SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Seeing as it was me that ventured the word semantics, it was a very tongue in cheek salute to UO, and I really do not feel that, as evidenced again by the variety of interpretation in this thread, any of us have been splitting hairs unusefully, but rather exploring difference and commonality in perception and experience that sheds light on a word/ concept used often as shorthand on these boards. So I don't agree that debating it is pointless. And I don't see that it is any panacea either, just another lens to try to understand a difficult subject.

But perhaps here now we're beginning to focus in on the nature of belief, rather than questions of reality.

It's so funny seeing a WS say that they lied and they don't know how they could have done that and yet never quite grasp that the other person is lying too. The A is usually with a fake person, just as the WS is fake.

Oh, I completely see that (in my case anyway) that my AP was being 'fake'. I've actually posted on that in the past. I'm not sure if this was directed at me also, but just wanted to clarify that.

Again, I think it's JUST the word 'fantasy' I have a problem with. If I insert the word 'fake' into where it has been used it feels much more 'true' to me in what my definitions of the two words are. I agree with everything you just posted.

I hear a lot of anger in your post and I can totally understand that.

No, you can't.

I didn't say that I was feeling the same way, or that I had ANY sort of similar feelings....but as a WS I can now absolutely understand it. I have watched my BH go through these feelings. Having empathetic feelings or 'understanding' them has been a huge part of our successful reconciliation to this point. So, and again maybe it is my definition of 'understand'.... without feeling it in this relationship, I do 'understand' having some pretty deep feelings of anger about infidelity. I have been cheated on in the distant past although I was not married to the person so while the feeling may have been similar, I don't want to say it's the same as someone who is married and has to deal with the additional fallout because of that.

[This message edited by helpemegetoverit at 11:08 AM, November 22nd (Tuesday)]

helpemegetoverit, I am posting as a member here... so take that for what it's worth.

I have a running list in my head of '2x4s' I want to write to all of the BS out there.

REALLY??? Look at your own tagline. You were here and posting while you were STILL IN your affair a little over 4 months ago! The notion that you've compiled some list of 2X4's that you'd like to give BS's in those magical 4 months of being honest, if it's been that, is insulting and absurd. Excuse me if I'm not particularly interested in what your version of fantasy is regarding my husbands affair.

UO ~ I agree totally with your latest reply on this thread.

It is sad and frustrating to see BS's put up with cake eating, gaslighting, and fence sitting for months and months and yes even years because they are hopeful for the potential. Meanwhile, they are getting deeper and deeper wounds. I don't know how these BS's can heal, I don't think I could/would. They aren't facing the reality.

I also agree about delusional thinking. Yes, it can be a symptom of mental illness but it isn't necessary to be mentally ill to have delusional thinking. There is a wide spectrum for delusional thinking. For instance, the OW in my situation thinks she can be friends with me and FWH. Mind you I don't know this woman, she never was a "friend". That is freaking delusional thinking. Although one may argue she is mentally ill.

ETA: *applause* meta!

[This message edited by SisterMilkshake at 11:23 AM, November 22nd (Tuesday)]

REALLY??? Look at your own tagline. You were here and posting while you were STILL IN your affair a little over 4 months ago! The notion that you've compiled some list of 2X4's that you'd like to give BS's in those magical 4 months of being honest, if it's been that, is insulting and absurd. Excuse me if I'm not particularly interested in what your version of fantasy is regarding my husbands affair.

Don't worry, it's not 'insight' that I would share publicly (although I do a lot of PMing with BS's whose WS's are RIGHT where I was about 6-10 months ago). And, yes, it may be absurd....but I think a LOT of people, not just me, can look at other's situations a ton more clearly than their own. That doesn't mean that I'm trying to insult anyone by any means. As UO said a few posts above, we all see it on here, either a WS or a BS accepting small signs of reconciliation, or continuing to take what they can get from their spouse because, after all, they did cheat. My 2x4s are related to that. Hell, I wish my husband had gotten some over the past year on here because maybe my tagline would have read differently.

Again though, as a WS on this board I try to stay in line and I am definitely not trying to hurt or insult any BS. As I said, it is usually much easier to see someone else's situation much more clearly than my own. And, given where I am now and how far I have come, I also feel I CAN offer advice to people who like me, came on this board while still in the affair as an attempt to extract themselves from it.

Hell, I wish my husband had gotten some over the past year on here because maybe my tagline would have read differently.

I assume by that you mean divorced, since 2x4's for your H would be about him, and not your behavior save by how it affected him, and 2x4's for him would be about his exiting a toxic relationship or at the very least laying down hard boundaries to protect himself, not about helping you extract your head from a very uncomfortable place by extension of that.

Ok, and because you were a WS doesn't mean there is some set of Universal truths that you have access to that BS's don't. The reasons, justification and types of affairs that people engage in are as varied as those who engage in them. When you say you

have a running list in my head of '2x4s' I want to write to all of the BS out there.

that's a pretty broad statement. Seeing a few posters situations more clearly than your own, isn't the same as saying you'd like to 2X4 ALL of us in a post about the notion of fantasy. THAT is what I took issue with. Trust me, at 5 yrs out I am not suffering any self soothing delusions that require your assistance.

[This message edited by metamorphisis at 11:58 AM, November 22nd (Tuesday)]

I am going to echo Meta here and say that i feel I have fully faced all sorts of versions of reality in my situation, I mean FULLY, faced and thought through 'reality', on a daily basis, without shrinking or self-soothing. Any 2x4 coming at me will be but a mere matchstick, helpmegetoverit.

Blimey, this is getting quite absurd in terms of delusion.

have a running list in my head of '2x4s' I want to write to all of the BS out there.

that's a pretty broad statement. Seeing a few posters situations more clearly than your own, isn't the same as saying you'd like to 2X4 ALL of us in a post about the notion of fantasy. THAT is what I took issyue with. Trust me, at 5 yrs out I am not suffering any self soothing delusions that require your assistance.

My bad, you are right, I did NOT mean all BS's out there. I would say that most of the BS on here are pretty astute ones on here who seem to know exactly what to do with their WS, exactly how to make sure reconciliation is a success (or at least a damn good attempt at success!!). The Healing Library is also a great resource. I should NOT have said 'all' BS's because that is completely not true. You are right, my statement was too 'sweeping' and I did not mean it that way.

Hell, I wish my husband had gotten some over the past year on here because maybe my tagline would have read differently.

I assume by that you mean divorced, since 2x4's for your H would be about him, and not your behavior save by how it affected him, and 2x4's for him would be about his exiting a toxic relationship or at the very least laying down hard boundaries to protect himself, not about helping you extract your head from a very uncomfortable place by extension of that.

No, obviously I wouldn't be hoping we would be divorced. I didn't find this site until after our first attempt at reconciliation failed. I did it ALL wrong, and truthfully so did he if you look at SI standards (no blame my dear - we did it wrong together!). I found this site and came on here after it failed, and ran like a scared puppy with my tail between my legs because I didn't like what I saw and heard. At all. I thought I could do it 'MY' way, that not EVERYONE has to follow the tenants on here.

I was wrong, and I came back when I was ready to really work on my issues and try to reconcile again.

I'm not sure what would have happened had we found this site after DDay1 last August, but I like to think that had we been working as a team and been on here together, we could have made it work back then and that is why my tagline would have been different. Who knows I guess, I was pretty freaking messed up.

No, obviously I wouldn't be hoping we would be divorced. I didn't find this site until after our first attempt at reconciliation failed. I did it ALL wrong, and truthfully so did he if you look at SI standards (no blame my dear - we did it wrong together!). I found this site and came on here after it failed, and ran like a scared puppy with my tail between my legs because I didn't like what I saw and heard. At all. I thought I could do it 'MY' way, that not EVERYONE has to follow the tenants on here.

I was wrong, and I came back when I was ready to really work on my issues and try to reconcile again.

I'm not sure what would have happened had we found this site after DDay1 last August, but I like to think that had we been working as a team and been on here together, we could have made it work back then and that is why my tagline would have been different. Who knows I guess, I was pretty freaking messed up.

This doesn't address what I said at all. You're talking about you. You're talking about your fear and your flight and your error and how things might have been different if the two of you had found this place and done it 'right', the last of which I will not address directly though I feel it bears significantly on the topic at hand.

2x4's for your BH are not about you. I cannot think of a BH on this site that would 2x4 another man with the intent to win his WW back, or 180 so she gets it, or 2x4 and say "She's completely fucked, Jim, ditch her but if you're lucky she'll come around and go all in again."

The best your H would get, as far as I can tell from my own experiences here, would be to 180 you, take care of himself and if you really threw yourself into working on R then to give it a chance if that's what he wanted, provided he stuck to his guns and not forget what you did.

I do not understand how you can jump from wishing your BH got a few 2x4s so your tag line would be different - presumably by your clarification to something less destructive. A 2x4 that would somehow change his perception... and demonstrate to you how fucked up you are?

That sounds way too close to the meat of this topic, and eating shit sandwiches every day because there's the potential of a meatball sub.

See what I did there, meat/meatball sub.

I did it ALL wrong, and truthfully so did he if you look at SI standards (no blame my dear - we did it wrong together!).

See, I view this sort of thing as fantasy thinking, too. If he felt like what he was doing was healing, or making steps in the right direction, then he didn't do it "wrong". Your fantasy says that R is a teamwork exercise where you grow closer and do it together.

Not all R looks like that, and you can't control that outcome. Some R looks like the two spouses being happy to do their own things and co-exist rather than drawing closer and more enmeshed.

For example, if my wife had insisted that I do MC with her so we could work through it together, I would have divorced her. I didn't want to work with her. I wanted to heal myself, and I would be goddamned to hell if she would ever be able to say in any way, shape or form that she had "healed" me by doing the "right" things.

She was the one who did the damage. She would never have the right to claim that she had participated in my healing. There's no mitigating that harm or unfucking that donkey through some misguided notion of amends.

That's my take, my process, the way my healing needed to owned by me. "We'll heal together" would have been a fantasy of the most egregious and disrespectful sort if my wife had tried to foist it off on me. I would not have tolerated it.

It's an equal fantasy that the BS will/should be there to support and nurture while the WS works on their issues. Some BS's aren't interested in that.

Every planned outcome has a potential element of fantasy. As soon as any of us say, "Well, your part in this reconciliation/relationship/divorce" is to act like x or provide y or do z to get us there, you're creating a fantasy outcome in your head.

People are free agents. We're all free agents. And even when we seem to be complying with the plans of others, it doesn't mean we're all in and not building resentments, just that compliance is easier than fighting this battle right now.

The best your H would get, as far as I can tell from my own experiences here, would be to 180 you, take care of himself and if you really threw yourself into working on R then to give it a chance if that's what he wanted, provided he stuck to his guns and not forget what you did.

And this is what he needed to get/do, for himself. I want nothing more than for my husband to be happy, and if he/we had been on here after DDay 1, he may have done the 180 to me. Ok, so that may not have made him 'happy'....but it may have saved him future pain that I caused, that I inflicted on him. Or at the very least he would have already been a bit more protected from doing the 180??

Through no fault of his whatsoever, I hurt him over and over again. It is all me, all me being hurtful to him. It also took me a while to realize that my extreme selfishness was pointedly directed at him, even if I was trying to tell myself that this was something I was doing 'for me' .

A 2x4 would not have:

somehow change his perception... and demonstrate to you how fucked up you are?

I knew how fucked up I was. I was in IC and we also saw her for MC, but with someone who SUCKED so badly I can't even tell you how badly. Had he been on here, had he been doing the 180, had he received some 2x4s, things MAY have ended up differently. Now, would they have ended up with us divorced? Or would it have ended up with me owning my shit and either him or I realizing that the counselor we were with totally sucked? Who knows. My point is that I do find this site valuable for a BS. I've looked around, there really isn't anything like it with literally step by step 'instructions' on what they are going through, what they can do at each step, etc.

We saw the same IC/MC....so we were both getting horrific 'advice' but felt we were doing the 'right thing' by being in counseling. I remember being on here after all of that thinking 'but my therapist agrees with our thinking.....so it doesn't HAVE to be done the SI way.'

I know this is naive, but it really took me a while to realize that there are some pretty shitty therapists out there.

I'm not sure I'm doing any better of a job explaining what I mean. I was not trying to say that my husband and I would have reconciled back then or not, there is really no way to know that. I just wish he, I, and preferably both of us had followed the tenants on here much much earlier. Again, maybe I wouldn't have, maybe I would have, but the advice given to BS's here is really dead on. It's one of the reasons I just wrote that I shouldn't have used the word 'all' when I posted before about the 2x4s.....

See, I view this sort of thing as fantasy thinking, too. If he felt like what he was doing was healing, or making steps in the right direction, then he didn't do it "wrong". Your fantasy says that R is a teamwork exercise where you grow closer and do it together.

Ha ha, now I'm going to eat some of my words and agree with you that my first attempt at reconciliation, and I guess my imagining us finding this site together 15 months ago, IS/WAS a fantasy. I think my BH and I sort of took the 'it's us against this nasty thing called infidelity' and we tried to do it 'together' thinking that was the right thing to do. THAT indeed, was false (fantastical) thinking.

Not all R looks like that, and you can't control that outcome. Some R looks like the two spouses being happy to do their own things and co-exist rather than drawing closer and more enmeshed.

For example, if my wife had insisted that I do MC with her so we could work through it together, I would have divorced her. I didn't want to work with her. I wanted to heal myself, and I would be goddamned to hell if she would ever be able to say in any way, shape or form that she had "healed" me by doing the "right" things.

She was the one who did the damage. She would never have the right to claim that she had participated in my healing. There's no mitigating that harm or unfucking that donkey through some misguided notion of amends.

That's my take, my process, the way my healing needed to owned by me. "We'll heal together" would have been a fantasy of the most egregious and disrespectful sort if my wife had tried to foist it off on me. I would not have tolerated it.

It's an equal fantasy that the BS will/should be there to support and nurture while the WS works on their issues. Some BS's aren't interested in that.

Every planned outcome has a potential element of fantasy. As soon as any of us say, "Well, your part in this reconciliation/relationship/divorce" is to act like x or provide y or do z to get us there, you're creating a fantasy outcome in your head.

People are free agents. We're all free agents. And even when we seem to be complying with the plans of others, it doesn't mean we're all in and not building resentments, just that compliance is easier than fighting this battle right now.

See, I agree with every word, YOU are who my husband should have 'met' so long ago ....

He's there now, 100%. We ARE in MC, but not because I forced it, because HE wanted it. Actually what you wrote is a 2x4 to me. One of the things I 'think' every BS should do is go to IC themselves to work through the pain, etc. I've told my BH this, but he doesn't agree. I let it go because of the reasons you just stated, but it's good for me to read from another BH, that just because 'I' think he should be in IC doesn't mean it is how he wants to heal.

[This message edited by helpemegetoverit at 12:44 PM, November 22nd (Tuesday)]

helpmegetoverit, when I first read your post I didn't realize you were a wayward, reading it again, now that I know, it irks me even more...

So you're still of the belief that what you had during your A was real? You were really in luuurve? You really showed each other the real YOU? I wasn't there, but my guess would be "no." You showed each other the very best and saved the worst for the faithful partner. That is the reality. What you guys gave each other was a fantasy because it was in no way sustainable.

My husband balked at the idea that his affair was a fantasy because it took place in Afghanistan in a military camp that was bombed nearly daily. But the term fantasy doesn't always have to mean "good." It's a way to show that it's not reality. I disagree very much with the OP (forgetting the name now). What is right in front of you is not always reality. The reality during my husbands affair was a pregnant wife and 3 kids at home. What he was engaged in was not real in any way, shape or form. He gallavanted around visiting the comedy shows and coffee houses on base. Never had to clean a toilet or pay a bill. I was back home doing all of that shit. That is COMPLETELY DIFFERENT then when happens in the beginning of a relationship. In the beginning of my relationship with my husband we still had daily stresses. We still had jobs, we still had apartments (and then a house) to clean, bills to pay.

The only reality of my husbands affair was that at night, when he was screwing her in bed, I was home trying to take care of his kids and myself and every other detail of the life we had created. He had no reality at the time. He blocked off the reality so that he could engage in his fantasy life with the woman he loves. Hell, even my husband now conceeds that he doesn't know what the hell he was thinking, that what he had with her was a fantasy. Imagine that!

It's an equal fantasy that the BS will/should be there to support and nurture while the WS works on their issues.

Thank you for saying this w_a_l. I do think at some point both need to do this in order to repair the relationship (if that's the direction they go), but the entitlement to the BS support is awe inspiring to say the least.

Here's the thing FOR ME, I see many times on this site BS's explaining to other BS's how WS's view it and how they felt.

I laughed out loud with this one because I see this all the time here from some waywards with regard to BSs...not to mention declaring how the BS "should" feel or behave.

<<<tipping hat to meta>>>

Actually what you wrote is a 2x4 to me.

Not intentionally. Sorry if it seemed that way.

[This message edited by wincing_at_light at 2:03 PM, November 22nd (Tuesday)]

See what I did there, meat/meatball sub.

T/j this made me laugh out loud and I don't even know what a meatball sub is.

Helpme, perhaps me, mea culpa, going down yet another semantic rabbit-hole (because I only learnt what a 2x4 was here on SI), but am really struggling to understand why you feel the need to swing them (I get the zeal of the new non-smoker, and can accept the well-intent f the evangelism); surely translation and modification to each individual's emotional and intellectual syntaxes is better than a blunt instrument, as they HAVE to be the agent in their own story, not you as Archangel.

(I'm going to just address the initial post, since this bad-boy has taken quite a turn. t/j @meta - I really appreciate you speaking up as a member here.)

Reality is what you have right now right in front of you. That's what you can bank on.

Do they have the potential to be better? Yep. What does that mean? Nothing.

The present blows on an epic level but the potential of it getting better is such an unbelievable hook, addiction in itself. Our very self worth, esteem, sense of self seems at times to hang in the balance. We need this to work to matter. We have to have the potential of this as our future or all we dreamed, planned, counted on is gone and we have NOTHING.

Hope isn't hope if it's linked to a specific outcome so accepting reality isn't giving up hope.

Ok doc, so here's the thing. All that up there applies to me. Your entire post resonates.

FWH has every intention in the world to grow up, and yet all I have at this moment is a very compliant, panicked promiser. NC has been ironclad. Loving words and gestures are delivered. He's a dish washing, laundry doing, baby helping, yet full-time working marvel.

And yet, if I look at the reality of ever being happy with him, all signs point to no. There are significant judgement and foresight genes that I feel FWH has always been lacking, and it's always made me feel insecure with trusting him. The A was the icing on my concern-cake.

I hang on hoping that he'll magically be the person I want to be with someday, but today it's not the case.

Fantasy supposes that all his hard work will soften me. Fantasy insists that I will never find anyone else who wants to raise my daughter and grow old with me, so I have to stick it out.

Reality says run. I'm not running. And I don't plan on it.

So I'm pretty sure I'm not accepting reality. Not sure what do do with that.

[This message edited by Jrazz at 12:55 PM, November 22nd (Tuesday)]

And this is what he needed to get/do, for himself. I want nothing more than for my husband to be happy, and if he/we had been on here after DDay 1, he may have done the 180 to me. Ok, so that may not have made him 'happy'....but it may have saved him future pain that I caused, that I inflicted on him. Or at the very least he would have already been a bit more protected from doing the 180??

Through no fault of his whatsoever, I hurt him over and over again. It is all me, all me being hurtful to him. It also took me a while to realize that my extreme selfishness was pointedly directed at him, even if I was trying to tell myself that this was something I was doing 'for me'

I am assuming you are in R.

I still do not understand how 2x4's to your H would have somehow protected him from what you continued to do, unless they were meant to shut you down, shut you out and disengage. In order to maintain an honest relationship there must be various degrees of vulnerability. If you want a relationship with your H, that means his exposing something you can hurt - which you did. The only way around that other than getting away from you, is for you to stop hurting him. It is no more complicated than that because while he is responsible for his safety, it is also his choice to compromise that in order to be with you.

What 2x4 do you envision that would inure him to that?

I knew how fucked up I was. I was in IC and we also saw her for MC, but with someone who SUCKED so badly I can't even tell you how badly. Had he been on here, had he been doing the 180, had he received some 2x4s, things MAY have ended up differently. Now, would they have ended up with us divorced? Or would it have ended up with me owning my shit and either him or I realizing that the counselor we were with totally sucked? Who knows. My point is that I do find this site valuable for a BS. I've looked around, there really isn't anything like it with literally step by step 'instructions' on what they are going through, what they can do at each step, etc.

This is still the same thing. Why are you hinging the outcome of your decisions -such as owning your shit or realizing your MC sucked - on help your BH has access to, and his subsequent decisions based on those?

We saw the same IC/MC....so we were both getting horrific 'advice' but felt we were doing the 'right thing' by being in counseling. I remember being on here after all of that thinking 'but my therapist agrees with our thinking.....so it doesn't HAVE to be done the SI way.'

I know this is naive, but it really took me a while to realize that there are some pretty shitty therapists out there.

Yes, there are a lot of shitty therapists.

So you're still of the belief that what you had during your A was real? You were really in luuurve? You really showed each other the real YOU? I wasn't there, but my guess would be "no." You showed each other the very best and saved the worst for the faithful partner. That is the reality. What you guys gave each other was a fantasy because it was in no way sustainable.

Nope, not in love or in luurve. At all. I never wanted anything sustainable....which is why I think what I am describing as 'real' and 'fantasy' is being met with so much opposition. What I meant was that I consider anything that is really done as 'real'. A 'fantasy' to me is more of the THOUGHT of something. Not the action. So, a fantasy may be about having an affair, but not actually DOING it.

So, no, while I showed my AP a PART of my real self, he didn't know a complete 'me.' (one may argue that I didn't either actually). And no, it wasn't sustainable, but again, that's not what my experience with an affair was for me. But, every second of my affair was very very 'real' and I will not take back that I don't think it's right to use the word 'fantasy' when describing any part of an affair, love or not.