SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Mrs Panda and now SlowUptake have asked about whether your betrayed wife knows you cheated on her.

I'm curious as to the answer to that very important question.

JD

My wife does know. I did not confess but had a Dday. My sons know as well. I am working to heal the pain I have caused.

Hate and anger and whatever else someone uses to deal with the choices they made is fine. I am just not made that way.

I highly respect what this site is intended for and I come here to read, learn and change. But it amazes me at the amount of judgement that comes from the waywards here. The assumptions people make and the rocks thrown at people after reading a post about someones siutuation is shocking. We all justify our behavior including those who hurl vile under the guise of "tough love" or I have been there....I know what is best for you.

Its unfortunate because, i think many people could benefit from this site but are shunned away because they dont see the light as others do.

Marriedman...

I haven't see one "rock" thrown at you. You've received a lot of really good support, so by dismissing the people that took the time to help you is really unfair.

If you think its rough in this forum, where it's heavily moderated and protected, good luck out there>>> on another forum

I hope you stick around

[This message edited by SI Staff at 8:10 AM, February 5th (Wednesday)]

Reconciling who we were and what we chose to do, against who we want to become, by definition, requires us to see the broken, the ugly, the selfish, the entitled, and the cruel in ourselves, and, yes, our xAP's.

If I refuse to see or acknowledge those simple truths, I stay lost. IMHO, of course.

I did not suggest that I was being attacked, I made an observation based upon the reading that I have done on this site.

I am not dismissing the people that have offered me help, I have acknowledged in posts, those people that I have found very helpful and I will continue to do so. But to refuse to acknowledge that some waywards on this site are not judgmental or throw rocks is disingenuous. I understand the some people must demonize others to kill what that recognize in themselves, I am just not one of those people. And if you express opinions other then what is widely accepted here it is typically met with disdain.

I fully attend to stick around as I think this is a powerful healing community.

Justdesserts, I completely agree with you that reconciling who were and what we have become demands that we look at the broken, ugly, selfish sides of ourselves and our AP’s.

But to refuse to acknowledge that some waywards on this site are not judgmental or throw rocks is disingenuous.

I didn't refuse anything. I merely told *you* that *you* weren't getting attacked or rocks thrown at you. Please don't twist things into something they're not.

Thanks!

I fully attend to stick around as I think this is a powerful healing community.

That's great!!

[This message edited by SI Staff at 10:04 AM, February 5th (Wednesday)]

I find the advice on this thread discouraging. I am the OW and I have found that this site is harder on the OW than the OM. So yeah, I'm a typical shithead to some of you. OM's are typical shitheads too. The OM take advantage of a weak woman and prey on her insecurities. Using her body to feed their own selfish egos ignoring the tender hearts of their wives and children.

Sorry, the OW bashing is a reason that I'm thinking of leaving SI. It gets to a point where I do enough self deprecating without reading on here how awful I am.

But I digress. Back to the original poster.

I get where you're coming from. We don't want to see the OP in a bad light because we too are the OP. we made the same crappy decisions as the OP. You probably were friends. She probably was/is an overall decent human being with her own problems and issues--just like we all have. But that doesn't make her special--to you. That just makes her like everyone else on this planet. All screwed up. Maybe she's changing for the better, maybe she's not. We can't worry about that. We have to worry about ourselves and our families. Right after d-day I was secretly hoping I'd here from the OM. Wondering how he was. Blah. Now I just don't care. IF I ever got an email from him I would promptly show my husband and roll my eyes at what a loser OM is. I just don't care. Just as time heals wounds, it will help your perspective too.

Marriedman2013 - I highly respect what this site is intended for and I come here to read, learn and change. But it amazes me at the amount of judgement that comes from the Waywards here. The assumptions people make and the rocks thrown at people after reading a post about someone’s situation is shocking. We all justify our behavior including those who hurl vile under the guise of "tough love" or I have been there....I know what is best for you.

You are correct that at one level, SI is a judgement place however, I personally see that as a strength of the site and not a determent.

First and foremost, it has to be understood that each member here, including the mods, are here as a result of adultery being a life changing event in their lives. We are not, nor will we ever be, regardless of our experiences here, professional therapists, psychotherapists, psychiatrists etc. We are lay people, with varying abilities to express ourselves. And that varying communication skill is reflected in our ability to read, understand, deduce and read nuances from the written word. And its reflected in our abilities to write clearly and concisely without hyperbole and exaggeration in such a manner that everyone could readily grasp our intent, never mind the content.

Each of us here comes from our own background and the circumstance of our particular A so how could we not be guilty of the BTDT phenomena? This is what a informal support group does.

The truth is that if you don’t see things the way that the crowd does, then that’s your prerogative. Just as I am entitled to disagree with anything you said. That is why the adage, of take what you need and leave the rest. This is not a touchy feely place. This is not a place of detached, analytical and clinical discourse.

This is a moderated forum for the WS to express their own personal issues. To give and receive support. And while you may control what support you offer and how that is offered, you cannot control what the other members think, feel and offer up. That’s just not how this forum works.

Moderators do and will take steps including warnings, PM messages and locking threads where appropriate but they are not our mothers and they cannot police each and every message. The filtering of messages, helpful and harmful is left to ourselves.

I firmly believe that in a majority of cases, if is seems that the thread respondents are united in consensus and a particular message is being preached, that it would behove the member to take another look at what was written and said, in order to see if perhaps there is a point to the dissent. Perhaps, it may be helpful if both sides consider the following quote.

wincings_sparkle - If it hurts, it is something worth looking at. If it makes you angry, it is something worth looking at. If it makes you cry, it is something worth looking at.

Most if not all of us came here with poor interpersonal and communication skills. Hell, for a lot of us, the lacks of those skills were instrumental in the choices and decisions that eventually lead us to SI as the WS in the first place. That realization would seemingly be obvious to anyone here but in fact, at times, members here are held to a standard that is way beyond us.

Again it cannot be said often enough, we are not a professional counselling service and so, the quality of advice that we offer is very much conditional on the self-growth of the members responding to a post and that at times, the feelings and thoughts expressed are directly in proportion to the pain and hurt experienced by the members in their own journeys.

Marriedman2013 - It’s unfortunate because, I think many people could benefit from this site but are shunned away because they don’t see the light as others do.

Many people have benefited from this site. In fact, the protected WS forum here, which provides a safe place for the WS community to ask for and get support is one of the main reasons that SI is one of, if not the most respected infidelity sites on the net.

Yes, some members do leave and yes, some are even asked to leave but from my own experience, there are more WS who come here after they had even worse experiences on other sites. Other sites which I have visited ranged from very to extremely hostile to the WS. Finding SI and its dedicated WS forum was a life saver for me.

I would hope that you stay here. Yes, some posts may rub you wrong and irate you but for everyone that does, there should be 99 more that offer some support, advice or message that can be helpful for your healing journey.

HUFI

We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light – Plato

HUFI-PUFI,

Thank you for your post. I think you are probably right that this forum is better than others. However, the misogyny and vitriol directed at OW is sometimes over the top. This is a theme that comes up over and over again on this board and usually the person is told that they just don't like the message. I come here because there are some sane people on this site that offer amazing perspective and insight and empathy.

Back to the original topic,

I also am not a person to sit around and hate myself. I also am about addressing the issue and moving forward to help me become a better person. I accept that I will have setbacks and I will have to do hard work. Part of the hard work is letting go of AP and those mushy feelings. Indifference is such a hard state to reach. Good luck.

Back to the original post -- you may be reaching for the wrong emotion towards the AP. You said it would be easier if you "hate" the AP. But you don't hate the AP because of your former relationship.

I don't hate my AP's. They are the same amount of broken that I am. They made the same bad decisions and told the same lies as I did. I have enough hate for myself. I know this is different for some A's, but I think you and I probably have a similar situation.

If I had to hate the AP in order to stop thinking about them, I'd be in trouble. What I try for is to be indifferent. Like a lot of our improved behaviors, this is something where actions lead, and then the emotions follow. My BW from time to time brings up how AP#1 seems to be skating without any accountability. My thoughts are sometimes "Whatever it takes for AP#1 to heal." But I keep those to myself, because I cannot allow AP to take any place in my life. Eventually, not saying her name or responding to anything about her leads to not thinking about them. You need to starve the energy that you give to her.

So I guess my question is what tools/techniques have others used when they find their thoughts going back to the affair or XAP.

Have you tried acceptance? As in, accept that this person had a positive/negative impact on your life, but that there is no room in your life for this person.

It worked for me.

Best of luck in your healing!