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First I want to say I am grateful for the insights of everyone who has contributed to this forum. I am not that far out from DD and even less time considering I had 7 weeks of TT and gas lighting (a term I didn't know before this forum but it describes my WS's actions during that time).

We are both in MC (which started during TT) and IC (which stared after and was one of my terms for R). So far WH is remorseful and doing the work. He is broken and knows he must fix himself before I see myself recommitting to our marriage. He broke the marriage vows and our marriage is dead. I am cautiously open to R but have told WH it is too soon for me to be "all in". Slowly we are finding ways to work through the pain and I am determining if what we have is worth the work. In all honesty, some days I feel that it is and some days I am ready to throw in the towel.

I was thinking today that in a way the fact that the EA turned into a PA may in our case, help our chances. No, I am not glad that he had sex with a 22 yo COW. I could have lived my entire married life without a third person involved in my marriage. But considering the PA ended on it's own 2 months before DD (of course that is if his timeline is entirely true), Apparently, the 8 times they had sexual contact (3 of which were intercourse) were enough for them to realize that wasn't what their relationship was about.

The EA continued until DD. Why am I thinking that at least he won't be wondering the "what if" or "what it would have been like" to be physical with her?

Like everything else in this entire situation, I feel like these random thoughts are just me trying to rationalize the irrational.

I could have lived my entire married life without a third person involved in my marriage.

I like the way you put that.

I think you'll find, as you go along, that you'll have all sorts of crazy thoughts. Most of 'em come and go. Some stay for a while. IMO, it's all from

1) the human desire to make sense of life, or
2) an issue you have to deal with, or
3) random noise generated by your creative mind....

This particular thought sounds like it came from random noise.

My advice is to accept/roll with the weird thoughts and stay focused on your healing - processing the grief, anger, and fear that comes with being betrayed.

JMO, of course.

[This message edited by sisoon at 5:39 PM, May 29th (Thursday)]

Thanks for the reply. Typing it out made me realize how absurd the thought really is. Random noise is a great term for it. It is like my head and my heart are working together to make any sense of this surreal experience that is my life.

I have to agree with sisoon. I sometimes find myself trying to come up with some kind of reasoning or something that makes sense of all this mess. A lot of the time it makes me feel better to just accept it but then when I really think about it, there's no justification at all. Sometimes we do what we have to do to gain some kind of control in our sanity. Thoughts like those I feel just gives us a little break of thinking about all the wrongs. I don't know if that makes any sense but I think it's our way to survive all the roller coaster emotions and thoughts we have to deal with as a BS

It is great how you can find a grain of positive in barrel of negativity, keep it up. Those thoughts some good some crazy will keep coming ang going, sometimes I am sure of something, and then couple days later I wonder how could i ever think this, it comes and goes, good luck!It will get better

As someone recovering from the effects of an EA - your observation struck me as opposite to what I would be thinking. For me (at least as far as I can guess) a PA would be worse than an EA, somehow it seems a more concrete betrayal. So if I had known my FWH had a PA rather than an EA that would be it - a point of no return (impossible to know what I would really feel).

However, that thought is pretty random of me, because the betrayal has been hugely devastating, even though it was an EA. So maybe my logic about this wasn't sound in the first place ugh...

I think we all look for ways to make the situation less awful than it is. I remember feeling grateful it was only 2 months long rather than 2 years, like the average.

You'll see people on here saying they couldn't tolerate X, Y or Z, as if somehow there is a scale of adultery. Obviously some things are more heinous than others, but, we all hurt.

I have caught myself thinking the opposite of you -- why couldn't my H have taken longer to get to a PA? Why did he go from EA to PA in a month? Some people take years, or not at all! It is all different shades of crazy, in my opinion.

So, you are trying to self-soothe in my opinion. And you know, it really could be worse for almost all of us. Maybe it is a step towards acceptance. Be easy on yourself.