SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Anyone can post (no stop sign) but I do want to hear from "my WW peeps" (tryin' to keep it light - goodness knows we have enough heaviness in the muck here to wade through)

It's not been my experience so I just don't get how "after the affair" - post d-day - once it all comes out - "now" your spouse is the most wonderful ever and you want your marriage back more than anything.....

I had an affair to try to ridiculously meet needs in a very eff'd up way because it wasn't happening in my marriage.

Some poster on here says she can't understand how people have affairs when kids are involved and ok. But I just don't see how people choose (now!) the person they screwed over so royally.

Didn’t happen this way for me either. My BH neglected me for decades. 6 months before d-day my BH left for 3 months of training. Ok fine but he couldn’t be bothered to call or text. He didn’t even call home for our daughters birthday. He cared more about work than us. I stayed because I’m stuck.

He’s now the model husband and my feelings have started to come back but resentment and wounds run deep. We are both working on it.

For me, it was as close to a spiritual awakening as I've ever had in my life. I took my wife for granted for a long time, plus I was a completely broken individual for many years. I suppose I can liken it to be a functioning alcoholic. I was able to get up and go to work and minimally interact in society. But my boundaries were shit and I was very inward facing. As long as my needs were met, life was tolerable. Then all of that crappy thinking really took over and gave me license to cheat.

Now that the blinders are off, I can really see what is right in front of me. I am able to really appreciate what I have, as opposed to being angry about what I thought was missing from my life.

I was at a shitty place in life and lacked the coping mechanism to handle it. Rather than reach out to my wife for support I turned inward.

I stopped seeing all that I had and focused on specific things I didn't have (healthy sex life, connection, external validation).

To your point of why the change? I now see that some of the things I sought were unmet because I was looking in the wrong places. Perpetual feelings of not being good enough were not because of other people's expectations but of my own. And the needs that were going unmet were because I thought they should be easy, yes shouldn't have to work, if I had to work for it it must mean she didn't love me.

My wife has been by my side the whole time but instead of seeing her for the remarkably strong woman she is who was trying her best and suffering from the same unmet needs as me, I just saw a broken marriage.

Now I see what I was choosing not to. Now I see the woman I fell in love with, not because she has changed but because I have.

Fww/my here. I cheated on my exbh/mh during our marriage because I felt neglected, not supported, and I had poor boundaries. We divorced and started dating again over a year later but remained friends. Now, he is living with the woman he started dating while we were dating and I am having a hard time with it. Our kids aren't big fans of her and his housemates are not her biggest fans either.

I still love him but realize now we probably are too broken to be a couple ever agaon.

To clarify my BH has a good reason for avoiding me but I wasn’t given that information despite me asking over and over and over again. I finally gave up on him. Enter OM.

Thanks everyone - same story different script more or less huh? I gotta read them a little more and ask questions.

Anymore adultery seems to me like such a chicken shit lazy way to live. But also broken as we have all noted in various forms of responses.

I might as well as have been Helen Keller for how different life looks to me now than it did pre-affair. With no disrespect for her journey at all but I hear and see things on such a different level now. And surely I had been exposed to all of this before the A. Thanks everyone.

Now that the blinders are off, I can really see what is right in front of me. I am able to really appreciate what I have

This is exactly how I feel. I don't agree with her but my BS says it is just because I have nothing else anymore.

Right islesguy - and kinda why I asked. I mean her response is totally logical, right?

My AP and the whole of the affair is vomit to me now and I'll not go backward for sure. Forward alone is better than a marriage that I can't make function for either of us that is hurtful for LO. Cause one person can't make a marriage function - even on a practical level.

This is a very good question. One of the difficult parts is understanding why all of a sudden as a BS my WS wants a relationship with me when all he did our entire relationship is have affairs. I too feel it's because he's got nothing left. That is until he decides to find someone else rinse and repeat. I think it's hard to understand how WS's compartmentalize so much including their feelings. If I was to fall for another person it would be because my feelings for my WS are gone and I would be moving on. The back of forth of "I want her.....now I want you" doesn't make sense at all. But then again a lot of what a WS does doesn't make sense. I wish I could believe my WS wants R because they really want me. But between "the AP is a nice person, I have strong feelings for her, I don't love you after he confessed on DDay" how else am I to ever feel.

Are the answers to the question the same for serial cheaters? I fail to understand how one can cheat again or claim to love and want their BS after seeing the devastation of previous DDays.

Because one person can't make a marriage function - even on a practical leve

In this type of situation it is logical to see how a WS can realize what is in front of their eyes.

This is also our marriage story. I worked my tail off as a BS in the marriage. Every thought was for husband, children, family. Clean home, dinners, pretty wife, I didn't go out with friends in the evenings, my children were model students, never in trouble at school. I supported my husband's career.

My husband was the most selfish asshole in our home. I made excuses. I got tired of fighting. I NEVER said no to sex. I was so lonely.

But guess what?. I never cheated. The concept of cheating is so wrong.

My husband's affair was just an extension of his selfishness. I am at the point that the past 10 years of 15 years of marriage hurt me more than his affair.

He is doing everything he can do to be more and do better.

He recently told me "you were an employee to me; I didn't see you as a woman". Even though I knew this. To actually hear these words. It hurt me more than the affair discovery.

I can see his current words backed up by his actions now. (Becoming a changed man)

I realize I have been experiencing all my blessings this whole time. It's so sad because he missed out on so many wonderful blessings. He can't get this time back or those experiences for himself.

I send him my Facebook memories everyday through text. It's bittersweet for him. He loves seeing our kids happy faces. But he wasn't present for a single event. Not one. I don't mean school or sporting events. But those picnics in the park. Kids riding bikes. Sidewalk Chaulk. Preschool programs. Me cooking or baking with the kids. He missed all of those things.

[This message edited by Iwantmyglasses at 11:02 AM, October 24th (Tuesday)]

Being fucked up and broken made me blind to everything. I was a total bitch. I still don’t know why BH didn’t leave me on the honeymoon. Yes I was that awful and I get to carry that shame now. In my defense I was undiagnosed bipolar and BPD plus my parents did everything in their power to ruin my life.

I knew the entire time my husband was the best thing that had ever happened to me. Every single box was checked and then some. I literally went out one year after a horrific 8 year relationship and and thought "I need the opposite of him" went out and found my prince charming. What lacked (in myself) is even though he told me constantly how beautiful, sexy I was, it was never enough. I simply couldn't see who he did staring back at me. I tried but eventually chalked it up to he loves me that's why he's saying it. OM on the other hand held up the most beautiful, filter effect mirror that made looking at myself glorious. So I was having my cake and eating it too. (BTW I hate that saying, who the fuck gets cake and doesn't eat it?? Like literally?) With that said once OM was gone that everything came crashing down on me "the blinders" were off it highlighted my husbands wondefulness even more.

[This message edited by JulieMarie at 11:24 AM, October 24th (Tuesday)]

This is a great question, and one that I'm sure a lot of BS's wonder, as well!

For me, it really didn't have anything to do with BH. Truly. We were happy up until 16 months ago. At that point, I stopped being happy, but not because of him. My other sources of support and validation fell apart, and I crumbled.

We were the same, but I was in a different place. Unfortunately, neither of us were equipped to address what was going on with me, at the time. I felt unsupported and that eroded my boundaries.

But you know what? I wasn't unsupported. I just wasn't seeing all the ways I was. I was so wrapped up in my own struggle that I was blind to all the things I had to help me get through it. Part of that was a love-language mismatch. I closed myself off, and then had the audacity to feel abandoned.

I completely relate to ChangeMe1 when he said:

Some of the things I sought were unmet because I was looking in the wrong places.

I'm looking in the right places, now. And, now that I'm seeing it, I am able to appreciate everything I always had.

I know, this is off topic.... in response to JulieMarie..

Have your cake and eat it too is an old English way of saying that you cannot eat your cake and still have it. Once it is eaten it is gone...

In other words, once you have burned the bridge down you can't still walk on it.

The phrase had always bothered me too until I looked it up on google..

ItsNotMe, Wow...this whole time...well that certainly makes sense! To think this entire time I'd debate people who told me that!

Now I want cake.

Frankly, I don't get it either, and it's a stumbling block for me. Yes, he was a selfish asshole before and during the A, now he's better. Suddenly I'm awesome?

It makes no fucking sense to me at all and really it kind of just makes me angry. He was so hypercritical for years and now, NOW, nothing is my fault and I can do no wrong. I mean yeah, my mental state is due to what he did, and we both know it. But before, stuff was my fault that didn't even have anything to do with me. If anyone should have had an affair it should have been me, but I promised myself I would never do that to HIM.

gonnabegr8,

Yes, her response is logical and likely the same response I would have if the situation was reversed so I don't blame her for feeling this way. This is just another example of how there will never be trust gain.

I think a lot of this points to the inability of the WS to love unconditionally and sacrificially prior to the A.

I am at the point that the past 10 years of 15 years of marriage hurt me more than his affair.

when I look back I realize I did not get from him what I needed and that is a whole new layer of healing. WS's who are remorseful and healing now realize they can love much deeper so they can feel the love that was always there. How sad that we BS's lose the love right at the time WS's get it. How ironic.

hen I look back I realize I did not get from him what I needed and that is a whole new layer of healing. WS's who are remorseful and healing now realize they can love much deeper so they can feel the love that was always there. How sad that we BS's lose the love right at the time WS's get it. How ironic.

I don't know if you saw my thread about forgiveness.

Through a series of church sermons; I realized. I was receiving all my blessings. He wasn't. He missed out. It's extremely sad for him. Now, I have the opportunity experience blessings with my spouse and my children (with their father). I don't want to miss out on this. I wanted this for so long. It did indeed come at a steep price. You know what though....the steeper price is on him. Not only did he miss out on our life for years because he was selfish. He also had to sell his "integrity". He literally had to be brought to his knees.

It's so easy to sit back and think. Oh well this shouldn't have happened. But it did. And how much worse would it be if he never got it. Or didn't use this horrific event as a catalyst to change?

Human beings get hurt. This is the truth of the world. And human beings hurt other people. Humans make horrible choices. Each of us has the power to make things right again.