This has been more difficult for me to write than I first imagined. I was not expecting the overwhelming response to my account of impregnating the barista at my local coffee shop. Many people have asked whether I am still with my wife and if she knows. I eventually told my wife. This is my account of what happened.
My wife and I were going through marriage counseling (something I never thought I would do) prior to this happening. A few years ago, we found ourselves at a point where we thought our marriage was going to end. My wife was having an emotional affair with a coworker. It was not something planned, but she was unhappy in our marriage, and I was oblivious.
I was providing a good life and home, but nurturing and affection were lacking. I think many men miss this. I was under the impression things were good even though I had my own dissatisfaction that I just set aside as part and parcel of being married. Never in a million years would I think she would seek affection and attention elsewhere, and neither did she.
Infidelity is one of those things you think you know about until you actually go through it. You think you know how you will react and feel, but it hits you hard and devastates everything you think you know. My wife was growing closer to a coworker, having intimate conversations, meeting with him secretly, and I had no idea. Just a funny feeling that something was off.
Everything came to light when my wife was late coming home from work again. I checked 'Find Friends,' and she was in a part of town that was very out of the way from us. Something wasn't right, so I pulled up our cell phone bill online and found multiple calls and texts to a number I didn't recognize. They were daily, and some of the calls lasted over an hour. I put two and two together and knew she was having an affair. I tried calling repeatedly, and no answer. Finally, I texted her that I knew what was going on and that I just wanted her to come home. She called me in tears and told me she was on her way back.
When she got home, we had a hard, emotional, and long-overdue conversation about her affair, our marriage, and how we felt. For her part, she was torn and ashamed about how she felt for this guy. She felt alive around him and could speak to him easily. He was interested in everything about her and didn't judge her. All these things she said he was, she was also saying I wasn't, and that realization cut me to the bone.
She said she did not have sex with him but wanted to. When I called her, she was on her way to his place. She had convinced herself nothing would happen, just talk, but she was fooling herself. She didn't understand why she felt so drawn to him, but she did not want to lose me.
For the sake of time, I will not go into the details of what we had to do to work through this, but it began with both of us being totally honest with what we wanted, and we both still wanted each other. We had to admit to each other and ourselves that what we got from each other had to change, and we were going to have to be honest about our wants and needs if we were going to survive. We found a therapist (actually, it took us three before we found a good fit for us) and began putting in the work to rebuild our marriage from the ground up.
Experts will tell you that recovery from an affair can take anywhere from two to three years and maybe longer, depending on the couple. It is not a short or easy road. Every day, you make three steps of progress; the next day feels like you fall back two. During year one, I was a mess. I felt emasculated, undesirable, foolish for trying to save my marriage, and basically like a sucker. I was at rock bottom. We were making progress, but at this stage of our recovery, I felt like I was second pick.
Oddly enough, the sex my wife and I were having was incredible. Probably some of the best we ever had. The term for this in therapy is "hysterical bonding." We incorporated fantasy into our sex play and were open about what and who aroused us. It was during this time that I met my barista. When I was at a low point in my life, this beautiful young woman reminded me that I was still a man. I do not say this to justify my actions, but I think it is helpful to understand my mindset during this time.
I felt like a charlatan at this point in therapy, and I was. I was talking about and working on being completely honest, exploring hurts from as far back as childhood, and sharing things with each other we never shared before. On the other side, I was having an affair that seemed like a balm for my wounds with no attachments, no stress, and no work.
I understood my wife more. I saw just how quickly you can slide from working hard at a relationship of substance to falling for what is easy and what feels good. But unlike my wife, no one was there to stop me from going into a physical relationship. No one knew totally what was going on except my individual therapist. She was the one who ultimately convinced me that if I wanted something real with my wife, everything had to be on the table.
During a session with our marriage therapist, about one year after things with my barista ended, I put all my cards on the table. I outlined how the affair began, how it continued, my feelings, how it ended, and the baby. I don't know what I expected, but it wasn't what I got. I think my wife could accept everything I outlined, but the baby was what clinched it.
There was no raging, no tears, no "how could you." She just looked at me in silence for what seemed like an eternity and said, "I'm done," and walked out of the office. She took an Uber, and I did not see her for a week (it ended up that she went to her sister's). I fucked up everything, and I knew it.
I felt like someone ripped out a part of me. The only other time I felt like this was when I discovered her infidelity. The difference is now I didn't feel hope. Before, it was up to me whether or not we continued, but this was my fuck-up, and I didn't think she would forgive this, especially the baby.
It took weeks before she would even talk to me, but eventually, she did. She went from being done with our marriage to at least being willing to continue counseling. Willing to see how to either fix this or end it. In a couple of months, after the hurt was not as fresh, we started having conversations about what happened. I answered all her questions. I remembered from being on the other side that being honest with my answers and telling it straight was better than trying to spare her feelings.
The first question was the obvious one: Did I love the barista? Yes, but not in the same way I love my wife. Typing it, the answer sounds shallow, so I can imagine how hearing it was, but it was the truth. I explained that my barista gave me comfort in a time when I was hurt and reminded me of a part of myself I thought was lost. She was also the mother of my child. For those things and more, I could not help but love her.
But I am no fool either. Much of what we had was fantasy: wild sex, no obligations, our kinky role play, but you can't have a whole relationship based on that. My barista was half my age and had her entire life ahead of her. Just as she didn't expect anything of me, like leaving my family for her, I didn't expect her to give up her life and future for me. It was a very odd relationship, but we understood each other. I don't think my wife expected that answer. She pictured me as a lovesick puppy for the barista because, in a way, that is how she was with her affair partner.
She asked me if I still desired the barista, and I truthfully told her yes, I wanted both of them. I needed both sides of what they each offered, and I felt like shit for having a desire that selfish, but I would be lying if I didn't acknowledge it was there. That she understood wholeheartedly. We talked about opening up our marriage as a possibility, but once we had a real conversation about that, I realized it wasn't appealing. I already got anything I would get out of that from my relationship with the barista.