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I seemed to have been somewhere between the seventh layer of hell and oblivion for a while and every time the despair passes I arrive here, is this it?.

I want to know if this is it?, truthfully and honestly. I feel that it is, I don’t like it but there’s not a thing I can do about it.
Life looks different now, everything is a choice, happiness is a choice, joy a choice, smiling is also a choice, there is no being in the moment because that is also something that has to be chosen. My husband and I have spoken about this and both of us agree that we love each other, both love our boys, we enjoy each other’s company, we get on well with each other and we have an amazing sex life but somethings missing, something is dead, gone, empty, void, it’s like just existing. Is this how life is now?, is this it?. I think it’s better to face reality and accept that it’s not going to ever come naturally ever again, my thoughts, emotions and my marriage now have to be managed like a full time job, every single thing requires work.

I’m tired, I don’t want to work on anything anymore, I’m exhausted, mentally physically and spiritually, I have a virus ATM my eyes are full of cysts because I’m so run down.
My H said that my eyes have changed, he said that they’re not the same, they say the eyes are the window to the soul so maybe my soul is destroyed.

I think maybe it would be for the best if I told my H to go, he fucked up, he can’t pay for this for the rest of his life it’s not fair, he’s sad, I’m sad maybe it’s broken and we face reality and move on. What is there to build?, what can change? I don’t know? I don’t know if I want to change anything, but what I do have I’m not sure is enough anymore because something is missing. Does anyone understand what I’m saying?

Can anyone relate and give it to me straight?

Thank you for listening

Bruce.

First things first. Go see a doctor. You need vitamins and mineral to fortify your body. You have taken a hit. It is not just emotionally, it’s very much physically as well. Your de can give you something for anxiety and depression. You probably need help sleeping.

Put aside the marriage problems right now and the two of you need to be outside together. In a park, on a trail, by a pool. Let some sunlight help. Both of you are dragging bags full of despair and they are wrecking your health.

Go somewhere with your boys. Being busy physically helps put good hormones in your brains.

I relate. Every day is horrible. I have to take gummies to get to a point where I can function at all. I have to be sober for work, and it's so hard to get anything done there or find a reason to care. It's all so ridiculous...why does turning in a report matter when my entire life is obliterated?

I'm a month in. Wife cheated. She is supposedly willing to do whatever, and it seems like she is doing those things, but every morning I wake up in despair. I hope this isn't "it" and just how life is now. I don't know how people do this.

I hear you.

In the Healing Library, there's an article called Plain of Lethal Flatness that you may wish to read. Remember, this is trauma and healing takes time. One industry suggestion is that it takes 2-5 years (if not longer) to heal from infidelity, and can take even longer if you're trying to R.

Give yourself grace and practice lots of self-care. Infidelity is probably the most painful thing to experience.

No. This is NOT 'it'. The SI rule of thumb is: healing takes 2-5 years. Many of us in R say it can take longer - I felt healed 3.5-4 years out, but my W didn't.

M may have seemed easy, but it never was. It's always been difficult. How could it not be? When you think about it, M requires some sort of partnership between 2 different people with different experiences, strengths, weaknesses, habits, blind spots, hot buttons ... you get the idea.

Last night, W & I watched an interview with Mike Nichols. He mentioned the final scene in The Graduate. I had forgotten that the 2 lovers were on a bus running away from the church in which Elaine had just been married, and slowly their faces started to show fear. It was as if they were saying, 'What have I done? How do I make this work? How do I get out of it if it doesn't?'

Nichols argues that that's life - something new and unprepared for can always happen.

New BSes have just been traumatized by that fact. If you choose R, it takes more time than anyone wants it to take to know if R will work. But since it's trauma, it's intense at first, but the intensity fades, if you heal.

You won't always feel as bad as you do now.

Life looks different now, everything is a choice, happiness is a choice, joy a choice, smiling is also a choice, there is no being in the moment because that is also something that has to be chosen.

Wow. This is exactly how I feel. I can’t get lost in the moment. Can’t enjoy things for what they are without thinking of the affair in some form or facet. Movies and songs are constant reminders. I can’t bear to see old family photographs from before the affair without thinking I had no idea at the time. Life currently is like a fog that I can’t see that far ahead. I don’t what "normal" feels like anymore. Everything feels like work now.

I have noticed that a lot of bs get to the place you are now. It’s a place of pressuring yourself to be well. It’s natural to be exhausted.

Lean into being kinder to yourself. Remind yourself that your feelings are natural. It hasn’t even been a year, and worrying that you are going to keep punishing him forever is a clue to the pressure you are probably unknowingly putting on yourself.

Some of it is you are tired of the pain. Some of it is he has been doing everything you want to see and you don’t feel better.

Trauma is not something you can logically mitigate. Navigation requires giving yourself permission to feel. Your husband conducted an affair behind your back- don’t you think it’s okay if he feels fallout from that for more than 7-8 months? We say this healing timeline is 2-5 years. The therapy community also uses those numbers. Why would you expect yourself to be over it in a fraction of that time?

It’s okay to choose divorce if that is what you want. That’s what happens when a ws gambles your entire sense of trust and security. But in taking in all the context of your posts, I would say practice patience with yourself. Do things for yourself. Do not pretend to be okay when you are not to save his feelings. The more you can let out rather than restrict is the quickest path to what will prove to be a long journey. The outcome of your marriage doesn’t really change that trajectory. Healing will need to occur either way.

Focus on you and what you need and honor it.

No this is not it!!! You’re just 6 months from Dday.

I was still massively struggling to make sense of it all at 6 months from dday1 and then at the 6 month mark I was hit with dday2.

Please don’t give up on yourself and happiness. It will take time to rebound, recover and reconcile (if that’s the route you choose).

If you met me now you would never guess the hell I went through. And yes I had a fight within myself to reconcile b/c I really just didn’t want to at first.

As I’ve stated the first year of R I woke up every day and my immediate thoughts were "I can’t do this. I need to D him".

But now I wake up happy and happy with the choice to R.

You will survive this. We all do. But it’s not a path I would dish on anyone (except the OW in my case. She needs to truly understand what she did).