in the driveway while all the neighbors stood out side and the police tried to restrain wife #5.

But hey, lets not make any "judgments", right? Isn't it worse to say something is bad than to do something bad?! If someone - ANYONE - had just explained to us that this was a corrupt man and WHY, we could have watched this and known that he was the problem and NOT OUR MINDS. But when your mind is telling you something is wrong and adults tell you it is RIGHT, you learn to shut up that screaming voice in your head.

[quote=tullDon't you worry, she won't be morally confused but I just don't demand that she jumps to my point of view instantly. We have a lifetime to come to terms with this and I think explaining gently and slowly is better than attacking the children when they feel they are just defending someone they love.
[/quote]

tully, I am not talking about a point of view, but about truth. About teaching children the TRUTH about right and wrong.

Mel, for my own clarification, I would like you to be more specific on this subject. When you post about telling the kids (I have read probably over 100 of your posts on the subject over the past four months), you talk about children being confused, and should not be told lies about the subject. My clarification is what to do when there are no lies.

In other words, I wholeheartedly agree that in instances where the WS is openly seeing the OW/OM, that the children should be told. They are being subjected to it, and most likely the WS will try to sugarcoat and legitimize the relationship. I notice that a lot of the vets here who are proponents of telling the kids had WS's who had abandoned the family or who would not establish and maintain NC.

This is not the situation in this post. The children are oblivious that there is anything wrong. They have not been lied to. The WH has agreed to NC (although we have no idea if this has been established and adhered to yet).

So I guess my question is this. Are you in favor of telling children in all circumstances, even if they have not been subjected to the A, and the spouses are already working on R?

Gah, Mel, I'm sittin' here cryin' for the child/Mel.

I know, if you hadn't been HER, you wouldn'ta been YOU and I wouldn't trade you in on a million dollar pony...

But still!

tully, I grieve for your daughter because she can only feel mass confusion when the adults around her are teaching her that wrong is right when it all looks WRONG to her. She needs her instincts validated or she will be perpetually confused and will learn to DOUBT HERSELF. She knew something was very wrong seeing her dad sleep with his OW and no one said a damn thing to validate her instincts. That is not right.

It is a horrible feeling when nothing makes sense in your world and no adult will make sense of it for you. It is like being raised in the FUN HOUSE.

Hi

We tried not telling the kids for awhile. My H didn't really want to, I don't think, because we were working on the marriage and because he didn't want them to see me differently. But then my DD started having bad dreams about the OM (her former guitar teacher) and mommy killing each other, she didn't understand why she had to quite guitar. She knew something was wrong and thought it was her. DS knew something was going on but didn't know what. And you have to understand, at this point, we were already past D-Day; we were working on the marriage. etc.

But it just couldn't stay a secret. No, they didn't fully grasp what it meant, and my husband didn't draw them diagrams or go on an on about evil or anything (which I think is unnecessary), but he told matter of factly what Mommy did, that she is sorry, and that she and Daddy still love each other (or something to that effect - I wasn't there, but he told me about it).

Now DD is 13, and I don't know how it will affect her through the teenage years, but if it does cause her problems, it won't be because my H told her, it will be because I had the affair in the first place.

IM, kids may not be directly exposed to the affair, but they are ALL exposed to the fallout in the home. Even when things seem calm, kids know something is wrong. Telling them helps them deal with the tension at home.

And they also need to know who the OP is so they are not inadvertantly exposed to that person. It is not uncommon for kids to HEAR about the affair from someone else. So, if they know already, they will be prepared.

Secondly, it is a great life lesson for ALL for the kids to know. It helps the WS recover when others know [he is less likely to do it again when others know] and it helps the kids see first hand how serious adultery is. Dr. Harley talks often about knowing about his fathers affair and seeing the pain of his mother and the subsequent reconciliation changed his life. It was life changing lesson for him.

I found a good post my Dr Harley that addresses this:

Thank you, hunny!

p.s. I was a damn good drunk driver, though!

My WH was angry when I told DS the truth about his A...he said "Oh you only told him one side of the story"...I said you have every right to tell him your side of the story and what exactly is that:

"Well mommy was sick and daddy wasnt happy. Instead of helping mommy, talking to mommy and working on our relationship. Daddy decided to find someone else to make him happy. He lied and cheated so he could be with this OW and when he had to choose betw his family and OW he couldnt give up OW, so he moved out. Even though mommy still loves Daddy, is getting the help she needs and is willing to work on making our whole family happy."

I said good luck tellin him that...I guess DS never heard his side of the story.

Don't underestimate the children. They know more than we think.

My sons found out about the affair at the same time I did. I talked to them about it and explained to them that it was morally wrong for a married man to have a relationship outside of the marriage and that it was the reason why he left.

My kids are 14 and 10. I am terrified for them. My WS and the OW live together so when the kids go to their father's house for visits, they are exposed to the affair relationship. His family "tolerate" the relationship and friends socialize with them with my kids around, thereby legitimizing the relationship.

How does one teach moral lessons about fidelity to children of this age when they are clearly getting mixed message from influential people in their lives (their mother, father, grandparents, uncles, aunts)?

4myboys, kids KNOW instictively this is wrong and if you tell them why and validate their feelings, they won't be as confused. What will cause great confusion is if you say nothing. They will grow to see their affair supporting family members in a different light - as they should.

As a child I always felt like someone STOLE REALITY being around people who lived wrong as right.

This is difficult, but there's more to it than that. For example, their own lives have changed because of the infidelity. Their father has left the home. They now only see him according to the visitation schedule. They also have to share him with the OW. They also have to witness your pain. These are just some of the consequences they suffer from adultery. Isn't it better that they understand WHY this happened to them? If they didn't know, they would be blaming themselves for all this! This is a lot of blame to take for an adult let alone a child! Waywards are messed up in the head in part because they CAN'T take the blame! Why would anybody want to impose this on a child?

My son is now 21. He was 18 on D-day. I told him right away. It was over the phone as he was living away from home at college. He was devastated. He did go through a phase of listening to suicide-theme music, drinking, staying out all night and he's made a few rash decisions which so far have worked out for the best but could have gone either way. WXH did talk to him and fess up to his affair and now that he's openly living with OW, DS visits with both of them. However, she was not welcome at his wedding (one of his rash decisions), nor at his graduation. He's gone to visit WXH's family - who incidentally are his step-family - as he was particularly concerned that he might lose them. His uncles took him out, as an adult, and had a good heart-to-heart with him. Basically they told him that they are disgusted with what WXH did, but that he is their brother. They give the impression that they "tolerate" the infidelity, but as they have explained their POV to DS, I think he understands it better.

Younger children aren't mature enough to benefit from an adult discussion, however, they still need to know the truth, if only so they can fully comprehend that they are not to blame. It is also important for them to learn that you can love someone and be angry with them at the same time.

You also don't need an active affair (or even an affair) to teach kids about how infidelity is wrong. The other day my daughter told me she knew what a "womanizer" was. (She's 10). So I said "what's a womanizer?" And she said "it's a guy who cheats on his girlfriend." And I said "is that the only thing that makes him a womanizer?"

D: I don't know.
ME: Well, he's not married, so he *could* date other people. If he told his girlfriend about it and they agreed to take a break so they could both date other people then do you still think he's a womanizer?
D: Noooooooooo...I don't think so.
ME: What if he didn't ever cheat on his girlfriend but just never treated her with respect and put his own needs before hers?
D: He'd be mean AND a womanizer.
ME: What if he's married?
D: He can't date a girl if he's married!
ME: You are absolutely right. Good girl! That's called "adultery" and it's a sin.

I love (you know what I mean) all of you for your time and advice and support. I'll post an update soon but things are going well so far. As well as they could.

And no, I'm not deluded that he's special. I'm being strong and being a Giver even though I'm mad as hell. And I'm following your advice. On step at a time.

Any and all advice is SOOOOOO appreciated. Thank you thank you thank you!