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I am someone who needs detail. So I asked many questions and he has answered every one, but other than his word, all I have is phone records if when calls were made. The secret email account was closed, the messenger account was closed, and all text history erased.

So it kills me not to know some if the exchanges. I wonder how they talked. Was it cute and fun or more serious and love filled? I wish I knew, and then again I wonder if I had that info, would it have been too much for me to process and would it have changed our outcome (deciding to R).

Any thoughts from those that didn't get enough proof/info and this'd who got too much?

I guess I'm one that saw too much. Pages of email exchanges that were horribly XXX. On one hand I'm glad, I was able to read first hand the reality of the situation, what exactly was going on. I'm not sure I'd be able to rest otherwise, as I'm a detail person as well and Wh is hardly a forthcoming with info guy. On the other hand, I read what they said to eachother and that is burned in my brain for ever. The desire they had for eachother was INTENSE and I could throw up thinking about it.

Gun to my head however, I wouldn't change that aspect of it because although their sexual desire was so strong , I was able to see that there were NO feelings there, it was all just sex. Not that that makes it any better. I don't know. I've also found that for questions I've had that went unanswered for a while, what I imagined was going on was much much worse than what was going on.

All in all, info, no info, it all sucks and there are pros and cons to both situations I think.

ETA, without that major proof I know in my heart my WH would have NEVER come clean on what really happened. He's just not that guy. He would have minimized and lied through his teeth and gotten away with it all and the thought of living a life with him after and never knowing makes my skin crawl.

[This message edited by OldCow18 at 11:50 AM, October 29th (Tuesday)]

On one hand, I got more info than I wanted. On the other hand, I would be interested to see their text exchanges as well.

I did ask detailed questions and made him give detailed answers. I know what happened. But like you, it kills me how they texted like all night one night and his response about it was "I told her I wasn't sure I could do it, she said fine, and we talked about board games."

The flip side is that I found out by going into his Skydrive and seeing the photos he texted her that he thought he deleted....

I found about the A by stumbling across my WH's secret email account. Most of the emails had already been deleted. There were only maybe three still present (none of his sent emails were stored).

So all I had to rely on was his word as he answered the questions I posed to him. I trusted him that he was finally being honest with me. Well, it turns out he was still lying to me.

I'm praying so hard that he has truly disclosed everything at this point, but I have nothing but the word of a liar to go on. I wish I would have been able to get more information. I don't know if it would have necessarily changed anything, but at least I wouldn't feel half blind like I do now.

If I had more information to confirm a few suspicions, I'd have his stuff in bags at the end of the road.

As it is - I'm willing to give him the benefit of stupidity and see where this goes.

I think I have his attention because of my response when I found out about the last time he broke NC and when I found out chickie had been in our lives over a year..... Yea - that wasn't so nice.

I kept digging because something inside me tells me that after the online affairs he carried on with for at least 1 1/2 years couldn't just come to a complete stop. He did send both a NC e mail and I read them. What I found was an e mail from last year which of course was before DDay. It really upset me because he was saying he was looking for a date and a good catch....and we were together at that time, so how many coffee dates etc did he go on while with me to see if they hit it off????? According to him it was all on line and texting and phone calls - TT I think it's called and it kills me.

I really don't know the answer to that. I found out alot just from OW and only saw one text exchange. It went on for 3yrs so I am not sure he would even be able to tell me everything if he wanted to. At a year post-DDay#2 I don't think it would change if I found out more now of what happened then. I can't change what he did and neither can he. I never asked for too many details and he was never forthcoming, but only confirmed what OW had spilled to me on the 2dday's, which was more than enough to make me have triggers for the rest of my days.

I am struggling with the same questions. I know a lot about the LTA but not the ONS. This morning I asked for a list if names, dates, etc and then changed my mind. Part if me wants to know how many and make sure he's not in contact with any of them, but part of me fears it will be too much and if I have names I won't be able to quit researching them, which is not where to put my energy. I am in limbo on this...

I can tell you if I find out anything more that my decision will be easy.

I read the emails, but his text messages and pictures had already been deleted by the time I found out so I never got to see those.

I am very detail oriented and would love to have seen those for a few reasons. One, being that I would have actual evidence as to what happened and not his word. And two, because I would love to know if any of them were people he had more than one sexting session with him.

I knew about #1 and 4 when we separated. #1 was a failed attempt at a ONS in 2006 that we dealt with back then. #4 was supposedly "the love of his life". He walked out on his family for her. I discovered all of his porn, sexting, etc after he left. I came to terms with it and was ready to divorce him.

Then somehow we started to date again. I asked him point blank if there were others. He looked me in the eyes and said NO. I fell in love with my husband again over the next several months. He eventually moved home after a 10 month separation.

Six weeks after he moved home, I discovered #2 and 3.

Had I known about #2 and #3, I never would have started dating him again. We would be divorced by now. But, by that time, we were "in love" again. My kids were starting to believe in Dad again. My marriage was better than it had been in 7 years. I gave him an ultimatum that night. He chose me.

I will say that finding out about #2 and 3 made it easier for me in a way. I fully understand now that #4 was not special, she was just there. I had built her up so much in my head that I couldn't even say her name. But now, she's just one of many mistakes he made during his 6-7 years of fuckedupness.

Still, he let me reconcile under false pretenses, without the full truth. Had I known, I'd be living the single life by now...

I am still in distrust mode. I am really playing with the idea of a voice recorder for his car. Hopefully that can put an end to my curiosity

Like you, I only have phone/text records. My WS claims he wasn't emotionally attached but I can't help but be curious as to what he was saying to her in their conversations and texts. On Dday I counted 30+texts that he sent to her so obviously they had a lot to talk about. Would it change if I knew more info, yes I think so. Knowing what he was saying would tell me a lot about where his head was at during their affair.

I know some stuff that my SAWH doesn't know that I know because I accessed his old phone (he upgraded phone about 4 months before DD). So I saw a bunch of text between him and his AP. Very sexually charged. Also, he was her errand boy…"Babe, can you move the mattress in my apartment? The cable guys are coming in the morning." "Sure I'll take care of it no problem." I also saw stuff like "I want to be with you for the long haul." But honestly, he had no real plans to do that…and in fact let her "deadline" (her 30th birthday) pass without taking action. My H is not a planner to say the least. I guess in this case it was a good thing.

In a way it's good that I know some of this info because it paints a picture of what their relationship really was so I don't have to just imagine what it was like. It's fair to say it was not a "real" relationship.

Just like you, I was witness to very little, and I also wonder how it would have changed things. At the time WH was a deleting maniac to try to cover his tracks, and early on made comments about how he feared what I would have done if I saw their exchanges, but now he claims that he wishes the opposite. He said now that I know everything that happened and the stupid lies he told her he wishes I could have seen how dumb, unromantic, and unloving it was in comparison to our love letters and in comparison to how I imagine things. I'll never know the truth, or what the truth would have done to us, but I have to come to terms with that too I guess.

I'm a person who wants to know everything, and every detail I want to ask about, I can sure take the answer.

Here is what it would have changed, if I found out more...

If I had known on the first DDay that the A was *really* a LTA 7 years long with a hooker, I would have kicked him out that night, changed all the locks ASAP, and cleared his stuff out of the house and dumped his crap in the driveway or front yard.

[This message edited by Hope2B at 3:49 PM, October 29th (Tuesday)]

I have almost everything from the emails, texts, and google chats. He didn't protect her for one moment. He handed everything over the day I confronted him, which was HUGE. I don't think I could have handled TTing. We were able to recover the deleted texts shortly thereafter.

It does help some, as I know what he said about me and the marriage. Also, I can see how it evolved. Even though I have the evidence, I still have trouble believing him. A lot of it is telling each other how "hot" they are and how great they are at work, so it is a lot of ego stroking.

The sex talk is pretty pathetic. He basically described himself as Don Juan who was wronged. He completely threw me under the bus, which is a HUGE point of contention for me and several MC sessions have been devoted to it.

Also, there are a few segments of the OW giving him tips on how to help our marriage. What an idiot. NEWSFLASH: Maybe NOT sleeping with a married man may help the marriage? Or telling the married man to fu** off and go talk to his wife?

[This message edited by ILINIA at 4:24 PM, October 29th (Tuesday)]

D-day #1 was generated off of one text. I had no idea until then. I saw a bunch more after I started texting both OW myself that same night from his phone, but only that one text from him. That one text, with him calling her "babe" was enough to still be one of the top three things about the affairs I think about.

D-day #2 I saw enough recorded chats to get a general idea and to get an email address. When I emailed that OW, she clued me in on two others who were friends of hers. Then they contacted me and forwarded me pages and pages of emails and chats between them and my WH. Once they realized how much he had lied to them, they were happy to throw him under the bus and out him to me completely.

I won't ever forget the sickening drop in my stomach, reading his interchanges with them - how much it sounded exactly like his emails/texts/chats with me when he was courting me. And how impossibly frequent and prolific.

I wouldn't wish that feeling on anyone. What I read was so much worse than what I would have imagined. All the "us" dialogue and vocabulary that I had thought represented our courtship was used with all of them. ALL OF THEM. There was literally not a word special to "us."

Did it help me make an educated choice and understand exactly what was going on in WH's head? Absolutely.

Are there parts that I read that made R way more difficult? Absolutely.

The term "mixed blessing" is spot on.

[This message edited by Reality at 4:36 PM, October 29th (Tuesday)]

I'd like to have seen the texts, though I don't think I would have read them all, since I believe they were, as my W says, pretty lame.

For me, my biggest fear was that I'd find something that would be a deal breaker. I didn't want it to come out 6 months down the line - just after D-Day, I thought that would be a long time - so I pushed and pushed my questions until I felt I had enough to know I had everything I thought could be significant. I'm 99.9% certain that nothing important is missing from my understanding, so I now believe more info would not change my decision or my process.

In fact, nothing really significant came out after the 1st week, but if I had stopped my questions then, I'd be walking around in fear today.

Obviously, I'm for asking, asking, asking until you're more than satisfied with the answers, but YMMV. This is a very personal choice - the best approach is the one that works for you.

Details? No, I suppose they help with filling in the whole picture and I'm the type that needs that.

Knowing 1A was actually a PA instead of an EA as I was tricked into believing?

Well, I wouldn't have conceived DS 4 mos after c-day. Possibly would've filed for D by then. Would've kept my job at the daycare I had been at for nearly 6yrs instead of following MrH to another state. I had been moved from teacher to receptionist. Had I stayed, they were planning on making me assistant director because the director was leaving soon too.