SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I believe, in hindsight, that the false reconciliation I have been in has been worse for me psychologically than if he'd just left me after the A.

The first year after D day were horrific. Then after that it stopped being horrific and just moved to rug sweeping.

I saw on a thread here someone said "What he put me through during the six months after his affair was far more cruel and abusive than the affair itself. How somebody can see another human being in agony and then continue to treat them so horribly is a mystery I will never solve"

For me this is most definitely true.

Did anyone else go through similar to that in the aftermath?

In my case he wasn't outright saying or doing this - if he had been I would have left.

He was crying and saying he loved me - but his actions were continued lying and betrayal and refusal of even step 1 of reconciliation and I feel ongoing trauma from that.

Has anyone else experienced it, and how did you heal yourself or come to a place of understanding?

I was in false reconciliation for months. I didn’t know about SI until years after my H’s last affair. So I made all the classic mistakes too.

But thanks to SI here is what I learned. It helped me. Maybe it will help you.

I see you are struggling with the fact your H will not open up and bare his soul (so to speak) or go to counseling etc. In your other post you describe how he’s good to you and kind and caring etc.

So unfortunately here is where the betrayed spouse comes to a critical point in the marriage.

It’s called acceptance.

You have a choice to make. You accept the affair. You accept his "efforts" at reconciliation. You accept his explanations of whatever info he has provided.

Because it’s all you are going to get.

You can continue to spend your life fighting for what you want/need, or you can stop the inner turmoil and accept he’s not going to change.

From there it’s Reconciliation or Divorce.

Yes the betrayed is treated horribly during the affair. Yes it’s trauma beyond words. My H during his midlife crisis was going to D me. I listened to that crap for 6 months.

And then I decided that no matter what happens to my marriage, this affair was his fault. I did nothing to deserve his lies and cheating. It was my responsibility to heal myself and be happy. Despite his affair. Despite his wanting a D. Despite the crap I had to endure from his affairs.

Life is hard. Sadly you don’t need people you love to treat you poorly. But they do.

But I would hate to see you spend another day waiting around for something you are not going to get.

Here is my example of how I came to this mindset. My H had one bad habit. He was never accountable for his time. He’d have a client dinner (legit) and say I’ll be home by 11 pm. Show up at 1 am w/ no call letting me know he was late. Did it for years.

I spent 15 years trying to get him to pick up the phone and call. He would not do it. So finally I stopped asking. It was not going to change a damn thing.

However after dday2 when I told him I was D him, he suddenly realized that I was serious. And all of a sudden he stopped being MIA and started telling me where he was and if he was late etc.

He decided to change. It didn’t matter what I asked for for decades. He ignored that. But suddenly he felt he needed or wanted to change and that is the only reason he changed that pattern of behavior.

You deserve to be happy. I struggled for 3 years after dday2 until I found SI. In 6 months I learned much and became a much happier person.

My marriage is not my number one priority. My happiness and satisfaction is. I’m not mean or selfish but I also no longer put him ahead of me. I did that for 25 years. Lesson learned.

I hope this helps you. Stop fighting a losing battle. It’s making you miserable and ruining your life.

Accept the cheater for his flaws and faults and move forward towards happiness. You can reconcile or divorce. But both choices need to bring you to a place of peace.

I was in false R for 2 months, due to TT. It was worse than the original A. I describe it as instead of doing it behind your back, you now have a front row seat. The WS removes the knife from your back, apologizes and then sticks it right in your heart.

When someone repeatedly says "ok trust me now" and continues to lie, it’s abusive and traumatic. It took 2-3 years to get to about 80% healed but it didn’t even begin until the truth was on the table.

Thanks guys.

I want to be clear I am currently separated because my WB wasn't doing any healing work, and mentally I'm in a place of realising he's unlikely capable and I almost don't care anymore.

I really just want to make myself feel better at this stage. Part of that is, I think, "going back over it" to establish why I am feeling like I do and really acknowledge how bad it was.

The timeliness I have put together in my head is that the affair started when we were "long distance" and contact with the AP really didn't cease until he physically removed himself with her.

It was complex because he worked with AP and had a shared social group, so "ran into her" a lot; but looking back I think he made no real effort at NC and genuinely didn't care that I was retraumatised each time.

It's not really that he continued lying either. He was relatively honest about it. He just seemed to rationalise it.

Excluding necessary contact for work purposes, the timeline of those betrayals was:

DDay + 3 months he spoke to AP at a social event.

Dday + 3.5 months he went to a party and when AP was there didn't leave

I went ballistic after the above and broke it off, after which he sought out AP immediately for comfort and slept with her again.

Dday +4 months, things were obviously very bad between us and we were not officially together, but he was begging and pleading and saying he loved me but had also (without my knowledge) met the AP personally at least three times outside of work. He rationalised this as "owing it to her to give her closure"

DDay +4.5 months he actually followed through finally with NC with the AP but experienced withdrawal from her, during which I certainly felt I was comforting him after a breakup

DDay + 6 months, he was leaving to move to live with me / win me back and exchanged in secret very fond farewell letters with AP

After that he was physically removed by geography from the AP so I feel like if he hadn't he'd have carried on being unable to stay NC.

DDay +7 months to +9 months he was geographically with me but refused to block AP on social media.

I realise how horrific all that is. I think at the time I was in so much shock I couldn't take it in.

After that he stopped behaving like that. He became honest and considerate and has remained NC and I think he is very confused by his own behaviour.

For me, that period was trauma after trauma after trauma and I'm hyperventilating just writing it out.

It's difficult for me to hate him. It's difficult for me to find any explanation that I can work with.

The cruelty of seeing how much harm he caused me and deciding to continue to do it just bewilders me.

I think I just wanted to talk to people who'd been through similar with someone claiming they love you and want R but doing such cruel things.

@the1stwife

Honestly I really don't care what he does anymore. If he arrived at my door tomorrow with a therapist, I doubt I'd be interested in offering that investment. Right now at least, I don't feel like I want to do the work, or hang around while he does it. I just waited too long and now I'm sick of it.

I really just want to talk to people who understand that trauma. To help me work through it alone.

@tanner

I describe it as instead of doing it behind your back, you now have a front row seat. The WS removes the knife from your back, apologizes and then sticks it right in your heart

.

This.

It's just the weirdest thing to experience!

I was barely functional that first year. I was trying to figure out whether to stay or go. At about a year, I was recognizing that XWH wasn't doing the work to change. Then, he pops up with starting MC. Why not? At least I'd have tried everything. He confessed in MC to another inappropriate relationship and that was my hard boundary, so we moved to D.

I'd done the work and processed enough to not be in the horrible place that dday1 caused.

He was crying and saying he loved me - but his actions were continued lying and betrayal and refusal of even step 1 of reconciliation and I feel ongoing trauma from that.

Mine sent me a selfie of him crying. He didn't want to change. He wanted me to shut up and be the wifey that was maid and cook.

With my IC (betrayal trauma specialist), I worked through The Grief Recovery Handbook and a mindfulness workbook. Those tools, with the guidance from SI, helped me through. Frankly, SI was more help then MC was.

I experienced False R. For the first year after discovering the A with MOW in 2012 I kept catching broken NC and them meeting up. These events made me so mentally ill I attempted suicide and had to be hospitalized on 2 different occasions. My XWS eventually told me he ended the A and wanted to work on the M. 2 years later I discovered the A never ended (MOW was the one to tell me and they had been using burner phones). I lost all love and respect for my xWS in that moment and never got it back. I remained in limbo for 5 more years due to fear of breaking up my children's family, which I ended up doing in the end anyways as I couldn't bear to be with my XWS any longer.

how did you heal yourself or come to a place of understanding?

Healing took a very long time for me. Most of my healing happened after I left. I am still with my same IC attending therapy. That helped the most along with my closest girlfriend who is a licensed therapist herself. I read a lot of books. Cheating in a Nutshell was the most eye opening for me in understanding why I felt what I felt.

I leaned on family and friends for years they were my lifesavers. Also exercise, eating healthy, yoga and meditation. Singing and dancing to my favorite music. Redecorating my space and taking my life back and making it mine made all the difference. I am thriving in my new life without him and wish I had left much sooner!

[This message edited by crazyblindsided at 6:21 PM, Monday, August 21st]

I am so sorry you went through that :( your words are very familiar. I felt exactly like that. I felt like it made me seriously mentally ill.

What he put me through during the six months after his affair was far more cruel and abusive than the affair itself. How somebody can see another human being in agony and then continue to treat them so horribly is a mystery I will never solve

This is what in fact broke me and was my dealbreaker. My XWS was never remorseful only regretful and did not like my reaction to his A. He thought I would rugsweep it. I will never understand how another human can cause not only the suffering but not feel bad for continuing it. In my case I believe my xWS to be a sociopath. He even uttered the words once after False R when I was wailing in pain asking how he could watch me fall apart unable to parent my kids and continue the A. His answer was that no one cared to listen to me anymore. Nice guy eh?

This is so familiar.

Within the paradigm I had at the time - human being just could not or would not do that.

The cheating was obviously bad but I see there's scope for rationalising that what someone doesn't know won't hurt them.

But seeing a human being act that way was really mentally jarring for me.

I remember for example me being so ill I was off sick from work. We were long distance, so him going out at night was majorly terrifying for me.

He had told me he was going to a party that evening but he'd checked and AP wasn't on the guest list.

I was so terrified and freaked out, he spent half the day comforting me. He even texted me once he got there to say the coast was clear.

We'd agreed if AP showed up he would immediately leave.

Then AP showed up.

And he didn't leave.

I texted for an update and he said "yeah AP is here but it's a big party and she's in another room"

I went absolutely crazy.

And as he kept doing this stuff over and over again, instead of realising what he was doing to me he actually decided I was becoming unstable and mean and the AP was nicer to him.

It was almost a kind of psychopathy. Like a complete absence of empathy or integrity and when I got angry he'd just gaslight me.

MCC,

I may have been the person who wrote your quote - if not, I have said something similar many many many times. The A I could have worked through. The false-R, that was the killer of our relationship, and it was much more cruel and abusive than any of the rest of it. False R is a very special, miserable, place in hell. It's a good thing most people don't have to have lived through that. I thought it would kill me.

Timeline:

10/1/17 - D-day 1 (discovered A with married co-worker. WH worked with both AP and OBS). He swore he had just ended it recently (lie) but then backtracked on that the next day and said he would end it, and sent the whole NC email thing at my request (worthless request IMO in hindsight).

10/4/17 - A resumed. A stopped for about 3 days after d-day, then went back underground - they texted and sexted and mutually masturbated on the phone multiple times per day - hundreds of texts and calls almost every single day - I love yous exchanged, etc. Although they came up with some insane rule that they would no longer have actual physical sex (this is confirmed by messages between them - her counting the days since they last had actual physical sex - blah blah blah) but otherwise the A continued as it had before. I could give more detail but its safe to say they masturbated each other to climax over the phone roughly 10 times per week, and texted with each other constantly throughout each others 40 hour work week, and called when I and the OBS were not around, like teenagers hiding from their parents.

10/1/18 - D-day 2. I had been suspicious for a long time and finally broke down and set him up to be alone and then recorded the call I knew he was going make to AP. I got lucky in that he put her on speaker phone so I got the whole call - all hour of it - all the I love yous and countless lies to her about all kinds of things. Just gross. Neither me or the AP were special enough to get any truth from him as it turns out. I inform OBS of the A. WH sends NC to AP on his own, and tells me about her multiple attempts to contact him, shares her messages with me, and asks for my approval on what to send back.

12/30/18 - AP calls me and messages me several times blaming me for ruining her child's life by outing the A to the OBS. AP sends the same to WH and confronts him at their work place when - AP comes in early to catch WH on a break. Apparently this turns into the resumption of their A yet again.

1/15/19 - A resumes (rough estimate on date - I can't recall now - which is a good sign in and of itself). A resumes for a 3rd time, but not as hot and heavy. WH is controlling and blocks her at will, apparently resolving never to talk to her again, only to break NC, and talk to her, and then block her. This goes on for about 6-8 weeks, during which time WH is incredibly moody and withdrawn - the openness of the 3 months before has turned to more defensiveness and anger.

4/1/19 D-day 3 (roughly) - I know it's back on - I can just tell, and I see him with her sometime around the beginning of April 2019 outside his work - as luck would have it I was driving by to the bank (never intended to check on him as he works at a secure facility that is fenced in so you can't really see into the place - they were sitting on a bench outside of the solid fencing. I kept driving and texted him saying I saw them together, he was a liar, etc and he claimed it wasn't her and that I was "blind." It was her and I proved it by point blank asking one of his co-workers. Cat out of bag...I send email to AP, WH, and OBS - it is a rant from me to AP And WH - illustrating all the lies he told me (and her) replete with text message screen shots as proof. I didn't care what happened - I just wanted to say my peace. He and AP have huge blowout about some of the contents of the email and A ends in a ball of fire. Whatever.

Post d-day 3 - I was already planing to move back to where I was from or just far away from him - I had just taken a contract position so I was stuck until 2020 and decided to ride it out living with him to save money. Then COVID happened so my move was delayed until 2021. I moved a two days drive away in 6/21.

I would say that both the suspicion in 2018 when the A was ongoing and I was being lied to, and the aftermath of d-day 2 when I knew 100% that the A had not ended and that every day between d-day 1 and 2, except maybe the first 3 days I was being lied to and manipulated, was the worst experience of my entire life. It was agonizing, miserable, soul-crushing. I couldn't focus on anything and even drove off with the gas nozzle still in my car (which resulted in it being ripped from the gas pump) TWO TIMES IN THE SAME DAY. I drove the wrong way down the one way street that you have to use to leave our house - something I had driven down for years. I forgot things constantly. Lost 35 pounds over the course of like 6 weeks. I was humiliated, embarrassed, disgusted with myself for giving him a chance. I went through periods where I just despised him, found him disgusting, and could not see anything redeeming about him at all.

I can't explain it but somehow, when I decided I was leaving for sure in 2019 I started to feel better. I'm sure it is because I started to feel more control over my own situation and had given up on making a future with him/started seeing him as someone I did not want to make a future with. It's hard for me to fathom now - that there was a time when I would have considered trying again with him the way he was.

He and I are now reconciling our friendship - we date occasionally but I live several hours flight time away, so it's rare. WH has done a lot IC work. He hit his own personal rock bottom sometime in late 2019 and decided he did not want to be the person he had been and has been in IC for roughly 3 years (maybe closer to 4 now). He is different. But his change and how I feel are not directly correlated. That being said, I could not be speaking to him now if he wanted to rugsweep - that would not be acceptable to me and I think I would still live with that pit in my stomach if I had tried to rugsweep. That pit - that nervous little shiver of nausea and adrenaline combined, would have ended me up in the nut house. Being the relationship police was not sustainable. But the false R - the looking me in the eye and lying to me/telling me I was crazy/overreacting when I was NOT - that he could do that to me and not just let me go - that, unless you have been through it, is impossible to describe.

[This message edited by ThisIsSoLonely at 7:21 PM, Monday, August 21st]

MCC-

What he put me through during the six months after his affair was far more cruel and abusive than the affair itself. How somebody can see another human being in agony and then continue to treat them so horribly is a mystery I will never solve"

- This is what did it for me too. After I left my cheating ex last November when I was sick of all of the social media nonsense, talking to multiple other women, and I'm 99.9% sure he was hooking up with a few of them, he called me saying he would do whatever it took. He sent NC texts, deleted numbers, deleted social media, but didnt follow through with anything else. Then I found out in January when I was away for work, giving the biggest presentation of my career, he was back on social media making plans with another woman to meet up in a different city while I was away, and I was thinking he was supporting me in my big day. Then I found that while he DID delete their numbers, he wrote them down on paper, kept them hidden, and had more conversations on SnapChat with the OW he sent the NC to. It's just sickening to type that out. I'm so thankful we were not married and had no financial ties. I haven't done counseling, and honestly, I just try to not keep going over all of it in my head. Counseling is the healthier way to deal with this. I doubt I'll ever be able to trust anyone again. You're definitely not alone.

@thisissolonely

I wanted to say I read your post a few times and am really grateful for you writing it. It made my chest physically hurt because I could almost feel the pain coming off it. I am so sorry you went through all that. It's helpful to know it wasn't just me who developed memory and cognitive problems.

@LoLoRetta

I am so sad to hear what happened to you. There's a part of me that feels it would have been easier on me if he'd not maintained plausable deniability the whole way through.

Like for example if I had heard him say anything sexual or romantic to the AP I would have been done.
He was able to maintain the cover that all communications were just "to give her closure" or "to say goodbye to someone he was close to and would never see again".

If for example he had slept with the AP again when I hadn't dumped him that day.
He was able to say "I was so devastated when you ended it that I ran to her for comfort, I don't want her, I want you!

Aaaaaalllll the way through he was able to just about maintain a semi plausible story where almost everything he did indicated he DID want me and not her and in that first year I felt like that was what mattered.

I see now that what is probably true is that we were long distance and she met all his needs in my absence, like a place filler. And he had an attachment to her that wasn't "love" but was intimate and a LOT closer than he led me to believe or has ever admitted.

What I see now is that he DID want me, but he also didn't want to let her go fully. Particularly because I was now angry and crying and disappointed and disgusted by him while she was there telling him he was completely amazing.

Hes never been able to admit either of those things to me but I think they are true, and him never admitting them means I can;t begin to forgive them or get over them.

It made my chest physically hurt because I could almost feel the pain coming off it. I am so sorry you went through all that.

No worries - it is just the pain of a recalled past. I can talk and think about it now like it was a shitty movie I saw almost. I think I wore the pain out - I felt so bad or so long my body and mind just maxed out. I'm good now. Happy even. Better than I ever would have imagined during those darkest of days.

It's helpful to know it wasn't just me who developed memory and cognitive problems.

The memory and cognitive issues were something I really couldn't have expected. It made no sense that I was so totally shut down. If affected my work too, especially my new job at the time. D-day 2 coincided with my first day of my dream job that I have since left to get a even dreamier job. That being said the cognitive and memory issues are REAL. Cut yourself some slack and be careful what you are doing. There have been people on here who have almost burned their house down, left kids in the car unattended, forgot appointments, couldn't remember birthdays of close family...you name it. It happens. Be kind to yourself and ask for help - preferably not your WS - but don't let that get in the way of being safe. I was not safe to be on the road more days than not for quite some time.

I really have worried for a few years now that I have early onset dementia. Sometimes I do really strange things, like put the phone in the fridge. Sometimes I have huge black spots of memories, like I did my tax return twice because I forgot I had already done it. Sometimes I struggle to recall names of things, for example today I wanted to open a website I use regularly for work and couldn't recall it's name.

I really have worried for a few years now that I have early onset dementia. Sometimes I do really strange things, like put the phone in the fridge. Sometimes I have huge black spots of memories, like I did my tax return twice because I forgot I had already done it. Sometimes I struggle to recall names of things, for example today I wanted to open a website I use regularly for work and couldn't recall it's name.

I'm not to say to not be concerned about those symptoms BUT it really could be related to what you have/are experiencing. I can say I don't have those issues anymore (aside from the fact that I have never, in my life, been able to recall where I set my keys down). It's worth paying attention to, but not insignificantly, from the time I really started realizing that the problem was him, and subsequently started to lose interest in "us" those symptoms went away.

I experienced false R for about a year or so. Yeah, it was just horrid and would've been far better if I'd ended the whole thing on dday but I was in a puddle hyperventilating, so that wasn't possible. He continued cheating and seesawed between pretending contriteness and raging at me as I sobbed. It was so incredibly abusive and unlike anything he'd ever done before.

It's just a total mind fuck onto of a mind fuck. First the person you loved isn't the person you loved, your past wasn't actually what you thought it was and your future is up for grabs. Then you get kicked around for having feelings about being betrayed by the person you thought would love, honor and protect you. It's no wonder our brains go haywire with cognitive and memory issues.

I'm 4 years from dday, 2.5 divorced. The cognition and memory are better but I'm not sure they're where they were before this trauma. It just takes the time it takes.