SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Read again and again DRSOOLERS advice!

You are in charge of what your future will look like, choose carefully!

Actually, it's very simple.

You'll leave her. And she can stay in her company.

You're already starting to resent her. Why make it harder for her?

Just leave and divorce her.

You can still reconcile in a few years, after you have healed and after you saw how she "behaved" in the separation and divorce process.

There is another option here.
Since by not immediately quitting the job, or at least asking you if you want her to quit, she’s already told you her priority list and you’re at the bottom.
So,
Do you believe the company will be worth a substantial amount in the somewhat near future? You could always just white knuckle the "marriage" until the time that it’s worth enough, then divorce her and take half of her portion of the company.

If he divorces her, why couldn’t he take half of her stock/options now?

Wow since Your kids financial future might depend on her success this is a tough one.

Research the OM he could be a con man who has done this before, did your WW invest family money into this startup. Possibly the OM uses affairs to blind women and steal from them.

I’ve been in that (startup) world repeatedly. She must choose between her marriage or her startup. Co-founders work crazy hours together, usually under both exciting times and stressful conditions. Her relationship with her AP co-founder is forever MASSIVELY tainted. There’s absolutely no way for things to go back to "just friends".

That also goes to you OP. Unfortunately you must also choose between a CHANCE at R (someday) or the (statistically smaller) chance of landing a payout from an eventual exit. If you choose the cash route (your wife stays with the startup), know that you cannot get there with a truly healed marriage. If she’s still working closely with her co-founder, which she absolutely must, the infidelity continues, whether it’s "physical" or not anymore. What’s truly sad is that your either/or have something in common: not-great odds of succeeding, whether it be a truly healed & happy marriage or a startup landing a big exit.

You still must and can choose only one. Sucks she put you in this position.

straight talk. No sugar. Your head is spinning, so treat this as a checklist.

1. Say nothing about divorce until you're prepared. Right now she thinks she's managing you. Let her think it. While she performs remorse, you quietly gather every financial document you can legally access: tax returns, bank statements, her equity/vesting docs, the cap table if you can get it. The spouse who prepares in silence for 60 days beats the spouse who announces in anger on day one.

2. This week, consult the top 3 family law attorneys in your county. Not one. Three. Once you've consulted them, they can't represent her. Consults cost a few hundred bucks and commit you to nothing. You cannot make any decision - R or D - from a position of ignorance.

3. Understand your leverage, because it's enormous and it's shrinking. Her AP is her co-founder. That means a divorce filing doesn't just reach the marriage - it reaches the company. Depositions of the AP. Subpoenas of their communications and expense reports. A forensic valuation. No startup wants founders deposed about an affair mid-fundraise, and investors hate reading "founder litigation" in due diligence. You never threaten any of this - explicitly threatening to expose the affair to her investors to force a settlement can cross into extortion, so don't. You just file if it comes to that, and legitimate discovery does the rest. The pressure builds itself.

4. Her equity is almost certainly marital property. The timing of filing relative to valuation events (funding rounds) can matter a lot depending on your state. This is exactly the kind of thing your attorney needs to weigh in on. Another reason to go NOW.

5. Dissipation. Every marital dollar spent on the affair - hotels, dinners, gifts, "offsites" - can often be clawed back or credited to your side. The timeline you demand from her is also an accounting document. Get it in writing.

6. If you're in a state where fault matters, proven adultery can reduce or completely bar her from alimony. If you out-earn her, this could be the whole ballgame. Again: attorney, your state, now.

7. From this moment you are a saint on paper. No angry texts, no drinking, no moving out of the house, no revenge dating. Custody evaluators don't care who cheated. They care who's steady. Her 80-hour weeks with her AP become your best exhibit without you saying one unkind word.

8. Know the trade you're being offered. Others here said it and they're right: as long as she works beside her AP, the affair isn't over, whatever she calls it. You can hold out for a payout from an exit that statistically probably never comes, or you can pursue an actual healed life. You can't have both. Only you can make that call, but make it with full information, not fog.

Your leverage is maximal exactly once: before she knows you're serious. Every week you accept words instead of actions, it decays. None of this forces you to divorce. It puts you in a position to choose instead of react.

Standard disclaimer: not a lawyer, laws vary wildly by state. Which is the entire point of #2.

[This message edited by Sharkman at 11:49 AM, Monday, August 10th]

I really appreciate everyone who's chimed in here. We're now back home from our holiday and I've reminded her that -- although we had a pleasant time over the past few weeks with the children and my family -- in my mind nothing's changed, the affair is still ongoing, and if she's looking for R, which she claims, it all starts with NC with the AP. Suffice it to say, she hasn't taken that reminder well...

In the meanwhile, I've already been in contact with two family law firms and will possibly initiate a conversation with a third (thanks for the tip @Sharkman). She has no idea that these consultations are occurring and will likely be taken by surprise when the time comes. It hurts me to go this route, but she really isn't giving me any other out.

For everyone who's commented on the implications to the startup, I absolutely understand my leverage here. For my children's sake, I'd rather not blow up her company, which I believe is currently valued in the low single-digit millions. I'm not at all entertaining the idea of sticking around for my own payout, given the low probability of a successful exit in the world of biotech.

And as for me, day by day I'm seeing R become more and more improbable. I've opened up to more friends, my own family, and even her brother, with whom I'm close. Everyone agrees with my (our) assessment: that she can't have both our family in its current state and her company. Really poor decisions on her part have guaranteed awful outcomes for everybody...