Our home has felt like a battlefield for a week now. Oliver and I barely speak, avoiding each other’s gaze and only discussing our child in clipped, emotionless phrases. And it all started with what seemed like a trivial accident.
That morning, Oliver left for work as usual while I tidied the house, our little one napping peacefully in his cot. Around ten, his phone, forgotten on the side table, buzzed repeatedly. I moved to silence it, not wanting to wake our son—but my eyes caught the chat name flashing on the screen: “My Family.”
A jolt ran through me. “My Family”—why had I never heard of this group? As his wife, the mother of his child, wasn’t I part of his family? My stomach twisted. Curiosity got the better of me. I opened the chat. And instantly regretted it.
The messages were between Oliver, his parents, and his sister—no mention of me, except as the subject of their criticism. According to them, I was a hopeless homemaker, a clueless mother, and entirely unworthy of their son and brother. His mother complained I fed our child the wrong food, at the wrong times, in the wrong way. She called our home “a pigsty” and mocked me for looking “permanently exhausted, like I’d been down a coal mine.” His sister chimed in smugly, though she’d never so much as held a baby.
The worst part? Oliver’s silence. Not a single word in my defence. He hearted his mother’s snide remarks, liked his sister’s jabs. The man I loved, the father of my child, let his family tear me down. And I’d tried so hard—smiling through their nitpicking, nodding along to keep the peace, then quietly doing things my way. I never wanted conflict. I just wanted to belong.
When Oliver came home that evening, I couldn’t stay quiet.
“I read the chat,” I said, staring straight at him.
He paled—then exploded. “You went through my phone?! That’s private! How dare you?”
He shouted, accused, seethed. Not a word about how I felt. No remorse. No understanding.
Standing there, I barely recognised the man I’d planned to spend my life with—the one I’d forgiven for late shifts, grumpiness, exhaustion. I’d never hidden my phone from him; I had nothing to hide. But him? Apparently, he did.
Now we barely speak. He sleeps on the sofa, saying trust is broken. But I wonder—by whom? Him or me? Because I’m the one who feels betrayed. Discussed, judged, and dismissed—like I’m not his wife, just some temporary lodger in his family’s world.
I don’t know what comes next. We’ve mentioned divorce—maybe in anger, maybe for real.
But one thing’s clear: betrayal isn’t always an affair. Sometimes it’s silence when you should’ve spoken up. Sometimes it’s a like beneath words that crush someone else’s heart.
Right now, I just need to know—can I ever trust him again? Or is it already too late?
