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Hey everyone. New to the forum, although d-day was about two months ago. I have what seems to be a different situation than most..
I have been married less than a year and discovered that nearly that entire time, my H has been having online sexual encounters with MANY women (all strangers). He travels for work and has exchanged messages with women in the cities he goes to looking for "casual hookups". He claims that he never actually met up with any of them, and I never found any evidence that he did... But deep down there's a nagging feeling in me that he did. And even if not, it was clearly headed that way. And the messages are devastating enough regardless.
When confronted with what I had found, H had the audacity to deny. Once he finally realized that there was no way to continue denying what I knew, he broke down and was hysterically upset. He seemed extremely remorseful at first, and to an extent still does. He wants to stay together and things have been different, but I don't think he's willing to do absolutely anything to make me feel at ease. He understood my being upset for a couple weeks, but now if he sees me cry, he gets very frustrated. He doesn't come out and tell me to get over it, but he doesn't seem to understand why I would possibly still be upset... HELLO! How about the fact that my entire world was turned upside down by the very man who promised to honor me and be faithful to me for the rest of our lives? Ugh... I just feel so lost because I cry daily and think about it on an almost constant basis. He has almost convinced me I'm making this too big of a deal but I'm surely not.. I thought for sure I wanted to reconcile our relationship but now I'm wondering if I came to that decision too quickly. A big part of me wants to leave. We have no children, we are still young, I could start over... That is very appealing, although I know it has its own challenges.

Anyway, that's where I find myself today. Ask again tomorrow and you're likely to get something different. I'm sure you're all familiar with this roller coaster, though. I wonder if anyone else has a story similar to mine? It's in some ways easier because there's not this other woman that I have to worry about him being in love with. In some ways it seems harder because I am disgusted and left trying to figure out why he wanted anyone and everyone but me.

((movingbackwards)) Welcome to the greatest club you never wanted to join. Sadly there are many of us like you. There is a resource thread for those with WS into anonymous encounters and prostitutes:

http://www.survivinginfidelity.com/forums.asp?tid=502528&HL=32550

Please read it.

It is highly unlikely he has never met any of these people. You need to read this thread, get STD tested immediately, and see a doctor and lawyer immediately.

I know in general people like to say, if you are young and there are no kids, cut and run with anything less than 100% remorse. It's easy to say that when it's not you. But please understand it takes a very advanced level of broken to pursue anonymous sexual encounters and it will take a long time for him to fix himself, even if he threw himself into it full force right away, which does not sound likely ATM.

I wouldn't wish this special sort of hell on anyone, and if I didn't have kids I would have immediately filed D, do not pass go, do not collect $200, and never looked back. But because he is the father of my kids, and it wasn't legally advantageous on many levels for me to do so, I had to take another path to at least try.

You don't have to make any decisions on your M today. Today all you need to do is read this thread, and make appointments with your doctor and lawyer. Eat, sleep, and cry when you need to. You will get tons of great support on this thread. Keep posting.

Thank you for the response. That thread is extremely helpful. Very glad I've found this community.

I am sorry you found yourself here and for what you are going through.

Your story is a bit like mine. I found several things over the years just like you did. I found emails, pictures, craigslist ads and his replies, phone #'s in the emails. I confronted him and he would say it was all online, a fantasy of sorts. He would also be very remorseful, at first, then like your wh, would think I should be over it by now.

In April, I went to the dr for my yearly pap test and found out I had herpes. She told me I could have had it for years and it just now broke out, but I knew better. I confronted my wh and he denied it at first. Then he told me he met someone on Ashley Madison and had sex with her. I kept questioning him because I didn't believe him. He then said it was a prostitute from cl.

My advice to you would be to not believe him. Keep looking, keep questioning him and get an STD test.

Thank you for sharing Butterfly. The beginning of our stories are just about exactly the same (Craigslist ads have been the main form of communication with WH as well). I do plan to get tested and move forward from there. Again, either way the devastation is terrible but just seems to be a whole other level if he met up with them.

Really your situation is not different at all as you will sadly find out the more you hang out with us. Individually sad--absolutely. Different---no. You will find what is best for you. If I was young, newly married and without kids I think I would have walked.

My WH started cheating within the first year of M and kept it up for the next 5 year and 10 months. If I had known then, I would have cut and run.

I know it's easier said than done, but please trust me, from someone who has been there, it's probably for the best. Now I'm almost 12 years into the M, 3 kids, and essentially stuck.

Do you want to spend the rest of your M always wondering if he's cheating? Do you want to spend all your time worrying, checking up on him, always waiting for the other shoe to drop? How would you feel 10 years from now if you find out that he just took this behavior underground and you just wasted the past 10 years?

My WW cheated on me only 9 months into our marriage. The problem is, I didn't know about it until years later.

Had I known about it at the time, I would have gotten a D. Unfortunately, as time goes on and lives become more intertwined, it is much more difficult to D from a financial standpoint. I could still leave her now, of course, but it would have been easier to do it early on.

You are young, you have no kids, and you are newly married to a cheater. My advice? Get out now! You are one of the lucky ones who found out right away. Use that to your advantage and get out.

Life's too short to be caught up in a quagmire of crap.

There are many paths that you can take from this point. It is best for you to sit and think things through. This is a decision that you will need to be able to live with.

To me it sounds like your H really doesn't know what to expect in your healing. That it isn't just an I'm sorry and all is well. You might want to read some in the wayward section. I think there is a thread about what a betrayed spouse needs to heal. From such threads you might be able to pass on some helpful information to your H.

I know you love your WH. We all did. Your story is similar to mine 30yrs ago. My XWH#1 cheated on me before and after our marriage for over 20+yrs. I wasted a lifetime trying to believe him and change him. It never worked. We finally got a D when he couldn't give up his 18yr old "friend". He was 45, hadn't worked in years, and continues to be a messed up dick.

I am not telling you to D your WH. If you want to make your marriage work however, he has got to own what he is doing and seek help. Otherwise you will spend a lifetime like myself in a messed up marriage with an unremorseful spouse. (((HUGS)))

Thank you for all the responses and advice. I do want to try to reconcile, at least for now. I am not making any long-term commitments to stay in the marriage at this point, but I want to see if it is possible to move past it. If he does not put forth the effort required, I don't have any opposition to walking away. I just want to know that we tried.

I will clarify, I was pretty frustrated when I wrote yesterday, I don't think he isn't remorseful and I don't think he's unwilling to do what it takes. I think he just doesn't know what it's going to take, and up to this point, I've been unable to communicate that to him and ask for what I want. I plan on pursuing IC to learn how to tell him what I need, and I also think we need more MC. I think after our first MC session went so well, it left him with the feeling that all was right... and he needs to understand that it's not, and won't be for some time.

Thanks for the thread recommendation, Movingupward. I will check that out and pass along.