FamilyGuy
I get where you are at and where you are going. You will get your share of posters telling you your wife is a lost cause and that your best bet is to divorce. Maybe they are correct, but I get why you feel you need to see this through. You two won’t be the first to divorce due to infidelity, but you two won’t be the first to reconcile either. Both are fine options and they beat the dreaded third option. The one I want to warn you about.
I like to use this comparison. (Heck… I like it so much that anyone with over 12 months on this site is probably sick of it. But I still think it describes the situation in the best way that is accessible for those in these shoes. So there!)
It’s like you have lived an unhealthy life. It’s like you have added weight over the years and you always plan on doing something about it. You don’t exercise but always plan on starting someday. You KNOW you should have fish or a salad for lunch, but always opt for the burger and fries. You know you should manage your finances, but always manage to settle or pay just before the collection agents visit again. It’s like you know you should get off the couch and clean the house or take a walk or read but instead you doze with one beer too many watching Jerry Springer or Friends re-runs. You know the cast-list on that series on Netflix better than you know the contents of the microwave-meal you just had. You know you should go to bed before midnight because you are always late and stressed in the morning. You know those cigarettes are going to kill you and you once again try to convince yourself that after this pack you might quit…
That’s your marriage pre-infidelity. OK – so maybe not THAT bad, but things taken for granted, maybe a lack of focus, maybe a lack of communications, maybe things you lived with but didn’t like. Maybe no one thing was totally bad, and maybe overall things were OK. But they could have been better…
Then one day you feel a sharp pain down your left arm and next thing you know you are awake in the ICU at your hospital. Cardiac-arrest and the doctors and nurses are telling you how lucky you are to have survived.
Over the next few days a barrage of experts tells you what went wrong. Your diet, your physical condition, stress and maybe even your genes. They can’t necessarily point to one single item and say THIS caused the cardiac arrest. But it’s an accumulation of all sorts of things. Some within your reach to change, and others out of your reach. Sort of like the “experts” (me included) are telling you here on SI.
That cardiac arrest was the infidelity. OK – Here is the weak part in this comparison because there is NO WAY anyone can blame YOU for ANYTHING that made your wife cheat. But there are factors that can make you a better husband. And if we look at husband and wife as one, then it’s a bit like the brain or kidney absolving themselves of the damage caused by the heart.
You do some hard thinking.
You contact a dietician that gives you a list of books to read and offers you some diet-plans and courses.
You get a membership card at the local gym.
You get online access to all your accounts, tax returns and buy some fancy online budget app.
You decide to get off the couch and jog.
You buy the best quik-dry sports clothes and the neatest sneakers.
When you get home none of the above will do you any good without you using it correctly.
That membership card doesn’t build your muscles or burn your fat by simply being in your wallet.
Those sneakers don’t run by themselves.
If you are eating a chocolate-chip cookie while reading up on how to lower cholesterol, then there is something wrong…
Basically, you can have all the intent and all the will in the world, but nothing will happen until you take action. Nothing will happen until you put on that quik-dry gear and sneakers and start hitting the road.
That’s where you and WW are right now. You are all fired up and have gotten the nicotine-patches and thrown away the cigarettes. You might have all the book-lists and even ordered some of them. You might have looked into IC or MC. You might have talked about improving your communications.
If you managed to stick to the advice offered by the dietician, jogged 3x a week, did some yoga, lifted weights, slept regular and all that then right away after some months you might notice a positive difference. If you stuck to it for 3 years you might look back and realize that you are in the best shape of your life. You might feel better, weigh less, sleep better, be relaxed but more productive…
At that point it would’ even enter your mind to think:
“Wow. I’m so grateful that I smoked and ate unhealthily and didn’t exercise because that gave me the gift of a cardiac arrest. Thanks to that I changed my life and now everything is great!”
I think that what you would do is reflect on the effort and work you have done and all the changes. You would be grateful for all that. But you would probably find some sadness in knowing that you could have done all that without having reached that low. The cardiac arrest didn’t get you to where you are – the hard work did.
It’s the same with your marriage.
It’s not enough to decide to reconcile
You two could read a couple of books and talk about maybe doing a couples retreat next fall. You could decide that every Friday is date-night. You could talk about being honest and all that…
BUT NOTHING WILL HAPPEN WITHOUT THE WORK.
And although you might get pleasure us of completing your first ten-mile run, then that pleasure is paid for with effort and pain. Same with reconciliation.
FG – I wish you luck on your journey, but be very aware that you are entering a phase where deciding to reconcile is really the easy part. For the next two years you two need to keep at it and there really isn’t much time or space for leaning back and simply enjoying the feeling that at least your wife isn’t sleeping with the OM. You two need to keep constant pace and persistence on the work ahead.
