SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I echo sadman's post and am truly thankful for the posts to this question. I guess I'm beginning to understand what is meant by the "limbo stage" mentioned on this site. I have moved past the intense emotional and even physical pain I felt for nearly 8 mos after D-Day and am now kind of numb. I don't suffer 24-7 anymore but I just can't seem to move on and live with comfort either. I can go for several hours without thinking about it but then for some reason a thought enters my mind and I feel this intense pain in my stomach like a bad case of butterflies. I just made it through a 3 day holiday weekend without a melt down but awoke this morning with nothing but bad thougts. My WW sent me a text that said that our past will always be a part of our futures but so is the wisdom we gain from our mistakes. Problem is that the mistake was hers, not mine, so what can I gain from it? Nothing but heartache for the rest of my life. I love her and want to stay with her but to do that means a life spent knowing that she gave away things that she promised to only give to me. That will never go away. I guess I posted this question hoping to be able to feel better about staying with her but I don't think that's gonna happen. This bad feeling inside is setting in and I don't think I'll ever feel safe or comfortable again. This woman was the love of my life and it's been ripped away from me through no fault of my own. I just don't get it.

Thanks again for the honest answers.

A little background. My FWW was very inexperienced sexually when we met. I had sex maybe 5 times with 3 different women. After dating awhile we became very sexually active. Resulting in pregnancy and marriage.

My wife claims she was a virgin when we met although admitted to some mutual under clothes groping with her 1st high school boyfriend. I sometimes think that even if I had been a model,"husband of the year," (I wasn't! Narcissistic and TOTALLY unaware of her needs.) she may still have cheated. She missed the "life experiences" due to being married at 19. Still, I think she felt she missed something by not being able to experience other men.

Do I think she looks back fondly on her multiple affairs? Probably not, but I don't think she regrets the experience. I must say that she told me after she would have sex with OM#1 she would sit on the floor in our darkened master bedroom closet, feeling horrible about what she had just done. She certainly seems to regret the "fallout" but most of the tears and remorse are not because of what she did to me. IMO. It seems it's more centered on her. How she has suffered. The guilt SHE feels. How this is affecting HER.

Had the affairs never come to light I don't think she would have had a problem living the rest of her life without disclosing.

So, in a nutshell, in MY opinion, she's sorry about all the problems her behavior has caused but is she sorry she had the sexual experiences with 3 or 4 other men? NO! (Especially OM#1 who was very well endowed both length and width, and was trained in sex techniques by a prostitue who "took a shine" to his exceptional endowment while he was stationed in Germany.)

[This message edited by cuckhold at 3:18 PM, September 7th (Tuesday)]

Problem is that the mistake was hers, not mine, so what can I gain from it? Nothing but heartache for the rest of my life. I love her and want to stay with her but to do that means a life spent knowing that she gave away things that she promised to only give to me. That will never go away.

That is how I felt for a very long time. Feelings are never wrong to have, what you do with them is another story.

The answer to your question is that you will gain the personal and marital growth of forgiving and moving forward. You may not believe it now, but you will come out of this a better person in the long run. So will she.

It will get better and the pain will diminish with a lot of time and work from the both of you. It may take years, but it does get better.

It might be true that some WS's only have partial regret but the good ones experience total regret and have learned their lesson. Their memories are not good ones. If they were, your WS would have left you for him.

Does my WW think fondly of her multiple OMM and the PA's? Only if she has a total mental relapse and I have not seen that.

It did take time for her to realize how poorly she behaved and understand the extent of the damage she caused, but I can tell that she has turned the corner and her regret is total.

I learned that I have no control over what others do, it is all I can do to contol myself and not seek revenge. It took a while but my WW is now a FWW.

Remember:

You are better than the bad in all of this.

I really like our MC, but she has said from the beginning my ww should not disclose all info because it would only hurt me.

I guess its true that once you know some gross detail you cannot unknow it.

Its frustrating to have questions that go unanswered. The feeling that OM and her have 'secrets' for me.

But on the other hand. The stuff i do know is pretty disturbing and i am not sure I REALLY want to know even more details.

It is already hard enough to try and find some sort of respect/trust for ww knowing what i know and who she had the A with.

There is a difference between lying about things versus not disclosing every little gross detail.

A ws should never lie because once you find out the truth as bs you have to start from scratch again. ("ofcourse i always used protection"....sigh)

..i echo your sentiments on resigning myself to a life of pain and heartbreak, that they did unspeakable things with another man, in my case, a best friend for nearly 20 years..

..although we are working hard to R, i know that this magnitude of betrayal and deceit will forever haunt my mind and soul..it just won't go away for years and years.

..i don't believe she thinks fondly of it, given the devastation she has caused in our 40+ year relationship, but one can never really know what private thoughts she has about him because we were all friends for so long before i found out.

..i still suffer from a twist in my gut and a pain in my chest..i'm thinkin' heartache..and a burning pain in my head when i think about them together..for so many years..

..i know 'exactly' what you are saying and feeling here.

..what a state of mind to wake up to every single day of the rest of our lives..

..will we ever be at peace??

smy

slight t/j:

Cuckhold, I'm sorry about your wife's view on things. I, too, was very young when I met my husband, and had never had sex with anyone else. For me, experience as in 'more men' was not what my affair was about. It was a side-effect, and not one that conjures up fond memories. I don't feel better educated now, I don't need any comparison. I'm glad that I left some things to be unique between my husband and me, and the experience was worth exactly nothing.

~L.

and the experience was worth exactly nothing.

My FWH said the exact same thing.

Did I regret my affair? Not completely until I told the truth about it three years later, allowing me to see what I had done through H's eyes. Truth telling does wonders to gain perspective.

Before then I had the sense of having dodged a bullet and reprimanded myself for being selfish and stupid, but the fuzzy A feelings only very gradually lost their luster over a long time, and appeared nowhere near as ugly as when full disclosure happened. I grieved the OM for almost a year. It is horrific.

[This message edited by facethemusic at 5:38 AM, September 9th (Thursday)]