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OakStreet posted 7/23/2014 07:18 AM

How did you acknowledge your wedding anniversary while dealing with recovery from your spouse's affair?

Next week is our 22nd. I am spending this week with friends at the beach and will be returning on our anniversary.

While I am in limbo, WH is supposedly "all in" for R. He is attending IC, while I wait for MC to resume after Dday 2.

So - he checked out of our marriage for 2 years. And his efforts at R have been a bit lacking.

Do we even acknowledge the day? In some ways, I feel THAT marriage is over. And I don't feel the love to declare a "new start".

We're still friends and talking...but it by no means will be a romantic evening.

How did you cope with this? I am afraid it will be a Trigger Day.

Deeply Scared posted 7/23/2014 08:33 AM

Oakstreet...

I think it's really important that you share your feelings with your H. If you don't want to acknowledge your anniversary, that's ok, there's nothing wrong with that. Just don't bottle your feelings up.

If you don't let your H know what's going on inside your heart and head it will lead to confusion on his part, triggers for you, resentment and a host of other things that can easily be avoided if you sit down and talk to him.

Anniversary's are hard in the beginning...you are definitely not alone with feeling this way.

Imissmyhusb posted 7/23/2014 12:54 PM

Ive been thinking the same as my anniv is coming soon.

If we do anythg it will be all on him. Which means we probably wont do anythg

OakStreet posted 7/23/2014 14:30 PM

Thanks Deeply Scarred:

I know my WH can't read my mind, but I certainly do wish he would show some initiative!

Aside from our wedding anniversary, there are a lot of "trigger anniversaries" coming up.

The next few months are going to be hell. And very painful.

Imissmyhusb: Sorry you are going through this too.

I guess I'll contact him and tell him no cards or gifts. This is so very hard - How long DO we say we are married?

whattheh posted 7/23/2014 17:00 PM

My fWH and I are talking about this. We are considering picking a different date for our anniversary and different time of year... the original one has lost its meaning for me.

Verynaive posted 7/23/2014 17:14 PM

I am right where you are. Very confused how I feel about it. Our 22nd is on Friday. Dday was a couple months before 20th. We had planned a trip to Hawaii for our anniv. Went on the trip and actually renewed vows. A couple weeks after we returned I got texts from the OW (a pretend friend) that he was still lying to me. Lots of TT. Decided to try to reconcile and a year ago today, 2 days before 21st anniversary, find out more TT. It all feels like one big lie. Vow after vow broken. Part of me wants him to do something to make it special, a huge effort. And the other part of me want to just sleep through the whole day.

sunfish posted 7/23/2014 20:43 PM

My first D Day happened on our 20th Wedding Anniversary - for me, the day is ruined. We reconciled less than a year ago and just passed our 24th this week. We went to dinner at our favorite restaurant and played it low key - no cards or gifts. I shared on the way home that I would like us to choose a new day to celebrate. He was speechless, but recovered quickly and is open to a new date.

At this point, I do what feels right and keep open lines of communication...

OakStreet posted 7/23/2014 21:56 PM

Yeah, Verynaive, sleep through the day!

I guess I don't want to give our anniversary date up, but it feels false to say we're 'celebrating' our 22nd.

But I told him on the phone: no card, no gifts please.

It's going to take a while to get over this second betrayal and hopefully MC will help. Cuz I'm just confused and in limbo.

I'm just wondering if my DS (19) will take note of the day and how we're behaving....

Areukiddingme posted 7/23/2014 22:11 PM

Our 21st anniversary came and went without a word from either one of us. I thought about it and knew I was going to be mad if he tried to celebrate and mad if he did nothing(very mature, I know). But in the end, the past year was not anything I wanted to celebrate, so I was okay with that. I would say we're in R, but we are by no means out of the woods yet. Try not to stress about it, go with your feelings on that day....especially if you're still on the roller coaster. Just my two cents.

OakStreet posted 7/24/2014 06:40 AM

I was going to be mad if he tried to celebrate and mad if he did nothing(very mature, I know).

Areukiddingme: I think I was in ^^ this place, too.

So, we'll probably go out to dinner & talk about my beach trip and his IC session. And all the nasty trigger dates that are coming up.

Thanks everyone for the input!

deena04 posted 7/24/2014 07:22 AM

We won't be celebrating it. He might be, but I am going to keep busy and get away for the day. He has brought it up and wants to do something, but I really just want to forget it.

Skan posted 7/24/2014 15:02 PM

I have not celebrated a wedding anniversary since DDay. Neither of us will again. We acknowledge well-wishers, but it's a date that is dead to us. That marriage was killed.

We picked a new anniversary date and we picked the date that we first saw our MC. That date has a lot more meaning to us than the other one now. It just so happens that we can drop a "2" and have our new anniversary come out correctly. This year will be our 23rd year of being married, but we will be celebrating our 3rd year of our new marriage.

Didact posted 7/24/2014 16:17 PM

How did you acknowledge your wedding anniversary while dealing with recovery from your spouse's affair?

Our 29th anniv was weekend before last.

At first, I wanted nothing to do with it, and WW respected that decision. She even whited out the notation on the calendar.

About a week before, I asked her if she'd want to prepare a date for us that night, and she agreed.

It was the best night I've had since dday. Dinner overlooking a bay, then a walk down to a beach after where we said what our intentions were for the coming year, and lit a floating lantern. The first lantern failed, we lit a second one (appropriately? called it plan B [one of my biggest fears]) and sent it to the sky. Some triggers happened, but she was there for them. For being only 4 months out, we did great, and it was because of WW efforts.

OakStreet posted 7/24/2014 16:45 PM

Didact: That sounds like a great evening full of promises!

In one respect, I also like the idea of celebrating another date: such as first visit to MC or maybe the date we BOTH decide to try to RECONCILIATE at the same time!

At the very least, if someone asks me how long I've been married, I'll be subtracting 2 years..