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I have been thinking over and over, that the most natural step for me should be to get divorced.

After latest DDay, the discovery of many betrayals (one PA and many EA), my constant feeling that there is more to uncover, I feel no emotions any longer, and that's a sign for me that I should restart my life.

The first betrayal 17 years ago completely destroyed me, I lost myself, my career, my future. She came back, I uprooted my life twice, moved to a foreign country for her, restarted from zero, rebuilt my career, a company, but my life and identity was eroded slowly, passing from PTSD to the deepest depression and getting suicidal couple of times, this went on until the breaking point, we can call it "healing". Now I a rebuilding my life from zero for the third time.

Against all odds, I still like her, I remember her as she used to be the love of my life. But she belong to the OM in my heart, I lost her 17 years ago, she never honestly reconciled, she kept cheating (even if she feels like it wasn't or is a "cheating light", since she denies sex, as it makes any difference).

Those feelings are gone. Still something survives but is nothing compared to what it used to be. No hate, no anger, no remorse, there is nostalgia and missing her when we were truly a couple.

I decided to not Divorce because I want to spare that trauma to our little Daughter (she is the most important one in my life right now).

However her avoidant and emotional unavailable side makes me feel she is still rebuilding a narrative to "restore the old status quo" like nothing ever happened. Minimizing, blocking memories, changing versions, defensive, little to no empathy, shame but not guilt.

I feel there needs to be a point that I am done with her attitude. That is not ok. Her game is no fun, I am tired to live in a lie.

I am wondering if separation is viable tool in my case. We stay for the child. She likes me, I like her, so we meet as man and woman still. But I want to be free to follow my path in life.

I do not care or pursue anything, I live and see how it goes I am happy that way since I rediscovered myself. But I do not want to deprive myself either if I see a new path.

If this wakes her up about what she truly wants as she claims and she steps up, then good. If she wants to pursue more OM she is free to do that either, I genuinely do not care. But I am done pursuing her and carrying the emotional weight of our relationship on my shoulders.

People who went down this road or have more insight might help me to see it clearly. In my entire life I saw marriage as something that was extremely unlikely to happen to me, but if ever, it would be unbreakable.

Apparently I was wrong, that too can show cracks.

Thank you if you take time for this.

[This message edited by BackfromtheStorm at 8:47 PM, Tuesday, January 13th]

I’m really sorry you’re in this position. Reading your post, what comes through most clearly is how much you’ve already sacrificed, how much pain you’ve carried for years, and how deeply you’ve tried to be principled, even at enormous personal cost.

Because of that, I'm going to push back on your idea of a "half-in/half-out" marriage or a separation-in-place.

First, despite what you say about being emotionally done, it’s clear you still love her and are holding out some hope that she will finally wake up, take responsibility, and choose you. Staying married keeps you emotionally stuck in that hope. It prevents you from fully grieving the marriage you actually had (not the one you wish you had), and it prevents you from building a life that is truly your own. You can’t restart your life while still tethered to the person who repeatedly destroyed it.

Second, remaining married keeps you legally and financially bound to someone who has demonstrated time and time again that you can't trust her. You’ve already uprooted your life, your career, and your identity multiple times for her. Continuing to intertwine your future with someone who lies, minimizes, rewrites history, and avoids accountability puts you at ongoing risk, whether you emotionally disengage or not. Paper and law don’t care how detached you feel.

Third, this situation does not spare your daughter from trauma. It only changes the shape of it. Children learn what relationships are supposed to look like by watching their parents. A household where love is fractured, trust is absent, intimacy is ambiguous, and boundaries are blurred teaches a child that this is normal adult partnership. Many children raised in "we stayed for you" homes later say they felt the tension and wished their parents had chosen honesty and stability instead of quiet misery. It's also unfair to put the burden of your unwillingness to leave a toxic and unhappy marriage on your child. She may grow up to feel immense guilt (or resentment) for your decision to remain married, despite the fact that it's clearly crushing you.

Fourth, practically speaking, this arrangement will sabotage any chance you have of forming a healthy future relationship. Emotionally healthy, self-respecting women do not want to date a man who is still married and living with his wife, regardless of how "separated" he is in theory. The dating pool you’ll attract in that situation is far more likely to consist of people who are themselves unavailable, avoidant, or chaotic—exactly the opposite of what someone with your history needs.

Fifth, many people have tried this "for the kids" limbo. The outcome is almost always the same: they feel trapped. They are unable to fully invest in their marriage, but also unable to fully move on. Years pass. Resentment quietly grows. Life shrinks instead of expanding. You deserve more than survival mode after everything you’ve already endured.

Sixth, the logistics alone are a minefield. How does dating work in real life? Are you expected to watch your daughter while she sees other men? Will she do the same for you? What happens when jealousy, hypocrisy, or old wounds flare up, as they almost certainly will? This isn’t emotional neutrality; it’s an ongoing slow bleed.

Finally—and this is important—you don’t actually control how long this arrangement lasts. Your wife can decide to divorce you at any time. Right now, she’s staying because the status quo benefits her. But the moment a "better deal" appears, you could be discarded anyway... except with more years lost, more entanglement, and more damage done.

You’ve already rebuilt your life from zero multiple times. At some point, rebuilding has to include choosing a structure that protects you instead of eroding you.

Divorce, in your case, would may be the most honest, protective, and ultimately loving choice for your daughter A peaceful, emotionally present father living a grounded, authentic life is far healthier for a child than a father quietly rotting away inside an intact household.

[This message edited by BluerThanBlue at 9:24 PM, Tuesday, January 13th]

Sorry you're going through this. Infidelity really sucks. Your situation is quite different from mine as it sounds like your WW might be what some might call a serial cheater, and it sounds like what she did was pretty extensive and covers a long period of time.

I know for there to be any chance of R she needs to come completely clean and acknowledge your pain. Then double down and truly work to change whatever it is in her that made her think it was okay to cheat on you. I've read enough of your posts to know you've spent some real time and put significant thought and effort into your situation. I know that I'm not experienced enough to really offer you much in the way of advice, but just wanted you to know you've been heard, and most of us do understand the pain you're going through.

I'm working through recovering from infidelity with my wife of 27 years right now myself. We have a son, but he's grown and out of the house now. She had a short lived physical affair with a co worker this past April (9 months ago). She had 3 different trysts with him over a 2 week period before I caught on and confronted her about it. That was following several weeks of flirting and connecting emotionally. She eventually came completely clean about everything, cut all contact with him and has been bending over backwards to show me she can be a safe partner again, but the pain of betrayal is pretty hard to deal with. If it weren't for her current attitude and contrition I'd have been gone. I'd already set up appointments with divorce lawyers when she broke down and begged me to stay. She's been spending the last several months making a pretty good case for it. That, and I do still love her. 27 years is a long time and this is the only time this has happened to us.

So I get it. I know how much it hurts, but your situation is more complicated than mine. I wish I had more for you, but there are others here with more experience than I have who'll be along to give you some ideas or at least some other things to consider.

Those feelings are gone. Still something survives but is nothing compared to what it used to be. No hate, no anger, no remorse, there is nostalgia and missing her when we were truly a couple.

I decided to not Divorce because I want to spare that trauma to our little Daughter (she is the most important one in my life right now).

Have you considered what you are modeling to your daughter? You are showing her "this is what marriage looks like". I don’t blame you one second for feeling the way you do. Your mind is trying to protect yourself as best it can from more trauma. Tragically your wife’s infidelity is inflicting much damage on your daughter as well.

Thank you both because you gave me some good things to ponder about.

The sacrifice for my daughter is, because in her case, she is adoptive (my wife got an STD who made her infertile and always avoided to seriously diagnose it and get rid off since her first betrayal 17 years ago. Only now after my change she is seriously doing everything to get it healed) so it is a seriously traumatized child (fucked up story, her biological mother is older than us, drug abuser and alcoholic, in and out of prison, she has at least 8 different siblings, all from different men, cheating with multiple men included, she had it all), we are just lucky she does not have FAS and is perfectly healthy, beautiful, extremely intelligent and sensitive.

I am not even sure I want another marriage, I had only very few real relationships because I never believed I was made to be with someone (but those few I gave it all, unconditional), so I accepted long time ago that since I am popular with women, I will settle in having many as company instead of a serious exclusive partner (which is what I always dreamed of). I have tons of potential options, especially since I restored my true self and started to live socially again, from girls in their 20s to my age if I was into it, I'd just have the embarrass of matching choice of who with my free time.

That's what I would have done before her.

Is just I am kind of uninterested in general, I only found one woman that was having an effect on me (before my "change" other women no matter how attractive did not even register in my brain, no matter how open they were, it just does not compute), strong chemistry, that electric feeling, I cut her off without even asking her name or giving her mine, she is married, so it's a hard no for me. I am never touching a girl in a relationship, I'd rather die than do that.

And for the rest, while their smiles are nice, their flirting is flattering, in the end I do not care much because I used to do that for most of my 'romantic life' and no matter the 'variety' it was always hollow.

I changed radically sexually too, I have no longer the kind of impulses I always knew, that's another thing that is extremely weird an still new and not fully understandable to me, I obviously only tried with my wife because we still have strong chemistry and she is incredibly attracted to me now, it blows her mind but at the same time I could live without. Apparently I had more changes than emotional only, also physical, I am discovering still because it has been only a couple of month since I survived PTSD and trauma.

So technically I would like (ideally) to build a future with a woman that I can fully love and she can reciprocate at the same level, but somehow I feel deep inside, it is fine either way. There is no anxiety, no longing, no panic, no sense of urgency.

My wife now. She is trying hard to change. She keeps swearing that since the wedding she never ever betrayed me (but when the betrayal trauma eroded me just enough and I felt into depression she was showing patterns that I associate to betrayal, plus she lied me for 17 years about the first R, so it's hard for me to trust her, my trust is at zero)

She seems deeply in love, she is doing therapy, she is present, she changed behaviors. I can feel and see that. She is also trying to open up and reveal all the things about her betrayals, but she is blocked, she feels shame but I sense she does not feel guilt. Her memories and recalling of the events do not match, she narrates inconsistencies, even she notices that and says so herself.

And above all, she feels disgust and shame, but whenever she is trying to show empathy about the pain she inflicted she gets blocked, a pain in the chest and she feels detaching, frozen.

She has her diagnosis from the therapist, but for me this blockage means it is very hard to rebuild trust.

She is terrified of me, I do not have mood swings, I am at peace all the time, but I have no filters and she is afraid by the fact that I want to know the whole truth, she avoids every topic or situation that might bring close to the subject as she is walking on eggshells.

She had one night when she cried and cold not breathe and she opened up completely, that night gave me hope, the morning after she was perfectly regulated (usually she needs my presence to co-regulate). But the day after, as she went to work, she returned wearing her fucking mask and armor again, I noticed and she noticed it too.

For the rest of the moments right now we are like a teenage couple, I like her as a woman and she looks like a girl having a crush, we dance at home, she can't have enough of me, our daughter is happy to see us toghether and is also regulated by our presence.

I think that that could be a base to rebuild if only: she feels and can open to my demands for clarity. I don't think about the affairs most of the time, most of the days, I live in the present, not the past, but when the memory come back I need to process those emotions (that have been suppressed for 17 years) and I need her cooperation to know, otherwise I can only make assumptions, and the assumptions might be worse than reality, but I have only those and my instincts to work with.

If she feels the pull to run away from that or as she claims has "blocked memories" (which I know is possible, but how can I know if is true or she is lying with certainty since I have lost my trust?), then is extremely hard to properly process those emotions, as a result, I detach from her. She says she can see how she destroyed my life, believe it or not it is painful for me, because no matter what, it was my choice to take her back, so I destroyed my life the responsibility is on me.

It's a lot and it is difficult to explain, it might seem as I feel distressed, I am not because I can regulate my emotions naturally now (something I was never capable of before), I just know I have 'helped her a lot' to change with just being my new me.

But I do not think I should be her therapist. At the same time she is terrified that I will leave her, but she becomes avoidant when we get close to touch the betrayal subject, she clings to her 'soulmate' feelings, she dreads to feel those emotions and tries to pretend nothing is happening in those moments. So I leave her therapy to her IC, I was wondering if perhaps separation might give her message how serious the situation is.

Logically what I heard from you makes perfect sense as well.

I have no rush, but I think I have to think things through.

[This message edited by BackfromtheStorm at 10:44 PM, Tuesday, January 13th]

Have you considered what you are modeling to your daughter? You are showing her "this is what marriage looks like". I don’t blame you one second for feeling the way you do. Your mind is trying to protect yourself as best it can from more trauma. Tragically your wife’s infidelity is inflicting much damage on your daughter as well.

Yes, deeply. Our daughter sees only the nice part of us, the loving partnership, the helping each other.

My wife is can regulate her emotionally in a way that I never could (she comes to me when she needs to feel safety, but mom can give her true peace).

Problem is, when I was in depression my wife was really disregulated and our daughter followed suit. Mom feels fine when I am present, so does our child.

Those questions and conversations only come up when they naturally come up, if I get those emotions we only talk about it when we are alone (my wife describes is as a "rollercoaster"). It's calm, but her feelings run high then get blocked.

Considering our daughter is making huge progress to resolve her trauma is making me think it is one thing we are doing good in our lives. When we adopted her 5 years ago, she did not know how to cry or laugh or play. Imagine a 4 years old child who does not know how to cry.

She is a precious little girl now, she still has traumas to resolve but she can manage her emotions well all around.

The side of the marriage she sees now is a loving marriage, I always tried to give her that, but when I was in the last 2 years of depression I could tell that the vibe was wrong, it was forced and she could feel it, ow it is natural and she can feel it too.

The issues we have as a couple are something that we only face when alone (and only when those memories come back organically is not a daily occurrence).

If she was able to disclose all the details and take full acountability instead of excusing her choices (even if she does that only in part, I feel is still wrong, is denial) and she could feel guilt instead of just shame, we probably would have a good foundation for a true R.

OK ... now your initial posts make some sense.

I don't think you can heal if you continue to see yourself as the person who lived for some Great Love. Clearly you chose the wrong person again and again. Love and Limerence is probably a very good read for you.

I don't know why you let your GF/W mistreat you, but I'm not sure the why matters, if you take responsibility for your life and for your choices, and make different choices for your future.

Limerence can do very nasty things to a person, but once in it, it's hard to get out. Being kind to yourself is a good step. In addition, maybe the psychological tactics used by addicts who are healing will help you.

I have 60 years experience with limerence. It worked great for me, because I forced myself to keep seeing what my W actually showed me. Certainly I developed a number of wrong ideas about her, but I adjusted my image of her as I learned, and I did not think of anything permanent until I experienced love and care from her. My W focused on me for close to 45 years before cheating - and even then, she betrayed herself before she betrayed me. The aftermath of her A pretty much showed she's as hooked on me as I am on her - mutual addiction, perhaps.

But your W has betrayed you again and again for 17 years. You're clearly limerent, and you don't report much that indicates the feelings are mutual. Limerence seems to works when only one person is limerent if the limerent object (your GF/W in this case) supports the limerent one, but you say she cuts you down (or has that stopped?).

If my interpretation of your words is correct, the one-way addiction (you to your W) is wearing off, and that leaves you with a serial cheater. Serial cheating isn't irredeemable, but your situation is unusual, and I think R for you is going to be harder than for most people, and multiple As makes R still more difficult.

If your addiction is not wearing off, being with your W is bad for you and for your daughter, because you've gotten so little support from your W over the years.

Before you post how supportive she's been, compare the support she's given with the support you've wanted. Be as honest as you can with yourself. If you choose R, you'll have to live with your W.

If you still want to consider R, make sure you have a good set of requirements, and make sure your W agrees to meet them.

Some requirements for her could include:

total honesty - no more lies.

total non-contact with old aps

no new A

your W does whatever she needs to do to change from cheater to good partner - IC is a minimum, IMO (I know there are some good ICs in Poland, but Poland isn't a small area)

probably IC for you to help you process your feelings about the As and your resentments over lack of support out of your body, answers all questions, etc

Maybe MC, if one of you wants it - but IC is almost definitely going to be more effective.

You have to heal you, whether you split or R; no one else can do the work for you

Your WS has to heal herself; no one else can do the work for her

If, after starting to heal as individuals, you both want to R, you can heal your M

You can D from strength or weakness. You can R from strength or weakness. My hope for you is that you act from your strengths, not your fears. My 2nd hope is that you get the outcome you want.

But don't tie your sense of self-worth to the resolution of your M. Don't try to control it. Let the resolution grow organically from what you want and from what you and your W do.

*****

Um ... kids understand a hell of a lot more than parents think they do.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 11:03 PM, Tuesday, January 13th]