'My brother faked that my wife had an affair and I believed him.' UPDATED

"My brother faked that my wife had an affair and I believed him."

I met my ex-wife Kelly when we were in college when she asked me for some notes one day. We had been sitting next to each other for weeks without a word until then. We started dating and got serious pretty quickly, which upset my younger brother Robert. Robert was about 16 when I started dating Kelly and you could tell that he had a bad crush. She was always nice and took it in stride.

After Robert left home and got into college, I let him move in with us. Kelly and I had been together about 3 years, living together for for 2. We all had a good relationship.

Kelly started complaining things were misplaced soon. One of her earrings would disappear, her panties, sometimes it was socks. She was under a ton of stress, changing medications, so we both chalked it up to her ADHD giving her an issue until one day, I caught my brother with a pair of her missing panties. We found everything he stole.

We kick him out and he goes to live with my parents again and begs for forgiveness and decides to go to therapy. It takes about 5 years, but we all decide it was water under the bridge, Kelly included. Robert had a hard life growing up, he said it was all acting out.

A couple years ago, I received an anonymous e-mail that Kelly was cheating on me. He knew dates she was out of town, names of co-workers, and everything. They gave me no photographs, but knew enough details that I was sure they were telling the truth. Kelly fought me on it, denied it, begged for marriage counseling, but cheating is a solid dealbreaker for me.

Robert came to stay with me as my emotional support while Kelly was there. Kelly had asked me to get him to leave multiple times, stating that he was watching her and making her feel uncomfortable, but all I said were things I'd rather not repeat about her not being trustworthy.

The day she left last April, she said to me that it was going to turn out to be my "pervert brother" and that if it is, she hopes I feel every ounce of pain I just put her through.

My brother has apparently been wracked with guilt and confessed last weekend. He told me in front of our parents. I couldn't say anything, I just walked out and went home. I turned my personal phone off and I've just been walking in a daze. I go to work, come home, I watch TV, and I go to bed. I can't tell you what I've eaten for the past week, what I've watched.

My Dad came by to talk to me tonight and he wants me to talk to my brother, tell him that it's going to be okay and we can work through it. I turned on my personal phone for the first time to see hundreds of texts from my brother. I just want to reach out to Kelly and beg for forgiveness and ask her if we can start over.

Here's what top commenters had to say:

LushFlower said:

Not to kick you when you're down, but your soon to be ex wife warned you. And it sounds like your parents support him still, even though he's blown up your relationship twice and terrorized your wife for years. You all made choices and now you're gonna have to live with them.

You should tell her she was right, so she can have validation, but don't expect understanding, forgiveness, or reconciliation. She's better off away from you and your toxic family especially that psycho stalker brother of yours

JooJooBeeNYCgirl said:

You should’ve trusted and listened to Kelly. She’s better off and you should not bother her.

Confuseddragonfly said:

Well you'd best go powder your poor poor brothers ass, make him feel better and it's going to be ok and keep feeling sad and in a daze. You had already caught him with her panties and other stolen items. Why you wouldn't believe her the second time is beyond me.

Leave Kelly alone, she doesn't need anyone's lame apologies. It took you 30 mins to throw away what you had and a year for your brother to admit what he did.

And Successful_Win_2259 said:

Yeah leave Kelly alone, you endangered your ex-wife, let her stay safe away from your brother and you

Three days after his original post, he shared this update:

I vented about finding out that my brother faked that my wife had an affair on a business trip. I'd been in a daze since I found out. I kept reading that everyone said leave Kelly alone, but I sent her an email to where we had been communicating about little things that popped up and then I went to bed.

I apologized, told her that I know I can't mend things, but that she was right and that Robert was out of my life and probably my parents, too. I didn't expect an email back, but I received one and it was massive. It was filled with a lot of personal things that I don't want to repeat.

She said she understood the desire to listen to that e-mail, but that she wasn't even able to defend herself, that I just gave her time to get out and then immediately moved Robert into our home where she watched him intentionally keep us from communicating as she was forced to leave.

She said she would've done anything, let me talk to her coworkers, check her Geotracking, but Robert kept a permanent buffer and I allowed it, belittling and mocking her along with him whenever she attempted to talk to me.

She thanked me for the closure on this chapter of her life and she wished me the best, but she asked me not to contact her again, ever. After the year and three months she said she endured, she isn't the same woman I knew.

She asked me to set the record straight with any former mutual acquaintances, but she honestly never wants to hear from any of them either, and to tell them so. She told me I poisoned that well when I accused her of what I did, and it was the most bitter and isolating experience she's ever dealt with and that she genuinely feels nothing for anyone in her former life, including me.

She also told me cutting out Robert is a great idea, but don't cut them off trying to get her back or even in her good graces because she is moving overseas on a fiancee visa to try things out with her new fiance. She said they've only been dating 8 months, but she's never felt this way about anyone in her life and that she thinks he might be her soulmate.

She told me to learn from my mistakes with her and to find someone to love more than I loved her. It crushed me to see the word "soulmate." She used to tell me all the time she thought I was her soulmate.

I called my Dad yesterday morning after reading the e-mail and I told him that I am not going to comfort Robert. He ended my marriage through lies, made me a liar to all of my friends, and isolated and hurt one of the most loving, loyal people on the planet who tried so many times to help him.

My relationship with Robert is over, and I told him that if he has a problem with that, my relationship with him is over, too. My Dad told me he understood truly how bad it was once I broke it down that way.

I'm going to put in a transfer request at work tomorrow. I live on the West Coast, maybe I'll head to the East Coast. I'm going to get a change in scenery, a therapist, and figure myself out.

Here's what people had to say after the update:

ZestycloseSky8765 said:

I’m glad she found her soulmate. I hope she can heal from the pain you put her thru

Starry-Dust4444 said:

I’m sure you are feeling pretty down about this response but it sounds to me like she got her life together, after you pulled the rug right out from under her, and is on the right path. I’m happy for her & glad she found someone who will treat her with the respect she deserves.

You, however, need to do some serious soul-searching & ask yourself why you were so quick to believe these lies (I’m sure some simple replies to the email asking for additional details would have caused the whole scheme to fall apart) and why you didn’t respect your own wife enough to listen to her. You’ve got a lot of work to do on yourself before you even think of embarking on another relationship.