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I agree with Smillie 100%. She gave you the BS speech so she could have more space/privacy while pursuing/cheating with OM. Please don't bury your head in the sand. Your WW is a liar. Assume the worst until you have proof otherwise.

2 years of heavy stress, communication breakdown, we had no time alone together and I suppose we drifted apart. At least that's how I understand it. From my point of view there wasn't an issue, we had a lot going on and I knew when everything had been dealt with we'd have more time for our marriage.

Here's the thing - no marriage is perfect. But even perfect marriages experience infidelity. The issue in your marriage is your WW. There is a flaw in her character that lead her to seek sex from outside of your marriage. This has nothing to do with you. She thinks it's ok to lie to you and fuck other men. That is the reality you need to accept.

So what are you going to do? Doing nothing will get you more of the same. She needs to face harsh consequences. TAKE ACTION.

You marriage is done. She killed it. It is entirely up to her to save it. If she shows no effort now to do so, then your only choice is to file. You sitting by waiting for her to "get it" means she gets to seek other men while you pay for her escapades.

2 years of heavy stress, communication breakdown, we had no time alone together and I suppose we drifted apart. At least that's how I understand it. From my point of view there wasn't an issue, we had a lot going on and I knew when everything had been dealt with we'd have more time for our marriage.

You just described 90% of all marriages.

Your WW prompted the separation because she was already cheating on you with the OM. She's a liar liar pants on fire. Put the hose on her.

Jonas. So sorry you are here and facing this nightmare.

I like your idea of keeping normalcy for the kids. Good plan.

Yet it doesn’t mean she can continue cheating. She doesn’t have the right to disrespect you. Read up on the 180. It. An help you protect yourself.

You should start by opening up a new bank account in your name and having any $ deposited there. She should not have access to your $ to have an affair. Tell her to get her own plan for her cell phone if the affair continues (after you get all the evidence from her phone).

See an attorney. Find out what your rights are and what you will be facing financially. Threaten to sue her AP if you can.

Regarding the ILYBNILWY (I love you but not in love with you speech) - typical cheater behavior. That’s to be expected (hurts like hell). I suggest a good counselor for you and a good support team to help you (family & friends etc.).

I can tell you my H finally snapped out of it at the last possible second. It not before I was left with no choice but to tell him I was divorcing him. He cheated, ended it, false reconciliation and demands for a D. I finally blindsided him and told him he has to leave, he no longer had any control over me and I was making my own decisions. And he was moving out ASAP.

He refused to leave. I made a call and found him a place to stay with a friend. Thereafter he was on his own. I was done with him and his affair.

Funny how things worked out when I stood up to him and stop being kind and loving and supportive. I regret not throwing him out 3 weeks after the affair when he was arrogant and thought he could flaunt the OW in my face.

Sorry you're here Jonas, but you picked a great place to find help dealing with the mess your wife created.

She insists nothing physical has happened and it's only mesgs, I'm having trouble believing her. Been going on for 4 weeks again I'm suspicious it's been longer than that.

It's definitely been longer than she says. She's lying.

I'd came across some suspicious items, lengerie, condoms, a pregnancy test.

100% it's a PA.

Hang in there man!!

condoms, a pregnancy test

Uhm, you want to add a kid to your marriage? Seems like with the condoms she is the one responsible for protection in her A and with the pregnancy test she failed that at least once. I guess the OM wants the naked feel, will you put up with that?

Hey Jonas,

Sorry that you are here. It sucks it really does. I won't pile on with everyone else, I agree with most all of what they are saying.

I will say you need to face the truth. It's over. Whether it last's with a 28 year old fuckwit she cheated.

She opened the genie's bottle and rubbed it furiously.

You didn't do it, she did.

She chose to cheat on you.

She chose to throw you in the garbage bin and move on.

Can you come back from it and fix it. I don't know, but do you really want to.

I have been fortunate from what the community has said because I didn't have a choice, mine left and moved to a new city to be with her married AP.

I will say, it gets easier. There are a lot of good people here who only care about helping you.

So let them.

We have all been through what you are going through. Some are a lot softer in their approach, some are a lot harsher, I am usually harsh but I am in a nice mood or something.

You will be told things you don't want to hear, and told to do things you don't want to do.

There is millennia worth of experience here and we all know what happens, so listen.

Read the healing library. Go online and type in whatever you are feeling and read articles, read until you are sick of reading and read some more.

Download podcasts, do whatever you need to.

For god's sake, pray and journal.

If you don't believe in god, great, pray.

If you don't think it will work, great, pray.

I am not saying you will convert but having a conversation with someone other than yourself helped.

I talk to my dog all the friggin time and I talk outloud to myself. It helps.

I journal all day, every day, I write what I am feeling, I write that I miss her and love her and hate her and despise her.

I vomit it all out and it helps.

The peaks and valleys you will feel are shitty, but they get more manageable.

Someone here told me, I am sorry I forgot who, but you will feel like you take one step forward and ten steps back, but eventually your ten steps back will be smaller than your one step forward.

You will get past this, it sucks ass but you will.

Just be honest and let your logical mind work for a while and give your heart a rest.

Once you do that you will see the same thing that all the rest of us see in your situation.

She cheated, she lied and she moved on. Accept it and follow her lead and do the same.

Stay strong.

[This message edited by sorryforeverythi at 4:08 PM, January 31st (Friday)]

2 years of heavy stress, communication breakdown, we had no time alone together and I suppose we drifted apart. At least that's how I understand it. From my point of view there wasn't an issue, we had a lot going on and I knew when everything had been dealt with we'd have more time for our marriage.

You just described 90% of all marriages.

Westway, I strongly disagree. I think you described maybe 90% of marriages involving infidelity. But not happy marriages.

Happy marriages don't put the marriage on the back burner for YEARS. People do it temporarily when there's other stuff going on, but every time you do it, the relationship takes a hit. It's incredibly unhealthy to think it's okay to take your relationship for granted!

You can't expect to have a solid relationship if you're not investing in it. So you must know a lot of unhappy people if you think this is normal behaviour. It's not.

It doesn't excuse Jonas' WW cheating. But this is one of those places where I think people have to examine what went wrong if they ever both want to make it to R (it doesn't sound like Jonas' WW is anywhere near ready for that), because deprioritizing the relationship is a critical error.

[This message edited by PSTI at 4:04 PM, February 1st (Saturday)]

Your wife is a very typical lying cheater having a sexual affair with another man while moving you out of the marital home so she could have more time with him uninterrupted.

Stop being naive and act.

Talk and words will get you nothing.

The only one who can make you a chump is yourself.

Wake up!!!!!!!

Brother, she had you move out so to spend more time with him.

Buffer

Actually PSTI you are full of shit.

All marriages (or 90% of them) go through ebbs and flows, ups and downs, cycles, life happens, kids, etc. Even those long term, committed marriages with two people focused on it. They understand the pledge of richer/poorer, sickness/health, better/worse. They eventually recognize the drifting apart and work to bring it back together again. It might be lead by (and probably is) one person being open and honest and communicating the concern.

It isn't that it doesn't happen in "happy" marriages. It does in most. It depends on the character, commitment and investment in the marriage of both people.

No, I'm not full of shit. Ebbs and flows don't mean years of neglect. If you think that's normal, that says a lot.

Saying "life happens" is a copout. We don't let WS say that affairs were mistakes. Neglecting your partner and your relationship is a CHOICE, not a mistake or an ebb or however you want to whitewash it.

One of the keys to staying happy is staying connected. If you don't make your relationship a priority, you can't expect it to last, infidelity or no.

[This message edited by PSTI at 1:05 PM, February 3rd (Monday)]

No where in Westway's post was there anything about years of neglect or abuse. No where in Jonas's post was there anything about years of neglect or abuse.

Read up on marriages. There's lots of literature about the seasons of marriage and how to recognize them. Jonas described his recognition of the distancing between them and was wanting to reconnect. What was his WW doing?

I stand by my diagnosis.

Come back, Jonas. There is a lot of experience gained in dreadful ways here on SI.

I didn't say abuse at any point. Jonas said there were two years of stress and disconnection. But distance is generally part of deprioritizing the relationship. It's a choice, just like anything else. And this cross is worth dying on.

I strongly believe that BS still need to evaluate their own behaviour and choices. WS is totally responsible for the affair. BS is responsible for their share of the marital issues. If you deflect all the blame onto the WS, though, then there is no possibility to actually build a better marriage if you R. Both partners have to be willing to and desire to grow.

You can't spend YEARS disconnected and think it'll be okay and you can reconnect when you're ready. If your marriage is important, as soon as you notice that disconnect, you need to be in there fixing it.

Once again- the affair isn't Jonas' fault. It's wholly his wife's fault. But the disconnect is half on him.

I would never have said anything if Westway hadn't made it out that that was normal. Thinking that level of disconnect is normal, is extremely problematic IMO.

[This message edited by PSTI at 11:42 AM, February 5th (Wednesday)]

I can tell you this in regards to my own life and how it seems to parallel yours:

TT as to length of time: My WH said A was over when I found out and that it went on for 2 months. It was not - it was still going on and it was 4 months. Later, after a year of false R, he said they never had sex again (but did not deny other physical things happening) - lie - they had sex 1 time in that year (read phone messages from her talking about how long it had been to confirm it was 1 time during that year) - he admitted to it later w/out knowing that I knew, but he lied for over a year about that before coming clean.

My WH was distant and admitted later that he did not want the A to end, wished I had just up and left him so he didn't have to be the one to end it, but went back and forth in his head about what he wanted depending on the day. My concerns, feelings, needs/wants were usually not part of that consideration except when he thought I should leave - that was because he felt like he didn't want me and wanted me to be happy because I "deserved" that from him.

I too am still at home but I plan to leave permanently when my job ends this fall. That being said, my WH seems to sometimes (based on little things he says) think that I will stay somehow, despite everything. Othertimes I think he thinks he will be happier when I am gone. Either way, I'm through wondering what goes on in his head as 90% of it has been harmful to me. Luckily for me, financially speaking, we have come to an agreement that isn't harmful to me and requires some compromise on his part - it sounds like you are not there yet.

I explain all of this because, sadly, it's normal. What is also normal is that in many cases, there is no happy ending with the two of you riding off into the sunset somehow. I loved my WH beyond words - yet no amount of love from me resolved this clusterf**k. Prepare yourself for that possibility as best you can, meaning take financial precautions to protect yourself and your kids now...if you don't need them later, no big deal. Prepare yourself for a life w/out your WS because it might happen. Start thinking about a new plan for you in case it comes to pass. You may not even like thinking about these things BUT, I don't think I'm alone when I say I wish I had dealt with these things earlier.

You've received a lot of good advice here - take what you want and ignore the rest - however, my last piece of advice is try to consider parts of it that you don't want to hear as possible(easier said than done, I know). I think just about every BS who posts on here is hoping like hell that they can save their marriage...but for a lot of us it doesn't work out. Preparing for the "worst" is better than hoping for the best at times like these and makes things much easier for YOU later on.

[This message edited by ThisIsSoLonely at 12:01 PM, February 5th (Wednesday)]