Divorce in New Zealand law is 'no fault' and adultery is not a crime.
Three women tell Sinead Corcoran Dye about the moment they found their partner was being unfaithful.
Susanna*, 35, area sales manager
I met Tim* on Tinder and he was different from the “bad boys” I had previously dated. I was fresh out of a long-term relationship so wasn’t really convinced I wanted to get into anything too serious – but after a few dates we became inseparable.
The relationship was so good at first it was like something from a fairy tale. We were really happy and we’d agreed we didn’t want kids so we bought a house and got a dog instead.
But about two and a half years in, things started to go downhill. We’d both been sick at different times in the past six months and somehow, we both checked out and simply stopped communicating. I’d always known about a female friend of his but on the occasions I asked about her he reassured me they were just friends. I had this nagging voice in my head which kept questioning “Is there more to this?” and eventually it got too strong. I decided that if he wasn’t going to tell me the truth I would ask her.
I reached out to her and she confirmed they were friends – but she also confirmed they had been more than that during our relationship and that they continued to have an emotional affair. My heart sank. I confronted him and I lost the plot – there was screaming, yelling, name-calling and tears. He also cried and tried to explain but I felt like it was a sinking ship.
Looking back there were warning signs – there were lots of nights he stayed up late on his own to watch TV; there were short-notice extended work trips; and he would never let his phone out of his sight. But there were other signs in a way – I had felt for a while something was not right in our relationship that couldn’t put my finger on so finding he was having an affair brought a sense of relief in a bizarre way.
I think we’re probably an exception to the general rule because finding out about the affair brought things to a head. We went to couples counselling and worked through the issues that had got us to this place – and ultimately, I forgave him. We’re still together and it’s been more than three years now. The road to recovery was a long one but I believe it can be worth it. You won’t find many positive stories off the back of affairs – I certainly didn’t when I researched next steps and feelings after “discovery”. But we’ve grown stronger as individuals and as a couple because of it.
One of the very positive changes this whole thing has had is me putting myself first – something I haven’t really done in any previous relationships. I set clear boundaries and expectations for how I will be treated. I’m also much better at voicing my feelings and recognising they are valid – and that I deserve to be heard. It’s been a tough journey for sure but positives can come out of an affair – though I obviously wouldn’t recommend it.”
Megan*, 28, communications manager
We were high school sweethearts – he was 19 and I was 16 when we started dating – and then I got pregnant my first year out of high school so by 18 we had a daughter. It meant we did a lot of growing up and figuring out of life together. We had some really rough and volatile patches – and some “on-off” periods – but because I’d grown up in this relationship, I truly couldn’t picture life without him.
When our daughter was 4, we decided we didn’t want a big age gap between her and siblings. We also loved being young parents and so I fell pregnant with twins. He was extremely happy about it, but then out of nowhere he became really negative. As the pregnancy progressed, he started to say he didn’t know if he was ready – which is a little late when I’m heavily pregnant.
My sister was getting married and I was a bridesmaid and he was a groomsman. Three days before the wedding, we were at the rehearsal and he told me he’d “heard things” and couldn’t be sure the twins were his. He then said that even if they were his children, he wanted to give them up for adoption, give our daughter to his grandparents, go our separate ways and have a second chance at life to do all the things we missed out on as young parents.
I was seven months pregnant with the twins at this point, hysterical, and obviously didn’t make it to my sister’s wedding rehearsal. I didn’t see him until the wedding and to my shock he didn’t acknowledge me at all. He mingled with my family, did his groomsman duties, but largely acted like I was invisible. At the end of the night, I realised he’d said his goodbyes and left. I hadn’t even organised a ride home because I assumed we’d leave together. I got a ride from a friend and we drove past his mum’s house to see if he was home. I had half planned to confront him, but when we pulled up, I noticed a red car by his in the drive that I hadn’t seen before.
The next day a friend sent me a screenshot of a girl’s post on Instagram, which was a picture of her holding a kitten with my partner in the background smiling. I scrolled through her Instagram posts and saw she owned the red car.
I went straight round to confront him but when I got there the red car was there again. I picked up a rock and smashed it through the window – then I drove to the police station and confessed what I’d done. (As an aside, I’m now 28 and know I should have put the rock through his car window, not hers).
My partner and his new partner wanted to press charges but, fortunately, I was granted diversion as it was my first offence. Part of the agreement was that I write a letter of apology – but the police waived it as they didn’t think I should have to apologise under the circumstances.
What followed after was the hardest time in my life. They proudly posted stories online about being a couple (yes, the relationship started before my sister’s wedding) while continuing to tell people that I had tried to trap him by getting pregnant to someone else and claiming the babies were his. I received online hate and my car was vandalised four times – the last time happened when I was in hospital giving birth to my twin boys.
I eventually got a court-ordered paternity test, which of course showed the twins were his. Despite that, he has never met them. He is now engaged to another woman and has two children with her.
Today I am single and I have no interest in men or in dating. To be the best version of myself and the best parent to my children, especially as a single mum, I don’t have energy to allocate to a relationship. I am so happily single with all of my babies; we live the best life and they are the best wee children. Being a single mum is challenging of course I wonder now if I would have got out of the relationship earlier if I hadn’t been so scared of being on my own. Fear can make women stay where we shouldn’t – but it is beautiful on the other side.”
Martha, 34, marketing executive
The night he crashed the car drunk was the night I found out he’d been sleeping with someone else. This was about 18 months in – he was drunk, angry and got into the car to drive home in a huff. After failing to grab the keys off him I got in the passenger seat, telling myself I couldn’t leave him alone like this. He crashed into a ditch and passed out – from alcohol, not from the impact.
While I’m sitting there thinking “what the hell did I get in the car for?” his phone lights up again and again and again. I pick it up and it’s a chain of sexts from his ex-girlfriend talking about how good the sex was the night before.
In hindsight, there were warning signs right from the start. He wooed me with dog walks, spontaneous adventures and even drove a four-hour round trip just to see me and say “hi”. When I look back, it was classic love-bombing.
We were together two years but only since I’ve been through therapy can I see clearly that he was a narcissistic emotional abuser. It got pretty toxic and he was aggressive when drunk. He always blamed me for being “too perfect” and “too good for him”. He said it was because of me that he had to self-sabotage. I tried to break up with him lots of times but he threatened self-harm and suicide if I went through with it.
After I found the texts the night of the crash, I went numb. I carried on with what had to be done to get out of the car situation. I called a friend of his I knew lived close to come and get us – but I had the nous to screengrab the texts so he couldn’t deny it. I stayed in bed with the cover over my head for almost the entire next day – I just didn’t want to deal with it. Unfortunately, I was at his house in the middle of nowhere. Eventually, I shoved him awake and asked about the ex. He denied. He cried. He threatened. He proposed we get married. He got mad at me – because it was my fault as always.
I didn’t leave him then. But after catching him cheating again and again I finally went through with the breakup. The final straw was when I saw a name come up on his phone; I messaged them and found it was someone he’d matched with on Tinder. Ironically, after we separated, he found out from a mutual friend I was on Tinder and he exploded, once again alternating between begging to get back together and get married, and yelling abuse at me (this was all from someone else’s phone as I’d blocked his number).
It had a lasting impact for sure. It took me a long time to believe that it wasn’t my fault. He drilled that into me so I was scared to start dating. I was embarrassed and scared to tell anyone. There are still things that trigger me today – if my partner is on the phone at night, I get nervous and have to remind myself it’s an old wound. If there’s one positive, it’s that my ex showed me what love isn’t. The man I’m with now showed me what love is. When we disagree, we work on it. When we’re mean, we apologise. We’re a team more often than we’re not. He’s now dad to our kids.
As told to Sinead Corcoran Dye. Names have been changed
Dining out editor Jesse Mulligan and deputy editor Johanna Thornton discuss the supreme winner in Viva's Top 60 Auckland Restaurants 2024. Video / VIVA