SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I have just seen he has finally posted the story of that night on wayward.

They are already calling on him to take responsibility for his own actions and to grow up.

I think this is a good start at being willing to fix things even if he has admitted more to me since writing it.

Just a note to say his explanation of events is a few posts back and we cross posted.

Don't want it getting missed.

I am broken

can I ask should I be doing 180 with a remorseful spouse?

180 CAN wake up a spouse and get them to own their consquences...because they start to get a grip at what they threw away to get what they got. This is beneficial to a M and the R and is a "must take" step...but that is not the primary goal of 180. 180 breaks the unhealthy connection a BS has to their fWS...that connection that I spoke of earlier that talked about how we as BS try and attack adultery in our marriage...as if we are a team. This allows a WS the ability to minimize the affect of their choices because a BS is trying to help them with it, many times minimizing the pain OURSELVES....that mode of operation is horribly destructive. 180 is a must to break our own unhealthy contribution to our M.

My wife brought to me an intimacy building experiment. We stand close to each other, well balanced and stable, then we lean in and hug each other. One is not supporting the other...we are equally sure-footed and yet we are connected.

I wrestle with the full meaning of 180 too. But am cautious to NOT use it manipulatively or as a punishment tool.

Something counseling has helped us see is that to have a healthy marriage the people involved have to be healthy.

Something my pastor has helped me see is that to have a healthy marriage we must choose to love and support each other even if that is not the "feeling of the moment". He is also helping me see when righteous anger is warranted, that right and wrong is NOT the same as judging. He also helped me that "two becoming one" does NOT mean losing the original "one"....180 gets us back in touch with the "one" within us.

180 speaks to a healthy way of existing.

I am grateful for how many separate events and items throughout this past 14 months have tied together so completely.

I believe their are no coincidences. Perhaps your husbands slow to tell the truth was no coincidence...perhaps it has helped you get in touch with your inner strength to handle todays newly revealed truths. You had this strength all along....you just had not accepted that fact. You accepted this innner strength time to handle todays truth.

I dont think that is coincidence or luck. God is with you.

We are all broken....God uses only broken vessels. God is working within you.

Peace be with us all.

[This message edited by blakesteele at 8:30 AM, November 5th (Tuesday)]

You're spot on. That's what I have been trying to do. attack this as a team, understand it and move on. I thought if I could understand what he had done I could accept it. I kept minimising what he was telling me from day 1 so I could swallow it but all it did was give him a story to hide behind.

Literally EVERYONE in my life is telling me to take a step back and let him deal with what he had done and focus on myself for now. My psychologist, my psychiatrist, my mum. Even H!

I just don't know how to move forward feeling this much pain. It's like I am trapped in a nightmare. My mind refuses to accept what he has told me.

Todays revelation makes much more sense sadly. I didn't realise how hard the truth would be to take but I know deep down it's the right thing.

I just wish it wasn't so, as do we all.

I so know where you are right now. If it's any consolation I have no idea what to do either

x

Owlen - It seems that you are quite hung up on the fact that you have been diagnosed as bipolar, and have some serious issues with depression at the present time.

I want you to stop and consider this. If your H was not in your life, if he hadn't married you, and none of this would have happened where would your mental state be? I am very serious about this. He has been manipulating you, lying to you, and breaking your self esteem for many years. You find yourself broken in many ways, but if we remove this one factor, your H, do you get healthy? I think you do.

You are letting your mental disease define you, and it should not be that way. There are gobs and gobs of people that suffer from bipolar disease, and still function in society. They lead productive lives, have jobs, raise kids, have families, but they also understand that they have this illness, and sometimes have to rely on others for assistance. Loved ones family, friends, and spouses people who should really love you and support you will, they will say things when you start to get too manic, or too down, to help you to limit your response.

You however find yourself with no support from your spouse, in fact this yahoo finds it a burden to help you through the difficult times, and continues to make you weaker and weaker by lying to you, and manipulating you.

180 is for someone in your exact position, it's not to manipulate your spouse, and I don't give two sh!ts if he reads this. 180 is for you to focus on you, to get yourself strong, and well. It is used in other dysfunctional relationships in mental health and counseling as well. For kids of overbearing parents in early adulthood, for Adults who have kids that abuse them as teens, etc.

180 is to focus on you. Make yourself healthy and strong. Then you can honestly and sanely make a decision to carry forward, or end this relationship. Hopefully in the meantime your H does some real work on himself, and start healing his brokeness.

((((and strength))))

tush nurse - I appreciate where you are coming from but I have prob had bipolar since I was 9/10. That's when I was first diagnosed with depression.

The only happy times in my life have been the first 7 ish years of our relationship.

Then we had fertility problems. Then I ended up in a psych ward. Got medicated and piled a load of weight on.

Since then we have struggled along but I thought he loved me.

Oh God help me I really can't do this. I just can't.

He went for her cos she was the opposite of me and he resented me for everything.

He must have really hated me that much. I can't stop crying. I so badly want to hurt myself but I have ds home.

I think he chose her cos I am fat and she is slim.

I am 35 but she is 29, he actually said her age played a part, he thought how could a busty ex barmaid who is only 29 want a 40 yr old man.

she is confident and outgoing with loads of men after her. I am shy and have my problems to deal with - believe me just getting by day to day is too much right now. No one else would want me. I have only ever had two other men in my life and that was when I was slim.

They liked all the same stuff, I hate tv and takeaways.

She didn't hate her body, H says he got sick of me moaning about my weight but he was always on at me to do something about it. It just made me eat more and not want to be physical with him.

She made him happy I made him miserable.

That's how it all seems to me.

he wanted the complete opposite of me ffs how do I live with that?

Sorry for any typos but crying

I can't control the depression. I am taking my meds and going to therapy. I do all that I am meant to and it still takes me over. Even before I met H.

I am doing my best and failing all round it seems.

I will try the 180 but am feeling pretty pathetic right now. I just want to disappear. I am hiding from my son so he doesn't see me cry. I can't keep doing thiss

[This message edited by olwen at 10:21 AM, November 5th (Tuesday)]

This is nonsense olwen

My fwh has bipolar. I have cared for him and looked out for him and never blamed him for his illness or desired him less when he put on weight with drugs. Because fundamentally I am not a cheat

He did this because he is on some level broken. Not because of you. Being married to someone with bipolar can be a challenge. Seeing someone you love on a psych ward is no picnic. But life is no picnic. For better or for worse is what M is about. Not giving up if it gets difficult.

There is no excuse for what he has done. And yes she was the opposite of you. In that you have morality and integrity and she does not. All OW are low because you have to be low to go with a married man.

Much love to you

Stop!! He didn't cheat because you make him miserable, you are bipolar, and have gained weight. He cheated because he chose to be selfish. Instead of working on emotional intimacy with you, he took the easy way out and is now gas lighting and trickle truthing. He knows you're trapped right now and is using that to his advantage.

You did not make him cheat!!!!!!!

olwen...my husband cheated on me with a man(so I had 2 huge surprises on dday).

It doesn't get any more opposite than that.

Im a woman. He cheated with my EXACT opposite.

While not the same thing,it is in a way. I can not be a man. I don't have a penis. No matter what I do to change myself,I will still be a woman in the end(Thank the Gods! No offense men,but I make a pretty good woman..a man? Not so much ).

But..here's the thing you need to remember, and I think you've forgotten...this isn't about you. his cheating wasn't about you. It had nothing to do with your confidence,your weight, your bipolar,nothing at all. It had nothing to do with her. It is all about him and his selfishness and his ego.

Nothing you did made him cheat on you. It is/was something lacking in HIM.

ETA: How old is your little boy?

[This message edited by confused615 at 10:29 AM, November 5th (Tuesday)]

Why the hell does he keep saying he wants me?

He told me today how much he resented me and how he thought I was dragging him down.

He says now he can see it was him and not me. That he didn't try. That he loves me and wants only me.

Why would he want me now if I wasn't good enough then?

I wish he would just leave and find someone he really wants but he won't.

I can't believe a word of it. If he wanted me he wouldn't have cheated with someone who was nothing like me.

He wanted her for precisely that reason. How do I live with that?

Weight wise There is not even that much difference. I am a size 16/18 uk now.and she is probably a 12/14, it always bothered him though but he felt mean that it bothered him so he would make little digs then when we talked about it he would say no I love you as you are but I hate that you hate your body so why not do something about it. I can't even eat in front of him I am so paranoid.

Why didn't he just leave me if I wasn't good enough and if I am suddenly the best thing since sliced bread how the hell did he go from one extreme to the other? He was mad about her and didn't care about me to he hates her and is mad about me.

yeah I am really going to swallow that

Have you been able to release you rage on him? I don't mean in a physical way,but have you been able to tell him how pissed off you are? Have you been allowed to scream and yell?

My little boy will be 9 at xmas and he is my life. I would not be here now but for him.

It is about me in a way. He says he was wrong and keeps telling me it's not about me but I have eyes.

He resented his life with me and instead of doing something productive he went off with someone the opposite. He was that unhappy and resentful of me. He says it was the attention and all on him but if that's the case why did he do it with someone who would be such a better match for him.

She is all he wanted in a woman clearly.

So why come back? It makes no sense.

Oh yeah, a few times. He has sat there and told me to let rip.

I am ashamed to say I have slapped him. I will never do that to another person again.

He would never have cheated with her if she was fat and ugly. She was just right at just the right time as far as I can see. I wish he would go be with her and I could hate him.

You can't suddenly be mad about someone when you cheated cos you weren't happy with them surely?

Who knows what a WS can do

My fwh is all over me at the moment. All about how amazing I am

Idiot

Guess you really don't know what you got until it's (potentially) gone

xxx

Who knows what a WS can do

My fwh is all over me at the moment. All about how amazing I am

Idiot

Guess you really don't know what you got until it's (potentially) gone

xxx

That's what he said - you don't know what you have got until it's gone.

We have been talking this evening and he has reassured me a bit.

He says he was low before he met her but that was mostly work stuff. But when she came along all bubbly and flirty he wanted that life. Instead of coming to me and talking to me he turned to her. She was the easy option. Instant attention, Bright and breezy adoration with zero effort so he took the easy option and turned to her to make him feel better.

So cos he was tempted by her, she wanted him so he wanted her, he told himself our marriage was over. He didn't really want to leave. he just told himself that to justify, in his twisted mind, the fact he was chasing her.

The more he moaned about his life and his marriage he got all he wanted to hear. Oh poor thing she doesn't understand you stuff.

He started believing his own spin and they got closer and closer. He was thoroughly enjoying himself and saw me as the wicked witch. Truth is our problems could have been sorted fairly easily. He just told himself we were past the point of saving our marriage.

he was ok til he met her then dropped me like a hot potato.

He reassured me it wasn't my fault. That he knew he could come to me about anything but was too wrapped up in himself to go to the effort to save the marriage when he had her ready made giving him what he thought he wanted. It was nothing I did.

Also he told me she was not a better option - just easier. It did matter that she was the opposite of me cos if it was someone like me he would have got sensible advice not someone whispering in his ear. Although he knows he was the cause of this and kept it going cos it made him feel good.

It didn't matter that she was younger, attractive, busty etc. He would have done the same with anyone who acted that way around him and gave him what he thought he wanted. She could have been fat or thin, younger or older. All that mattered was she fed what he thought he wanted and needed. And that she was attractive enough for him to be flattered by her attentions.

He said the stupid thing is he thought he wanted someone else to want him so he could get his ego boost. He definitely got it but says it fell completely flat when he came out of the fog. He realised it was just not worth it. He has always wanted other women to find him attractive. Now he says he doesn't care. He got that and found he didn't want it after all. The only one he wants to want him now is me.

He is in for quite a wait while I process all this.

He does not want to lose his family, he is deeply sorry for his actions and is hating seeing me grieve all over again.

One thing I have realised but he never said is that I have not made it easy for him to be honest with me over the years. I am NOT blaming myself. He did not mention it. However I realised today that he seems to want to always tell me what I want to hear. I don't make it easy for him to tell me stuff. I tried to kill myself ffs! How could he feel able to tell me more? My therapist wants me to learn how to manage my extreme emotion and I think I must!

Just an observation I have made about myself. So I am trying to listen to him and not freak out.

He has said he will work through as much as he can on here. He has an exam on Friday so needs to revise but after that I expect him to do some serious work.

He has said he will be here as long as I need. He wants to stay forever and fix things but as hard as he intends to work, whatever my decision he will respect it. He hopes he can earn back my love and trust.

Right now I don't know, but the talk did help. He is certain of what he has told me and has not buckled and downplayed it again. No matter that my tears make him want to take it all back.

I questioned him about why he got in the back seat if he didn't enjoy the front and he said he was just that pathetic. He was taking everything she offered him every time hoping he would like it. I believe this cos if he had liked it it would most likely have been repeated and I am sure it wasn't.

I feel horrible this morning. Having to face the fact he did want her is so hard.

I am finding myself trying to minimise and justify what he told me. It's just too big to face.

I keep telling myself he didn't really want her. He just thought he did.

He didn't plan it just was too weak to say no.

That he was more tempted and curious than actually wanting her.

Why am I doing this, I am so mad at myself. I hounded him for the truth and now I can't accept it.