I lied [25M] to my wife [36F] of four years about my age when we first met, can’t keep it up anymore

I [25M] met my wife [36F] my at the start of my senior year of university. I had just turned 20 and I met her while on a flight returning home from visiting my parents. She’s a flight attendant, and I was pretty cocky, flirting with her the entire flight. When I saw her getting off the plane behind passengers, I asked her to have lunch with me in the airport food court and was surprised when she said yes.

She jokes about me looking young, so I lied about my age and told her I was 25, but went to college late. I was surprised when she told me she was told me she was 31, and she jokingly confirmed I was indeed young. It turned out she lives/was based at the airport in the city I went to university in, I ended up going back to her place that night and we’ve been together since.

I originally had no plans of things getting serious, so I didn’t think of lying about my age as a big deal (I know, it’s horrible but I was young and dumb). We ended up falling in love very quickly, and By the time I graduated we were living together and engaged. It was easy to hide my lie about my age, my parents live in Ireland, my wife has absolutely no social media, and at the time we got married I had very few friends.

I took care of all the paperwork for the marriage license, we eloped in June of 2016. I was 21, my wife was under the impression I was 26, she was 32. We now have two children with a third on the way. I have a successful engineering career, my wife is still a flight attendant. We’ve moved to another part of the US, the majority of my friends who I socialize with on a regular basis think I’m 30.

I’m now estranged from my family because I am so afraid they’ll ‘out’ me even though it would be so easy to fly to see them because of my wife’s job. She has me on her flight benefits at work, but I haven’t renewed my passport because I’m so terrified she’ll notice my birthdate. I’m hyper vigilant about never leaving my wallet laying around, so she won’t see my driver’s license.

It’s getting to a point where I am self-loathing, riddled with guilt. I’m sick with stress all the time, worrying about if/what will happen when she finds out. I’m shocked I’ve made it this long. I miss my parents and brothers terribly, and I can’t make excuses anymore on why we haven’t visited them.

I know I have to come clean, but I’m almost positive my wife will leave me. I can’t think of a way to break it to her that I lied to her for five years without her never trusting me again, taking our children, and going to live with her parents. I’m also going to have to deal with the social fallout of losing the majority of my support system - all the friendships I’ve cultivated as an adult, my wife’s brothers who I’m incredibly close to, and her parents. Is there anyway to go about telling her without totally blowing up my marriage?

tldr; I lied about my age when I met my wife, I was 20, I told her I was 25, she was 31. Now, five years together, a marriage, and two (soon to be three) kids, I know I need to come clean but I have no idea how to go about it.

Submitted June 26, 2020 at 03:22AM by Throwawayagee https://ift.tt/2A3xY2C