SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Becca What you've shared here is totally amazing. Thank you. I found it extremely helpful. Had been with my H for 30 plus years upon discovery of ten years plus of twice weekly creepy cheating. Guess it's all creepy but some seems creepier to me. So much of what you wrote hit home-was moving-was interesting.

I think you're talking about a kind of reality acceptance that's maybe necessary to maintain sanity, balance, a sense of okness with life again. You're fortunate that your H has shown nothing but goodness since discovery. I have not had that --bouts of nastiness--no more sexual acting out-just personality unpleasantness that he then apologizes for. Not good but overall not so bad.

After 40 of being with this person, by and large, it's ok enough.

Maybe for some of us ok enough is . . . ok?

@Striver

But the marriage was a sham. It is pointless to even argue anything about it.

If you feel your marriage was a sham, than it was. However, you do not get to define my marriage or anyone else's marriage as such. And, I don't know if you are speaking specifically of your marriage or of marriages touched by a LTA. If I misunderstood please forgive.

@bpguy Thank you.

It just seems to me that if I was sharing my spouse for years and years with another "spouse"

Just because a WS has a LTA, what makes you feel that the AP was like another spouse? The OW in my particular sitch was the furthest thing from a spouse. I have a word that I usually call the OW but we are in Recon, so can't use it. But, it has to do with a dumpster. And, OW was nothing more than a masturbatory tool for my FWH. He knew little to nothing about OW even though the LTA was 7+ years. When I found out and started doing research on OW, FWH was shocked to find out the many things I was able to find out about OW that he had not a clue about (27 alias's, for one). He didn't care about OW, he used OW. That was what OW was good for. He could call OW at a moments notice and OW would jump at the chance to hook up and would be ready, willing and able to be the hole he got off in. Ha ha! Most of the time OW even paid for the hotel room, if they got a room. He would spend maybe three hours tops with OW each time they hooked up, which was about every 4-6 weeks. Naw, OW was nothing like a spouse. More like a free prostitute. But, that is my story and not all LTA's are the same. But, please don't make the mistake in thinking that they are.

@beachwalkerI

n a LTA, however, there are the weekends away, sleeping over, having sex often, afternoon love sessions, etc. The AP gets to know the WS pretty well, blurring the difference between the BS and the AP.

See above post to bpguy. This was not my FWH's LTA and I know many others WH's didn't have this kind of LTA. (see LTA thread in ICR forum)

@Becca Becca, when was your d-day? You have some pretty clear thinking going on from what I can gather from your posts, this isn't a recent revelation, is it? I know I was a total wreck for months and months and was actually quite traumatized that I wasn't thinking very clearly at all. I can relate to so much of what you have posted and agree with your thought processes as it is similar to mine. My FWH had at least 7+ year LTA. Some of it was EA before going PA, but not EA in a romantic way, and as my d-day happened 6 years after the LTA ended my FWH is fuzzy on exact years. Which isn't an excuse as we are both terrible with dates and we both have a long history with that. But, it was easily over 15 years of deception.

After 40 of being with this person, by and large, it's ok enough.

Maybe for some of us ok enough is . . . ok?

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I think the good news here is that you get to decide for yourself if okay is enough.

My H did go through his own process that was a gradual sort of evolution from feeling like he knew he fucked up (like...how you may drop a person’s favorite mug or reveal that you took $5 out of their purse)...to understanding fully that he had really, really broken something serious. That took months. Like, I’d say he STARTED to really get the degree to which I was shattered at around the 10th month. Up until then, he continued to play his sports leagues, come bouncing through the door, put triggering things on the TV only to be surprised that I was bothered by it, etc. etc. etc. It wasn’t until my relentless grief started taking a real physical toll on both of us that I felt like we might have a chance of pulling through this.

He got it in theory, but not viscerally for quite some time. Even now, he’s got spidey-sense...but I can’t really expect him to really know what it’s like to walk around with an axe in your stomach all day. Or to doubt the very ground you walk on.

But he does get the sadness now. He gets that what he has done was no minor chink of character. He understands many more pieces of himself that led to thinking any of it was something that a healthy person does to the relationship they were supposed to protect.

And yes. That does help.

But the loss is simply not assuaged completely by any of that. It’s necessary dressing, and certainly diminishes things faster. But the wound is hardly forgotten, and we have both been shaken onto new ground.

It’s the new ground that I’m talking about here. Someone asked where I am relative to Dday?

I am two years out and some change. His affair has now been over for 7 years, if his story is accurate...but he makes it clear that his affair-mindset did not end until Dday. So really, we are looking at 2 of 26 years where I can possibly assume I am dealing with something new.

Oddly, it’s like we’ve juxtaposed.

I believed whole-heartedly in monogamy for all of it but 2.

He’s believed whole-heartedly in monogamy for none of it but 2.

What does someone do with this kind of thing?

For me, I feel like I’m just now stepping up to some clarity after two solid years of paralyzing grief.

Some aspects of our relationship are business. Some are synergy and convenience. Some of it is physical. Some is pure companionship and the good aspects of predictability. Some things are entirely new...like the ability to carry on a conversation and be happily engaged for longer than 5 minutes without frustration. Actual connection and empathy. Real effort. It feels in many ways like he’s left puberty and is finally joining me in adulthood. I think about renewing vows sometimes and just go “meh”. Nah. Not for me. It feels like the curtain has dropped on it and I can see the little fat wizard working the knobs. It’s not what I thought it was. It won’t be the fantasy again, and I’m not sure that’s not a better thing to hope for vs. a worse thing.

He won’t be the perfect guy because part of the curtain dropping is the realization that there isn’t a perfect guy in the first place. My foot is down against abuse. I won’t negotiate further abuse, and I am not too exhausted to take whatever steps may be required to lay down hard lines if need be. But that thankfully hasn’t been tested yet.

That’s my new normal. For now. Still with some problems.

I am two years out and some change. His affair has now been over for 7 years, if his story is accurate...but he makes it clear that his affair-mindset did not end until Dday.

D-day for me was 6 years after the LTA ended and same.

to understanding fully that he had really, really broken something serious. That took months. Like, I’d say he STARTED to really get the degree to which I was shattered at around the 10th month. Up until then, he continued to play his sports leagues, come bouncing through the door, put triggering things on the TV only to be surprised that I was bothered by it, etc. etc. etc. It wasn’t until my relentless grief started taking a real physical toll on both of us that I felt like we might have a chance of pulling through this.

Oh, my gosh, Becca, I feel like you are writing my story. So much all of this.

I can tell you, Becca, that at almost 10 years post d-day I am healed. Our marriage is healed. I am no longer walking around with the "axe in my stomach". I rarely think of his betrayal. I rarely get triggered. The times I think of it most is when I am reading and posting on SI.

Actual connection and empathy. Real effort. It feels in many ways like he’s left puberty and is finally joining me in adulthood.

Yes, this is us now. I am #1 priority, not his fishing and hunting.

I think about renewing vows sometimes and just go “meh”. Nah. Not for me.

Even this, this is how I feel. This comes up in Recon every so often about renewing vows. And, I have nothing against it for others. If that is what they would like to do, go for it. But, for me. Nah. For one thing, I didn't break my vow, I have nothing to "renew".

I truly believe that you can heal from a LTA. You can feel very much in love with your spouse. You can look at them with pride and respect once again. I know I do. There is no asterisk. There is no footnote.

Thank you Becca and Sister Milkshake, you are so helping me thank you ! .. yesterday my WS took a polygraph test .. so I know there are no more major secrets .. I knew something was off that he was with holding, he did tell me that last piece in a joint IC session and thankfully that was the last straw .. love my gut feelings .. WS has been wonderful .. cared for me when I broke a few bones .. now thru pneumonia this week ..we stay for so many reasons at 74 I have no real desire to be by my self . He is changing back to the person I fell in love with but there is now a softer side.. we are 7 months past 3rd DDay

Long way to go .. first is to get rid of the depression I am in ..resistant to take if meds .. but IC feel that may help me ..

As for Marriage .. I have used the word relationship concerning my WS .. marriage is between 2 people and there were 3 in mine ( for the past 18 1/2 years ) I just was never consulted for approval . We didn’t celebrate our 50 th with family and friends because I couldn’t celebrate a something I didn’t trust.. that was a decision I made 17 yrs ago . All my WS says is that he is sorry .. he loved 2 women .. me and a fantasy.

I can tell you, Becca, that at almost 10 years post d-day I am healed. Our marriage is healed. I am no longer walking around with the "axe in my stomach". I rarely think of his betrayal. I rarely get triggered. The times I think of it most is when I am reading and posting on SI.

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Thank you for this. It's a rock to cling to. At this stage, I strongly suspect that someday one can get over this if they work at it, but the notion that someone can have as good or a better life is something I still struggle imagining in many moments.

I am curious though...did it take you 10 years to get there, or did you feel healed sooner? When did most of the cloud fully lift for you?

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For one thing, I didn't break my vow, I have nothing to "renew".

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Ha I love this. Yes! This is the first time that I have ever had any questions or doubts. So "renewing" anything feels silly. Besides, renewing what? We realized some things through this process. That there were some really important things we didn't ask each other prior to marriage. That we didn't ask ourselves. We did what so many do and just went into it thinking "it's time and we enjoy each other so why not?"

There were some serious why nots. Especially with him. He did not know himself. Part of this healing process is that he is finally coming more into a sense of self and out of the intense need for being a dancing approval monkey. That's a thing I'm watching so closely, and it was over the top when he was young. Now at 56 he's starting to find his own skin.

I think when I'm really hurting and angry, I say thing like "he destroyed the marriage". But in truth, it's just the same thing behaving differently now. We have a companionship. Using that word when I'm feeling angry helps. Sometimes I just don't want to give the word marriage back to him so easily.

But who am I kidding.

In so many ways I now have the marriage I always deserved and wanted.

The pain story interferes with allowing for that. There is a strong desire to self-protect by denying it and holding it close to the breast pocket. Healing for the BS demands so much of us this way. We have to be the ones to loosen our grip on our weapons when we've just been clobbered so badly. But, it's the only way.

Otherwise, I've seen it.

You can easily take and build on this bitterness to your grave.

Another reason I stayed, contingent that his behavior moves in the right direction...

We all now have this story.

Switching geography doesn't change any of that.

You have your bag of wounds and bitterness.

It made sense to me to spend all of my energy trying to dissolve that for my OWN sake, vs. carrying the heaviness of the "I'm the woman that got cheated on my whole adult life" story.

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yesterday my WS took a polygraph test .. so I know there are no more major secrets ..

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Wondered about this for a long time. My husband claims that he actually only had sex with her a handful of times, and most of them over 15 years ago.

I absolutely, positively, still do not believe this one bit. He's been going over there for 21 years. Calling her. At some point, it started mattering less, because I believed the sincerity of his remorse, and I also believe that cognitive dissonance is a very real thing. I would strongly suspect that there have been others too. Not necessarily in a sex-addict situation, but just in a "sex is casual like eating a bag of chips and if a bag presents itself...well hey". His sports leagues include some awfully leggy, athletic young women.

A friend of a friend is a brain research specialist who thinks he's stumbled onto some method that is more accurate than a polygraph. I do hear that polygraphs are excellent, but largely depend on the administrator's ability to question as well.

I would have liked to know the whole truth.

But I also wonder how necessary it may actually be after a point. Our greatest fear is that they will do all this again and that they are still quite capable of lying. But the reasons for their lies are multi-layered. For one, they have been lying to themselves for literally years in a LTA, and may have twisted the truth into something not even they recognize anymore. Second, when they truly feel deep regret, it hurts them to recall it. It's like putting their hand on a hot stove and holding it there. Third...they genuinely don't want to put you through more pain...now that they realize the actual depth of that possibility.

Again, that split between the person they thought they were (good) and the person they actually were (shitty) can really create a clash.

So curious...do you feel better now having had the polygraph? Was it the relief you needed?

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What you've shared here is totally amazing. Thank you. I found it extremely helpful. Had been with my H for 30 plus years upon discovery of ten years plus of twice weekly creepy cheating. Guess it's all creepy but some seems creepier to me. So much of what you wrote hit home-was moving-was interesting.

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Thanks for your kind words, marji. I'm still on my journey, and it's still really hard. I'm sure you would agree that there is something special about our little category. We can share our story with other affair victims and get a shame-within-a-shame reaction from them too as they gasp at the amount of time our situations lasted.

I know I do.

I tend to feel sort of "extra" damaged because we can feel elevated into a whole new category of victimhood. And the judgement sometimes. I would get the oh you can work anything out speech until I told them how much of the marriage this overlapped.

Then silence, a gasp, and the ol' well...sometimes you can do too much. I know I'd have to leave if it were me.

**sigh.

Me too. Thank you to everyone who shared on this thread. I am in pieces and in tears from your honesty and your insight, but maybe in a good way. I have some new hopeful thoughts to hold on to and some clarity about why I stay and try so hard, when it feels so hopeless sometimes. Forgive my lengthy and confusing vent.... even our therapist who watched my discovery unfold during our sessions was shocked and confused by the continued revelations and deception. He helped me to understand that I have done nothing wrong, but a great wrong has been done to me and will take great care and much time to recover from. He helped me to accept that it is ok to not know what I want, and to think of myself as much as my husband and my marriage. He helped me to understand that I needed support, but to be cautious telling anyone what I was going through, to be sure I needed them to know and could handle them knowing this down the road. You can never untell anyone. He helped me to reconcile sparing my adult children the truth, at least for now, until I find my way through and can decide what is best. He helped me to see that my husband is a very flawed man, that I have been beyond trusting and forgiving and maybe I should spend some time focusing on envisioning a future that works for me and then figuring out the steps I need to take to get there. He asked me so many times what does that look like? What does moving forward, letting go, forgiving look like? Next year, five years down the road? Hard questions, truly. He made me believe it necessary to take my time because this will continue to impact and change me for a very long time. He helped me to understand that the nature of my discovery, my curiosity and my ocd coupled with the unusually cruel unfolding of the truth were going to make this much harder to heal from than it needed to be. I made him afraid for his own perfect marriage. It was surreal, and I have outgrown him but he gave me kindness, perspective, soothing words and some finger and toe holds to hang on to moving forward.

My affair season is 2010-2019, specifically and painfully the months of September, October, April, July, November and January. I have discoveries from attempts to cheat on our wedding Anniversary, know they celebrated their December/January birthdays together and discovered their continued affair on our daughter's birthday. A quarter of my marriage and half the months of the year. There is little that doesn't trigger me now. I deserve an Oscar for keeping up appearances for the last two years. I found out about my "perfect" husband's affair right before our 31st anniversary. He and his mistress gaslighted me into believing it was a short term affair years ago. I couldn't conceive the truth or that they colluded on the story together. Every minimizing confirmation I got from her was a relief and I am embarrassed to admit I thanked her for helping me learn the truth. The real truth trickled out over the next two years, and I am finally feeling like I know enough. I know it went on almost a decade. I know my repeated discoveries culminating in my threat to destroy her life were the only reason the affair ended. I know they continued to meet, travel and sleep together for seven months after the first Dday, on what was probably my seventh horrifying discovery of further lies and deception. The twisted timelines and slow revelations have me permanently damaged and confused.

I went from obsessing for almost a year about what happened in my life eight years ago in 2010 to thinking anything current in 2018 was a LT emotional affair, to realizing in 2019 it never ended, it was actually eight years of intense sexual infidelity and friendship, and have had to realize that every milestone in my life for the past 10 years, every event in our children's lives, every graduation, right of passage, holiday or trip, he shared with her, and those years included sexts and emails, phone calls, dinners, movies, hotels and fun trips with his girlfriend. It took me a year and a half to discover the affair continued after DDay, and that I inadvertently ended their physical affair with one very threatening email to her. I was an absolute fool and I know I should not feel this ashamed or humiliated, but I really expected better from myself, because I am so smart! So detail oriented! So organized! A tech savvy researcher who was intensely invested in her family and their happiness! I was sure I was paying attention, that we were all happy and on the same page. How could I have missed every clue? How stupid was I and how stupid am I now? I go back and read my journals from the early days and want to yell at myself. All the clues were right there, how could I not connect the dots? I tell myself I won't get fooled again. Trust is a bitch.

The hardest thing to know is that he can't find his way to full disclosure, and can't admit fully what he has done unless I wave proof in his face and still he tries to minimize or deflect or hurry me along to the happy recovery place we are supposed to live in now. He is trying as best his personality type will allow, and watching him try is its own hell. Things used to be easy and now almost everything is harder....He loves me. I am the love of his life. I was never supposed to know or get hurt, neither was her husband. They resented us because we didn't make them feel special and needed, etc.... He sees now, or is beginning to see because I keep throwing it in his face, that it was wrong, selfish, hurtful. He is finding his way to empathy and compassion for what he has put me through. It is hard for him to see what he has done to me, and he prefers to pretend I am still fine and fearless because he feels awful for the collateral damage he has caused in my life. He never loved her, she was easy and safe. He doesn't know what he saw in her in the first place. He doesn't know why he couldn't stop seeing her even after the sex got boring and the demands she made on his time more tedious, even after I could not stop crying, could not keep food down, or stop drinking or begging or clinging, or could not stop obsessing over her and them. He has no answers. It was easier to get in than to get out. She was needy. She cried, they developed a friendship, she cared for him. Disclosure would have only hurt me more. If I had quit looking I would have stopped being hurt by his affair, which he kept insisting was long ago and long over but was actually happening still, right then, under my crying snotty nose, while I was too stupid or trusting to piece together the truth my gut kept screaming alarms about. I was so busy trying to fix us, resizing our wedding rings, making promises to try harder, making him promise to be authentic and true, rebuilding our new marriage version 2.0. I was so gullible. He was so willing to manipulate me to keep his girlfriend. He never loved her he assures me. But he chose to continue to sleep with her after I demanded and he promised no contact, he continued to lie to me about the truth when I threatened to divorce at the next lie. He could never come clean about his relationship alongside ours, about his secret life, while I could not stop looking for clues and the truth. He couldn't choose me over her, I did it for him and didn't even know it at the time. It makes it really hard to feel loved and special. Once when I asked him why he made the choices he did, he said you give me too much credit. I was reacting not thinking. I'm not sure that helps.

I didn't find this site until months after I confronted her, until after I discovered everything about this being a fling was a lie, that it went on for years. I regret not finding SI sooner every day. I have learned so much I needed to know too late to be of use. I could have spared us both so much more pain, but I couldn't see my way through my pain to anything that made sense. We did almost everything wrong. I am reaching a point where I don't believe it matters. Not that the disclosure of details of his life and our marriage don't matter but that the truth doesn't matter to me anymore, it can't change or alter a thing. The damage from the lies is done and looks permanent. What can I live with is the question now.

I love him. I stay with him for a dozen reasons, maybe mostly because he still makes me laugh more than anyone else in the world, and no matter how long or how much I cry, he will hold me. He isn't much with words, and even though we talk more openly now than ever before, they don't carry the same value they used to. Neither does our marriage, our vows, our rings. Those things were illusions. We are left with what is ok enough, I guess. I like that term, thank you. I am still broken but mending. Still trying, fighting for a relationship and a family worth keeping. He seems up to the task now, he seems honest now, he seems faithful now, but I'm having a hard time letting my guard down enough to trust. Hope is precarious. It's safer to be prepared for the worst, to have an exit strategy, to care and love a little less to survive, now. I focus on getting to know the guy I share my life now with instead of wondering where the man I married went, or how much he changed. I focus on talking, sharing and doing things together, to building new memories that don't hurt, to paying attention and demanding I get what I need now too. But I'm not going to lie, I'm pretty bitter on a good day, when I'm not feeling sorry for myself. I'm working on that.

He gets a new me too, and this one is pretty unpredictable. I have lots of irrational fears I never had before, stupid things like driving across old bridges and having panic attacks, or a crazy obsession with snakes when I am out hiking and I've seen almost no snakes ever, but I fear that they are hiding where I can't see them. I can connect those dots, and see the root cause of the fear, but I can't cut the fear loose. Acknowledging the fear is a good first step I think. I am saying yes to almost everything, living my best life as best I can right now, even while I struggle to remember or understand what that is while I drift through my recovery and my grief. I make no apologies but I will accept them readily.

This is a special club in hell, I'm sorry to meet you all here, but really grateful for some weary souls who get how real this struggle can be. Even the people who love me the most and will accept whatever decisions I make in my life are shaking their heads saying I love you and I get why you stay, but I can't fathom how you can do it, and I never could, after all he has done to you and how much we watched him hurt you and lie to you some more. It's not the affair, or the eight years of cheating, which is horrifying enough, it's the continuing affair under the guise of recovery that is unforgivable. The lying about the lying when it could only hurt you more because he was just too stupid to cover his digital tracks. Of course it is unforgivable. I know that and the cognitive dissonance is constant static in my brain. I've been told I am brave and strong for fighting and staying, but I'm not feeling that so much, just stubborn, determined and clinging on tight and looking at my white fingers wondering what and why and how myself. I am still in reacting mode, just beginning to understand mode. It is still early in the recovery game, even if it is late in the life game. I feel like time is fleeting now, precious. Is that a side effect of being betrayed, or just getting older? And my WH is right on one count - it is easier to get in than to get out. I'm staying until it's harder to stay than to leave, and I would prefer not to reach that point. My therapist told me I can always leave and that is a comfort to me on the bad days. Of course I can. But do I want to? I think I do. For now I do. That has to be good enough, and it's fitting to be the one who isn't all in for a change. I'm here for now, I'm doing a great job of showing up every day, no matter how much it hurts.

I constantly freak out on this site when I realize what a long slow awful journey this can be, even for those dealing with just a ONS or an EA. Ours is a special painful journey, where the hardest question for me isn't how I can stay, but why would a man who could do this to someone he says he loves want to stay in the relationship with them at all? I question his motives, not mine. I question what is love? Who did I marry? Who am I? I'm exhausted from all the introspection and thinking and feeling. Literally spent.

Christmas is very hard. Dday was her sexy Christmas card to him. December is her birthday, she turns 60 this year. I want to ruin her day, every day. I want to know she's gained the thirty pounds I have lost. I want her to have lost half her hair too. I want to believe she was the only one, but I secretly would feel better if I were sure there were others so she could know she was not special enough to be true to either. I want to have drinks with her husband and commiserate and flirt with him and then go home knowing I am not a person who cheats. I mostly want this to never have happened and wish I could get back the life I thought I was living.

Sorry so long, so many words. Tip of the iceberg. Your stories touched me deeply. I hope this thread goes on for as long as we need it. Thanks for letting me vomit my story all over this thread. The more I tell it the less power it holds over me. Hugs and good thoughts and best wishes to you all. xo

edited for typos....

[This message edited by whatisloveanyway at 3:41 PM, December 15th, 2019 (Sunday)]

Becca, the gentlemen doing the polygraph was a licensed professional, works with the police , etc . The questions were not emotionally based .. ie do you love your wife.. one minute you love next you can be upset.. so test will not work .. he formats the questions in a way that it is a yes or no answer ..ie had the OW ever been in my home?

The fact that my WS was trying to help me because of all the past lies .. so my mind can rest and actually believe that WS has been truthful .. is telling me the truth .. relief ! I was waking up at 4am and hearing the imagined voice of OW saying he loves me, he is lying to you .. over and over .. when my WS told me the truth about the 2 withheld information..the voices stopped this past Wed.. his lies were self protection ..but he felt he had to tell me because I was hurting so much and he saw that.. I needed to know I had most of the information I needed to move forward and believe him .. so relief and peace is the gift he gave me ..

whatisloveanyway thank you for sharing all this-your words, your thoughts and feelings, your experience, your story moves me greatly. You write beautifully.

I think I've become numbish-four years and four months of discovery, since discovery, post discovery.

No particular person he-he doesn't have that type of personality--massage parlor girls instead-over ten years and twice weekly for hjs--over $300,000 worth of hand jobs -two years of lap dances--then coming home to me-a normal life-just a normal guy. Just a normal guy who lived a creepy double life-ok with a life of deception and gross exploitation-them, me. Whoever he could use for whatever he felt the use.

Then four years of apologies-more $ for therapists-for what? to get to the point of okness?

For the first year I couldn't even bare to let him hold my hand when we walked- we never stopped walking-even the first week we walked; there were parrots in a tree. The second year I let him take my hand but I couldn't open it-couldn't hold hands back. The third year he only took it sporadically. We still walked. Longish walks; four or five mile walks. Now he never takes my hand at all. Sometimes that bothers me; most times it's quite ok. I'm in my mid 70's. I have friends with dead husbands. Mine still walks and cooks and does the laundry. He drives at night. His cards for birthdays and holidays always said how much he was looking forward to retirement so we would be together all the time. Guess he was planning to give up his hobby when he stopped working-wouldn't have had the time and the space.

All so sad; so sick, so pathetic.

Wow, thank you for starting this topic as it really deeply touches me. I post rarely and am almost 2 years past Dday1 and almost a year from last trickle truth.

The affair with her HS BF had been going on from months after we married when she called, then met with him to complain about me. They met alone 3 times over 26 years. When I first discovered the contact about 12 years ago, she promised to end contact with him. She said the phone call was a one-time thing to catch up and assured me it would not happen again. I trusted her fully and was so confident in her love for me that I never thought about it again, until 2 years ago when I discovered the contacts had not ended. In fact, they had communicated more frequently and 2 of the three meetings occurred after my first discovery.

There were about 20 emails per year with some containing flirty language, references to their BF/GF nicknames, and hour long phone calls about 8 times per year. She deleted some emails (she's not technology savvy) and even destroyed a hard drive about 10 years ago (absent her telling me this I never would have found out). They discussed meeting and he told her he loved her at the end of many of their telephone calls. She claimed to have never told him she loved him and the discovered emails never mentioned love coming from her. The emails and phone calls occurred during at various time of the year including their birthdays, holidays and sometimes on our family vacations. About 4 years ago, she wrote a list of pros and cons as to whether it was possible to love both of us at the same time. She could not find the paper so told me just in case I stumbled upon it. Ironically, my wife was extremely jealous of the females I came in contact with and always worried I would cheat. Only after discovery and among our many discussions did I point out to her that maybe she was worried about me doing what she was doing. She said she never thought of it that way.

On Dday she professed her love of me, went full transparent, sent him a letter professing her love for me and for him to never contact her. She knew she had hurt me but justified the fact that there was no physical contact, except for an awkward hug hello at one of the secret meetings in a restaurant. Initially she justified her actions by saying she did not understand what was wrong with two friends catching up with each other a few times per year.

The remorse soon followed including a fair amount of self-hate on her part. She couldn't believe she could have inflicted such hurt upon me, a man, in her words who was the most loving husband, father, and provider. She said she did not want sex rather only wanted to be married to me and never thought of being with her AP. She claimed she did not yearn from him daily, that he was just an ego boost. I struggled, but am a very optimistic person. Since DDay, with the exception of the trickle truth, she's treated me like the most important person in the world. Over the past year (after the last of the trickle truth: her acknowledgement that she did love him in some way), the words of my IC rang in my head. My IC said asked if I was happy the times we were together and I said yes, I'm only retrospectively unhappy.

This has changed my whole outlook on life. I dwell only on the happy moments of the past and am more in the moment than ever. I still plan for the future with my wife but know it is not guaranteed. The only actions I can control are my own and I don't take for granted that trust given will be reciprocated. This has been a long and painful struggle but my wife continues to do everything she can to make me feel loved.

LTAs are horrible, memory destroying acts that represent incredible selfishness. I am truly thankful to others willing to share their experience in enduring such pain.

The hardest thing to know is that he can't find his way to full disclosure, and can't admit fully what he has done unless I wave proof in his face and still he tries to minimize or deflect or hurry me along to the happy recovery place we are supposed to live in now. He is trying as best his personality type will allow, and watching him try is its own hell.

...................................

I think this is just a really standard part of the process as a whole, don't you?

I figure that the major problem here is in part with us, and our inability to line them up with who WE thought they were. When my husband started spouting things like "I was weak" or "I couldn't help myself" I felt like I had literally been sucked into some weird wrinkle in space and time.

He was actually saying incredibly cliche things

that I thought only other people said or did...like on TV.

He had actually done this incredibly adolescent thing that I thought other people did and that were easily spotted from the outside.

He said those things.

He did those things.

And of course now I see someone different standing before me that was the very depth of teenagery and I just wasn't prepared to realize who he had been all this time. Most of us saw things in smaller ways here and there...like with difficulty connecting or for example.. mine was never terribly responsible with money.

In truth, this was just more of the same.

whatisloveanyway: It sounds like our spouses, like most who step over this line, feel like it's just an entirely separate thing altogether from their mainstream lives. It's a corner of their being that they feel entitled to or desperate enough to express in private. My h was always into porn. Porn has never been my thing, and I've always sort of never gotten the appeal but I understand that most men do find it interesting. I always looked the other way with this, and he had passwords that kept me out of his computer, etc.

In hindsight of course, it's very easy to see how an emotionally repressed individual with low EQ could fall so deeply into porn addiction. How sex with a virtual school bus of swedish teenagers isn't exciting anymore, and then you start crossing more lines.

You're entitled to it, because "boys will be boys" and there's "boy-code" not to tell one each other and "no harm no foul if no one finds out".

Upon reflection, I had a very unsatisfying sex life, because he was never in it. He was into his porn, and since those were training films of the worst kind, there was little to no connection. I remember so many times thinking how weirdly "recreational" sex felt vs. intimate...but oh well...at least I can trust him and that's a good feeling. Lol.

I had been cheated on just prior to my H. and was utterly heartbroken, which is an an added, MAJOR layer of betrayal piled onto his current string of behaviors. He knew. I don't even try to forgive that. That will be an axe in my gut for an indefinite period of time.

I also had a very difficult surgery, and recall that he felt put-out by my difficulty. He was cheating during that time. Another HUGE..F'ING HUGE Layer of betrayal that feels worse than the sex itself.

I can go on, because I have over 2 decades of someone picking fights with me for no reason, embarrassing me in front of friends, and taking shots at me while I have to stay in a sort of defensive mode. And now knowing what was standing behind all of that make things virtually unbearable in moments. Of course I can go all day long down the list of why I stayed or how I got involved in the first place or how I didn't see things. I always fought back and held my ground, and I thought that was enough.

Now I realize that I shouldn't have had to. No healthy relationship should be a defensive battleground

...............................

They resented us because we didn't make them feel special and needed, etc.

........................................

Remember that our husbands needed to create a narrative to continue their behavior.

No one doesn't know that an affair is extremely shitty.

So they need to create the necessary distance, spark the strife that allows them to see the bad marriage and the unloving spouse who drove them into the arms of the other person.

My H did this.

He was often unkind, particularly when we were with other people. I just struck it up to him being moody or tired. He picked fights. In the moments where I needed him most, he was there, but I recall that he also complained and was at moments, shockingly unsupportive. A time I remember suffering from post-surgical depression and was in tears. He just stood across the room and stared.

And he was cheating then.

.......................

But here's the thing.

I realize that I could sit here and itemize every way that my spouse let me down. I can see all of his twisted thinking and his shit behavior over the course of two decades. He can quickly become only that, when in truth there were other moments too. He was an "acts of service" guy, and would literally do anything for me. He could be protective. He could do the cognitive dissonance thing positively and be a good guy and a good husband and friend. I do think that he believed himself in many of those moments.

I think that working through the trauma of this requires an iron spine.

I discovered childhood trauma I never knew that I had, and I found that working through that did help to bring my feet back onto solid ground. I think this is important to explore. Not everyone is shattered by infidelity. Some even expect it on some level, and don't fall apart when it happens.

But I did.

I utterly lost my shit.

And after looking at the lifetime of other small traumas I had collected, it made sense why I was so unable to get back up from this.

I also discovered that in any highly traumatic situation (this definitely qualifies), the brain itself goes through a massive hit. It has taken focused attention on healing that in order to stabilize too. EMI and Neurofeedback have been particularly helpful in my healing process. It took me from a place of "off" to "stable".

I am a bit of a health nut and do prefer to try to let the body do it's own healing. But in this kind of situation? I am 1000% pro-medication.

I would not have been able to function had I not had an antidepressant or antianxiety options. I had full-blown panic attacks for months and months and it wasn't until I stepped down off of my holistic high-horse and became willing to do what it took to sleep and stay stable, that I actually got some traction with functioning again.

It took about 3-4 months of consistency before I noticed a real difference in stabilization.

I also think, that for me, placing a 90% focus on rebuilding my own reality with me at the center of it has been the key to healing. We all hope that our spouses will do a 180 and become devoted totally to rebuilding the marriage and themselves. But, even if they do, it doesn't really change what they've done. We now have this history and this story regardless of whatever St. Francis they turn into.

IMO, the only way to survive that is to be a person that doesn't need the marriage or them to be happy. Nice to haves...but not need to haves.

Provided that a person is behaving on the up and up, it's simply so much easier to stay put. No liquidating, splitting assets, starting over, you get to keep the extra help, routine, etc.

But waking up gripping one's pillow and hoping that the other person will follow their checklist is pure torture. And you can't ever really know for sure if they are doing it. You can only trust your senses for what you see directly in front of you.

...........................................

Even the people who love me the most and will accept whatever decisions I make in my life are shaking their heads saying I love you and I get why you stay, but I can't fathom how you can do it, and I never could, after all he has done to you and how much we watched him hurt you and lie to you some more.

......................................

This remains a wrinkle to be worked through in our situation.

I find other people's judgement to be an added sprinkle of pain I don't need.

My sister, for example, responded with a level of fury and venom that would warm the heart, only it would get directed at me for staying. She also was cheating on in a prior marriage, and I get that this is extremely triggering for her. But, she just can't wrap her mind around why I would ever in a million years consider staying. She left. It's hard, but she did it so why can't I.

Well she was 20, that's why.

I'm 50. I'm tired and dealing with a near 30-year long set of data. And it's my unique set of circumstances.

Mom is extremely supportive. Thinks I'm far, far better and smarter than my husband ever was and feels like I can and should do better (that makes two of us), but she gets the security factor around staying. My father cheated, and she stayed much longer for the children and for financial reasons. Pride doesn't pay your bills.

So families are officially split. No shared holidays with mine. His doesn't know, except for his brother. And, since this whole thing went down, I have handpicked the folks in his family that I could easily do without for the rest of my life, resulting in basically a trap door on all of them. His brother. His father. perfectly fine to never see them again moving forward.

This remains a sore spot and a kind of "new normal" to work through.

I have no answers here yet, and realize that this may be a point of resistance in my own choices around healing things.

Oddly, I find myself spewing hate towards people that were simply caught in the crossfire. I lost interest in hanging out with most of our formal couple friends. I associate them with "that" life.

I can't hate my husband, but I can hate his brother...who was much more overtly a womanizer and who had shared his curmudgeonly behaviors here and there towards me throughout the years. He is married now and cranking out children late in life (he's 50 something, and his wife is in her late 20s). I have zero interest in developing relationships with any of them or their kids, even though he may be growing up himself and changing.

I also know that my husband feels wounded by my alienation of his family and his friends.

So, my anger has found it's way through different cracks and portals.

...........................................

I don't want an STD or someone else's lovechild. I don't want someone in my life that feels or acts abusive or unkind. None of these things are negotiable for me. But outside of that, can I really know where every second is being spent of his time? Hell...he's gotten a half a day's worth of things done before I ever even wake up in the morning. Plenty of time to be with a mistress if he wants. So, I can't worry about it.

I can only guage his engagement with me and see if it feels about right.

Then the rest becomes about me and the ways I'd like to enjoy my day. Decorating. Baking. Planning. Taking walks. Reading. Writing. Thinking of travel plans. Enjoying family and other friendships too.

I am my own person.

I always have been.

I look to the day that this doesn't have to be the anvil I carry all over the place.

Here comes another long post. I don't know how to use less words. I keep reading the posts here and can relate to so much and am finding so many pearls of wisdom to keep. I feel like we could have days of conversations together, comparing notes and strategies to make it through. I'm sure we would laugh and cry and hug and heal if any of us were to meet in real life.

sister milkshake, thank you for those encouraging words about a possible future healed, without asterisks. I need to know it is possible, because the statistics here are staggering. The stories of recovery that just couldn't make it, the BS that couldn't heal or worse, the WS that got tired of waiting for the healing. You are a beacon of light out here. Thank you.

marji, thank you for your reply. I am about to turn 60 and your story resonates with me so much. One of the most frustrating explanations I got was that their LTA was supposed to end organically when both couples retired and moved away. It was being slowly phased out or something to that effect, which I assumes means meeting a couple of times a week was becoming a couple of times a month or monthly. I guess their retired spouses around all the time would have made things harder, but the distance? She flew coast to coast to be with him while I stayed home taking care of our kids or moving them in and out of dorms and first houses so he could travel for work with benefits. I have so much to be bitter about and am struggling so hard to let anger over the betrayals of the past go.

I hear you about the perks of having someone to take the walks with, and a man who cooks, does laundry, drives, all of that, is a tremendous plus, and for me it weighs very heavily into the equation of moving forward together rather than alone. I know I can be fine alone and I am choosing to try to have a future with him together, as long as I can be sure it is genuine and on my terms. My husband has already lived well past the age both grandfathers died of heart attacks, and is three years from his father's death from dementia. I have spent the last five years working hard to help us to scale down as our nest emptied and find our joy in the time we have left. We had already started and were having the time of our lives when my world blew apart. It is salt in my wounds, that I worked so hard to help him live his best life and de-stress while he was being untrue to my friendship and unworthy of me period. And that I was so happy and believed he was just as happy in our relationship as I was is horrifying. He claims he was happy, but I keep throwing back the IF/THENS. If you were happy in your marriage then why did you need another person in your life? I call bs, or I challenge his definition of the word happy.

I feel like I have gotten him back, mostly, and it was a primal urge from the first second of discovery. I think it had a lot to do with it being mostly one woman I was competing with and my jealous nature. I had never been jealous in all our time together so it's hard to adjust to, being jealous of a ghost. He tried to recruit other married looking to cheat partners, but as far as I know, stuck with the one, and she adored him. Had it been a string of prostitutes I'm not sure how I would have reacted. I do know that I mated for life with him and I'd rather figure out how to manage the pain of staying than live the pain of life without him after almost 40 years together. We hold hands all the time, still, and we cuddle and sleep wrapped in each other every night. That never changed, which is also confusing to me, only the way I feel when he holds me has changed. I used to be at peace in his arms, but now I just feel held. I don't get the warm fuzzy endorphin release from him anymore and I'm not sure if that comes back from this. It did make me sad to read your hand holding words. I hope that you take his hand again someday on your walks, just to see how it feels and that he holds your hand back and that you enjoy it. Our walks and outside time have helped save my sanity.

Wantafuture, your last two paragraphs are perfect. I to am completely and permanently changed and I am scared to know I am not done changing yet. I intend to like what I change into though. I am in complete agreement with your approach to moving forward. Last Christmas I had my WH buy me a mantra bracelet that says BE HERE NOW. I wear it every day, like I used to wear my wedding rings. Also, I like the saying be where your feet are. They are not in any of the years, months or days where awful things happened to me, they are here, today where I can walk in any direction toward healing that I choose. I need to focus on facing my feet forward, and building the future I/we deserve.

Becca, thanks for the response. I really feel you on the extra layer of betrayal. My previous relationship before I met my husband involved a terrible betrayal and I swore I was done letting myself be hurt by stupid men again. I never saw my husband coming and our lives together were a whirlwind of friendship, love and adventures. When we decided to get married I told him I asked only one thing of him - please don't ever cheat on me - you don't ever have to stay with me, or want only me, but if you ever need another woman, just please cut me loose first - make a quick call before you drop your pants and I'll be ok with that. We joked about it many times in our marriage. We watched in horror as friends cheated and got divorced, we watched my sister's marriage unravel and the slow story of their infidelities that were the root causes of it all, and we talked often about how lucky we were. Once, when talking about the horrifying meat market our newly single friends were shopping in, I said jokingly I'd love to be a fly on a wall and watch you try pick up another woman, put your moves on her, that would be a hoot, and we laughed. A decade later he tells me those words were what made his resentments crystallize into his eventual affair. How about that to live with, knowing a stupid shitty joke I made is the justification he let himself use to decide to obliterate our marriage vows and the promise I made him make to me, to never cheat just let me go. I wish I had bit my tongue. I didn't mean it to insult him, I was just making a joke about his tech/nerd personality which is legendary, and I was that confident in the stability and fidelity in our marriage. I never thought he would cheat on me and I was sure we were the luckiest couple we knew. It hurts to recall those conversations where we talked about how lucky we were to be together, and even more the one recently where he told me his affair is what saved our marriage. He thought it was a win win for everybody. It has taken me a year to try to understand how his skewed reasoning let him see it that way, and to get him to understand that nothing about this was a win for me. I would have rather been cut loose than navigate this pain. Our family would have been ok. Different, but ok, and I would have back a past that was what I thought it to be, not one that confused me anytime I look back or see an old picture or a date on the calendar. Before, during, and after the affair are the new era's of my life. They used to be before my husband and before our kids. He chopped our family timeline into pieces I don't want to think about and looking back at the milestone events with the kids is the hardest for me to handle right now, so I try to steer clear of photos and all those looking back facebook or google photo prompts. They can ruin my day. I made a huge google photo album called Me, and it's pictures of me, with my family, kids, friends, dog, but not him. I has helped me to see the joy and love surrounding me in the years that hurt to look back at. I can see them through a less hurtful lens. I told him I did it to have a story of my life to look at that doesn't make me sad, which of course made him sad. He doesn't understand how a memory of a happy day can make me sad, but he is so compartmentalized he can't see the lie behind the smiles, or get the pain that looking into my clueless eyes causes me now. I see the charade now, not the fairy tale. The truth is gritty.

I'm sorry your husband has the ability to be rude or insulting to you. I am lucky that in public, outwardly my WH has always been a gentleman and my biggest fan. Makes the truth that much stranger to me. I like your teenager analogy, I know my H is still working through some baggage he didn't realize he was carrying from his past and his family dynamic. It has been good for us to talk about these things we thought were buried or non issues. Nothing is a non issue now.

When my WH started his double life, we had kids in middle school, then high school and now the last one is graduating college, so he stayed and he hid and he lied to keep the family intact, he says he never stopped loving me or wanting to grow old with me, I guess as best buddies with secrets, not true partners. But she was a place all the stress of our lives went away, she was his person to complain to, and have a beer with and watch sports with (two things I don't actually enjoy) and quite sadly for me, his only true friend besides me. He is not a close friend type of person. I worry a lot now about him resenting me for blowing that world to pieces. He is insistent that he doesn't need her now, that our kids are doing great after some very stressful years, our business is good after some very stressful years, we are in the process of moving to our retirement home in a warmer state and are going to have the grandest adventures together. The OW has moved across the country with her husband- once I made her tell him, he switched jobs within months and poof they are gone. I tell my husband that isn't much comfort, she can still get on a plane and we both will be near major hubs and my husband travels a third of the year for business. We have a huge aging dog and some of those trips are tedious, so I can't always go with him. He has a companion pass for air travel and wants me to come with him whenever I can, because he knows when I am left alone I unravel. I worry and I rehash and from time to time I go back through every electronic device and every file and every credit card statement because I still cannot stop looking for clues not yet. I cannot stop because I have found so many huge truths this way, and it is the only way this story has unfolded, through bad, slow forensics on my part and an inability to tell me the whole story on his part. It is my brain trying to feel safe and trying to find the last few puzzle pieces when they aren't even in the box to find. I expect this to phase out slowly, I need it to, but OCD is a cruel task master.

Anyway, when the person who hurts you this deeply knows it was a huge issue in your past, that you came with a cracked heart that you worked really hard to get over and then they selfishly do the same thing to you only much worse, it makes it harder to accept, let alone forgive. I may never forgive. I will never forget. I hope to be able to focus on my future, our future if we can get over this hump and stop trying to understand the past. I try to understand what he means when he said this was never about me, it was about him. He told me that I did nothing wrong, was the glue that made this family work and a great mom. I wish that helped. I am an overachiever who thought she was a great wife too. Navigating failure and guilt and low self esteem is the chocolate syrup, whipped cream and cherry on the infidelity sundae for me. I have much work to do before I am good with me again.

This has been a particularly awful week mentally and emotionally for me, and because I am posting here I feel even more raw and exposed. This has manifested in my forcing conversations that have been emotional and painful, I have cried buckets when I DO NOT WANT to cry ever again. He used up the allotment of tears I had for him, but I guess I am now crying for me and for us, not just over him. We are learning how to fight, how to navigate these conversations that get ugly, I am learning to pay attention and ask what prompted you to say that?? What is that really about? And we are learning more about each other than we ever knew. I hope these tough times continue to build trust and intimacy as we move through recovery. I do know that when I let the emotions or concerns build too long, when we don't have the affair talk often enough for me, pressure builds until I blow up. Once I purge and yell and ask and cry and try to summarize and clarify what we talk about, I feel lighter inside, like I know I can do this, that we have hope for a future together that doesn't hurt. It would be nice if the pressure would stop building though, and I'm looking for techniques to help with that, and looking for the root causes behind them, like the reasons I don't feel safe yet and what I need to stop worrying about snakes in the grass moving forward. It is a process.

I am hoping to turn a corner soon. My recovery has been in waves of awful unraveling and pain, lulls of complacency or what I thought was acceptance, followed by another swell of hurt and heartache. I am trying to help him understand that this is how it works, and to look for hopeful bits of incremental progress. I am still grieving, hurt, jealous, you name it. It is a lot to accept to be able to move forward. But onward I march. I really appreciate having this community to walk with on my journey.

Peace to us all.

I had never been jealous in all our time together so it's hard to adjust to, being jealous of a ghost.

.........................

Me neither. Never jealous. Never suspicious. He had no leash. He was gone most nights of the week playing his sports league, and I worked partial weekends often. I literally, gave him only a 1% chance of cheating simply because he had a pulse. I remember telling people when that topic would come up that "anyone is capable of doing anything, but I just couldn't ever see my H being that guy. It's completely opposite of his personality type".

Wrong. Wrong. Dead Wrong, apparently.

While I still would say that I am not really the jealous type, I am suddenly aware of the many, many opportunities that he could have to hook up. He gets coffee in the morning before I ever wake up, supposedly reading in the coffee shop for a couple of hours before coming home.

Perfect time for an affair, now I'm thinking.

All the little holes in our schedules are now perfect times to meet in some broom closet somewhere for a quickie.

But through this, I am fortunate that I haven't felt compelled to do a lot of personal comparison between me and the AP. I get that she had a great body, and that sort of sucks. But, beyond that, I can just see that he wanted more than one thing at the same time. Where an adult would understand the consequences and say no, he did the extremely shitty and adolescent thing and went for both.

...............

I'm sorry your husband has the ability to be rude or insulting to you. I am lucky that in public, outwardly my WH has always been a gentleman and my biggest fan.

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He did. My sister in particular, would comment on how he could be really mean to me in front of friends. She always thought he was a self-centered jerk and would often say so, but again I never saw the capability to cheat as any real possibility, so I just stood my ground and would fire back at him when he got out of hand. He always retreated when I pushed back hard enough.

Now, I see this as part of the dossier of entitlement and modeling of his father's behavior towards his mother. They have a fundamental loyalty, but his father routinely picks on his mom in front of others and she just sighs and takes it.

I think somewhere in this I had sort of hoped to uncover some complicated background story of his that would offer a really compelling and heart-wrenching opportunity to show him compassion for all his brokenness.

We did find some bullying. We saw some modeling of parental behaviors. There is a shaming culture in his family, low EQ, and a lack of emotional maturity across the board.

But mostly, he was really spoiled and immature and entitled with a big sprinkle of approval issues.

I saw it, but only in the doses required to stay with him. Prior to the cheating, I focused on the filler material that made the relationship seem great.

Post cheating, of course all I can see are the cracks and the flaws and how it was all right there in front of me the whole time. How other people even noticed things, but not the cheating. No one saw that, except my mom. When I asked her if I thought he was capable, she said ...heck yes. Look how entitled he can be. He'll do whatever he wants.

And she was absolutely right.

............................................

"My previous relationship before I met my husband involved a terrible betrayal and I swore I was done letting myself be hurt by stupid men again. I never saw my husband coming and our lives together were a whirlwind of friendship, love and adventures. When we decided to get married I told him I asked only one thing of him - please don't ever cheat on me - you don't ever have to stay with me, or want only me, but if you ever need another woman, just please cut me loose first - make a quick call before you drop your pants and I'll be ok with that.

"

.............

God. This was the literal conversation I had with my H at the beginning of our relationship, and it's why whatever it is inside me that is able to trust him is shattered into a million pieces.

We had this talk. Word for word. He was 30 when I started dating him (I was 23) and our conversation was so clear and felt so forthcoming and mature. He even got tested for STD's as a gesture to offer comfort around starting with a clean slate.

I spent the first year of our relationship sporadically crying on his shoulder about the previous one that had cheated. This is probably the true heart of his betrayal, not necessarily the sex itself. It was that he knew my story. He knew how much I was wounded.

He did whatever he wanted anyway, and then proceeded to carry on without guilt for another two decades +.

I have come to understand some harsh realities:

1. Someone can look you deeply in the eyes, tell you one thing, and then do another entirely. The whole time. Because doing it feels good.

2. I can't know if he's still doing it, because the same tone and ease with which he is assuring me this time was what I saw last time. The difference is in the peripheral behaviors. Up until now, he's stayed pretty self-centered, spoiled, and shallow.

3. I'm going to have to focus entirely on what I want for myself, and approach him only as if he is an accessory to that.

4. What he believes about himself is one thing. What he has done doesn't fit that narrative. Therefore, I doubt that either of us will really get a full picture of whatever the past was. I remember things generally much more clearly than he does, including non-affair related things.

5. In order not to implode from sadness, I have to focus on this simply being a movie reel that's external to who I am internally. I have to focus on anchoring there each day, because any number of things can and will happen in life.

Becca, holy shit. Your list has me shaking me head because yes, yes and more yes.

1 & 2. I told him the hardest part about moving forward is that the same man with the same look in his eyes is promising me again that I can trust him, but I can't tell the difference between this man and the one who cheats and lies. His answer: you can believe me because I am telling you that you can. All I can offer you is changed behavior. Watch me, we will prove all the statistics and all your friends wrong, because we are going to make it and I only want an need you now. I want to believe and I wish I could know that he is sincere, but I am only certain that I'll not be certain again. Yes, they did exactly what they wanted to do because the wanted to do it. They just never thought they would get caught. I too am watching the peripheral behaviors, notice the little things he does to be nicer that he might not have thought to do before. It's slightly reassuring.

3. I know that healing will only come from within first, that this laid bare my latent issues and personality flaws and I am having to remake myself for what better be the last time. The only problem I'm having is an inability to be sure what I really do want anymore, and enjoying his companionship on the journey.

4. Bingo. What he did is completely not how he views himself and it's been a slow coming around to understanding that his actions are who he his, not the story he tells himself. I think a little of his thinking was about sacrifice to keep the family intact while our children grew up, to carve out a little piece of happiness for himself to help get through the day. What I'm not sure he gets is what the inverse of that means, that the marriage he swears he never wanted to risk or the love with me he always wanted to have was obviously lacking and that there will always be a hint of settling or taking the path of least resistance to his current assurances of happiness and loyalty. I told his mistress after I found out that she traveled with him during our early reconciliation that I will never wash her stench off my marriage. Somebody here likened the AP to a smelly fart that has finally dissipated. I keep waiting for the air to smell fresh.

5. I have just tried to numb myself, or desensitize myself to the parts of this that hurt too much to face. I like your movie reel idea and will add it to the mix.

If I have gained nothing else from this, I have been given the gift of freedom from complacency. I take nothing for granted any more. I appreciate every small blessing that comes my way and I incorporate my new found wisdom into my chats with my kids and hope to help them navigate their lives with a little less upset than ours. Mostly I wish my kids luck. I hope I feel lucky someday. My WH believes we are very lucky to come through this together and I'm still feeling unlucky that this happened to us. Hope our views can converge as we move through time together.

Wishing you a kind and loving holiday.

I told him the hardest part about moving forward is that the same man with the same look in his eyes is promising me again that I can trust him, but I can't tell the difference between this man and the one who cheats and lies. His answer:

Sorry. Holidays. I've been meaning to reply to this.

I have to say that your post was refreshing to read. You know what it is to be screwed over twice and then have the second guy...who knew all about the first...be the one to drive the knife in further.

This experience has left me with a profound sense of sobriety with regard to what other people are capable of.

I can guess that he just really didn't feel like cheating was that big of a deal in general. Like he minimized his affair retroactively, I'm guessing he was also greatly minimizing the affair as it was in progress too.

I have an interesting story that I'll try to keep short. My dday came. A friend of mine that I've also known for 30 + years, and who is a real estate agent, was one of the first people I met and sobbed about it with. My intention was to have her be the one to list our house.

For the next year, we met for coffee, and I would sob and drone on about how awful a thing and what a betrayal it was. How it was traumatizing and that words could not convey the damage it can do to you. She offered words of comfort and she did the workup for my house. Her husband, who was also a friend, also extended a hand to offer support and comfort and to encourage forgiveness...as he himself had cheated in a prior relationship and was pretty convinced that you could come out the other side a changed and better person.

One year later.

Her husband shows up on my doorstep in shock.

He just discovered that she had slept with 5-10 guys since they were married just two years prior, and that she had been cheating on him literally the whole time they've been together...and also in all her previous relationships.

Naturally, he was completely, utterly traumatized and speechless and they both have been a complete train wreck since.

Here are some of the take-aways that I learned from this:

1. Cheaters don't think what they are doing is "that bad". In fact, it's "fun and easy", and can be an expression of being a free spirit.

She actually said "I literally had no idea this would hurt you this much" to him.

My husband said the same post-Dday.

2. My friend looked me dead in the eye for a solid year and commiserated. She encouraged forgiveness. She also, in restrospect, encouraged me to get out with her and have fun...which I later learned involved the side-note of one of her affair partners.

3. My other friend, her husband, said this profoundly changed his perspective of what it was like to actually be cheated ON. He said that he theoretically knew it had hurt his previous partner, but that he absolutely never understood the depth of it until now. He called his ex and apologized profusely, this time he said, with the heaviest heart he had ever experienced.

4.The experience with the AP's and with the spouse are viewed as separate "friendships" that are mutually exclusive. There was a perception with both of them that everyone did this, and that the don't ask don't tell vibe is something that the whole world subscribes to.

5. When discovery happened, all were shocked by the level of damage done...except me, of course. I'm only shocked that I'm still here.

I knew how much this would hurt from the start, and your line about having explained that to him clearly, calmly and with assurances from him really hit home.

I remember those conversations like they were yesterday.

I remember his assurances. His maturity. The feel of his sincerity.

And it was all pacification and lies. He didn't mean that at all. He simply said what he needed to placate me and keep both wheels spinning.

In hindsight, I see how grossly immature he was in some areas. Across other fronts. There were flags for the possibility of cheating that could only become clear in hindsight too. So I don't beat myself up over not knowing. Only for tolerating the other things I tolerated in the absence of the knowledge of infidelity.

As your H said, I can only see different behaviors. Here is what I can see now:

1. He looks me in the eye now, where before his eyes would literally dart all over the place.

2. His body language and level of touch have entirely changed. Instead of physically pushing me away outside of sex, he now draws in very closely.

3. Our ability to have a conversation has flipped entirely. We can now talk for hours about different things, where we'd get frustrated in the first 10 minutes before.

4. He is helpful in ways he was very resistant and childish before. Housework, cleaning, managing money...he's all in now.

5. He's actively practicing self-inquiry and humility, where before he was zero empathy, arrogant, and actually often insufferable.

6. He takes full responsibility for all of it.

He expresses his shame.

Reading this, I'm sort of laughing. Who stays with someone with these qualities? I did.

Because at least...he was loyal and a good man underneath it all.

HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!

He sees himself as good.

I'm simply allowing for the space for that to be true.

In the meantime, can we really know if we're getting duped a second time? Nope. He could still be screwing her or on the hunt. And, if I find that out, I'll be done this time. This is all only contingent on the notion that he has had a full frying pan to the face type of awakening. I acknowledge that I have zero control over the actual authenticity of that. I can only ask myself what it feels like, and then proceed under the battle plan that all of this is ultimately only about me and what accessories I choose to have to build the life I want.

Hopefully it works out somehow, but gone are my delusions that Disney is the template, that life is always kind, and that things are what you think they should be.

Becca, Hope 2020 finds you well. It has been rocky for us, the holidays have been draining. I have been meaning to answer for a long time, as your post spoke to me on many levels.

We have reached a new level of frustrated interactions with each other and I worry how we will come through this as a functional healthy couple sometimes. We are both trying to understand each other and to stop letting the emotional flooding cause us both to lose our composure. Yelling or avoiding or shutting down aren't going to get us anywhere. But neither is pretending this didn't happen and that I'm not living some twilight zone version of my life. I can't let the disorienting thoughts or my questions seeking clarity go. He can't understand why I can't accept that he has done something horrible he regrets and wishes never happened and choose to be happy and move forward with him leaving the past behind, to forgive and forget, to get over it. He doesn't understand why I need so much time. He doesn't get the significance of the last lies, because in his mind they are irrelevant to the end of his affair and his commitment to his marriage. He doesn't understand the neurotypical emotional brain that I have and I don't understand his ability to compartmentalize and let everything go. Our strengths are also our weakness in this game I guess. I told him I believe anyone can learn to take a kind gesture or recognize a predictable biological reaction to stress and try to act accordingly, either taking a time out or offering a kind word or a new tactic. Something. Anything. We both should be smarter than this but the emotional fragility is so hard to navigate.

Anyhow. I take hope from your words. Trying to give him the benefit of the doubt, to give us and a future together a chance. It is just so hard. Crazy making.

"I'm simply allowing for the space for that to be true" I will allow space for that too.

Also, your friend? The stone cold cheater who lies with ease? Isn't it scary to realize how easily we can be manipulated and fooled when we openly like and trust another person? I thought I had insulated myself from those people and had found the few good guys out there to spend my time with but maybe there aren't really any good guys. Just people doing what they want to get what they need. We never saw our friend's marriages unraveling until they broke either. People are great at hiding things from each other. I don't want to play that game.

Off topic, but I've always been a reader and particularly enjoy post apocalyptic dystopian literature, and maybe it's because they illustrate how it's never the monster or the thing you need to really fear, it's the humans who become the real monsters under stress. Mostly. There's always a few heroes or martyrs out there fighting the good fight with a clear conscience. Anyway.

I've bought a full spectrum light lamp, and I'm making myself sit in it. I'm working my relationships with WH, my kids, my friends and my family of origin like a certified therapist, with more honesty and insight than most of them can handle. I'm hoping in the process to learn to handle myself and my shifting moods as well. I'm trying to take care of me, as best I know how, and trying to reboot my brain for this new operating system I find myself in.

"hoping that things are what they should be..."

I'd settle for knowing that things are what I think they are... We don't get the illusion or delusion of knowing anything with certainty anymore, just life without a safety net, unpredictable and unnerving.

Good luck to you. Good luck forgetting, moving forward, forgiving. Good luck embracing uncertainty. And may both our WH's be true and sincere moving forward. That's all I really need, but so hard to really know.

* edited for typos...

[This message edited by whatisloveanyway at 12:34 PM, January 7th, 2020 (Tuesday)]