I should start by stating that I was the one who cheated. Back in 2013 a coworker started flirting with me and within few months I was flirting back. Soon afterwards, there were a lot of changes in the company that we both worked for, and at that point the relationship shifted to a friendship, where we shared our concerns about the company's situation. Eventually the friendship grew deeper as we shared our personalities, our likes and dislikes, we would recommend books and movies to each other, talk about politics, religion, any interesting events happening in our lives, etc. There was no more flirting between us and probably because of that, it became more meaningful to me. Even though many times we mentioned our partners by name and as part of our stories, we never discussed our marriages and whether we were happy or not. I should mention that he lives in the other side of the world (New Zealand) and most of our communication happened via text and very rarely via phone. He would come to town a couple of times a year and although initially I didn't accept his invites to eat out, as our relationship grew closer, I accepted first lunches and then dinners. At the beginning of this year, we found ourselves in the same city for work, both away from our homes. We went out to dinner and then we kissed three times during our way back. As we were walking, I told him that what we did was wrong, that we were jeopardizing our families and our friendship. He agreed with me and we parted ways amicably. Our friendship continued as if nothing had happened. I saw him again in my hometown a couple of months later. During a company's night event, he told me he wanted to kiss me again, that I was the most amazing woman he had ever met and that he wished we had met me many years ago. I told him it could never happen again. He didn't mention it again, but on his last day in town, during a company's event, the persistent and intense way he looked at me told me that it was not the end of it, and what's even worse, I wanted him too. Two months later I had to go to his hometown for work, and we ended up sleeping together. We never really talked about it afterwards, and I think it's because we knew each other well to know that we had our own lives and were not interested in something permanent or any kind of commitment. I cared for him deeply as a friend but never thought myself in love with him and I think he felt the same way about me. I should mention that having sex with him left me very empty and I felt completely disconnected while we were doing it. When I came back home, my guilt just grew bigger and bigger to the point that I couldn't live like that anymore. I told my husband about the affair and sent him a text telling him that I loved my husband, that I had told him about us and that I needed to put an end to our friendship in hopes to reconcile with my husband.
Now I'll switch my narrative to my husband and my marriage. My husband and I met 19 years ago and got married 3 years later. I was crazy in love with him and pushed for us to get married even though I sensed hesitancy on his side. I wasn't the kind of woman who fooled around or slept around and this was the first time (and only time) that I fell in love. I guess I thought that even though he wasn't so sure as I was, our qualities as people and our love would delete any doubts he had. Big mistake.
Unlike me, my husband was somebody with tons of sexual experience but for a religious reason, he asked that we waited until we were married to have sex (we had sex when we first met and then few times when I visited him). I agreed to it. When we finally got married I told him that we could finally have sex. He told me that we would, not on that day, but sometime before the end of the week. Months passed before we actually had sex and it was the only time we had sex on that year. For our first anniversary we decided to go to a hotel in front of the ocean. I decided to bring a sexy nightgown and try to seduce him. He told me he was watching SportsCenter but maybe sometime soon. I had never felt so vulnerable and humiliated in my life. In the next years our sex life improved a little bit, but I believe I'm being pretty accurate if I say that in our 16 years of marriage we probably had sex around 25 times.
There is a picture of us of the day that we got married. I set the camera to take the picture. I'm hugging him and smiling to the camera, he is playing PlayStation and looking at the TV. That is a painful memory to me as I so wanted to spend time with him and he didn't seem remotely interested in me. When we first got married I was very affectionate. As the years passed and as I felt he pushed me away we started to grow apart. There were many times I tried to kiss him and he pushed me away...until the day that we did no longer kiss each other.
So many nights I cried myself to sleep wondering why he didn't want me. Eventually our relationship got worse, especially during the last 8 years. He was miserable at work and we started fighting all the time. At this point I felt that not only he didn't love me, but that he didn't even like me. Later on I felt many times that he even hated me. It was not unusual for him to call me names, yell at me, imitate me and make fun of me or tell me shut up. If we passed each other on the hallway, he would just tell me to move out of the way. If I sneezed, he would yell at me to stop it. I grew colder and distant. Any time that we spent together it meant more fights so I just tried to keep away. At this point all I wanted was peace. I started focusing on my job more and more. I had followed him around the country as he switched jobs. During these last four years, my focus became my job and I quickly moved up. As my responsibilities became larger, work occupied more and more of my time. Even with the relationship I had with my co-worker, I felt very lonely. At some point he said that he would move into the guest room (we don't have children) as it was too uncomfortable to sleep all in the same bed (we have 2 large dogs that sleep with us). I decided to move out instead as I was trying to save the money he would have spent on buying a new TV for that room. It was around this time that my affair started.
Crazy as it may sound by reading this last part, I never stopped loving him. These experiences unfortunately became the largest part of our relationship but there were also many good times. All the movies, concerts and vacations we took together. All the laughs that we shared, especially early on our marriage. In spite of what it might look like, we both are good people. He is a very thoughtful man. If he sees something he thinks I would like, he would buy it for me, from a small dessert to an expensive coat, he always thought about me. He is extremely honest and I know that he never would have cheated on me. He doesn't have a problem apologizing when he believes he is at fault. He is very insightful and extremely smart. He is a hard worker. He is extremely clean and organized. He loves our dogs and is always thinking about the best for our family.
Going back to the present. I made the mistake of telling him about the affair a little at a time. First about the kisses and sex, then about the long friendship and at this point I don't have any credibility with him. He has said many times that probably this other guy and I slept together several times and that probably there was a lot of sexting going on (he found an email I sent my coworker during the phase where there was on going flirting between us, with a picture of me and a friend at a wedding - there was certainly very inappropriate flirting as I sent him the picture and he told me I looked awesome but certainly there was never any sexting between us). He believes there are many black holes and that I'm not being forthcoming. I have shared everything with him - as far as telling him that after this other guy and I kissed, I masturbated thinking about him (I didn't volunteer this information but he asked me and I felt I had to be honest), very specific details about the night that we had sex (where we kissed, positions, thoughts, conversations to the extent that I remember - I was a bit tipsy that night). Nevertheless he still thinks that I'm holding information from him and given the fact that I lied and cheated on him, I can't blame him for that. He doesn't believe that our communications were kept at the level that I told him.
Something happened when I told him about the affair. For the first time in many years, I felt truly loved by him. Not because he was devastated, but because he told me he loved me and showed it with his behavior. He would like for us to try to make it work (although during the downs he tells me he is done with me). We have made love multiple times, some times more than once a day. Our sex life has never been better and I have never felt so wanted as during these last month. When is feeling good about us, he is very affectionate with me. During the ups, our marriage is all I ever wanted to have: caring, affectionate, considerate. We have fun together and we have opened up and talked about all our issues, from the very beginning of our marriage, including his fear of being close to people and pushing his loved ones away to my tendencies to be selfish and how my lack of housekeeping interest affected his attitude towards me. The problem is the downs. When he doesn't believe anything I say and calls me names. When he asks very specific details that many times I don't remember and he accuses me of being a pathological liar, sneaky and selfish. It has been an emotional rollercoaster for both of us, some days are extremely good, other days I'm asked to leave as soon as possible. I understand where he is coming from. I am the person whom he trusted the most and I hurt him. He is afraid of being hurt again. I can deal with all this if at the end we have the type of marriage that we both want. But in addition to the distrust I created, now there is another third person in the picture. When we were dating, he met somebody that was very interested in him. Back then she was married but made it clear that she wanted to be with, my back then, boyfriend. He also made it clear to her that he was with me. Throughout the years, sporadically, she contacted him to see if something had changed. And although they were always friendly, he kept his distance. Now he says that he wants to go out with her (she is twice divorced now) and is planning on visiting her in January and spending the weekend of his birthday with her. I know they have been texting each other and she has sent him selfies. I opened facebook in our computer and opened automatically in his account. I was appalled when I saw the messages (although probably I have no right to be so). They are talking about having sex and joking who will give in first and how much time they will spend in the hotel room. I also noticed that he contacted another ex-girlfriend and based on their messages it seems that he told her everything about us. She calls me selfish and that I don't deserve him. And he said that he is just trying to keep it friendly between us.
Yesterday, after all the texting with this other woman, he came home and he was so cold. We ended up having a huge fight. At the end he accepted that he was trying to push me away again (although he didn't mention the texts) as some situations triggered his memory about what I had done and make him go mad all over again. I told him that I would fight for a loving marriage but I was not going to be in a marriage where I would beg for love again. I have begged for love for 16 years and I don't want to spend the next 20 years doing the same.
So my question is, should I confront him about what I found in his Facebook account? Do I even have the right to be upset? He has been honest in telling me his plans about having sex with this woman. Should I keep trying to save this marriage, or is it time to cut my losses and move on?

Hello luvmylab, welcome to Marriage Builders! Can you please summarize your situation in about 3 short paragraphs? If you can make it easier for folks to understand, you will get some help. thanks!

Yes please summarize your post. I skimmed rather quickly and have a first question. Did you expose to other man's betrayed Wife?