'My husband asked for a paternity test and our relationship was never the same.' UPDATED
"My (24F) husband (31M) asked for a paternity test and our relationship was never the same."
My (24F) husband (31M) and I have three children, our sons look exactly like him (dark skin and dark eyes and hair), but our daughter doesn't.
She looks exactly like my great grandparents (really pale, blonde and green eyed), but apparently he didn't think it was possible that our daughter could look like my great grandparents, and from the moment he saw her he told me he wanted a paternity test.
At first I refused because I felt it was humiliating and because I didn't think it was necessary because I never cheated on him and I hoped he would trust me but he didn't and for the first two months of our daughter's life he made my life hell.
He didn't want to hold her even if she cried desperately while I was doing something else, he never woke up at night to help me with her, he never helped me with anything and that hurt me so much because with our boys he was completely different.
He helped me all the time with absolutely everything and he was always there for me after giving birth, but this time he left me alone and it was the worst experience of my life. I have no family here and his entire family from the moment they saw my daughter turned their backs on me, I don't have any friends here either so it was just my daughter and me.
She is a colicky baby so it was very difficult for me to do everything alone and on top of that help with our sons.
I decided to do the paternity test because one day his entire family came to our house to celebrate my son's birthday and no one spoke to me and they didn't want to include my daughter in the photos that my in laws took of all the grandchildren. So I knew it was stupid to keep waiting for them to come to their senses.
Well, the paternity test came back positive and everyone was shocked and of course they felt guilty for not having believed in me. Everyone apologized and my husband even cried when he held our daughter in his arms for the first time and I know that his apologies were genuine and that's why I forgave him but I don't know if I can forgive his family.
They treated me really badly and said horrible things about me just a few days after giving birth and I can't forget their insults. My husband knows that I don't want to see his family nor do I want them near any of our children and he told his family, so these last three months it has been just the five of us, but it doesn't feel as good as I expected.
My husband is constantly apologizing and crying every time he holds our daughter and I am getting tired of this situation. I want us to be happy as we were before. So how can we move on? My husband suggested that we should start couples therapy, how much can therapy help?
Here's what people had to say to OP:
onionringrules
Your husband is a cruel person. Could you really move on from that? I know I couldn't.
individual_baby_2418
Have you ever broken a piece of pottery and then tried to glue it back together? It’s never the same.
Ok-Point4302
Just the way he treated your daughter would be hard to get over. Even if he thought she wasn't his, that wouldn't have been her fault. Cruelty to a child is pretty inexcusable. How old were you when you got together?
Asking because you must've started very young to have 3 kids by 24. Given his maturity level, I guess it would make sense that he went for someone much younger.
OP responded:
I was 18 [when we got together]
Adorable-Time-8916
I would've stapled the paternity test and divorce papers together. I'm so sorry this happened to you but I'd not forgive any of them. If anything your husband is the worst of the bunch. He's your husband and he dropped the ball massively. Not only that, but he then gave his family that ball to throw at you and your daughter. It's a no from me.
Frolicndetour
It's weird you are forgiving him and not them for the same behavior. His was far worse because as your husband he should have your back and trust you. His family doesn't owe you nearly the loyalty your husband does. They all suck but him worst of all.
Indoubttoactorrest
He got you pregnant three times before the age of twenty-four? And you're isolated with no friends or family?
He knows you didn't cheat. This is about control over you and you're allowing him to fake cry his way into taking no responsibility. Are you going to submit or stick up for yourself? Get on birth control too, and stop letting him get you pregnant for God's sake.
compassionate-pisces
You can never go back.
OP gave this update 5 days later:
I think before the update I should clarify a few things to put you in context, I know I should have said it in my original post but I didn't, and that made many people believe so many things that are not true.
Before I got pregnant I met a man (I think he's in his early fifties) at work and you could say that he's a little too friendly, for example he liked to buy me and another female coworker (she's in her late fifties) coffee every morning, or once in a while he used to leave a flower on our desks and things like that.
That never seemed strange to me because he never tried anything with any of us, he was always just friendly, and he was always talking about his wife, children and grandchildren and giving us parenting advice.
Well, my husband didn't like that I was friends with this man because he said that he was sure that this man liked me because I'm young and that he would soon try something with me, and when he told me that I told him that I wouldn't stop being friends with him because he was always respectful and I didn't see anything wrong with being friends with a man.
And I'm not gonna lie, he got really angry but after a few days he forgot about it.
But all those doubts resurfaced when our daughter was born, because she had a lot of platinum blonde hair, which none of our other children (5M, 4M) had, and my husband thought she would look like her brothers, but no, she looked completely different from him and me and that made him doubt, my coworker is not blonde but he has the same eye color as our daughter and he's very pale just like her.
So my husband asked me for a paternity test and I refused because it was humiliating and because I thought that at least he would educate himself about basic biology but he didn't, and when I say this I mean that my great grandparents look exactly like my daughter, same color hair, eyes and skin, and he always knew that but decided to ignore it to believe that I was cheating on him.
And I know that I helped this situation escalate and end badly because I should have accepted the paternity test, and I say that because here it is not easy to do a paternity test without authorization from both parents.
And regarding his sister and mother, they never liked me and for a while we even stopped having contact with his family because I didn't like the way they treated me, but when our second son was born I felt alone because it was just my husband, his friends, our son and I and I wanted my children to grow up with a family so we got back in touch with them and in fact they treated me very well until my daughter was born.
And when they pulled my hair my husband wasn't present and I didn't tell him until a few weeks later, and by then they had a big fight because of that.
Well, the update is that I gave him an ultimatum and told him that I want to go live in my home country and be close to my family and that if he didn't want that then the only option would be getting divorced.
When I told him that, I also told him that I'm talking to a lawyer to advise me on divorce and joint custody, and I guess that made him realize that I was being serious because he said he would be willing to do that to earn my forgiveness. Another thing I asked him is to cut off contact with his family forever because I don't want our children to suffer what I suffered with them, and he agreed.
At the moment our plan is to travel for Christmas and stay there for a few weeks and move in the middle of next year. In the meantime we will go to couples and individual therapy and hope to be able to solve our problems. So far things are going well and I hope they continue that way.
EDIT: I don't understand why there are so many people accusing me of being a terrible wife and not supporting my husband when he told me to stop talking to my coworker. I've supported him since we started dating, I moved to a different country as a teenager, I left behind my family, friends and everything I ever knew, all for him.
I didn't go to college until last year because he was doing his PhD and I had to stay home with the kids full time, which is why I could never have a single friend here, because since I arrived here my only duty was to be a mother and housewife, and that consumed all my time.
I got my first job when I was 23 and it was only because the kids were old enough to go to kindergarten, so don't say I don't support him because that's the only thing I've been doing since we started dating.
This was the first time I had "friends" here, even though they were both over fifty, and it felt good because there were days where I felt so alone and talking to them at work made me feel good. But for him that was wrong and when my daughter was born I quit my job that I liked so much, just so that he would stop feeling insecure, so don't jump to conclusions or say stupid things.
Here's what people had to say to OP:
The Edit is chilling - you were completely isolated and locked at home since you were a teen! Not being allowed to have friends or a job.
This relationship is toxic. I'm glad you are going back to your own country, maybe your situation will improve. But your husband won't stop being controlling or attempting to isolate you - he just may have a harder time isolating you when you are there. But it will still be possible tho, if he terrorizes you enough with his jealousy.
I really hope the move happens, but I am a bit skeptical since it would mean he is giving a lot of his power over you. But I hope not, I hope you manage it! I hope you manage to get friends when you do, and can actually take a step back and see how messed up your relationship has been all those years.
It isn’t so much the requesting a DNA test - it’s the way he mistreated, shunned and didn’t support your or the baby, and shared his doubts and allowed extended family to do the same - that’s the bigger issue.
4 months later OP made a new post summing up everything, "Am I wrong for telling my husband that he ruined my life?"
To put you in context I (24F) met my husband (32M) when I was 18, and as soon as we started dating I moved with him to his country because I was madly in love with him. Well, a few months after arriving there I got pregnant and I couldn't even get into college, because we couldn't afford a babysitter, and that's not all, after our son was born I got pregnant again just a few months later.
And I had to postpone going to college again because we couldn't afford that expense with two children because only my husband worked and at that time, and it was a part time job, because he was doing his PhD.
Until he graduated and got a well-paying job, I didn't have any social life, my life was reduced to being a housewife, mother, and wife, I didn't even have time to make new friends so I was always alone because his family hated me and we didn't have a good relationship.
But I always put up with that because I loved him and I was so proud of everything he had achieved and everything he did for us, because the truth is that he always did everything possible to give us everything, and I'm not just talking about material things.
I got my very first job at 23 when our kids were kindergarten age but due to life circumstances I had to quit that job just a few months after getting it, and those "life circumstances" were that when I got pregnant for the third time my husband thought it was from a coworker with whom, according to him, I was having an affair.
He didn't want to hold our daughter during her first months of life even if she cried desperately while I was doing something else, he never woke up at night to help me with her, he never helped me with anything during that time.
We had to do a paternity test for him to believe me and accept our daughter. After that I got really angry with him because I was tired of being alone, tired of not having friends or family around, so I asked him to go back to my country.
Last year for Christmas we moved here and he is doing everything to help me now that I am going to go to college, he got a good job here while while he waits for the validation of his degree to be able to work here, and I can't complain because here now we have my family nearby.
We have a nice house, we have a lady who helps us with the cleaning and cooking, and we plan to hire a babysitter when I start going to college.
The point is that lately my friends have been leaving me aside because we don't have the same lifestyle. They go to the club every weekend, and even some days of the week now that it's summer. And I feel like we're not as close as before because I have a completely different life.
A few weeks ago they started planning a girls' trip to the beach and my husband told me that it would be nice for me to go to reconnect with the group, but I couldn't accept because I didn't want to be away from the kids since we were never apart for so long.
When I told him that, he got angry and told me that I should keep my friends and that I'm not going to die from being away from the kids because he is their father and he also knows how to take care of them.
Then he told me that he is worried about me because when we started looking for babysitters I also behaved in a paranoid way, that I should teach the children to be independent and things like that, and I got angry and told him that he has no right to talk about my social life because he was the one who ruined my life.
And hearing that hurt him because he just said that that he knows that he was very selfish by prioritizing his PhD over me but that now he wanted to fix his mistake and help me get closer to my friends again. But I didn't want to listen to him and I haven't spoken to him back since this morning, am I wrong for that?
edit: I didn't say that it's not my fault that I got pregnant, but I'm tired of the fact that whenever I try to have some financial independence and start my studies, "accidents" always happen. I can't tolerate female contraceptive methods for hormonal reasons so we only depend on condoms and something always happens.
This time I moved here thinking I could work and go to college and I ended up pregnant again for the fourth time having a daughter who is only a few months old and two children of 5 and 4 years old, and I'm not saying that it's only his fault but I am tired.