A Reddit member shared some incidents that changed his life. However, he did not anticipate having to deal with the loss of the one item in his life that would never go away after surviving a cancer that could have killed him.

After fighting a cancer that drastically altered his life, a married man who was losing a lot of his talents was thankful to still be with his wife. However, he was forced to confront one of his greatest fears.

After realizing that his wife was actually in love with him behind his back, the Redditor decided to speak his opinion and let go of his emotional baggage. He commented under the “Off My Chest” subreddit and declared, “I’m going to make myself the villain.”

The Original Poster (OP) battled a serious degenerative condition for almost ten years of his life. Pain, surgery, medications, and a wheelchair took the place of his career, home, pride, and everything else that made him happy.

According to OP, he was only able to walk 20 feet and was only able to lift a few pounds. He had not done most of the enjoyable activities he remembered doing for the previous ten years. Despite all of his hardships, OP believed he had never lost love.

The spouse of the Redditor consistently went above and beyond to assist him. OP advised her to let him know if anything she did for him was too much, even though he appreciated her efforts. But OP felt she had no problems at all because she never brought up any related topics.

One day, while OP was in the hallway attempting to put on his shoes, he heard his wife conversing with her friend. He explained that she must have assumed he had left to pick up his son from Airsoft practice for an unknown reason.

He overheard his wife complaining about how weary she was of taking care of him and how tired she was of having to assist him with tasks because of his disabilities. OP was astounded and continued to listen in wonder. He heard another honest confession from her in the blink of an eye, and it devastated his heart.

“I’d give anything to be able to have sex with a real man again,” the wife said. but never made an attempt, primarily because she didn’t want to take the fall for abandoning her ailing husband. She broke the OP with her remarks. “A true man? “What does that make me?” he thought to himself with pain.

The OP claimed that although he had always knew his wife was frustrated and irritated with him, he had never realized how little she thought of him. He entered the kitchen, clearly in pain, and deliberately let his tumbler fall to signal his arrival.

When OP’s wife discovered he was home, she hurried to see how he was doing. He told her a falsehood about going back to get his water bottle and made the decision to face his darkest feelings by himself.

After deep thought, he decided to make it easy on his wife. So that nobody would blame her for leaving him, he would portray himself as the bad guy. He planned to tell his wife about a make-believe affair with another woman so she would get the happiness she sought.

But after reading his plight, people advised him not to rush since his wife could’ve just been venting her frustrations. “I will also add that the way she was feeling in that moment doesn’t necessarily mean it’s her “true” feelings,” wrote another Reddit user, explaining how everyone has unpleasant feelings and fleeting thoughts when upset or frustrated.

The person further added, “While hurtful, I don’t think she necessarily has been pining away for you to disappear just because she’s venting to her best friend.”

Another commenter agreed and shared how their mother would often rant about their terminally ill father by saying things similar to what OP’s wife said. “…but in the end, she’s just venting. She loves my father with all her heart…We all vent about our loved ones at some point, but we still love them,” the person explained.

Ultimately, OP was determined to see his wife happy and help her get everything he couldn’t give her. He knew his fabricated affair would hurt her but it would also set her free from judgment from other people. “She’ll be free from guilt…She will be free…from me,” he painfully asserted.