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There's nothing resembling fair, when it comes to infidelity. No consequences begin to approach fair, whether the WS is remorseful or not. There simply is no way to make up for the pain and losses associated with infidelity.

For me, the best gift I gave myself was completely letting go of the notion that I would find fairness, either in the courtroom or in my living room. It just doesn't exist.

A scarlet A on her forehead for starters. Marriage is not a contract though. Just a bunch shitty words that mean nothing to some. My wedding day was the happiest day of my life and now has become the worst memory I have deeply ingrained with regret. There is nothing my bitch of a wife could ever have to suffer compared to the torment she's brought down upon me. I just can't overcome this for some reason. I keep trying but get knocked back down to my knees. I guess some broken hearts never mend.

I'm a bit more ruthless where this is concerned.

When my wife "stepped out" she knew the consequences but did it anyway.

She has lost alot (divorced, a pittance of a divorce settlement should she choose to leave, loss of her share of the family home). But I always remember she hasn't lost anything she wasn't willing to loose.

Me on the other hand have lost things I wasn't willing to loose. She took that choice away from me and our kids. She chose this for her family.

She risked it all to be with him, was she willing to loose it all to be with me.

[This message edited by mozzchops at 2:30 AM, August 9th (Saturday)]

I don't think anything would have stopped him. He was so damaged that he viewed everything I did or said or didn't say in the worst possible light. And never told me. In fact, he told me he loved me often, bought me lovely jewelry and flowers. I had no idea that from the beginning of our marriage he "though we wouldn't make it." As if our marriage was something he could just sit back and look at to see how it did without participating. I had one of those spouses who never invested himself in our marriage or family.

When we went through normal rocky times that every couple goes through, I thought it was a normal rocky time that every couple goes through and knew it would get better. He thought those times meant our marriage was not good. But, again, he never said that to me. So I was clueless for 18 years.

By the time OW2 contacted him, he was convinced that our marriage was terrible. It wasn't. We always got along, laughed together, did fun things, etc. He couldn't get over that I wouldn't have sex several times a week, twice a day, etc. and so he though our marriage was bad because of that, too.

Years ago when I first found out I was pregnant, we had already planned a vacation to New Orleans so we went ahead on vacation. I was very tired and not feeling great just being 3-4 months pregnant. We didn't have sex that vacation at all. We did eat at some nice restaurants, talked about becoming parents, what to name the baby, walked hand-in-hand around New Orleans. I thought it was a wonderful vacation and felt so much love for him. Many years later I learned he thought it was a horrible vacation because there was no sex. It was his only measuring stick for how "good" a vacation was. Didn't matter that we had close, intimate conversation. It was a bad vacation in his mind.

Anyway, I've gotten way off track. My point is, he was certain our marriage was awful. He became convinced he was in love with OW2 and that I and our kids would "get over it" when he left us for OW2. Had our then-14 year old son not absolutely crumpled in front of his eyes when he told him we were separating, I'm sure he would have left us. So maybe if he could have actually had a way to see that, it might have stopped him (although I told him DS would be devastated). But I'm not sure. He had 7 months of fun, falling in "love," and sex prior to that. Not sure he'd have wanted to forego that pleasure.

So there were no consequences that would have stopped him, IMO.

What would be fair? Nothing can ever make this fair or even the score again. It's simply one of those things in life that is not fair.

[This message edited by sudra at 6:45 AM, August 9th (Saturday)]

I agree with SisterMilkshake: The consequence should be justice and fairness. But that only happens in fantasy land.

In my fantasy land, my WH suddenly develops a conscience that enables him to truly see the damage his choices have wrought.

IMHO if you agree to R you accept that there is a debt in your marriage that your WS can never repay to the BS. As for consequences, I believe in natural consequences. My WH lost a promotion at work, he has lost hearing I love you from me, he has lost my respect, he has lost any perceived integrity, honesty and genuineness! If he wants to stay in this marriage he has to look into the mirror every day and look at the monster he allowed himself to become, to visit the pain he has always avoided to try to work out why he did this. He has memories stuck in his head when he was desperately pathetic and needy, when he participated in things that went against what he likes simply to get his ego kibble. He has to live knowing just how weak and sad he really was. Does this compare to what we go through? No. But for a remorseful WS there is plenty there.

Our ws's may have acted like children but they are not. As BS's I don't think we have the right to play judge, jury and executioner on their actions. What we do have the right to do is stay or leave and negotiate our needs to do either. I wouldn't trade the consequences of being a BW with the consequences of being a WW, I get to hold onto my integrity and self worth, his is in the toilet with the rest of his self esteem!

As for consequences, I believe in natural consequences. My WH lost a promotion at work, he has lost hearing I love you from me, he has lost my respect, he has lost any perceived integrity, honesty and genuineness!

Consequences are consequences.

Isn't not saying you love him, being judge jury and executioner with that natural consequence?

I think he deserves all those things, but just sayin'.

My wayward knows he has lost my respect, and integrity and any thought that he is always honest and genuine.

But, he knows I still love him. That is the only reason I have decided to R. I may not love him quite the same way as prior. There is a wariness associated with my love, now. And, I am willing to D more easily should he not continue to be the man I thought he was.

But, If I did not love him, I would be divorced already.

[This message edited by seethelight at 11:23 AM, August 9th (Saturday)]

Read sisoon's response again. It was excellent. No one on this site advocates rug sweeping. Consequences applied externally rarely work. It is the work done internally that makes the difference. You have no bearing on that. Is that what drives you nuts?

I read and responded to Sisoon's post.

Did I distort something he said in his post that led you to believe I did not read it?

As noted, tired girl, You are entitled to your opinion, I think you have to accept that it's your opinion. One apparently other posters, many in this thread, may disagree with.

So we will have to agree to disagree. But, I do find your opinion interesting and enlightening, and you are certainly entitled to feel as you do.

Consequences applied externally rarely work. It is the work done internally that makes the difference.

Tired girl, that's a major generalization.

Likely external consequences influence just as many people as they don't. Rarely? How do you know that it "rarely" influence the populace?

Unless I psychoanalyzed the entire population I have no way of knowing which applies to whom.

Is that what drives you nuts?

Are you suggesting I am nuts because my opinion is different than yours?

This question was meant to open a dialog and to acquire varying opinions. Why would you assume that pondering this question has driven me nuts?

Anyway, I've gotten way off track. My point is, he was certain our marriage was awful. He became convinced he was in love with OW2 and that I and our kids would "get over it" when he left us for OW2. Had our then-14 year old son not absolutely crumpled in front of his eyes when he told him we were separating, I'm sure he would have left us.

So maybe if he could have actually had a way to see that, it might have stopped him (although I told him DS would be devastated). But I'm not sure. He had 7 months of fun, falling in "love," and sex prior to that. Not sure he'd have wanted to forego that pleasure.

Awwww Sudra:

Your wayward husband was likely rewriting the marital history. A lot of waywards do this. It's often away to absolve themselves of the guilt of cheating and to blameshift onto you.

regardless, if there were problems and he never mentioned them to you, how were you to address them.

You can't fix something if you don't know it's broken.

I am sorry you are here.

If he were so miserable with you, he could have filed for divorce.

I could be wrong about this, but it's my opinion, and fair would be to go through it just like we all did.

That is along the lines of a consequence that I would deem both fair and one that would teach the wayward a lesson.

My very first long term boyfriend in college, cheated on me.

While we were dating, and had agreed to be exclusive, I learned he was dating another woman on a different college campus for almost a year.

I dumped him immediately because, we weren't married and we had no long term history other than a three years of dating in college.

Still, he eventually married the woman he cheated on me with, and she cheated on him with several other men, while they were married. She even had a child with one, that she initially passed off as his.

Years later I got a phone call from him and a profound apology.

He had gone through the trouble of tracking me down to apologize and to tell me that now he knew how I felt and that he would NEVER cheat on anyone again.

He has since remarried and he has never cheated and has his boundaries firmly in place.

[This message edited by seethelight at 11:58 AM, August 9th (Saturday)]

As far as I can tell, negative consequences are about hurting someone. I don't see how the BS can hurt the WS without hurting himself in the process. Accepting that is part of R, and I don't see how a BS can R without accepting that.

Ok so what is the answer then? The BS is already experiencing negative consequences of the WS's affair. I get that both spouses having negative consequences won't help, but is it really consequences or making amends? Or is the issue that those consequences should be internal to the WS and if they're not intrinsic, it won't help anyway..,?

See this is why I won't make my husband move. It should be his suggestion. I'll just say I'm moving, with or without him,

[This message edited by rachelc at 12:20 PM, August 9th (Saturday)]

Or is the issue that those consequences should be internal to the WS and if they're not intrinsic, it won't help anyway..,?

Correct. This is why externally applied consequences don't have much effect on the WS in the end. Until they understand that the problem is internal and they are the issue, nothing else will change or have an effect.

Seethelight,

What I have seen with you is that you are very tied into your anger concerning what your H did. You see it as something that was done to you. When your focus shifts off of that and onto your own healing then things will begin to change for you. I think it really bothers you that he could have done this TO YOU. Only he didn't. It had nothing to do with you.

[This message edited by tired girl at 12:35 PM, August 9th (Saturday)]

TG you know I absolutely agree with you in the wayward doing it to themselves.... I've come to realize that the Waywards who don't realize this have BS's take that role on themselves , myself included for a long time. "What? This isn't life changing for you? Well then it sure as hell is going to be for me."

I feel for these BS. I am one. But when we do this we're taking on additional pain that not ours and prevents us from being mentally healthy... Maybe it's ours- I don't know - but the pain is not that they did this to us, but that they can't realize or even fathom they did it to themselves...,

consequences are consequences

Agreed, I'm pretty sure I said I believe in natural consequences, not no consequences. The difference is, is that I recognise that while it would feel great for 5 minutes to enact my own type of justice or vengeance, at the end of the day, why do I get that power? That brings me to WH's level in some respects. I like being different from WH, he blew his own life apart and if he wants to make it worse by doing it again then the natural consequence will be that I and my son will leave. I will live knowing I tried my best and upheld my promises and he can go live the gutter life that he must obviously want so badly.

Isn't not saying you love him, being judge jury and executioner with that natural consequence?

depends on why you do it. Me, I do it because I don't say something that I can't 100% mean. Yes effectively I'm still here because I love him, but do I love him the way I used to, do I get the feelings that should be there when you are in love. No, so I don't say it unless in the moment I mean it. He is working hard to help me fall in love with who he really is, who I loved before was an illusion. I don't do it to punish him, then I would be judge, jury and executioner!

Question-what would make you happy seethelight? Would it make you happy for him to feel what you've gone through? Or would it just give you a sense of justice? Myself, I'd rather try to be happy then feel like he "got his"! JMHO of course.

[This message edited by RomanticInnocenc at 4:52 PM, August 9th (Saturday)]

Interesting discussion...this is what has helped me so much at SI...so many of us at different places in life and our journey on the infidelity road.

When I was raising three young children I was lucky to find someone who taught me there were three ways of parenting, the helicopter, the drill sergeant and the consultant parent. Natural consequences were the basis of consulting parenting and it took a lot of work for me to remove my sergeant's hat, but, boy, did life change and our family life become so much more rewarding and easier when I did that.

That being said, my H is an adult, not a child, and I wrote earlier he has to live with what's he's done. IMO, fair doesn't exist. Just looking around the world today, you can see so many people in pain and suffering and they, individually, had nothing to do with the cause of that suffering.

Life isn't fair and the only thing we have control over is ourselves....how we look at the world, how we process what we see and feel and how we choose to move forward.

See this is why I won't make my husband move. It should be his suggestion. I'll just say I'm moving, with or without him,

Rachelc:

Exactly, many of the things I want my wayward to do I have told him have to be of his own accord. He has done that regarding some, but not all.

"What? This isn't life changing for you? Well then it sure as hell is going to be for me."

I feel for these BS. I am one. But when we do this we're taking on additional pain that not ours and prevents us from being mentally healthy... Maybe it's ours- I don't know - but the pain is not that they did this to us, but that they can't realize or even fathom they did it to themselves...,

Rachelc:

Another good point, and one I resonate with.

Me, I do it because I don't say something that I can't 100% mean. Yes effectively I'm still here because I love him, but do I love him the way I used to, do I get the feelings that should be there when you are in love.

No, so I don't say it unless in the moment I mean it. He is working hard to help me fall in love with who he really is, who I loved before was an illusion. I don't do it to punish him, then I would be judge, jury and executioner!

Ah, so we agree, a NATURAL consequence of his affair is that he knows that you don't love him the same way.

But, you don't do it to punish him, it's just a natural consequence.

But if you did not want him to suffer any consequence, you would say you loved him to make him happy, whether you felt it or not.

Still, by not saying it, you are not punishing him, it's just a natural consequence of his cheating on you.

With hope he has learned a lesson from that consequence, one that will prevent him from cheating again.

For me, an IMO, what happened to my ex boyfriend was a natural consequence. He took up with a women who was willing to date a man who had a serious relationship and had promised exclusivity in that relationship, and then he felt the sting of her doing the same thing to him that he did to me.

I would say that is a fitting natural consequence, and one that by his own admission and subsequent apology taught him a very valuable life lesson.

Me on the other hand have lost things I wasn't willing to loose. She took that choice away from me and our kids. She chose this for her family.

Mozzchops

Excellent point. It seems that too many times, it is the BS who suffers all the consequences of the wayward's affair even if there are consequences for the Wayward.

One of my biggest complaints in all this shitstorm is that I feel my WH has really suffered NO consequences.

He got to have LOTS of fun for two years, got caught, is still being regretful, not remorseful, and his W (me) desperately wants R. (He wants R too, just doesn't want to do any hard work - desperate is not in his vocabulary.)

I remember saying to him once, "there is no punishment for what you did. What am I going to do? Spank you? Ground you?". It's just ridiculous, these are grown men (?) and unless we just walk, which it appears the majority of us don't want to do, they really don't suffer.

My WH thinks having to "talk about it", "re-live" it, see my pain, is consequence enough. Punishment enough. Such crap.

There are so many ways I can think of to MAKE them suffer consequences, H and the OW. But none are truly "doable" just fantasies. Some people on here have come up with some truly great ideas, but truthfully, am I really going to cut off his testicle, no matter how badly I'd like to?

I think when they finally become remorseful, and start the hard work towards regaining our trust, love, really being the man they should be after what they did to us, then they may - may - suffer some consequences.

Being honest, open, emotional, kissing our ass - those may well be the only consequences they ever suffer. All of those things are hard for most men to do. Completely unfair, I know. But unless the marriage ends up in D, and they lose everything, IMO there are NEVER any consequences for them.

And that sucks most of all. . . .

My WH thinks having to "talk about it", "re-live" it, see my pain, is consequence enough. Punishment enough. Such crap.

Delilah

Exactly, My wayward sees the CONSEQUENCE of his betrayal in my pain as me trying to PUNISH HIM, too.

I see other BSs complaining about that type of reaction from their wayward, too.

For my wayward to Think that letting him see my pain is a punishment at all upsets me. It's not a punishment it's just a normal reaction to a betrayal.

I could have written your post and I feel the same in almost all the things you said.

Even reconciliation seems to be rewarding the wayward.

Yet, all my wayward sees is that my pain is a punishment for him.