SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

AD,

I don’t think I swung a 2x4 in my last post, I just gave you a glimpse into my reality because I believe it really applies to your situation.

Now as far as loving my STBXWW, I would say that I still do, but part of my growth over the last few years was the realization that love isn’t always nice and flowery and it can often appear very unloving. Would it be loving to give your children whatever they want whenever they want and to never discipline them? Not at all. Loving them means teaching them, showing them the ropes, helping them grow, and even disciplining them when required.

Right now your wife is that spoiled little child who thinks she is entitled to whatever she wants whenever she wants it, and you are enabling it. In this situation, ‘loving her’ means letting her feel the full devastation of her choices. So while I still love my STBXWW, I do not trust her, I do not respect her choices, and I deserve a hell of a lot better.

Part of what has helped me to give up our history is the realization that a vast majority of it wasn’t real. My STBXWW’s manipulation didn’t just start up during the A. It has been there in some form or another for our entire relationship. As you get better at recognizing it, you more than likely will be able to look back and see that a lot of what you remember as ‘good’ was her way of positioning you to give her something (at least it was in my situation).

On a completely unrelated note, you have discussed your breakdowns and ‘angry sobbing’ a couple of times, and I just wanted to say that another thing I learned in IC was that I was horrible with emotions. Basically because of some major FOO issues I often expressed anger as sadness. This had the horrible effect of me running to my WW for comfort when she had done something that would anger me and it gave her complete control over me and our relationship. I don’t know if this applies at all to you, but something to think about.

Sounds like you can't let go...I know,BTDT medal, but I was dying a slow painful death..and I had kids..they needed me...I finally just said to myself, "Not everyone gets Cinderella". I would self talk and say "What makes you think your so special..what about all the other people that have it worse".

Even when I am down now..I still repeat that to myself.

It made me realize I am not the only one that has been through infidelity and it has been going on for years and years and others before me have survived. If Queen Katherine (Henry 8ths first wife) couldn't keep her family together then what makes me think I can. She had a broken heart just like me. There are many broken hearts out there. But what you realize is those broken hearts keep beating and beating. And life goes on...

When she died, I see that I did indeed invest in my wife the role of mother. Not that she resembles my mother at all in personality. But my wife "took over" that feminine presence, nurturing and motherly. (Yes I know, she was having an affair and that's not nurturing, but you know what I mean.).

We know what you mean.

I'm so glad that you realize that this reaction from you isn't just about your wife and her affair, but is about loss (I've BTDT).

You need to focus on yourself and taking care of yourself since now you don't have parents to help with that when you need it, or a wife who will help you with that. You DO have children you need to help with this, though, and your wife isn't doing a good job.

Would your beloved mother want to see you being treated like this?

Would you be heartbroken if someone was treating your darling son like this when he was grown-up?

Your wife isn't the woman you married. Perhaps one day she will decide to try to become a better woman. Perhaps not.

A dear friend of mine did get divorced from her husband and they later did remarry, and were happy. But they both worked very hard to get back together.

The only one working on your realtionship is you. Not working on the bathroom or the laundry - but in being a couple in love, nurturing each other, being respectful, and mothering if you need that. Meeting each others needs.

She isn't going to be mothering to you. She isn't even being mothering to her own children. This woman is in no stretch of the imagination going to replace unconditional feminine love in your life. I know you hope she can, I wish you'd look at her actions. Every. Single. Day.

Love is much more than cleaning the bathroom then going to your apartment to sleep with another man who isn't your husband.

This and that fear of being alone is making this so difficult. I feel like I will be abandoned my my mother again. I usually don't subscribe to this sort of Freudian stuff, but in my case I know it's the truth. And it's powerful stuff, you know? It is primal and wields incredible force.

Yes, it is powerful stuff, the force of an F5 tornado. I had to realize the same thing in my life, too. That the whole A mess wasn't about my AP but was about something else in my life and I had to deal with that something else.

You have to deal with having no parents, it has to be done. But you don't have the luxury of time and space to do that exclusively because you have young children and a active WW. You are going to go through a journey with your kids through this. You need to work on yourself and work on being there for them, too.

My first thought after reading your first post after the weekend was "has he had enough pain yet?"

“We change our behavior when the pain of staying the same becomes greater than the pain of changing.”

This and that fear of being alone is making this so difficult. I feel like I will be abandoned my my mother again. I usually don't subscribe to this sort of Freudian stuff, but in my case I know it's the truth. And it's powerful stuff, you know? It is primal and wields incredible force.

Yes, I do know. I was there myself. My parents divorced when I was young. My dad was an alcoholic and I saw him maybe 5 or 6 times during my younger years. The last time I saw him I was 16 and I'm 34 now. He was killed in a car accident last year. My mom did remarry, but I have no relationship with my step dad. I have gone back and read diary entries from my late teens, and I see so clearly how I was looking for a "man" to be in my life and love me. There was a lot of depression and a lot of talk about not having a boyfriend and would it ever happen, etc. Those feelings put me in the position of being willing to accept whatever came along. And I did that with my WH. He was the 3rd relationship I ever had, and I totally romanticized things. How it really went was something like this:

Meet a jerk

Have sex

Accidentally get pregnant

Stay together despite the many flaws in the relationship

Have another baby (and then another and another)

Never really feel loved, but pretend because it's better then being alone and raising 4 kids on your own

What I had created in my mind went something like this:

Girl who was just cheated on, finds guy who adores her and takes care of her the way that other jerk never would. Accidentally get pregnant...it must have happened for a reason. We were meant to be together. Young little family, fighting together against the challenges life through our way. People thought we wouldn't make it, we showed them! etc. etc.

Even the affair I romanticized. Devoted dad was overseas, away from his family. He missed them so bad and he was fooled by the awful predator, OW. Poor, confused, wounded man. Needs my love. Needs his family. We will beat this too!

It was all delusion in my head. I had arranged and written just exactly what I wanted my situation to be. I lied to myself for YEARS!

It is good that you have figured out through IC that losing your parents plays a role in your current mindset. That is the beginning. Now make that list! List all of the absolute worst parts of your marriage, because they are TRUTH! They are a part of the story too. So often in life we are taught to focus on the positives, but I think with infidelity, it is the one time that we really need to focus on the crap, because it is part of our truth and is going to predict what happens to our relationship in the future. I was not in your marriage, but I would bet money that the relationship was not all love and rainbows and butterflies. I bet there was some ugly, unloved there too. Focus on that for a bit. Focus on the traits that drove you nuts about your wife (there have got to be some). Don't live in the fantasy. That little play is over now - exit to the right. Time to live in the NOW!

[This message edited by thenon-goddess at 1:26 PM, June 12th (Wednesday)]

Justdone and Thenon,

Thank you for your understanding my psychological struggle. Your posts move me.

I am taking your advice and making a "deromanticized list" consisting of all the negatives of the marriage prior to the affair. It's a difficult psychological task, as it forces me to take off the rose-colored glasses that are so firmly affixed to my face these days.

Following this list will be another cataloging the emotionally abusive actions over the course of the affair. This will be a painful list, but an easy one.

Thank you again.

AD, once again I will not labor on here because you got such good feedback and advice from 7yrsflushed, JustDone and others. I can not add to that advice other than to say *PLEASE* try and listen to it.

BTW, my M was 38+ years. Yes there were good times and I have two wonderful kids from it I wouldn't trade for anything in the world. However, and this is a really BIG however... my stbxWW decided to throw *ALL* that away on an A. That was not my decision. It was 100% hers. I am *NOT* angry about that any more AD. I thank God every day that I woke up and realized that *she* had changed for what ever reason and that *I* had no control over that. I am now truly more happy than I've ever been in my life. You can be too brother. You just have to take the steps needed to really make it happen.

My last post was ugly for a reason. You were getting a lot of tempered advice that included support. That's great and really what SI is all about. I purposely decided to be the *bad* guy because I really do think someone needs to shake you up. 7yrsflushed put it very well to you. If you continue to play out this fantasy, you *WILL* get burned and hurt severely. I pray you wake up before that happens my friend!

ETA: Don't worry if some of what you say comes off as objectionable to others. Remember that emotions run very raw as we all work through this shit storm. You're bound to hit a nerve or two, especially considering the volume of text in your threads. We all know you don't purposely post to hurt anyone, so if you get flamed for something, just bank it in your mind and move on. Because just as you're not trying to hurt, they are just venting frustration. It's all normal considering the subject matter.

PEACE

AD,

I loved my ex-WH so intensely losing him drove me insane. Literally. Having my life erased and being reduced to less than nothing (in my mind) drove me to suicide attempts and I ended up committed. I was in such pain I felt like I was being barbecued alive. It was intensely physical.

Please do not think for one minute that any of us don't know what it is to love intensely. With everything that you are and everything that you have. To feel that physical tearing when they leave to go to their AP leaving us eviscerated and bleeding out on the floor as they step over our corpse.

We survived. Sometimes to our dismay initially. However, down the road we learned to be happy. We learned the difference between fantasy and reality. We learned to see the person we loved as they truly were. And we learned to be healthy and detach.

Don't let the fact that I am back at SI throw you. I did find love again. I AM happy even though I'm back here. And I've learned enough that I can cope this time. I don't like it, but I know I will survive. My M may not, but I will.

You will too.

((((((HUGS)))))) to you my friend.

"Everyone is so sure and so strong and confident in their 2x4s. But there is so much anger at their exes. Did they really love their spouses like I love mine, despite what she has done and is doing? They can't possibly have. This woman is the love of my life. Our roots are so deep. Our marriage was largely wonderful prior to the disaster. So much love, so much intimacy, so many shared joys and sorrows. How can I possibly give this up when there is even a slim ray of hope that we can eventually reconcile?"

I think that if you dig deep regarding the disaster, of which you speak, that you will find it was much longer in the making preceding the event and involved the erosion of respect and dignity, which are just a couple of the elements most want in a loving relationship.

[This message edited by alphakitte at 3:52 PM, June 12th (Wednesday)]

AGain you have recieved great advice. Please take it, please use it.

Please STOP letting her manipulate you if ONLY for the reason of stopping the madness and confusion for your kids. Please.

AD, everyone thinks their own situation is different. That somehow everyone's experiences couldn't possibly be like yours.

Well the truth is, the WS handbook is all so similar. What she is doing is text book. And you refuse to accept what she is showing you. She wants the OM. She lives with OM. She takes OM's opinions and advice over you. You are the problem to her. She wants you as a security blanket, to not rock the boat for her benefit not yours. She is asking you to swallow her infidelity and wait in the background in case this A falls apart. She doesn't want you out of love.

Please stop looking and hoping for the outcome you want and look at the reality of your situation. What you have now, is no wife, and damaged M, and upset kids. You cling to the thought you are waiting for the kids so you don't have to face divorce.

Deep down you know you have lost her. Stop erasing the picture and redrawing it by putting the fantasy she will come back and love you and all will be as before. It can NEVER be as before. Not ever. Please face this.

Abbondad, when my ex started his affair, I thought I'd die from grief. We met when we were 18, at university, and had been everything to each other for 24 years, through the birth and childhood of our son and daughter, the deaths of our fathers and other extended family tragedies. We were the rock of our family and each other's soulmates, I thought. I felt I'd be nothing and die without his presence, without his love. I felt his leaving would destroy our family and that anything was worth it to save that. This is a stage of the process, Abbondad - maybe the worst one. I would NEVER have believed you then if you'd said I'd come to a stage where I felt no anger, even, towards him. I love him as a friend, and as my kids' dad, that's all now. I love someone else (though that's another tale), and the kids are absolutely flourishing. All things are possible, Abbondad, apart from loving your wife back into being the person you wish she was. I'm telling you this because, though you won't believe it now, there IS peace, freedom and happiness beyond this point - but ONLY if you now believe in yourself , and your right to the sort of life that can only come after the end of this situation.

Everyone is so sure and so strong and confident in their 2x4s. But there is so much anger at their exes. Did they really love their spouses like I love mine, despite what she has done and is doing? They can't possibly have. This woman is the love of my life.

Anger and hate aren't the opposite of love AD. Indifference is. I am mainly indifferent to my ex, except when he hurts the kids, which is all too often lately.

I recently read through my old posts, the ones from when I first joined. I loved my ex. I was sure of it. I knew there was no one else for me. I knew we could work through it all. You say you put up with all her crap, and that shows how strong your love is for her. If I say I put up with my ex having affairs and being emotionally abusive, does that show how much I loved him? What about when I say I stayed after he tried to run me over? Does that show how deeply I loved him? Or how deeply damaged I was? The thing is, I saw it as love, not damage until long after he was gone.

Eventually, I realized, the only thing salvageable in our relationship was me. You can't rebuild a house from splinters. I couldn't fix him, but I could fix me. It was only then, that I realized how wrong he had been, how badly I had been treated. I'm years out, and sometimes randomly remember treatment that I cannot believe I ever tolerated.

Like thenon-goddess, he wasn't the only one re-writing our history.

Young lovers against the world. His parents hated me and my parents thought he was kind of a dick.

We'd been through so much and fate and deep love kept us together. We fought a lot about his female friends, I called off the wedding, then an accidental pregnancy that we were trying to make "right".

I'd stand by him through anything! all the times he got fired or overdrew our checking account. the times he punched the holes in the walls, and even the emotional affairs.

Hard times pulled us apart, each of us with our own struggles, but, love would keep us together and we would come out stronger! I had postpartum depression, he decided to start cheating. I started to get better, he found he liked cheating. I rug swept.

And finally, the guilt he felt over the damage he caused was just too much for his poor tortured soul to handle and he lashed out for the final time and we were finished. *end scene*. Or you know, he wanted to have his cake and eat it too, and I closed the bakery. Again, 5 years later, he is EXACTLY the same as he was the last night we lived together. He has been through dozens of houses, jobs, and girlfriends in those 5 years. None of it ever works out, he never knows why, life is just so horrible for the perpetual victim, and he is still a cheater.

AD, we are so confident in our responses because we've seen it. We ALL loved our exs like you love your WS, believe it or not. We've all seen the damage we caused ourselves and our kids because we held on too tight for too long. We've all been on the roller coaster. We all had to decide whether to go down with the ship or jump into the stormy waters and try and swim for shore.

And, I think you can swim better than you think you can, you just keep wearing yourself out getting away and swimming then swimming back.

AD, we are so confident in our responses because we've seen it. We ALL loved our exs like you love your WS, believe it or not. We've all seen the damage we caused ourselves and our kids because we held on too tight for too long. We've all been on the roller coaster. We all had to decide whether to go down with the ship or jump into the stormy waters and try and swim for shore.

And, I think you can swim better than you think you can, you just keep wearing yourself out getting away and swimming then swimming back.

Thank you, Weatherly, and everyone else. I wrote the list--my own rewriting of our marriage and her character vs. the reality--and it was a long one indeed.

The last few days she's been sending me hints about some houses she's been looking at that WE could afford... How WE could possibly move... In other words, allusions to OUR future. Words, at this, point, mere words. No change in her actions.

She came to pick up the kids this evening and was in a foul mood, rather nasty to me in fact--yet another reminder that she has never been all sweetness and light. This is the veil I have been casting her in. To my credit, I did not engage her--just stared at her and let her rage so she could hear how horrible she sounded.

Her behavior helped dry up any tears that would have usually welled up at her arrival.

This approach--my illision vs. reality--is really helpful.

Thanks, Everyone!

My first thought after reading your first post after the weekend was "has he had enough pain yet?"

Yes, I have, friends. Our poor nine year old found on my wife's phone a text and pic she sent to the OM of her breasts as well as his leering response. My son is shocked. I am devastated yet again.

I have told my son the truth--the reason I am divorcing mommy.

Please send me strength to get through this process.

I can feel the shock with you. That's a horrible thing to happen to your son. Time to put some protection around you and your kids, Abbondad, and disconnect from her as far as you can. When you divorce her, she can't hurt you any more. Imagine a day when these things can't happen to you or your kids. That's a very inappropriate thing to happen to a young child - ask your lawyer for advice about it and what it means for her access.

Oh no. That poor,sweet boy,to have discovered the truth in such a vulgar,shocking way. That image of his mother is one he will never forget(I had a similar experience when I was about 11).

How is your WW handling this? If she is not remoreseful with her child..YOUR child..get her the Hell away from him asap. Her being his mother doesn't give her the right to fuck him up. She *needs* to be apologetic,remorseful,disgusted with herself,own ALL of this,and attend counseling with this poor child.

He just found out the reason his daddy has been so sad,the reason his mommy moved out,the reason his family has fallen apart is all because of his mommy..and his mom is the type of woman to not only have an affair and send nude pics of herself to men who are not her husband,but he knows his mom was willing to break his heart for this other man.

You did good,AD,being honest with him. Keep being honest,whether your WW likes it or not. No matter what,you tell that little boy the truth(in age appropriate terms,of course). You also need to tell him his mommy loves him, but right now her mind is messed up and she needs to get help.

Happy Father's day,my friend. Enjoy those kids today. Make sure they smile and laugh..do something fun. Let them know that,while a lot has changed in their world,you are still their daddy,and you will always be there for them. Keep your chin up,and be strong for them.

Also,siblings talk. You need to sit your DD down and tell her in an age appropriate way,the truth. Otherwise your DS will tell her and she will be confused..or worse..go to your WW for answers..and confuse the child even more.

[This message edited by confused615 at 7:52 AM, June 16th (Sunday)]

Thank you... I will do all those good things with my kids.

I confronted my wife--told her what he found and that he is very upset.

Asked her if she does not find this disgusting? Told her she is forty two, not fifteen.

True to form, SHE is angry at ME. Furious. "WE are not going to put our children through this," she said, incredibly.

Not a word of remorse. No apology. Just an insinuation that I am using our children against her.

It's just getting uglier. She is truly ill. Beyond fog land. Disordered.

She actually tried to deny it at first, saying that the pic is not on her phone. Ok, whatever. So maybe he saw it a few days ago and it has been erased.

I can't even explain what I am going through right now. At least anger has found its way to the forefront of my emotions. I just want to be away from her so she can't hurt me any more.

I have just reread everyone's posts in my thread--especially the 2x4s. They all make such sense now.

"No, they are wrong..."

"Uh uh. That is not true in MY case."

"No way would my WW do that."

"She is not really seeing the OM anymore. She is just healing and then she will see the light and come back full of remorse."

"Yeah, but these people went through much worse. They don't really get MY situation. Mine is different."

Etc. etc.

I was wrong about everything. Thank god for SI. Thank you everyone for staying with me and helping to steer me away from my own denial, rationalizations, justifications, and false hopes. In other words, my own BS Fog.

Hi Abbondad. Happy Father's Day.

I just wanted to share with you that I called DCF yesterday against my STBX and his OW based on things the children have told me. Of course, he is denying those things and blaming me and cursing me out, etc., etc., which is truly crazy-making. My L has suggested that I take videos of the children, asking them to show and tell me what happened with their father. I would suggest you do the same when the children tell you stuff like that. They've just been exposed to porn, and that's very serious. I would very much recommend that you take video of him admitting it so that you can prove later on what he said to you and that you are not making things up. I have normally been having someone else take the video as discreetly as possible..

Please protect yourself. I know it's hard to get your heart up to speed, but she definitely sounds like a manipulating unremorseful woman with at least some NPD. Please accept that, accept that you cannot fix her, and do whatever you must to protect yourself and your children.

Big hugs to you today..

My son is shocked. I am devastated yet again.

AD, I am so sorry your son saw that.

I am thankful he has you, and you are coming out of the fog!

Time, to not be devastated any more. Time to understand THIS IS HOW SHE IS.

Put your armor on, her behavior will become worse, she will demonize you, you will be turning the kids against her, and she will push every button on you to get the old you under her thumb.

We've got your back AD. You have come so far.

Happy Father's Day