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Back when my WW was in her A (this time lst year) I clearly remember how joyful she was. She bounced around the house, she usually had a smile on her face, she was up early and in the shower to be fresh for her AP, she laughed a lot, and she was great with the kids. I know that being desired and the excitement of the A was like a drug and gave her an enormous high but it’s extremely painful to think about. She was excited to be with her AP for sex and compliments, not about our marriage or me. I get it. Believe me.

I’m feeling so much pain over this lately. She joyfully lied to my face be with him. It hurts so bad to ponder this fact. Now she says she’s remorseful and I suppose is working on herself and being a safe partner (this is a slow process for her as she is not a quick study).

My question is how do I separate the pain from the past and move forward. If someone mentally hurt my child on purpose for personal gain, that would be the last time they are around my child. The past is an excellent predictor of the future. My stomach has been in knots with pain for almost a year and as Dday anniversary quickly approaches, im feeling extremely sick.

I did EMDR quite a bit and it might of made me worse. Her A is in sharp focus after those sessions. Maybe I need more. Any advice of support is greatly appreciated. Thanks SI brothers and sisters.

I have nothing to offer except to say I hear you. I feel the same as I am approaching dday anniversary in September. My WH wasn’t joyful, I’d say he was his normal self less the fact he was distancing himself from me. I was focusing on the kids, they had exams and he was “busy” working apparently. He was snapping often but I thought it was work pressure.

The months this time last year haunt me. Just like you I remember milestones in our day to day life. Our yearly holiday, little snippets of me wondering briefly if something is up (not an affair, no, my WH was a saint, he’d never do that, just little thoughts I had wondering if we are entering a new stage in our marriage where we were a bit too... routined, but I thought it was normal as he wasn’t complaining and I was accepting it), the fact that we were looking at moving house, plans for the future, issues with my brother when he was fully supportive. I look back and I really wonder when the hell did he find the time and energy to enter and maintain an affair. We were exhausted. My brother had a tough time and we were having to keep an eye on him almost 24/7. We were visiting daily and sometimes he had to live with us. My eldest had important exams. My youngest too. We were running around like headless chickens and he was the “perfect” husband. While he was also having a working hours affair (with texting in the evenings).

So I look back daily and things come to mind and I cannot believe that this is us now. It haunts me and I am still in disbelief that this happened. I remember telling friends at work I couldn’t do it without him. I remember telling him the same thing. I am waking up from my own fog and wondering how the hell did he manage his duality? How the hell did he have sex with her at lunch time and then came home and play the perfect supportive husband and father? How did he not feel any guilt and stopped?

I can’t separate the past from the future for two reasons: 1. He was his normal self mostly and hid it perfectly so I don’t know what’s normal and what’s not anymore when it comes to him. If he’s normal, loving and supportive does it mean he’s cheating? If he’s miserable is he cheating? 2. I still don’t know what the future brings. I’ll admit it: I have moments when I imagine myself single and it feels like relief. No more mind games and pain. No more anxiety.

I can only hope that one day, if we are successful at R, we can put the past behind us and find happiness. But I am afraid that, when people say that time heals us, they mean that you get used to the pain. I can see that my recovery involves a lot of getting used to how I feel now. I wake up, I acknowledge the shit situation I am in, I go about my life, work, kids, I find joy in little things while his A is always there, present to remind me it all changed...

For me, I had to let go of the outcome first.

I do remember that early on, my value got lost in the shuffle. I couldn't imagine the complete lack of empathy or how far someone will go to keep a bullshit fantasy going. There had to be something wrong with me. But, as we discover, no marriage can cause infidelity, it is one person's horrible choice.

To me, it sounds like you KNOW how you expect to be treated if the relationship goes forward and you offer the one last chance to your WS.

My wife had to show me that her worst days, worst behavior, selfish choices, and the lowering of her own personal standards, were actually part of the past. She had to make huge changes.

I think if your WS at least trying to understand the damage she caused, shows you some amount empathy (not merely be ashamed of her actions, but actually care about how you are doing NOW), then you will find it easier to focus on a possible future.

Two years of my wife working in a relentless 'I broke it, I got to fix it' approach, and these days I really believe she ain't playin'.

Understandably, I wasn't an easy person to live with the last 26-27 months. When someone cares enough about the hurt they caused, they'll hang in there (as they should) to work on showing me why I should stay in the relationship. That's when the past gets to the rear view mirror where it needs to be.

IMO, the events are in the past. The pain is in your present.

I know d-day was almost a year ago. The thing is, IMO, there is so much pain that it takes 1-2 years, maybe more, to get aware of it, and it takes longer to process it out of your body.

Your pain is not yet in the past.

She was excited to be with her AP for sex and compliments, not about our marriage or me.

NO SIR.

She was excited about a LIE...please remember that. It is just like the videos you see where a FAKE lottery ticket is given to someone...and for a few seconds they really believe it is REAL. They are ECSTATIC...until they find out the TRUTH.

You are remembering things also that are FAKE. There is NO WAY a cheater can be a great parent. She may have had fun times with the kids...but the A always took precedent. If it didn't...then your WW wasn't all that joyful about her A.

I have often read where the adultery co-conspirators are often torn...between their real life and their FAKE one. What has your WW told you about what was REALLY happening during this time? Does SHE remember that time as joyful?

The first year is HARD. You are anticipating the anniversary of the WORST day of your life...and your body is helping you to deal with it. Most people find that the actual day is not as bad as they anticipated. The GOOD thing about that day is that when you reach it...you will have proven that you SURVIVED infidelity . EVERY day after that will be a day that you have already lived through with the knowledge of the A. It may not seem like much...but it is!!!

You are almost there Dear Sir...and you will see that the WORST day of your life IS in the PAST . Then you can look forward to a JOYFUL future !!!

I don't separate the past from the future. I look objectively at the present. Right now, it sounds like your wife with her learning curve doesn't look so great in the present. This is likely why you feel like it is dragging.

A year in this is normal.

We can't know the future, all we can know is the present: watch and wait and be patient with yourself.

First STBXH, (((hugs))) to you. All the firsts are just so very hard. Each time they either came upon me in a surprising way or I thought I was prepared and then something different happened. Year 2 is much better for the antiversaries IMHO.

But to get to your question,

My question is how do I separate the pain from the past and move forward.

That's the part with which I am having the most difficulty. Here's what I told my WH today - I want to be with you physically and emotionally but I feel like I am still not seen or heard. And that's the part of you that still makes me feel unsafe. It sounds like something similar for you.

So while we are anxious to get those feelings back again and to be able to move forward, we have to wait until our bodies are emotionally ready.

My question for you is how do you relate together now? Do you talk about the A? Do you talk about the way in which you want your relationship to be? Do you talk about your pain? Her struggles? Or is most of the swept under the rug right now?

I don’t have much to offer as it was a jump I couldn’t make. My ex too was never happier than those few weeks I think it was the last time either of us were happy together.

Hopefully time will help. Plenty here have made it. Hopefully you can too.

Is she pulling her weight?

I am going to very respectfully disagree with some on here.

I don't believe in the fog or that it was all some fairy tale betrayers lived for a while. It was real, it was intended and the remorse 99% of the time comes from being caught. That's the real world we live in.

The betrayer's job is to truly believe they have done 100% wrong and totally turn from it, be contrite and remorseful and do everything in their power to be committed to their spouse/marriage or just move on.

To the betrayed, we have to accept that our spouses, the ones we loved and trusted, brutally betrayed us and loved every second of it- so long as it was secret. Our job is to accept the facts, and if we desire to retain the remnants of the relationship and hopefully grow on that to accept the facts, cope with it and try and forgive in as much as we can.

To me, this is the hope of reconciliation- accepting the true, brutal facts, cope, heal, move on.

Sorry to be a downer, but I dislike creating a lot of false fronts for betrayal.

STBXH.

is your wife appearing to be happy now?

I ask this b/c my H was not always himself during the A. He was short tempered (out of character). I thought firca ling time he was comparing me to the OW.

But at times I look back and the pressure of the A and guilt was taking its toll. The OW was pressuring him to D me.

Regarding separating the pain of the A - that takes time. It doesn’t just magically end when the A ends. One thing that helped me was that I could see my H was making amends and working hard. I also could see the changes he made.

And putting my recovery and healing as a top priority for me helped also. My H found only do so much to fix the damage - but I also had to fix my damage.

And once I did that every day - worked on me first - I started being happier and happier with my life.

STBX: About a year out from DDay. At this stage your WW should be making if very clear that she is grateful you are still with her and her deepest joy is the second chance you are giving her. Right about now is when true remorse should be kicking in and she should be showing you every day how much she desires you and how happy your presence makes her.

If you're not feeling that, let me remind you that from your side, at this stage, D should very much still be on the table. As in papers drafted and either filed or ready to file.

I totally understand what BP is saying. I want to add to these comments.

In the moment their needs are worth all costs. They matter more.

I think we say...what happened??? My spouse wAsnt like this before. I don’t think it’s true. For many of us we lived in marriages with excuses/explanations. It takes the betrayed a long time to face the true of who their spouse is.

If your spouse had the ability to go from being a normal human to a human who can betray....this is a major personality flaw.

If your personality allowed for subtle desrespect, made excuses, disregard for you in the relationship—this personality changes after an affair. The BS changes.

For years I projected my value system onto my husband. He had none of my values. I see it clearly now. If he had the values I hold dear. He would not have committed adultery.

Adulterous people do what benefits them.

Your wife’s affair was gross. I want to know how in her brain mini van sex in the park made her feel valued or more of a woman.

You can’t go anywhere, Facebook, Pinterest without seeing nasty jokes about women who participate in affairs.

I am imagining your wife isn’t dumb. She sees this just as I have seen it. Even OW in movies/ music are betrayed as morally defected. So why?

Why, did she find value in her despicable actions?

I hated doing EMDR too. Immediately after each session, whatever part of the betrayal we were working on would feel so fresh and painful. But after a few days, I would notice that the visceral reaction I had been getting from that particular trigger would be dissipated. So yeah, the trigger would still be painful but without the stomach-roiling sickness anymore.

Trauma screws up our sense of time. I don't know why, but it does. The past feels present, like it's happening right now. The best advice I've had for when that happens is to try Mindfulness to reengage the present; breathe through the trigger, notice visually whatever is in your field of view, listen to sounds and identify them, etc. Just take that pause to get back into the present. Does it take the pain away? ..nope. But with practice, it allows you to feel less overwhelmed by it and more in control.

The sad fact is that your cheater and my cheater and everyone else's cheater here... did what they did because they WANTED to. It made them happy at the time. They ENJOYED it. And they didn't think about us. They didn't care about us. All they cared about was getting that dopamine buzz and keeping it going.

When I ask myself how my WH could be so happy while he was betraying ME, the answer is that I wasn't even a blip on his radar at the time. I was just an obstacle to be avoided so he could get his biochemical high. In fact, if he were to be brutally honest, getting one over on me would have been part of the excitement, paying me back for any and all disappointments he'd ever had in our 30+ year marriage.

Of course that's a painful thing to acknowledge. Of course it is. We don't want to think that the person who promised to love, honor, and cherish us could so thoughtlessly crush us for something akin to a cocaine buzz. But they can and they do. And it's not about us... it's about them.

Integrity is what you do when no one else is watching, and these are people who have behaved without any. They've shown us a breathtaking capacity for deceit which devastates our old view of reality (hence the triggers and the time warp as our brains flop around trying to redefine what's real and what isn't).

Time is fluid though. It's a river which keeps on flowing. Who a person was yesterday may not be who that person is tomorrow. Real change is difficult but not impossible. Our challenge is to recognize it if we see it without allowing the bias of the past or hope for the future to impede our view.

If we give a cheater a chance, and they fail to make the internal changes necessary, we've given grace and the failure is on them. We don't owe a cheater a chance. They can either learn to be a person on consistent integrity, or not. That choice is theirs. We have no control over that. What we do have control over is how long we'll continue to give time and grace.

Sometimes I think the key is all about recognizing our own power as it pertains to what we control and what we don't. I had no control over my WH's choices then... and I don't now. But for the first time in many, many years... I'm able to identify what is in my purview and what is not. Weirdly, as my inner confidence grows, I care less and less what other people think of me... including my fWH.

STBXH - this is where you should have your sights.

Weirdly, as my inner confidence grows, I care less and less what other people think of me... including my fWH.

It is a great place to get to but difficult. Gently, focusing on what she did to you is a false paradigm. She did this to herself and you are on the sidelines as collateral damage. You may be putting yourself at the center of her but that's not where you sit. She is in the center of her and always has been. Now you need to be at the center of you and she is on the sidelines. Then you will be able to distance yourself from the situation.

This is the year for you to get to that place and my experience is that this part of the recovery is extremely hard but seriously necessary for you and you alone. You will get to a better place so that you can manage your life the way you need, irrespective of her or what she did to the M. Dig deep, don't panic (although I understand it and have lived it) because this part of the ride is maybe the roughest but most rewarding. You are on the way to a total breakthrough my friend.

[This message edited by ISurvivedSoFar at 7:45 AM, August 13th (Monday)]

The hard part was learning the depth of the lies and how long they lied to your face. Mine lived a double life for so long. But we are working real hard on R. It is a journey. You cannot change what happened you can only learn to live with it and move forward or leave. There are not a lot of options.

Wow, these are all amazing replies. I’m reading all of them carefully and methodically. I have a bunch of questions and responses to all of you and will try to get to them tonight. Thanks everyone ❤️

Luna10,

Hello from the States...hope the UK weather is a bit better this time of year my friend.

YOU SAID:

How the hell did he have sex with her at lunch time and then came home and play the perfect supportive husband and father? How did he not feel any guilt and stopped?...

...If he’s normal, loving and supportive does it mean he’s cheating? If he’s miserable is he cheating? 2. I still don’t know what the future brings. I’ll admit it: I have moments when I imagine myself single and it feels like relief.

Wow. Parallel universe stuff right there? Mine also had sex at lunch. And, that thought of being supportive and just an overall great spouse? That is my reality as well. I'm so sad you're feeling this but I'm also so glad that I'm not alone in this EXACT thought.

Oldwounds

YOU SAID:

When someone cares enough about the hurt they caused, they'll hang in there (as they should) to work on showing me why I should stay in the relationship. That's when the past gets to the rear view mirror where it needs to be.

This is the struggle I have. Like I said, my WW is slow to learn. At this point she's not cruel or blame shifting (only minorly when pushed against the emotional wall) but it is frustrating when things aren't moving along at the clip I expect after such a f@#$% tragedy. I'm working on my patience through IC. I have learned the hard way that some people don't think like I do. Especially people who are capable of such emotional trauma. I'm letting go of the outcome and also learning to forgive myself if this doesn't work out. Divorce is always an option. And I keep reminding myself of that. Even if she becomes a super spouse, I may not be able to accept the A. I gave it another year to work through. Also thinking about seperation to clear my head. Hopefully I can look in the rearview one day. I envy those who do.

sisoon

YOU SAID:

The thing is, IMO, there is so much pain that it takes 1-2 years, maybe more, to get aware of it, and it takes longer to process it out of your body.

Your pain is not yet in the past

That's exactly what I'm afraid of. Sustaining this pain is an excercise in sadism. I never thought I could handle this as long as I have without killing the POSOM or drinking myself to death. Thanks for the reminder my friend. I'm anxiously waiting for a day of relief in the future.

Want2Bhappy

YOU SAID:

She may have had fun times with the kids...but the A always took precedent

BINGO...this is a painful realization that took me all of two minutes to come to grips with on Dday. Our kids were left with family so she could go have sex in the van with her lover a few times a week. There were days and nights were she was distant from me. Even on some date nights alone her mind was elsewhere. I don't know how to exactly reconcile this fact. It is a painful memory.