SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

People, you need to be cutting CBM some serious slack. His whole world blew up 5 months ago. His wife lied to him for twelve years about having a wild sexual affair and was not honest about it after he asked her. She has harbored feelings for his best friend for their whole marriage. She only told him as she thought the statute of limitations indemnified her from the person she was.She thought since she felt safe, all should be swept under the rug Now, people here are telling him that after 5 months the statute of limitations should be over for his intense anger.

Calling her a slut is non productive. But I get it. I called my EX much worse for much longer. But in my mind it was the only way I had to fight back for the humiliation she put me through. I wasn’t going to hit her, embarrass her to our children, have an affair on my own. Not much left to let out the steam.

I knew it was wrong and hurtful, but I was in intense pain. Eventually the pleasure I got from seeing her break down in tears was not worth the crappy feelings it brought to me for doing it. But that took longer than 5 months. I’m not sure if I read it here, but the path most WS take is to promise to do anything to stay married. She was not out of line for asking, but again some slack needs to be cut here. It is happening less frequently and my guess is he, like me, will stop at some point. She needs to remember the promise she probably made to do anything to stay married. If some name calling is that, so be it.

As to how you are feeling in the marriage I get that too. I ended up divorced because I couldn’t stand the person I became around her. I wasn’t nasty anymore, I was just flat. Of course her affair put that in motion, but I just could never let myself truly forgive her and knew I would always be half in, which wasn’t fair to either of us.

Plenty of others here have been able to make that leap. You are still early in the game, she needs to understand your anger, and you need to see if you can work through it

I can only speak for myself, but it was never my intention to shame him for being human in a very difficult situation. The sentiments that I was trying to get across is he is acting out in ways I believe is detrimental to HIM.

When we feel out of control, name call, and do things that don't line up with our actual goals (which to me at this point sounds more up in the air than I thought) or who we are as a person - it eats at our integrity and self-worth.

CBM- I just want to say, you likely don't realize it but you still sound more like you are in the shock phase to me. Which means now is likely not the time to make huge decisions. I would advise you to try and read more about what sisoon wrote and drama triangle stuff. I would also advise when you feel you can't control your emotions to take a break and step away from the situation. I think the thing that resonated the most with me was when he told you that this is about her gaining integrity and you reclaiming yours. The more you act out the worse you are going to feel about yourself. The more damage you are going to do. You have all options available to you at this moment in time, take your time, don't put pressure on yourself, concentrate on what you can control and that is you and your healing. Basically read what sisoon wrote over and over. It's very sage advice and I think the most helpful you have received.

I will add I have heard many posters say that they took the pressure off of themselves by saying "I will see how I feel in X number of months". Heck, even I did that. KingRat pointed out you can make the D decision regardless of the desires and actions of anyone else...so by delaying the decision it's not an indication of your mind being made up. Couples can be in limbo for a long period of time. You sound way too conflicted to me for you to know what the right thing for you to do is.

Take care.

@GoldenR

CBM says a couple pages back how he's really starting to think about D, and then its nothing but ppl trying to talk him out of it.

Then he talks about his occasional outbursts which include name calling and he's chastised for it AT LESS THAN 5 FUCKING MONTHS OUT.

Honestly, I blame his wife's thread for this. She's a master manipulator. The way she phrases what she writes throughout the thread and how the narrative slowly shifts from her supposedly being remorseful, to both of them needing to heal, to laying the groundwork for future deception and people are agreeing with her is beyond skilled.

That she leaves out insanely important details out of situations, only admitting to them when people ask for clarification and then instantly having an excuse explaining how that was supposedly in her BS's best interest just goes to show how skilled she is at this game.

A lot of the people here have also read his WS's thread. Where she constantly manages to leave out important parts of the story which explains CBM behavior and more than justifies it. Portraying him as unreasonable, over the line etc.

I think the thing that resonated the most with me was when he told you that this is about her gaining integrity and you reclaiming yours.

Hiking, I am hoping that you misinterpreted Sisoons post. I got from it that he needs to maintain his integrity not that he doesn’t have any. In my opinion CBM has boatloads of integrity. It’s his WS that is lacking in this department.

I hope this doesn’t turn into another thread where it becomes the BS failing that ends the marriage. It ended when she cheated. He is graciously giving her an opportunity to save it.

[This message edited by waitedwaytoolong at 4:02 PM, March 15th (Friday)]

Hi CBM.

I haven’t posted on your thread yet, but I wanted to comment regarding your anger and outburst, including the name calling. I get it. I completely understand. And no, it doesn’t make you a monster. Just a human being who’s had his life ripped apart.

I felt compelled to post because I agree wholeheartedly with WWTL and GoldenR. But more importantly because my DDay was about 3 and a 1/2 years ago and my WW and I are in R. But 5 months in? I was a mess. I was angry and cold. I called my wife slut and whore and worse. I’m not making a moral judgement on whether it’s right to do those things or whether it’s abusive or anything of the sort. What I am telling you is that it’s normal. You are a person and what has happened to you is traumatic and you are reacting to that. May not be the healthiest way, may not be kind, or anything like that, but it’s normal and understandable.

I did it for way too long. Gave me that cruel, happy feeling, and then I felt like shit inside. I was messed up. But I still did it. Doesn’t mean it was okay for me to, but I didn’t care about okay, or right, or fair, or being nice. Because those things didn’t apply to my WW when she did what she did, so none of that registered at all.

It passed. On the whole it didn’t make me feel better. In fact, I felt like a bully, and so I stopped. I still threw her A in her face for a long while after, but the name calling stopped after a time. It will pass for you too.

On a related note, while I think it’s good that your WW is working on herself, IMO now is not the time to involve you in that growth journey. You are paramount, not you two, just you. She can do what she needs on her own, but it is way too early for her to find her voice, express her needs and wants, or anything else along those lines. Again, just my opinion, but regardless of whether you contemplated becoming an MH or whatever designation you have here, in my mind you are a BS. As such I think your WW needs to shift gears and should focus on your healing. Grow later, heal now. Work on that.

Hi CBM,

I have followed your thread for quite a while, and it seems to me that while on the face of it, you are trying to reconcile with your wife, what you are really struggling with is how to reconcile with yourself. And that what you want your wife to provide for you is a 'key' that will enable you to break out of feeling angry at yourself because you want to stay.

On a simple level, the issue of names could be taken as a venting of raw pain and anger. However, I believe that is not your motivation. Nor is punishment. I believe that what you are trying to do - possibly without realising it - is to steer your wife to a point where she fully accepts the nature of what she did, but only because that is a stepping stone to the place she needs to be to say and do things that will help you justify staying with her to yourself.

It's like you could have an argument with her, and you reach a point where she says, "Okay, okay, fine, I acted like a slut", and in the silence that follows, you are waiting and hoping for her to progress to the next stage, which might be contrition, and maybe even throwing herself at your mercy.

Only...she says something else...And you feel like banging your head on the wall, because she still has not given you that key to open the door of you recommitting to her. She gets close sometimes, then heads off in another direction.

I think that exchange where she said to you, "Oh, so you want me to beg?" illustrates the impasse perfectly. If I understand this properly, it is not that you want her to beg. It is that you want her to understand why she could - or perhaps even should - beg you to stay, not because you get off on her grovelling, but because it would be a sign that she truly sees her actions in the same light as you.

I believe that if she could prove that she now hates her past actions the same way that you do, you might feel able to move forwards with her. I think that the real source of your anger in many of these exchanges is not based simply on the infidelity, but frustration that she never reaches a point of true contrition about it.

I think that the significance of her reaching a point of true contrition and acceptance of what she did is because for the greater part of the relationship, she has been in a position of power. A power that came from your infatuation with her, which in turn has left you feeling angry with yourself for being infatuated with her.

To break that anger with yourself, you would like her to acknowledge that you are no longer bound to her, and that you could actually go. I think that has been your motivation for leaving briefly in the past. It is not that you really want to go. If you wanted that, you would have gone. I believe that you want her to reach that point of feeling like her power over you has been broken, and make the relationship more balanced.

What comes through repeatedly in your posts is that you love her, but you are angry with yourself for loving her. Your anger becomes circular, going to her for how she treated you, then back to you for putting up with it, then back to her, then back to you...

So you find yourself looking for something that will break that circle, because it is so frustrating and repetitive. You look to her to do or say something to break the circle so you can move forwards and recommit. Only, she never quite gets there. And you wonder if she ever will. So then you think that if she is incapable of doing something significant to help you break back into the marriage, maybe she can do something significant that will help you break out of it. Like cheat again.

It seems to me that it is not that you really want to be out of the marriage, it is that you want to be out of what seems like an endless, exhausting circle of anger that never resolves itself.

If that is the case, I believe that the solution may lie not with your wife, but with yourself, and breaking that circle of anger (possibly in IC). I believe that a break in it can be achieved without breaking the marriage, if focus is put on that circle, and what drives it.

Perhaps a start could be made if you begin a list in your journal headed, "I wish my wife would...", and then spend a week writing down the words or actions that would have significance to you, and why they would be significant.

If we can find a way to stop you being angry with yourself for staying, and angry for having feelings of love for your wife, it could help you reach a more solid position for considering your future.

Waiting - yes thank you I meant maintaining. Sorry! Thank you for bringing that to my attention. Apologies to cbm too.

CBM,

I don't feel that your name calling is the right thing to do, but it isn't abuse, either. Its literally a verbal extension of your mental anguish. What I said to my XWW was far worse after I found out. She would tell you calling her a "slut" would have been a step up that night.

I know you love your wife and maybe down the road you two can figure it out, but its clear she is manipulating and, sadly, maybe a separation might be best for you right now.

Maybe some fresh air will help you get your mind where you need/want it. You can always D down the line once your mind is on a more even keel and know one way or another whats right for you.

Good luck dude.

I got from it that he needs to maintain his integrity not that he doesn’t have any.

Yes - maintain.

Verbal abuse in the first months after d-day is not a Good Thing, but so many of us do it that it's can't be a sign of lack of integrity. (Nor is thinking about all the awful things one might like to do to one's WS or the ap....)

I'm glad that Walloped weighed in, because he's exactly the kind of experienced SI member to whom I was referring. His story was iconic on SI, and similar to yours in that both he and his wife had closely followed threads, with strong opinions from many posters about their path to R.

What comes through repeatedly in your posts is that you love her, but you are angry with yourself for loving her. Your anger becomes circular, going to her for how she treated you, then back to you for putting up with it, then back to her, then back to you...

So you find yourself looking for something that will break that circle, because it is so frustrating and repetitive. You look to her to do or say something to break the circle so you can move forwards and recommit. Only, she never quite gets there. And you wonder if she ever will. So then you think that if she is incapable of doing something significant to help you break back into the marriage, maybe she can do something significant that will help you break out of it. Like cheat again.

I think this may be the most useful observation I've seen here, and I'll go a step further and say that it's possible that you are trying to incite her to make the call for you. You have posted more than once about the gut-wrenching unfairness of being the one who has to decide what to do. If you leave, you're breaking up the marriage. If you stay, you feel like you are signing up for a lifetime of pain and resentment. You're exhausted and in need of a definitive resolution, but the only definitive resolution is D, because you can wake up tomorrow morning and file, but you can't wake up tomorrow and R. On the other hand, it's terribly hard to take that step while there is still so much genuine love between you and Flawed... so much that was so good until so recently. If you can destroy that, and see her as a common slut, or even just convince her that she deserves better than the treatment she's getting from you, then the path becomes clear.

I guess the only advice I have is that you do not have to hate her in order to call it quits. You do not, of course, have to call it quits at all. I know there are many people ready to pull for you if you feel you can work towards R, including me. You also do not have an obligation to us, or to the opinion of family and friends, or to her, or even to your children. You can love her and respect her and want what's best for her, and still leave. There's always the possibility that if you really internalize that, you won't feel such a powerful draw to D after all. But whatever you decide, it's ok. You will be ok.

[This message edited by BraveSirRobin at 5:26 PM, March 15th (Friday)]

I'm glad that Walloped weighed in, because he's exactly the kind of experienced SI member to whom I was referring. His story was iconic on SI, and similar to yours in that both he and his wife had closely followed threads, with strong opinions from many posters about their path to R.

Not really all that similar, as the Mrs didn't show up here for close to 2 years after W's arrival. They didn't have JFO and "Just Busted" threads running concurrently

It's been a hell of a day. Thanks to all those providing advice and/or support. I'm going to try to take the weekend off.

CBM, I was a mess for much longer than 5 months. It was hell. You are still very early. Even if the emotions consume you, save a small place for a rational cognition that reminds you that how you are now is not likely how you will be always. For many, 5 months after d-day was still rage.

Also, while I hold your fWW accountable for demonstrating an authentic empathy and an level of honesty that she may never have demonstrated before, she will not be able to do that as quick as you need her to. Her struggles, while not your problem, are a reality and the degree to which that journey she is on to achieve a honest and authentic state will take longer than you reasonably expect it to.

Your rage is understandable. Your present view of the world and her and your M is all reasonable and normal. Your bipolar feelings for her, from one end of the spectrum swinging to the other, are expected and understandable. Calling names is not helpful, but then cheating on your intended and then lying throughout your M is at probably more unhelpful. I get it. It is all a bitch and we as BS's don't live in vacuums where rational thought of what is best guides our every impulse. We BS's occasionally react to the trauma like all people react to all kinds of trauma.

Just at least be aware that things as they are right now are not necessarily how they will be at a future point in time. I know that while you have to heal yourself, it is inescapable that your healing is in many ways intrinsically tied to seeing more authenticity and honesty in your fWW.

You are in the middle of a tornado. That tornado will pass. When enough time passes, and as such you have had more time to observe and judge the degree of safety your fWW offers, you will be better positioned to act not out of rage but out of a rational assessment of your life, your M, and how likely you think one path would lead to happiness vs the other.

I feel you brother. It is a trauma we all have endured. You are still early. You are still trying to figure out who you married and is she safe. All while trying to manage the loss, rage, confusion, anger......feel what you feel, but let your brain remind you that it will not always be this way.

I agree with others that suggest you could benefit from IC as a way to get your thoughts and feelings focused and in sync.

[This message edited by DIFM at 5:44 AM, March 16th (Saturday)]

Hello CBM, a few random thoughts:

First, keep in mind that you're only 5 months out from dday, and there has been some additional revelation, sort of a TT process, since then. I think in your case you ought to give yourself plenty of time before making any major decisions, at least the kind that could be irrevocable. Time does heal some types of wounds.

Second, let's talk a bit about your thesis that your WW didn't have desire for you back in the day, when your relationship was young.

My wife and I met in January 2004, 15 years ago, in college. I was shy and always had my head down and headphones on, but she started talking to me before a class we had together. We became friends, and pretty quickly, if not immediately, I developed a crush on her. She never developed a crush on me.

Never? She did in fact start having sex with you, lots of it, she moved across the country to be with you, she married you, and she had your children. Those are all pretty strong statements of desire where I come from. It may be more accurate to say she didn't develop a crush on you as quickly as you did on her.

She continued casually hooking up with guys while we grew closer as friends….as soon as I got back she told me how she hooked up with this douchebag guy she shared a class with. She first lied (notice another trend?) and minimized what happened, but then let it slip that they actually performed oral on each other.

From other comments in both of your threads, my impression is that she hasn't had sex with that many guys. Like 5 or fewer in total. Forgive me if I'm wrong, but in my book that's a pretty small number. Not nearly enough to support "continued casually hooking up with guys."

It felt like being cheated on back then, even though we weren't formally together.

Can you understand how that feeling was completely unwarranted and out-of-line? That is borderline stalker sentiment. You had no express agreement with her at that point. She was a single young woman doing what single young women do at that stage of life. One reason women keep things casual and hook up is to avoid getting entangled with an asshole or an abuser. It's a legitimate strategy of self-preservation while exploring one's envelope of emotional and sexual feelings.

I gave her an ultimatum, that I couldn't just be friends with her, that I needed an exclusive dating relationship with her or I couldn't remain friends. She at first told me no, that she wasn't ready to commit to dating, but then changed her mind about a week later. We became a couple.

Our relationship was born with me feeling rejected and then pitied, and her feeling unready to commit and without ever having had a crush or sexual attraction for me. I should have never moved forward with dating her, but I was in love with her and I wanted to be the guy who got the girl, for once. Everything about how we got together was a huge red flag and it bothers me to this day.

IMO, if anybody was seeing a red flag at that point, it was her. You were frustrated with the fact that you were a homebody who wasn't getting yourself out there to experience some of the thrills that other young people were experiencing, and you were externalizing this onto her, forcing her to a Hobson's Choice before she was ready to make it.

What is noteworthy to me is that she said "yes". Many women would have run screaming from your jealousy and insecurity. The only possible reason for a "yes" from her is that she recognized inner qualities within you that she knew in her heart of hearts she wanted to be with, for life. I can't think, honestly, of a greater statement of desire.

But instead, I jumped in and we dated and things were great. Our sex life was great. Our connection was great.…We ended up dating long distance for a year and we remained madly in love… wild sex once a month or so when we saw each other. It was like an affair.

Remind me again about the part where she never had desire for you in the early days.

She immediately takes the opportunity to leave the night club with her AP and go to fuck him, without even thinking about me or feeling any guilt. Pure selfishness. He was the opposite of me, and she treated him the opposite of how she treated me. She had a huge crush on him, and was a willing participant in sex as soon as it was presented. She finally gets caught by me, but lies her way out of it and greatly minimized what happened.

Completely shitty thing to do. No argument from anybody about that.

I was incredibly co-dependent back then and bought her lies, because I wanted to believe it. Mostly, I was terrified of being single and starting over. I regret how I acted back then enormously. I had a chance to push, to find the truth, and to leave her when there wasn't much to walk away from, but I took the easy way out, put on blindfolds and covered my ears. Fuck me, I hate that I did that.

Would-a, should-a, could-a. You didn't do those things. You made choices that had consequences. Life is linear. You can't return to that moment for a do-over. More on that below.

After the affair, while we're engaged, she goes on a trip to England with a friend and spends a day on a "date" with a random dude who hit on her while walking around town….This is how she acted as my fiancée, and after taking part in her affair and claiming she could never do something like that again. She truly had no respect for me at all. She welcome any and all attention from any male that gave it to her.

That incident, in a vacuum, is akin to something many married people experience, the playing with fire, getting a bit too close to the flame, but withdrawing before any actual sex happens. You did it too, while married, and you took yours farther than she did. Saying that "she truly had no respect for me at all" is a bit of hyperbole.

Sometime around this same time, she also has a heart-to-heart about cheating on me with another guy…. She shared with him the truth of what she did, which she hid from me for my whole life.

I'm stopping you here because "for my whole life" is factually inaccurate. In fact, she did confess to you, which is why we are here. I realize it is years later, but I'm highlighting it because you have yourself worked up into a froth and a frenzy and in doing so you're giving yourself license to create untruths that are worse than the reality. You're boxing at shadows.

This asshole was in attendance at my wedding. That kills me.

Now THIS is a truly shitty fact. For some reason, of all of the facts of your thread, this to me is the shittiest. People at your wedding, knowing that she cheated, and not saying anything, a circumstance that she created. And the guy she had a crush on from her workout group as well. That was indeed the time period where she was acting the worst toward you. As an outsider looking in, I see a commitment-phobe whose phobia of commitment was a screaming demon on her shoulder trying to keep her from taking the plunge, even though her heart was guiding her toward marriage and family with you.

If it were me, it would be a factor in how I treated anniversaries on a going forward basis. If you guys R, perhaps you consider renewing vows, including express reference to this, and use the renewal date as year 1 of your anniversary chain going forward.

She has admitted to me she had a crush on him and she felt embarrassed by it, but swears that nothing physical with him ever happened. She has passed a poly, but I still have my doubts.

Lots of married people form temporary crushes, during marriage. I'm not sure why you doubt her on this.

This all happens BEFORE we're even married. I had the most wayward of girlfriends, and I was oblivious to almost all of it. She hid 95% of it from me.

What's clear to me now is that she had no passion for me in the early stages of our relationship.….She acted like she was single every chance she got. She flirted, she indulged, she had an affair, she had another near-affair, she had inappropriate conversations, had crushes, put herself in inappropriate situations, etc. That is who she was.

The part you're not mentioning, of course, is that you were together as a couple during this time, presumably having sex, and taking all of the steps toward getting married and having a family. She was an attractive young woman who was outgoing and social. I sincerely doubt that she "acted like she was single every chance she got." For a young woman like that, life is a gushing firehose of opportunities to "act single". Literally walking down the street presents dozens of such opportunities.

What I see as an outside observer is that your WW was commitment-phobic at that stage. I knew a woman like her back in the day. Beautiful, athletic, bubbly personality. Every man wanted to be in her trousers. She was quite the libertine who freely engaged in sex with a wide variety of men, at whim, depending on what kind of male attention she fancied at the moment: a college athlete, a wealthy businessman, a brooding artist, etc. I was one of her ponies and I can tell you that she had the ability, while with me, to make me feel as if I was her favorite. She was express on the point that she would not be exclusive with anybody, and it was a time in my life where I was busy, so I was okay with the occasional favors I enjoyed in her bed from time to time.

There was a man who did truly love her and wanted to marry her. I wasn't aware of him, but I learned of him when I was visiting her in another town where she was staying in a hotel for a work-related seminar. I was her hotel fun, and one evening she invited another guy in for a MMF threesome. The next morning her room phone rang (this was before the day and age of cell phones) and it was a man calling. He was surprised when I answered.

A few months later I met the man in person. Let's call him "Mark". Mark was a prince of a man and I could tell he genuinely loved her. I was spending a weekend at her place while she was out of town, and I came down with a terrible flu. Mark came by and brought me homemade chicken soup. We had a heart-to-heart about her. Later, when she returned, I asked her why she would not commit and settle down and marry him. Turns out she had some trauma around the idea of marriage and commitment from stuff in her FOO. She turned away from her true love, to other men like me, as a way of avoiding facing her fear of commitment.

After that conversation, they did get married and build a family. That was probably about 30 years ago. They're still happily married to this day.

I always hated and resented my wife for the hookup that happened right when I thought we were getting together, and I always harbored a lot of pain and anger around "the kiss" with her AP that she lied to me about for 12 years….My wife can do all the work in the world, but none of it will change that she was a gigantic piece of shit back then, and that our relationship is built on a whole lot of negative emotions for me. Rejection. Lack of passion. Cheating. Humiliation. Emasculation.

Hate. Such a strong word. If you truly hate your wife, then I suppose you need to leave her. But I would suggest, as I said above, that you give yourself time, maybe a year, to process this before you make decisions that will irrevocably affect your children and family.

My impression, as an outside observer, is that at least part of what you actually hate is yourself, your decision back in your younger years to be a homebody, to not go out there and be social and have some casual trysts, and that you are externalizing that onto your WW. I would remind you that your WW didn't make those choices for you. That's on you. Frustration and anger with self, that is the hardest thing to deal with. I think this may be part of why you are stuck in this feedback loop.

As you work your way through it, let me offer you a bit of context. I know you are sick of people telling you how "good" you have it in your marriage. But I'm a metaphor guy so I'll offer up a metaphor. Right now, your WW is dishing up bacon-wrapped tenderloin to you on a fairly regular basis. I could fill the University of Michigan football stadium (the "Big House") with married men who have experienced zero infidelity but who would give their left testicle for even one helping of bacon-wrapped tenderloin voluntarily served up by their wife. So many married men make do with a few stringy bites of dry cube steak, grudgingly shared once or twice a month.

You're frustrated because you never tasted the White Castle sliders in your youth, whereas your wife not only tasted the slider, but continued to indulge in a few, secretly on the side, even while you were engaged.

So I'll share my personal experience, because I was exactly you with my first long term relationship. I had a woman who also served me the bacon-wrapped tenderloin, and I was also relatively inexperienced and felt some frustration about never having tasted the sliders. My ex made my choice for me by cheating on me years into our relationship, and then dumping me for her AP.

As an aside, I'm white, my ex was black, and the AP was not only black, he was a gynecologist who grew up in France. Yes, I was dumped for a black French gynecologist. You can't make that up. Since then, most of the women I dated were black, and my current wife is black. This means that in every case, almost all of the other men any of my women have been with are black. So I've had that experience of comparing myself sexually to black guys, times a million. There's no "there there". Black guys are just human men. Nothing exotic about them. Same with black women. I find them visually attractive, but once you get to know them, they're just human women.

But I digress. Where I was going is this: I had the do-over that you are contemplating. When my ex dumped me, I was late 20's, confident, established. I went out there and had some sliders. I won't lie. They are greasy and salty and decadently good. But the fact is, they are sliders. You can't sustain life on them, and eating them leads to heartburn, obesity, diabetes. I enjoyed them, but I had no alternative at the time.

It didn't take long before I didn't enjoy them. The bullshit you have to go through as a man to get them is not worth it. All of the hours in bars and parties, buying drinks for women, flirting down dead ends, multiple rejections, etc. It's different for men than women. As I said above, for a pretty woman, life is a smorgasbord of sexual options, a gushing firehose of offers. Most women are beleaguered by offers from men, to the point where they must devote considerable energy fending them off. It's the opposite for men. Men must invest energy into peacocking to get attention. You must do it in the presence of other men, also peacocking. It's humiliating. To be a man like your WW's AP means, in the end, sacrificing your dignity and self esteem; the occasional casual sex you might get is hardly a palliative. How much respect do you think he enjoys in the world in his place as a baby daddy and semi-unemployed loser? What do you think he sees when he looks in the mirror in the morning? What do you think he will see there at age 50, or 60?

Here's the other thing. Most of the time, a woman who hooks up like that is doing it to flee something. She's not looking for the man she's with. She's looking to escape a demon. As the man, you realize this. You're not really a man to her. You're a proxy. In my case, initially after being dumped, this was better than nothing, but I need to be clear that its primary benefit was anesthetic, not sexual. Eventually, as I learned the rhythm and how to figure out who might be willing to give up the punani without too much investment, I realized that was never going to lead to a relationship. I didn't want to wake up without love or family at age 60. I'm a family guy. My soul longs for that permanent connection. I stopped sex altogether, for like a year, and focused on myself. It was then that I met my wife.

I'm telling you that because if you decide to walk away from what sounds like a pretty good marriage, you need to know what you're getting after you leave it. I can almost guaranty that, two years later, you'll regret the decision. Your WW isn't dumping you. She is still serving up the tenderloin. If you leave, there's no guarantee she'll be willing to serve it to you again if/when you ever come back. It's more likely she will meet someone else and move on.

Meanwhile, you'll be out there on your own. It's rough out there. If you leave your marriage, I can promise you that you will wake up one morning in your apartment, alone, and look at yourself in the mirror, and wonder what the fuck you were thinking when you walked away.

[This message edited by Butforthegrace at 1:12 PM, March 16th (Saturday)]

Just wanted to say thank you for a great post, Butforthegrace. In R, empathy is a street which has to go both ways... and of course at it's root, it's just walking a mile in the other guy's shoes. But you did such a great job bringing those shoes to life in this post, explaining in such an approachable way that one almost feels like they were there. It's just not possible for a woman to truly feel what it is to be a man, or vice versa. We can only approximate it. But this was such a really well done approximation, engaging the emotional aspects of the issue to the degree where one can truly engage with it. Kudos!

Anger is part of the stages of grief. What I would suggest is you refocus your anger from her to something more constructive like working out or some type of hobby.

Being angry at her gives her power over you. She is the focus and is the one in control. That is how we get stuck.

You need to take the power of the affair away.

Work on you and stop focusing on her.

CBM,

You are in a tough spot. Your wife is far from safe. She is an accomplished liar and a skilled writer. She has half the BSs and nearly every one of the WSs charmed, so you are getting the brunt of their "defense" of her. Tough sailing for a BS trying to heal - looking for help for your trauma but being told your trauma ain't worth spit and to suck it up because she is putting out for you.

Well brother, it is your life. You are faced with not only the injustice of being manipulated into marriage, but EVEN after all this, you find out she is FLIRTING with your lesbian babysitter - A PERSON WHO IS INTIMATELY INVOLVED WITH YOUR CHILDREN. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot??

Now you find out she is crushing on this other dude.

And you are supposed to just accept she is safe and "suck it up buttercup" because she is so awesome and all her current and past betrayals are just really nothing? Seriously, I wonder what the hell some people are smoking here.

Look, there is some useful advice out there, but you will have to dig for it. Your trauma is not going to magically vanish. Seeking some help to process, detach, and figure out why your boundaries with her are not stronger will really help you.

Peace and blessings to you brother.

@reallyscrewedup7

Completely share your opinion. Which got me reported to boot. The way she leaves out critical information and people gloss it over when it's brought up just strengthens my view.

People here also act as if R is a foregone conclusion because everyone else wants him to do R. A few pages back when he was considering D he got about two pages of people pouncing on him telling him not to. So much for supporting him.

Which is especially sad, since he early on told us the same thing is happening with real-life family and friends. I really hope he finds the strength and the resolve he needs and puts himself first for once.

Those feelings bring out my anger and make me feel like what she did back then has ruined my life, and then something inside of me wants to hurt her like she has hurt me, and name calling is all I have. I know it's not healthy, I know it has to stop, I am already working on it and have been since d-day.

Think about that statement for a minute. Are you really trying to hurt her? Or are you trying to make her understand how hurt you are or how it feels like? If it is the second half, that will never happen. Can't you find the grace to just accept or settle that she is in her own world of pain to do the things she has been doing to herself let alone other people for years? I know that is a lot to ask. Turns out in a very vulnerable and open discussion with my wife when she was bringing up who I had become it was because her intentions were for her to communicate and for me to understand the depth of her pain and an attempt for me to face who I had become instead of running from it. It wasn't to inflict pain, it was to build a communication of the pain she was feeling. It was a lifeline thrown to me to make me swim out of my shit. There are just some things that have to be accepted in order for anyone to move on. No matter if it is individually or together. Reconciling may mean to accept and reconcile things there will never be a justice for. It is shitty and there is not justice in it. It still is the path or stay stuck in pain and unacceptance. A WS will never know how it feels. We just will not. It doesn't mean we don't know what pain is. She betrayed you. She does know what betraying herself feels like. I am sure there is no comparison to yours.

How are you doing, CBM?