SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Suck it up until a better time. this is not about you. It's about him.

IMO, and just saying this because of how far out I am...it is about you. It has always been about you. The affair was about you. The healing and changing afterward is about you. Yes, the BS gets shit thrown their way. I am no way trying to minimize what happens to the BS. Any BS that begins to heal and has a WS that owns it can realize it had nothing to do with them. This really has everything to do with a WS just reaching that point in their lives where they are crashing and burning. The BS is just an innocent bystander that got splattered by the WS mud while they were spinning their wheels. Or the shit that they were flinging while desperately trying to dig themselves out of the shit pool they were sitting in. You moving forward and becoming a better person you can live with and be proud of is about you. Being a better spouse and a better parent. Teaching your children how to own your bad choices.

What type of person do you think your husband is? I often see WS that don't tell do so based on their own opinions of what they would want. Based on their own personalities. Most do it from control or fear. Lets face it, we can't give a healthy POV of what a normal better adjusted person can handle. We think it is the worst thing in the world. Hell, not getting undivided attention is the worst thing in the world to us. At the time for some, losing their AP is the worst thing in the world to them. We can underestimate the strength and rights our BS have. Especially the rights they have as a human being in control of their own lives, just because all WS are selfish and entitled. If you step back and put yourself in your BS shoes. Are they the type of person that would want to know now? Would he be the type of person that would gain further hurt by staying in this house with you and to him it was all a lie while you kept the secret? Try not to look at it from the pain you would feel in his place or the shame you feel now. Look at if from what he would want to know. Has he made comments in the past about cheaters?

This is about you reconciling yourself. You have every right to tell him the truth. I know it will hurt and it is unfair that you burden him with the pain you caused. That is reality though and it can't be changed. You have a right to move forward and change yourself. You have a right to be healthy too.

Make plans to have a safe place to go to first. Like others have said, you never know how the BS will react. You have a lot to weigh here. It really depends upon the type of person your BS is. Some have gotten angry for any time they spent being manipulated. Some have been thankful for the time they didn't have to spend with the WS while they pine for their AP. You really need to figure it out who and what he would want.

VBlue,

Please reread my second post to you. If you contact your AP to give him a "heads up", you're siding with him against your husband. As time passes, you'll begin to see him as the asshole home-breaker he is. And, of course, you are too.

Tough times. We've all been where you are. Have you read How to Help Your Spouse Heal from Your Affair? I think it would help you.

This is why I said what I said about confessing today if you're even thinking of breaking NC. You need to absorb that you are never, ever speaking to your AP again. Ever. Not for any reason, and especially not for the reason you propose. It needs to be like he was hit by a bus in a foreign country and buried in an unmarked grave. I know it's hard to wrap your head around that dramatic change in your life, but if you want to save your husband from total annihilation, the AP is now dead to you.

In addition to the ethical reasons, you really cannot predict what will happen if you try to bend that rule. There are so many WS here who thought they knew their AP and what they would/would not do. Most of us discover that the fallout of exposure changes everything. After all, how sure is your BH that he knows you and what you're capable of? And how wrong was he?

Your lovely, guilty AP may go into survival mode and use your warning to gaslight his wife. Many BS who attempt to contact OBS after D-Day find that the AP has blocked and screened all communication to prevent it. In other instances, they characterize the BS as a paranoid lunatic, making wild accusations about imagined affairs. Or AP may confess first to beat you to the punch, so his wife is the one who calls your unsuspecting BH. If you're planning to coordinate your approach to avoid that? That's continuing the A and putting your and AP's needs ahead of your spouses, again. How can you expect your BH to trust that you've changed if you're still planning to orchestrate disclosure with the other man?

Holding off on confession in order to protect your children from witnessing D-Day may be understandable. Communicating with AP to protect OBS is not. She is not your concern. That should have been crystal clear the moment you slept with her husband.

Please confess as soon as you can. Take it from someone who carried around that secret for over 8 years. Eventually it will come out. I knew holding this hidden secret was a weakness in our marriage even if she never found out. After making my peace with God over the guilt of the sin against Him, I knew to fully surrender it to God meant to truly surrender everything. Nothing hidden. Every time I’d hear that I was a good man the weight would get heavier and heavier. The pain the confession has caused on my family is like nothing I’ve ever seen, but it’s in God’s capable hands now. I’m only 4 months post d day, so still not sure where this will lead.

I agree with Blitz about not preaching too much. My BS and I are both very scriptural and the last thing she wanted from me was talking to her about God. Let the Holy Spirit do that part. Keep faith in God’s promises. He makes all things new.

Confess as soon as you can. I have delayed telling the full truth for years. Every time new truths come out is shatters any recovery you have had previously. A new D-day if you want to think of it like that.

DO NOT CONTACT AP......EVER.....I still worked with mine for six months post D-day before I got a new job. This pretty much stopped any chance of BS and I working on recovery and understanding.

Full truth as soon as possible.

How are you doing?

Thanks for everyone’s feedback. I realize it was really thoughtless and foolish to consider reaching out to xAP to let him know as so many of you pointed out to me. So, needless to say that won’t be happening.

I still haven’t said anything to my husband and we are still self isolating.

I’ve read all of the posts and it’s hard to process through all of them and address everything, but I do read and re-read it.

Thatwilldo - I understand what you’re saying, and that my actions cannot side with him. This includes staying NC without exception. Thanks for the book suggestion. I will be reading it. Oh, and the comment about realizing what an asshole-homewrecker he is, and the reflection of that back at me... that is very true and a hard realization.

Zugzwang, It’s hard for me to write about how I’m doing. I feel that all of my thoughts and processing them is necessary and self-centered. Your words about the fact that it’s always been about me - I know I’m awfully selfish. And writing in a forum, knowing I’m going to share things that are hurtful to the BS on here is very difficult. I struggle with the notion that BSR talked about - that xAP needs to be dead to me. I wish I could flip a switch and pretend he was and I can’t. I don’t want to hurt my husband anymore. You asked what he would want. I think he would want to know. I think he would want to be considerate to our kids.

I don’t want to hurt my husband anymore.

If your husband was hospitalized from getting robbed and beaten severely, causing long term hospitalization, you would certainly have hate and disdain for the perpetrator, no? Perhaps view your AP as the perpetrator who caused equal emotional injury.

This may help facilitate negative emotions towards him. I realize the circumstances differ in that you welcomed the perpetrator into your life, which essentially granted AP access to your husband getting an emotionally beating in a sense.

Perhaps a shift in thinking towards your AP and the damage he inflicted on your husband is in order. If you can picture AP as an accomplice in the assault upon your husband, some degree of anger could form, after all, no one is fond of the person that hurts a loved one.

[This message edited by Jorge at 6:22 AM, April 21st (Tuesday)]

Perhaps a shift in thinking towards your AP and the damage he inflicted on your husband is in order. If you can picture AP as an accomplice in the assault upon your husband, some degree of anger could form, after all, no one is fond of the person that hurts a loved one.

Jorge, this is something that I have thought although not as deeply for him as I do for myself. I feel very ashamed for putting my husband through this and for my decisions. I also feel very ashamed for putting another family through this as well. Thinking what you suggested is always a reflection in the mirror for me. I know I am these things as well and those are all hard realizations.

Don't worry about hurting the BS on here. They make the choice to read in this forum. You need to be able to work through things and thoughts with the ability to share so those that had similar thoughts at some point can point out faulty thinking and help you to see your AP in a very different light.