A Letter Claimed My Husband Had An Affair—How God Restored Our Marriage

Beloved friends, are you going through a difficult hour? Are you feeling like this is too much? Are you emotionally exhausted? Are you feeling so raw and weak, like you never thought your life would turn out this way? If you’re disappointed, broken, and feeling all kinds of shame and fear, this post is for you. I’m going to share something super personal and painful that I went through last year praying that it would encourage your heart!

2024 brought me one of the worst experiences of my life. I often find that the mercy of God is even sweeter when we are going through extreme pain and suffering. Sure, no one chooses to go through a tough time, but I have found that what is learned in the ringer can build our character like nothing else can. I pray that as you read this post, no matter what you’re facing, you’ll find hope in the lessons God gifted me through the valley of the shadow of death.

2024 was by far one of the toughest years ever. In March, I got an anonymous letter in the mail telling me my husband was having an affair… actually, it said he was having multiple affairs. As I read each word, I could feel the life, love, and trust being sucked out from under me. I felt like I and my family were under HUGE attack. A weird feeling of, “This is a joke and cannot be true!” oscillated with, “Is it true? Oh my God in heaven, help me.” I honestly felt that when those keys were pressed by the person who wrote it, as light as their fingers were on the keyboard, they pressed a weight so heavy on my soul that I could barely breathe.

I showed it to my husband, and he began to read it with me. We both ran upstairs to talk—maybe scream—about what was happening. As we reread the letter, we both felt so much pain, and I know I started to feel anxious and worried. Even if the letter wasn’t true, someone still hated me enough to write something like it and merrily send it over to my home.

When I read the letter, I legit felt like it had been written by the enemy himself! I felt so attacked on so many levels. Not only did it tell me my husband was cheating on me, but it also defamed my character. I had a choice: do I believe the letter, or do I seek God in His infinite wisdom?

I sought the Lord. After crying for five minutes, I realized it was time to fall to my knees and pray. I prayed out loud as my husband watched me (we had both just read the letter and were BOTH EXTREMELY EMOTIONAL). I prayed that God would help and lead us. I prayed that God would give us wisdom, that we would not become each other’s enemies, and that we would work together in this hard hour. I prayed for the anonymous person who wrote the letter, and I blessed them in Jesus’ name because if you’re intentionally sending something like that in the mail with no name attached to it, you are definitely hurting. So I prayed for God to heal and help the person who sent it.

As I knelt in my pain and just sat for a minute after my prayer, I heard the Lord give me the BEST SCRIPTURE for what I and Doug would be walking through this past year: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him, and He will make your paths straight” (Proverbs 3:5–6).

I knew I couldn’t start blaming Doug, and I needed him to tell me if this letter was true or not. It’s been the hardest battle of my life having this letter in the back of my mind. Satan has used it so many times to discourage me from trusting God, myself, or anyone else for that matter. I realized that the letter’s intent was from THE ENEMY HIMSELF. He wanted to destroy my joy, my hope, my confidence, my trust, and my peace. This passage guided me all year as I resisted leaning on my own understanding of whether I would trust my husband or the letter.

I had a choice at that moment. The minute I read it, it felt like one of the biggest spiritual warfare attacks of my life. I knew it was meant to destroy me—and by extension, destroy my marriage, my family, and my daughters. So much weight carried in that tiny little piece of paper that someone so easily sent off with a stamp. You have no idea how powerful words can be until you are sucker-punched by the meticulous sentences you might read or hear.

However, I’ve been in a similar place before—choosing whether to believe words spoken by someone else or THE TRUE WORDS OF MY GOD AND SAVIOR. I can’t say that I acted perfectly throughout the year as I grieved the loss of trust and the foundation of “normal” for our family. It has been one of the most painful experiences of my life. Not only did I face the suspicion of whether the letter was true, but I also felt the sadness and grief that someone who apparently knows me very well intended to destroy me and my family. Who do I trust?

JESUS. I trusted Jesus. When all else fails and you feel like you don’t know which way is up, Jesus IS THE ANCHOR. I believed my Savior and my husband, who has proven to me that our relationship WILL NEVER BE PERFECT, but he is willing to be in it with me day in and day out. Are we both sinners? Yes. Are we both so flawed that we mess up our intimacy at times? Yes. Are we going to disappoint one another again? Yes. But are we being healed and growing in Christ? By God’s grace, yes.

We are at the mercy of the potter’s hands, and sometimes being in a relationship just hurts. It’s tough because it reminds us of old wounds. Jesus sees the decay in us that we can’t see, and He allows tough circumstances in our lives to act as a refining fire, burning away anything hindering us from seeing ourselves the way He sees us. My goodness, that letter was a GODSEND. It forced Doug and me to confront really hard things we had been avoiding. We took time to examine our relationship, sat in uncomfortable conversations, and ultimately found freedom from past hurt and resentment.

The letter became a key to bringing us closer in intimacy, and it actually STRENGTHENED our marriage. This year has been so tough, but it has also been a year of TOTAL RESTORATION. We’ve been praying together and speaking scripture over one another. I’ve been declaring affirmations over our marriage like never before. I love this verse in Romans 5: “But we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.”

The truth is, marriage is about sacrificing yourself for your spouse and vice versa. The process is painful, and no one wants to endure it because it hurts. Marriage wasn’t designed to make us happy; it’s designed to make us holy as Jesus sanctifies us through our relationships with each other. We see the BEST in each other, but we also see the WORST. Yet, if we don’t give up on each other (except in cases of abuse where safety requires leaving), we can experience relational intimacy that is worth the pain.

I had to heal from my own relational trauma with a therapist and Jesus so I could love Doug better. I had to uncover wounds from my past—like abandonment and sexual abuse—that marked my soul in ways my husband could never fix. Only Jesus can fix and heal us. Only Jesus can satisfy our souls. Spouses aren’t meant to meet all our needs; they’re fellow flawed humans with their own baggage to sort out with Jesus. When we rely on the Lord to meet our needs, we can come to marriage differently—without an agenda or unmet expectations.

The letter helped me realize that I didn’t feel good enough for my marriage. No matter how great a husband Doug might be, I would always be insecure unless I deeply relied on the Lord to heal me. Now, I feel free to be in a relationship with Doug. I feel safe within myself because of the redemptive work Jesus did on the cross for me.

Last year, I dedicated myself to healing. On my birthday, I ran a half marathon, and the entire time I trained, I prayed that God would heal any part of me that wasn’t aligned with His sufficiency for my soul. I knew in my head that I was a new creation in Jesus, but I didn’t feel like it. I knew in my head that Jesus died to give me life and life abundant, but I didn’t feel it. I knew in my head that when I accepted Jesus, His perfect scorecard became mine, but I still didn’t feel worthy.

I was tired of being a Christian for so long and still feeling like Jesus hadn’t transformed every part of me. There were areas of my life where I felt worthy and valuable, but in relational roles—as a wife, a mom, or a friend—I still felt unworthy of love. So, I dedicated every run to Jesus healing me. I would pray, “Lord, let what I know as head knowledge become a part of my soul and my entire being.”

I can tell you, without a shadow of a doubt, that I now feel good enough. I feel free from the shame, guilt, and worry of not deserving my husband’s love. I feel honored that God allowed this letter to reach me because, without it, I wouldn’t have entered the most whole, free, and fruitful part of my life. Isn’t it amazing how God can use our worst circumstances to bring about good? That’s the God we serve. That’s the God we love. He is a miraculous and intimately purposeful Savior who heals us, transforms us, and uses us for His glory. I did my part, I trusted God and I spoke life to our marriage every day. I didn’t let the enemy win the war over my mind.

I never imagined I would feel this way. I still have days of doubt and worry about my marriage. I think anyone who’s human would occasionally wonder about their relationship. However, those doubts no longer leave me insecure or distrusting because I know WHOSE I AM. Even though I am imperfect and my husband is imperfect, JESUS IS PERFECT. He is always trustworthy, and He never fails.

This experience taught me that my worth and security can never come from another person. They come from Jesus alone. As I’ve grown in this truth, it has freed me to love Doug more deeply, without fear or conditions. Our marriage, though imperfect, is now stronger than ever because it’s rooted in the unshakable foundation of Christ.

As you read this, if you’re going through something painful or overwhelming, I want you to know that there is hope. God can use even the most painful trials to refine you, draw you closer to Him, and bring about blessings you never imagined. Trust Him. He is with you in every moment, and His love will never fail you.