TL;DR my longterm partner slept with coworker (think self proclaimed “work wife” and best friend), whilst we were on a break. Now I’m struggling with how to proceed together.
My (28F) partner (27M) and I have been together for, coming up, 10 years. For full context, when I was a couple of weeks postpartum, with our second child, he cheated on me. We then went on a month long break as I wasn’t in the right headspace to deal with that. That happened 5 years ago now, and after that happened we moved across country and have been working on fixing our relationship.
Everything was going well since until a few months ago. We were arguing a lot and it was, overall, a very unhealthy environment. We both have stressful jobs, combine that with young kids and still being early in our careers (so still having a lot of financial stress), we decided to separate for a couple of months to work on ourself.
During that separation he started sleeping with a coworker of his. This coworker, is someone I have had issues with from the start. For the last 3 years they have worked together she messages him literally all hours of the day and night, they would send inappropriate memes and gifs, she would plant seeds of doubt (suggest I am cheating because I worked late, or that I must flirt with all of my males colleagues and bosses because that’s what she does and so do all women). All the while she would claim she wants to be my friend, hang out etc. I had asked him to put boundaries in place for years, but he never did.
Since we have started reconciling, I stated that if he didn’t put clear boundaries in place with her, I would not stay with him. He removed her from social media, doesn’t text unless it’s work related, however, they work side by side everyday. To add fuel to the fire, she admitted that she has feelings for him and had every expectation that by sleeping together he would cut all ties with me, to be with her. Which he very passionately denies would ever happen.
I don’t want to give up on our relationship, however, I’m not sure if I can handle the fact that he and her are still friends. Some days, I’m okay with it because it happened whilst we were separated, he was honest and has assured me he doesn’t want her in any capacity. But then there are other days, when I honestly feel sick to my stomach at the thought of them near each other constantly.
I don’t know how to proceed or what the best action is.