SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Have you ever stopped the narrative in your head to think that it wasn't that he didn't care, but maybe because he trusted you? Was he unhappy all that time or emotionally content? Dig deeper as to why you would choose to do something just because you thought "no one cared"? Are there other aspects in your life that hold you to accountability only as opposed to not doing it simply because it is wrong to do it?

[This message edited by ConstantLearner at 2:27 AM, February 28th (Wednesday)]

Yes, but who really gets hurt from a stolen sandwich?

Yes, your husband was neglectful and yes he could have been more emotionally available, but comparing your need for emotional support resulting in you cheating on your husband is far different from someone hungry stealing a sandwich.

I get the comparison, but the scale is skewed. The emotional damage from infidelity has caused suicides, broken homes, depression, murders and mental issues. No wayward really pays those consequences any attention once they are in the throes of euphoria produced by their indignant behavior. Those consequences come with a huge price and that debt takes years to pay off.

If you look deeper you will realize that the infidelity had nothing to do with your husbands emotional inadequacies, but it had to do with how you coped with his emotional inadequacies. If you are starving I am sure there are many good people who would assist you in getting something to eat, however I don't know many good people willing to assist you in cheating

So basically the BS is always faultless? Even when the BS´s selfishness has damaged the M way in advance? When he continuously ignores the need of his SO?

What should a person in a dead bedroom do? Leave in the quiet of the night? Wait months for the divorce to come through in complete celibacy? What should the woman do who feels neglected and unheard? She will be ridiculed if she asks for divorce. Hell, even the people in the alanon were seen as weak if they decide they are not able to live with an alcoholic!!!!!

I have counseled many women in hard circumstances to divorce. Two of the alanons and some from the hospital. In both cases there was just so much resentment and anger on one side and so much disinterest and selfishness on the other.

Many here are arrogantly assuming they know exactly that whatever the WH/WW´s went through is harmlesss and insignificant. Any Issues like this are minimized. Well, sound s selfish and self absorbed to me.

[This message edited by GlowingLife at 7:59 AM, February 27th (Tuesday)]

As you have shared more about how you felt it was a fling, you were under stress, and you felt happier than you had in a long time...these are all things I identify with in my own situation. Even down to my AP asked me if I was so happy then why was I doing it?

You aren't getting underneath it yet, and it's going to take some time. One thing that I wondered as you write this...do you miss your AP? You don't seem to have disdain for him. He knew you and your husband. He knew what he was doing, he manipulated the situation to get what he was seeking. (And for most men I think it's sex, but often it gets more complicated than that)

I know you are saying he's not better, but are you pining for your AP? The emotional need is strong in women, and when you get that filled after a long time it can be hard to put away. Somehow your AP doesn't seem as much in the rearview as he would normally be by now. Have you been in complete NC...no going to his social media, no checking up on him, no talking to him in any form?

This is the metaphor our therapist used: a person who is deprived of food for years at a time who goes out and steals a sandwich. Or a Thanksgiving dinner. Is it right to steal? Objectively, no. Does it make the person a monster? Nope. It makes them a starving person who did what they thought they had to do to make it.

That is horrible. No wonder if you therapist is blame shifting and justifying it on you starving. Whose fault was it that you stayed so long and starved. A healthy person would have gotten out of there and gotten a job.

Was it right that your husband was who he was for a relationship with you? Nope. But, he was who he was. You knew who he was. You stayed hoping to get fed. He seemed to be happy. Of course he was because he was getting everything met. You weren't. You set those needs that weren't getting met. You chose to stay so long in a relationship when they weren't. I wouldn't doubt that in the beginning you even had needs met by being valuable in meeting his needs. Eventually you ran dry being the giver. Yet, instead of leaving after begging for attention you cheated.

Yes, there is a cheater's script because it seems that when we all do finally get it. It all follows the same thing. When we see it isn't about the stimuli or outside factors. It is only about US. What we choose as ways to be valued, what we choose and wants and needs, what we choose to get those met, and how we treat others that we expect to meet them. You seem to be getting a healthier narrative back. So, leave and keep going. You come across to me as "I gave x,y,z so I should get x,y,z." In a perfect Utopia that would be nice. In the real world it doesn't happen. But, it could if you choose the right environment. If you teach others how to treat you. If you have enough self worth to step out when you feel you aren't getting what you put in. If you had been a healthier person with better coping skills and more self worth you would have left when x,y,z wasn't met. So, is it really the fault of the marriage or the fault of the individual people that stay in dysfunction? That is part of "owning it and understanding the control". To me it wasn't the marriage that made things dysfunctional. It was the person that stayed due to their dysfunction. But, good for you for finding your voice and self worth. I hope if your husband shows no signs of being a more emotional partner that you would prefer, you divorce as opposed to resenting him for what he isn't going to be and find a better partner finally. Hopefully you have learned that when someone doesn't meet your expectations, you choose to find a healthier choice. When faced with obstacles you have better coping skills even when you don't have the help you want to make the decisions and have the strength to stand on your own two feet without the despair you have felt in the past when alone.

Those consequences come with a huge price and that debt takes years to pay off.

Agree, but I have noticed that those waywards that go into affairs with resentment seem to have trouble seeing beyond their resentment. I ask who should one be angry at? The person not meeting their needs or the one staying for so long expecting another person to change and fill them up? You seem to have a focus that you were starving. It was his fault, so you did something illogical to feed it. The point is, why did you starve yourself. Your husband didn't starve you. You did. I wish you luck in your journey and I hope you don't starve yourself again. I hope you find in life the restaurant that serves what you eat.

So basically the BS is always faultless? Even when the BS´s selfishness has damaged the M way in advance? When he continuously ignores the need of his SO?

In choosing to cheat? Yes. In the marriage? Yes.

A healthier person would have left. Divorced. Again, whose fault is it? The environment or the person choosing to stay in dysfunctional situations? What answer gives the person the most control? Relying on someone else? Or trusting yourself to live a healthier life? IMO a healthier person that has self worth and demands respects doesn't stay in dysfunction. A person that stays with a dysfunctional BS gives the BS the control. Whose fault is it that they gave the BS so much control?

She will be ridiculed if she asks for divorce.

Why? Why does that matter? Whose chooses to make that matter to them and make their decisions about their life and health based on what people think? Whose fault is that? Being that influenced about their self worth by being ridiculed? Does society even still act that way? I would guess in some customs?

[This message edited by Zugzwang at 8:06 AM, February 27th (Tuesday)]

Glowing life: The BS is not faultless to the state of the marriage. They are faultless when we go out and decide to betray them and break all the promises that go with marriage. It certainly isn't my husband's fault that I stepped out of the marriage instead of trying to work it out or end it with him.

My marriage definitely had it's problems. But, it had problems that both of us contributed to. So instead of trying to triage it, I ran it over with a car. And, seriously, it was the worst thing for my own mental health and well being as much as it was for his. An affair is never going to help a situation and in most cases it makes it 100 times worse than any alternative.

I say that without judgement. I know all too well how you can fool yourself into justifications. But, the justifications only help to prolong you from the healing process. Noone is attacking Constant Learner, but trying to get her on a path to help her thinking to get her out of infidelity. Even if she is not to be with her husband, which I always think is the prerogative of either the BH or the BW, this is a core issue that without the proper introspection will manifest itself in other areas of her life...even if she doesn't use cheating as the coping mechanism again. It could be something else that is less healthy than what she deserves.

[This message edited by ConstantLearner at 2:28 AM, February 28th (Wednesday)]

Forgive me if I’m speaking for others but we are all in the same boat. We all had our own perceived issues within ourselves and in our marriage and we all chose to deal with them in the worst way possible.

So basically the BS is always faultless? Even when the BS´s selfishness has damaged the M way in advance? When he continuously ignores the need of his SO?

The problem with this way of thinking is that it’s subjective. Every person has a different criteria where the BS can be blamed for our going outside the marriage. Where does it stop? Who’s to say that your reason is better than mine? Once you start blaming the BS for your decision to cheat, all reasons become valid. He left the toilet seat up or left his dirty socks on the floor or wouldn’t mow the lawn. Silly? How’s this? He didn’t pay enough attention to me, he didn’t validate me, he wasn’t good in the bedroom, he had a temper, he drank too much. Better? And if all reasons are valid then we never own what we did. After all, it’s “their” fault I cheated. So we don’t change, we don’t become healthy people and safe partners. Because it’s our BS’s fault.

What we have to realize, and it takes time, is that we all have issues. And the BS shares in those issues. But we chose to betray them. We decided to deal with those issues in this way. That’s on us. Not them.

[This message edited by Poppy704 at 11:53 AM, February 28th (Wednesday)]

[This message edited by ConstantLearner at 2:28 AM, February 28th (Wednesday)]

Hi Poppy704,

Literally everything is your fault because you are the WS, that’s the SI way.

I’ve never seen that here. Ever.

EVERYONE NEEDS TO OWN THEIR SHIT! You own your affair, it’s yours.

This I have seen over and over again and I agree with wholeheartedly.

All we are saying here is not to combine the issues in the M with the decision by the WS to cheat. There are so many ways to cope with marriage issues yet we chose this way. Why? Don’t blame the M. There are so so many people with poor marriages that don’t cheat, so why did we? That deserves and demands introspection and work to figure out and fix. Separately, but important, is to address issues in the M because an unhealthy M isn’t good for anyone. But it’s wrong to use those issues as a cause and effect kind of thing.

I think building a true M needs both partners to own their 100%. I hope and pray that my BH will find the guts to do the withdrawal and keep dry. But I also know that I am prepared for any outcome.

[This message edited by GlowingLife at 9:11 AM, February 27th (Tuesday)]

Poppy,

With all due respect, you have been here less than a month. I had a hard time embracing some of the concepts here at first as well because I didn't want to own my own shit.

I think you misunderstand the frequent advice of those who have been out of infidelity a long time. I am not included in that category, but the advice I have been given here has helped me in my journey tremendously.

For the record, I, and I am pretty sure everyone on this site knows that affairs don't happen in a vaccumn. Waywards have to take ownership though of the affair, and the damage caused by it. The BS can't, the decision is made solely by the person who chose to have the affair. And, it's traumatic to the BS. The trauma has to be addressed first because it's like a bomb went off in the marriage.

By staying in our justifications, we fail to address the issues we have with boundaries, coping with stress, and dealing with the issues that made us believe it was okay to do it. It's a critical aspect of healing the relationship. You can read any book about the aftermath of the affair, and you will read many of the same principles as what those here take their time to try and reinforce or help others to apply.

I, and the majority of the others do not feel poor self worth or self image is a path to healing. Rather the contrary, by building those things up you become a healthier you and that translates to any relationship that you have out there.

What you are reading when you see some of this (often called 2X4's) is trying to help others whose shoes we've been in get to a state of thinking that brings them success in the reconciliation of the marriage, if that is what they want.

I do not know you or your story yet, but I hope you will keep coming and posting. If it's such a backward thinking site to you, I have to believe that there is still a reason you are here. Believe me, I came very intermittently in the beginning because I didn't want to face what I was seeing. But, over time I learned to filter out what was not helpful and I have learned there is a core group of people here that care very much about helping others and reinforcing their own learning.

But, at any rate, take what is good and leave what doesn't work. I have found much of it to be a good frame work for helping my relationship heal - so we can get to working on a better relationship that includes ways that my husband will hopefully step up. But, for now, we have to recover from this to get to that, and it's because I chose to have an affair instead of working on those things productively in the first place. Anyway, welcome.

Glowing Life - I hope he does too. And, I think there are specific dynamics when married to someone with drug and alcohol problems. I do not have any experience with that, but maybe others here do. It would seem to me that those addictions he has is probably the first trauma in your relationship and until those are addressed it will be difficult to address anything else because he won't be a safe partner for you in too many ways to count. I hope the two of you have found resources to get help with those issues.

But, yes, I agree...a healthy marriage takes two people and in many ways I think it's never 50/50...it should be 100/100. Sometimes it's 80/20 but as long as it keeps balancing out and someone isn't carrying the load all the time then it's okay sometimes when the balance is not equal. I can imagine that you have carried quite the heavy load if he's been abusing drugs or alcohol. Best wishes to you.

[This message edited by Poppy704 at 11:55 AM, February 28th (Wednesday)]

Poppy.

Interestingly i think your last post speaks to the crux of what's being discussed here.

At the end if the day I've not cone across anybody here who advocates staying in an unhappy or unhealthy marriage just because you are a WS. A healthy functioning marriage takes two people working together.

So for example if the WS gets their sgit together, accepts that no matter what was going on in their marriage they should never have stepped out of it, owns that and helps their spouse recover from the damage done and then takes a look and says "this isn't working, they are not pulling their weight in this marriage and are constantly berating me with the affair" (which is different to then being in pain over it) then the WS should take the healthy steps, raise it discuss and see if it can change and if it can't, walk.

You say your husband refuses to let you go to counselling, that's not healthy if it's somethi g you feel you need. Your previous threads have hinted at an unhealthy balance at home. You need to look at that for yourself and decide if it's a marriage you want to be in. The phrase "own tour shit" applies to more than just the affair. If you aren't happy only you can be responsible for that.

If you look through the wayward forums you will find examples of threads where the wayward has been advised by these same people to get out of the marriage because despite what they did the marriage appears unhealthy and will not make them happy in the end.

[This message edited by ChangeMe1 at 9:42 AM, February 27th, 2018 (Tuesday)]

ChangeMe: Right now I’m where my kids need me to be, because under no circumstances would I ever allow them to be left in BHs care.

I realize that REAL reconciliation probably isn’t possible, BH didn’t give a shit before and I certainly didn’t give him a reason to want to be better and care about my happiness by cheating on him. The best I can hope for is to focus on myself and becoming someone who will never cheat again. For now, I have to do that work in a less than ideal environment with no support system, and there are times reading posts on SI helps me with both my progress and enduring my home life, but I have to wade through a lot to find those useful bits.

[This message edited by ConstantLearner at 2:29 AM, February 28th (Wednesday)]