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It was more about blowing smoke up his ass than it was about the sex, but the sex was the added benefit.

What an idiot. Look, in case anyone doesn't know, if you just want to hear how awesome you are, just walk into any high end retailer (Gucci, for example) looking like you might want to buy something. They'll blow so much smoke up your ass it will come out your ears. There are SO many ways to get someone to tell you how "awesome" you are that don't involve cheating. You might be broke, and you wouldn't be the first person to wind up there, but, at least you won't be a cheater.

Go buy a car, my goodness, you'll need a few weeks to let the smoke work it's way out.

Hi slapjack- I would just echo what old wounds said.

As someone who has not been betrayed, I can’t speak to what is worse. And really pain is so individual. But as oldwounds said the emotional aspect of it is about 90 percent escapist bullshit. And my husband was a lot more like gmc described - really more focused on the lies, my character, etc.

You have it right though when you say it’s hard for you to believe she loves you when she says it when two months ago you were reading what she said to someone else. I think that one of the things a ws should do is evaluate their beliefs and understanding of love. Some people “love” for what they receive, some think it’s just the warm fuzzy feelings, the romance. Love isn’t any of those things. It’s truly wanting a better life and the best for your mate and doing the things that help that to be.

I’m going to think on this “out loud”

I hate that my WH had sex with the OW. I also hate that he told her “I love you” and all of that mushy crap. I think the “i love you’s” would have been easier to swallow without the sex. I also think the sex without the “I love you’s” would have made the sex less traumatizing. I guess I’ll never really know, because you only get the hand you’ve been dealt.

The thing about my WHs A, is he LIED about damn near every single bit of his life to the OW. He lied about being married, being a father, even his last and middle name. He could never be honest about what he was really doing on a daily basis, and so it’s a little easier for me to believe he didn’t truly love her. He told her what she wanted to hear so she’d continue with the ego kibbles and the occasional sex. He could have had way more sex with her than he did, but didn’t for some reason. (And yes I know this for a fact) I believe his A came down to wanting attention and validation. He had no problem ignoring her when he wanted and talking to her when he wanted. Then again, they did have about 25,000 texts between them in 7 months. Again a lot of it was for the attention. We were basically roommates at the time...

Idk where I was going with any of that. It sucks he had sex with her, and it sucks all the things he said to her. However I know it wasn’t a real relationship or “love.” It was simply selfishness at its finest.

I think if things were left as just an emotional affair and the WS never pulled the trigger on the sexual, that would be something I could have lived with. It would have showed that the WS still had some feelings towards me and wouldn't cross a line.

As it was, my EX never had the emotional part. I do think that is more a result of him just viewing her as someone to have sex with and to do things to that his own wife wouldn't. He just didnt offer the sex up. He played to the emotions of a still beautiful, but older woman and her fears of being left behind. He flattered her to no end to even get to the point of being in a position to have the sexual component. Had he continued on that track there probably would have been an emotional connection. She is the kind of person that needs that. He however treated her like a prostitute and nothing like that was established. Thats why I have now come to thinking that she wasn't lying when she said she was planning on ending it, although one never knows.

Even though it didnt become emotional, and on D Day it was like she had a bucket of ice water thrown on there head and she woke up, it still didnt matter. She crossed about every line that mattered to me. The fact she didnt cross the emotional one meant shit to me. In retrospect if I had to read that she loved him it would have been worse. Still in the end for me, the sex part was enough to end our marriage. Even if it did take close to 5 years.

When I read the stories about how their WS not only had a huge amount of sex, and were in love with their AP, I wonder why the BS even would want them back. Who wants to be plan B? I know that is my own belief system, and dont look down on anyone who has reconciled from something like that, but I just can't understand it.

So the answer in a long winded way is, the sex is huge hurdle, the emotional only is still a hurdle but not as bad, but the two together is just something that for most would take a massive amount of work to get over, but for guys like me, a wall I could never climb.

Slapjacks, how does she, or does she, now show you that she truly loves you and isn't just staying for the safety and convenience that you provide?

In my situation, the AP was just after an easy lay, so there was no emotional connection, from his end at least. Any reasonable person would look at my WW’s A and say, wow, he played you and you fell for it so easily.

For me, the sex is obviously the thing that I struggle with. I held our physical relationship in high regard. She let some POS (and yes, my WW was equally shitty) take something that was special to me, so, so easily. It cheapens sex with my WW for me.

Same here Jameson, when I read posts like yours I often wonder "was it the same guy". But then I realize, no, there are plenty of them out there that all follow the same MO. Easy lay, say what it takes. What's exceptional aren't the AP's, it's that tired trope works at all (and apparently, works pretty darn well in fact). Yes, that's the same crap I said as a young man, but, everyone was single, we were all young, and there was little/nothing to lose having sex. What's amazing is that it continues to work on people who have so much to lose from an A and where the evidence (I mean, he is married and still sleeping with his wife, so this "love for the ages thing" seems to ring a BIT hollow, but hey, that's just me) is so counter to the words.

So, as I look at my WW's affair, are there any women that have been in love (in a sexual/dating scenario) and "gotten over it" in 2 months??

Yes, often. But in my younger carefree days, I was usually done with the relationship long before I pulled the trigger on ending it.

I've said ILY to probably 8-9 BFs in my life (I meant it at the time!) I only missed 2 of them once I said goodbye.

I think this whole male/sex/female/emotion cliche has to stop, personally. Affairs, Physical or Emotional, are just as shitty for men/women/other. As Oldwounds said:

In order for infidelity to happen, at some level we have to become invisible to the people we love.

And I think that's the worst part.

Slapjacks, how does she, or does she, now show you that she truly loves you and isn't just staying for the safety and convenience that you provide?

I have no real certainty, other than the fact that she is here and that I watch how her actions have changed from day to present. At first there was a lot of anger, defensiveness, “you can’t control me” crap but it has slowly changed. Not by leaps and bounds, but I do see progress. She does the normal things a WS should do right now. Tells me when and where she is, and I can track her if I want. I have passwords to social media etc. all basic stuff, but seeing her actually start apologizing out of the blue tells me she knows she fucked up. She has also developed a weird patience that I can’t describe. She knows when to leave me alone and when to engage.

Now those are positives and are in line with my 6 month timeline I made for myself when the shit hit the fan. But it doesn’t mean shit with respect to how I will feel down the road. Whether or not I want her or even desire her in an authentic cleat is TBD.

These are all good things, but do you feel like that you are truly the one person in the world she really loves? Much of this feels like a checklist. You definitely need them, but it feels like you deserve more.

With my Ex, I felt like it wasn’t a list. It was she realized how bad she screwed everything up, The no contact, being accountable, are all kind of givens. It’s the pain I saw in her that convinced me he did really mean nothing compared me.

In our case it wasn’t enough, but enough for me to stick it out for five years. I hope you see real recourse from her. Doing the right things are expected. She should be doing more at this point

When I read the stories about how their WS not only had a huge amount of sex, and were in love with their AP, I wonder why the BS even would want them back.

*Raises hand* Me

All of it is bad. My STBX had multiple PA's and I believe 2 LTA's. I didn't like any aspect of any of them. The emotional cheating, the physical cheating, the lying and the gaslighting. Everything that comes with betrayal whether it's emotional or physical hurts. It turns your world upside down and the person you thought had your back stabbed you instead.

As far as I know, my WH didn’t do anything physical other than his own hand and a kiss. Most of his was online, cyber affair, EA, whatever you want to call it. Even though some people find that laughable in the whole spectrum of ways to cheat, I do not. He made plans to leave me for another woman while we were actively trying to get pregnant. Told her that even if I was pregnant or had given birth and found out, he would just tell me it was over and be done with it. Apparently he thought she’d make a great stepmom. Told her he wanted her, best friends, soul mates, worshipped her, etc., some things he has really never told me. There’s a lot more to it, but he was deep into it. Anybody reading their conversations would think they were madly in love. To a point I do find it laughable now only because he hadn’t seen her in 30 or so years, he had no idea what she looked like, and she wouldn’t send him photos. Turns out she was about 300 pounds the whole time and was totally catfishing him. I do take some pleasure in knowing that.

But anyway, this whole thing while planning a baby with me, me getting pregnant, the first years of our son’s life, bother me greatly and has been hard for me to see past. He even told her about my pregnancy and the birth of our son before we told anybody else. There is nothing really laughable about it other than his stupidity. The hurt caused is not at all laughable.

She claims now that it was all based on a lie, affair fog, limerance or whatever.

My WH does the same. It’s not really that believable or reassuring in my opinion.

Anyway, so that one in particular to me was really bad, painful, etc. The kiss doesn’t bother me nearly as much as that. BUT, if I find out he has actually had sex with somebody other than his hand, it will be a complete dealbreaker. Does that mean I think it’s worse than emotional? I don’t know. I think it would just suck in a different way, a way that I couldn’t get past like an EA. I think trying to decide what’s worse or better with affairs is like trying to decide between eating a dark brown turd or a light brown one. Both taste like shit.

[This message edited by landclark at 8:23 PM, July 14th (Tuesday)]

Slapjacks....I don't think ive ever read where you said how/why you found out and how/why the A ended.

I feel sex with an emotional attachment is worse than just sex. Just sex and lots of it, is excruciating for me, but the added emotion makes the ķnife and wound go deeper. On the affair fog issue, sometimes I wonder if it's just made up bullshit.

I don't know if my WW had an EA. She travelled with him for work and went on lunch "dates" apparently before she arranged to set up the first sex date. I had no evidence of any of it. I guess they kissed a couple of times. I know things weren't good between us during that time but I didn't really know why. A heavy load at work, probably.

Shortly after they screwed the first time he apparently said ILY to her and she replied the same but didn't like it. This was in his yard by our truck after screwing. After all, that would be wrong like screwing wasn't. After that they had their own kindergarten work "lu" as a short "luv u".

About the same time he said something to her that she replied with "maybe I should move in with you". I'm guessing he might have said something about wishing she could stay longer. He, apparently got deer in headlights and she saved him by telling him she would never do that, as in, she wasn't going to leave me.

From what I've gathered there was very little personal things. She knows practically nothing of his likes, dislikes about anything. He never complimented anything about her. Not in 4 years. She supervised him but nothing in 4 years.

When they travelled she phoned me every night, we talked about our days, said ILYs, then she phoned him on the hotel system (no tracing) for him to come to her room. When not travelling he phoned her everyday from home after he left work and she went. She walked in, they kissed, they hugged, they went to his bedroom, she dressed and came home to me so we could make supper together.

The worst affair is the one that happened to you. In my case it's a whole lot of screwing all over the province, in his home, our pasture, a bird sanctuary viewing platform, his machine shed, his parents basement, the side of the road, my office space in my house. That's enough. It was the sexual along with the fact that, while she controlled logistics of screwing she would do anything he asked, including things she supposedly hated. So, the activities they engaged in once together were under his control.

Again, the worst affair is the one that happened to you. The sex was the worst for me but the period of their "dating" before sex certainly added to it. After the first sex she arranged it was just screwing on demand. An unpaid call girl.

My experience was that sometimes the sex was the worst aspect of my W's A, sometimes the emotion (even though it was fake), and sometimes the lies. (Now and for the past several years, it's the lies.)

IMO, an A is based on lies, and truth simply can't come from lies. That's why I think the 'luv' that aps talk about is fake, and that's why I think it's entirely possible for it to disappear in a flash.

I also think a BS who accepts that the A luv disappeared in a flash is selling himself short. It's easy to seem like a good partner for a couple of months, but often a WS just can't/won't keep it up. If R is on the table, you need to give your W more time

It took me 3.5-4 years of absolutely consistent R work from my W to accept that she loved me and was in love with me. It took thousands of trust-building actions with very few mistakes to win back my trust, and it takes a LOT of time to do that much work.

Your W has made some good changes. That's very positive for R. Almost all WSes need IC, IMO, with a goal of changing from betrayer to good partner. What is your W doing along those lines?

Six months is not a long time. The SI rule of thumb is 2-5 years to recover from being betrayed.Six months is a good checkpoint, and I hope you have enough info to know what you want to do by then. If you don't, however, I urge you to give yourself more time - I think it's better to go for a good solution rather than a quick one.