SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Good decision Reen!

Jokingly start calling alcohol the lie detector. Maybe have another night where the 2 of you drink together and talk through things.

Come up with a funny name for the sessions.

Thanks again for your advice, everyone! You’ve helped me process a very stressful situation.

After 20 years of a very happy marriage where my wife has been there for me in every way possible, I’ve decided to let this isolated incident go. She said at one point that, “I knew I was doing something I shouldn’t have been doing!”

I asked all I could. She insists nothing happened! Since I know more about the situation and I know my wife, I believe that more than likely, nothing happened!

Having said this, I have to ask....how long does it take to leave my mind? I think about it constantly and feel depressed. I think it’s because I can’t put it in the perspective of a 20 year relationship. I feel like it will get better shortly, but don’t know. What is normal In a situation like this?

Posted by Reen

Thanks again for your advice, everyone! You’ve helped me process a very stressful situation.

After 20 years of a very happy marriage where my wife has been there for me in every way possible, I’ve decided to let this isolated incident go. She said at one point that, “I knew I was doing something I shouldn’t have been doing!”

I asked all I could. She insists nothing happened! Since I know more about the situation and I know my wife, I believe that more than likely, nothing happened!

Having said this, I have to ask....how long does it take to leave my mind? I think about it constantly and feel depressed. I think it’s because I can’t put it in the perspective of a 20 year relationship. I feel like it will get better shortly, but don’t know. What is normal In a situation like this?

Do you really know more than you did?

You have chosen to rugsweep. That means you decided to internalize and try to forget rather than finding out what was really going on.

In general when you have nagging questions and feelings like this, they don't go away, you just suppress them until they bubble up at inopportune moments, like the next time you are drinking with your wife, when you have a fight with her, or when she is friendly with another man.

Best of luck to you.

It will leave your mind when you are convinced that nothing happened. If it is still in your mind then that means you aren't being fully honest with yourself about believing that nothing happened.

If it is still on your mind and you are pushing it down, repressing it you are rugsweeping. It will fester and erupt some time in the future. Saying that more than likely nothing happened isn't saying nothing happened. She did lie to you about who she was going to the concert with, who she went with and where they went. And nothing happened.

You can always try a polygraph. Even asking for one could bring about a reaction that would be telling. There seem to be parking lot confessions which usually still aren't the full story. The confessions are made about minor things in order to avoid the polygraph. Carry through with it.

Still, it's your call and your life.

You should be very honest with your wife that you want to believe her, but that you did detect the initial lie in the phone call after the concert, and it has been eating at you all this time and confirming the fact of the lie has made it worse. Just be honest that more rugsweeping is not going to work, but you need her brave support going forward. Have her read “How to Help Your Spouse Heal From Your Affair” by Linda MacDonald. You read it too. Even if she told the guy she had a bf and only danced to 11pm with no goodnight kiss, she has confessed she knew it was wrong and that she lied to you the next day. She has also confessed that her sister lobbied her to tell you upon her return to Texas, but she did not, which was to protect herself, not you. This dishonesty about what could easily have been a romantic and/or physical connection is still infidelity because of the lies. She was doing something with a man behind your back that she never would have done were you standing by her shoulder.

The book will help her see this. And if, Heaven forbid, there is any more to the story, it may help her own it all.

[This message edited by Odonna at 6:41 AM, August 22nd (Thursday)]

Hi Reen,

I am sorry that this is still bothering you, but I am glad that you came back.

I get a feeling that what may be bothering you is not so much whether your wife slept with the guy, but the fact that she (a) did something that she knew she should not do, and then (b) lied about it.

You have described your marriage in glowing terms, to the point of being pretty much perfect. And this has come along, and suddenly made you feel like the marriage - and your wife - may be less than perfect.

And that perhaps it is that sense of lost perfection in both the marriage and your wife that pains you, and makes you feel depressed.

I could write more, but I think it is better to get feedback from you about whether that strikes a cord with you. If we can try and figure out what it is that is bothering you, it will help to fix it.

Reen, as I have mentioned before, I don't think you're rug sweeping this at all. You have investigated it, asked your wife directly and received an answer that makes good sense to me. While you two were dating, before marriage, she went out dancing with another guy for one night. She admits she knew it was wrong and she did cover it up. But that's what almost every young person would do in that circumstance. This type of stuff happens all the time. It doesn't make it right or good but we can't jump to the conclusion that it was more than she says it is.

Many people here in the Forum do jump to that conclusion because of betrayals they have experienced. That is human nature and that is what happens here on SI. But the fact of the matter is that you have no data whatsoever to suggest that it was anything more then a relatively harmless night out together. You have said yourself that you were attuned to the fact that something had happened all those years ago. But ask yourself, did you keep thinking something was happening back then? Is there more data that you got over the phone or the next time you saw her or in any of your interactions back then that made you suspicious there was some type of ongoing relationship happening?

I don't think there was because you have not shared any of that with us in your many posts. So you have a sensitivity to these dynamics and picked up on something that happened. But you never picked up on anything else wrong! There is no other data! I really think you should let this one go.

Sometimes we fail to remember that most people don't jump into bed with someone on the first date. And it was even more the case 20 years ago in our culture. Your girlfriend 20 years ago went out dancing with a guy one night. Don't make it any more than that. Don't perseverate on some more extreme circumstance that could have happened. With your sensitivity to her communication back then I am sure you would have picked up on more happening if she continued to have a relationship with this guy. She didn't..... so you didn't continue to see signs of something being wrong. Trust yourself and Trust the fact that most girlfriends don't actually cheat extensively on their boyfriend.

Others here will say you can't trust her or yourself, cheaters lie and they find great ways to do things behind your back! That is true. But that does not necessarily apply to your wife. She went dancing with a guy 20 years ago but it showed no signs of anything else since. Chalk that up to a foolish decision and Trust all of the other good years you've had where there has been no signal at all that anything is happening behind your back.

As far as how much time this is going to take for you to get over it, there is no Pat answer to that. I think the key thing is what are you doing to put it out of your mind? There is a good chance that if you keep coming back here the wounds will keep being reopened for you and doubt we'll linger far longer than it might otherwise. Usually we tell people to keep coming back here to help heal. But I think in your case, the opposite may be your best course of action. Focus on the loyalty and the relationship you've built during your married years.

Reen appears to have given it a rest. Maybe others should do the same.

Reen, I haven't read back through the 6 pages. If this has already been recommended I apologize. I would recommend you get some IC whatever path you choose. You've had a trauma even if short lived.

I think you should go with your decision. Trdd has made some good points. Your gut instinct is often the best indicator.

If you did not detect a change in your girlfriend's demeanor after the phone call and on her subsequent return then it was probably nothing more than she has already admitted to. Just have a good think about that though in the light of this recent information.

If after a reasonable period you are still unhappy then speak to your wife and explain your feelings and that it is important for the marriage that she takes a Poly. Not necessarily because you don't trust her but just to finally put this to rest.

M1965,

You did strike a cord. Of course I would be much more upset if I knew she slept with him over a little kissing. But, I will never know! And knowing my wife, I would bet on the lesser offense. Because I will never know 100%, I think I’m able to let that question go.

I do refer to our marriage as very good! I feel blessed beyond what I deserve because she walked up to me and said hi twice in one day.

I think my difficulty now is the fact that my girlfriend made a choice I never would have made in a million years or for a million dollars! I had an image of our relationship that was probably too idealistic to be true! I guess I felt fortunate to have avoided all the marital turmoil that many people experience, but I think I’m mourning a loss of the image I had of our relationship. As time goes on, I hope I’m able to put this incident into perspective of a 20 year relationship and see the big picture so I can start feeling better.

Thanks again for all your advice.

Todd,

Thank you so much for your advice! Your words have been very helpful to me! I think I’ve gotten what I need here! Coming back has been comforting and stressful depending on what I was told. I know everyone here has good intentions, but there were some posts that made things worse.

I think I got what I need to move down the road!

Thank you so much for your advice!

Hi Reen,

It is possible that you will not see this, if you have gone again, but I will post it anyway.

In one of my earlier posts, I said that just because something could have happened does not mean that it did.

I stand by that, and I hope that it will help you to see that what happened twenty years ago may genuinely have been an evening out dancing where nothing serious happened. Sure, it should not have happened at all, but the fact that it did does not invalidate the marriage that followed it, and it does not invalidate your wife as a person.

No-one is ever comfortable with their loved one going on a 'fun' date, even if it is just dancing, because we are all prone to nagging doubts, and the horrible power of 'What if?'

To counter that, it is worth considering that your girlfriend is not a good liar. When you spoke to her on the phone back then, you could tell that something was off. It seems likely that if she was actively misbehaving, you would have detected it immediately. And all you have from that period is one incident.

Maybe no-one would award your wife a merit badge for heading off to a concert with a guy, then abandoning that and going dancing instead, but it really is possible for a woman to spend time with a man without having sex with him, or crossing any big boundaries.

You know your wife, and if she was the kind of person who would sleep with someone she barely knew on a first date, I credit you with enough intelligence to have detected that in the twenty years that you have known her.

If she was 'that kind of gal', she would have done this repeatedly, and you would have caught her.

You picked up on something being 'off' in that phone call, but you have not picked up on anything similar in twenty years. That tells me that either your wife has become a proficient and callous liar, or she has not done anything that she should not have done for two decades.

Reen, your wife may not be a perfect angel, and I am sure that you must have your faults as we all do, but between you, you have a good and real marriage that you both enjoy, and which I believe you should continue to enjoy.

Trdd,

Thank you so much for your advice! Your words have been very helpful to me! I think I’ve gotten what I need here! Coming back has been comforting and stressful depending on what I was told. I know everyone here has good intentions, but there were some posts that made things worse.

I think I got what I need to move down the road!

Thank you so much for your advice!