After My Husband’s Death, I Found out He Had a Mistress and a Secret Child

The Yomiuri Shimbun

11:00 JST, August 4, 2024

Dear Troubleshooter:

I’m a self-employed woman in my 60s and have two children. My husband, who was from the same generation as me, died of an incurable disease last year. Then, I found out that he had a mistress and a 7-year-old child with the woman.

I took care of my husband at home before his death. Shortly after I had sorted out the inheritance and some other burdensome matters after his death, I received a petition from family court informing me of the woman and child’s existence.

I was shocked and angry that something like this — which I thought only happened on TV — would happen to me.

She is a Filipina in her 30s whom he met at a pub in Japan about 15 years ago. My husband had traveled to the Philippines once or twice a year in recent years.

He legally recognized the child as his own the year after his mistress gave birth. He had given her more than ¥10 million to help her raise the child and build a house.

In court, I was shown the pictures of my husband with his arm around her shoulder or holding the child, as well as documents recognizing the child as his own written in his familiar handwriting. I felt as if all my strength had gone.

I knew he had been studying English hard, but he seems to have done so for all these reasons.

I can’t believe this because he was a hard-working and very dependable person. How can I go on with my life?

C, Tochigi Prefecture

Dear Ms. C:

What a terrible betrayal. I truly understand your anger and frustration.

But you cannot take your anger out on your husband anymore, nor can you ask him about his true feelings.

Sadly, you cannot change someone who has already died. It is difficult even to understand them.

But even if you cannot change the past, you can change your mindset.

To do so, why don’t you take a look at yourself? Stop thinking about the person who deceived you; instead, reflect on yourself, who trusted and fully relied on him.

Ask yourself why you were unable to see through his lies and what you found attractive about him in the first place.

Don’t let this deceased person control you, but put yourself first all the time and analyze yourself objectively.

If you can look at what happened to you objectively, like something that might happen on TV — as you said — I believe that your anger may eventually subside and you will be able to calm your pain.

As for the petition, handle it in an unemotional, businesslike manner with advice from professionals. They say that those who have weathered storms of the heart become more beautiful. Your life has just begun.

Tomomi Fujiwara, writer