SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hi guys,

This is a bit of a T/J from my thread yesterday.. I didn't get any responses to this topic and still hoping to get some insight so I can handle it better with my BH. I know as a WW, I have take on a role of a healer too and I'm not sure what I can or can't do to help.

On 2 occasions, my BH has triggered big time and has told me he is thinking about having an RA.

His feelings are very normal and understandable but he doesn't know how to deal with his hurt. We will go to MC in 2 weeks to help.

He is upset that I fooled around with multiple men. He is upset about the sexual activities that happened with 2 of them.

So he has been having these thoughts of RA's. He has told me that even if he fooled around with 1-2 women, it wouldn't match up to what I did. Even if he had a ONS with 1 person, it might equal to what I did. Or if he fooled around with 4 women and did exactly the same things I did, it would be considered even.

Now these conversations always send me into tears. He gets mad that I would be even consider being hurt because I did it to him first. He thinks that I should just accept that if he wants to do it, he will.

After a while of talking about it, he always backs down and says he could never, ever do that to me. Never bring himself down to my level. He likes being the 'good and faithful husband'. He likes having that leg up on me and how it puts him in more power of our marriage. And also even if he did have an opportunity to cheat, he could never go through with what I did.

Last night we went to an event with some friends. I was sitting there, I quietly triggered in my head about the thoughts of RA's. It came out of nowhere.. At the moment where I was feeling like shit, my BH just looked over.. told me he loved me and gave me a big kiss. He had no idea that I was worrying about the RA discussions we had last week. It melted my heart that he did that at the very moment that I was needing it. But it also told me that maybe I'm worrying too much about it..?

I just would love to get any advice on how I can communicate better with my BH, in case he triggers like that again and I deal with it better as a healer. Not a crying WW that can't accept a dish that I doled out in the first place.

Remind him to stay true to his authentic self. Remind him what great values he has and to throw that all away would not help him. Remind him that having an RA will make him feel worse, not better.

Piling more shit on the shit pile of As only makes it stinkier.

Im glad you see this reaction as "normal" and he back pedaled on the thought.

No stop sign-

BS here.

I entertained the thought of a RA for quite some time. There was a while there that I thought, "He should feel the pain that I feel!!" it wasn't about any external validation, it wasn't about finding pleasure somewhere else. I honestly thought it would ease my burden and pain.

Dumb. Dumb. Dumb.

I never did. But I can tell you that every time I mentioned it to my fWH, he would bow his head and say that if I honestly thought it would help me, to go ahead and do it. He just wanted to help me get better. He said it would hurt him but he knows that what he did destroyed me and he deserves whatever I throw his way.

His patience really helped. Hearing him say that it would hurt him but he was putting my feelings first, REALLY REALLY HELPED!

I hope you can find the strength to comfort him. Sounds like that's exactly what he needs. He needs to know that you're putting him first and not yourself.

Good luck!

Different take on things here...

First, I would not stick around if my BW had an RA.

Second, the idea that your BH feels like he has a leg up, or that he has more power over you and/or the M because he says he wouldn't/couldn't cheat is disturbing. An M is not about power.

You guys need to hash that perspective out. Just because you are a WW, does not mean you have to sublimate yourself to his trigger, which he is subsequently perceiving as gaining power based on your reaction.

Find a different way to help him.

I think the whole revenge affair situation is a hard one. Its easy to just draw a line and say cheating is wrong, no one should do it. But that is too simplistic. If it was good for you, why not him?

Its a kind of hypocrisy I think cheaters (like myself) have. I cheated a good amount. Pretty similar to your cheating in that it was multiple partners. My wife did have an EA.. not for revenge but still. I know the feelings you are going through. By any standard I *deserved* to be cheated on. Still hurt.

And I can relate to your husband too. I think a lot of people are going to say revenge affairs don't help anyone. I don't know about that. Sometimes people need to be on even footing. I don't know your husband. For me, I couldn't stand being a cuckold. I acted our motivated by revenge. It caused us a lot of problems that we are still going through today. But if I didn't have the revenge affairs, could we have R'd (or tried to)? I don't know. I need to feel like things were back to how they were.

I don't think even if he had a RA it would be the same type of hurt if that is his goal. All it would do is help with his self-confidence and pride. Maybe its not a bad idea if you can figure out someway to do it without any emotional connections.

As a WS, we learn that having an affair is a really poor way to cope with our problems. A RA is just another affair, and a poor way to cope through feelings, pain, etc. I think it's natural to want to get revenge, even if it's only in thought, it's good to process those thoughts and where they are coming from. Keep communicating openly and honestly with each other.

My husband doesn't call it a RA, he says he's "vulnerable" now. I can understand how he feels that way. I can't make him not have an affair. I can do my best to live my life forward with integrity and honesty, but it's not a guarantee he won't cheat. I can do my best to earn his trust and help him heal and support him, and it may still not be enough. We both have choices now just as we did before. Knowing that we each own our own choices, be them hard or easy, has allowed me to let go of the fear of his getting even. I don't own him, I can't control him, I only control me.

So he has been having these thoughts of RA's. He has told me that even if he fooled around with 1-2 women, it wouldn't match up to what I did. Even if he had a ONS with 1 person, it might equal to what I did. Or if he fooled around with 4 women and did exactly the same things I did, it would be considered even.

My W and I both had affairs. Neither were RAs, and her's was first, but very mild compared to mine (EA/PA a kiss), and I didn't find out until after my (first) A was discovered. Both As happened due to horrible coping skills, poor boundaries, and we are both working on our own issues to become healthy.

There is no making things equal. My BW was/is just as devastated by her own behavior as she is of mine, and vise versa. There is no way you can compare the hurts, or try to make them equal.

As stated above, adding more hurt on top of what you already have will only make things that much harder to heal.

He likes being the 'good and faithful husband'. He likes having that leg up on me and how it puts him in more power of our marriage.

That's because he feels powerless, weak and cuckolded. When you feel you love your WS more than they love you it does that to you. Anything you can do to feel some sense of power, some feeling that you're not helpless and vulnerable, you'll grab onto. That statement from him and the ones about RA's are both coming from the same place...he feels very weak and vulnerable to being hurt again. He needs to feel strong. Trying to R does take strength, but it also make you doubt yourself and ask what is wrong with me that I love someone who hurt me so badly.

Also, you've mentioned how you met the AP's and how many are an issue/trigger for BH. It makes him feel emasculated.

That is the source of his pain and his behavior.

Next time he talks like that maybe try holding him close, look him deep in the eyes and tell him you know he's stronger than to have an RA because he knows what the damage is. You know he likes being faithful because that's who he is. That it doesn't give him power, but it comes from his strength. Might want to let him know you appreciate that about him. He feels almost trapped by those virtues, that they set him up to be hurt.

MUC, I am probably in a very small minority but I don't believe in or accept the term RA. There are healthy/unhealthy people and choices, RA is a term people use to justify a horrible choice when at the core is a person with poor coping skills, FOO, P/A etc etc. I say this as that unhealthy, jacked up person who felt justified by my wife's poor actions to allow a EA to start. I do not call it a RA as that would suggest that my wife had a part in my horrible choice and she did not. She was busy getting healthy and becoming more than I could have dreamed of or hoped for.

While he is expressing anger in a poor way I understand it and am sorry he says that. At the end of the day though what is he doing to get healthy and or heal? You can learn to communicate better, but if he doesn't then what? Your healing has to be yours and his, his..

messed up,

relate big time to your story. my BS also talked about a RA or that she deserves a 'hall pass' for what i've done. She went as far as offering herself to the OW husband if he ever feels like getting back. Obviously, like you, that only caused more conflict and made it more difficult for us to stay focused on any kind of recovery. She would also admit she could not do that and she was only talking out of anger.

Don't forget your husband (and my wife) are the good and faithful players in our roles. You and I screwed up. Now forgive yourself and allow them to work towards forgiveness. It will take longer than we ever could imagine but it can't be forced.

Now unfortunately I have to say my wife did pursue another man by seeking out his number and calling him for two months, even meeting him for lunch. This crushed me. At first she was very sorry but then almost immediately felt bitter that I would dare make her feel bad and it was one thousandth of what i did. she admits it was a bad decision but holds to the fact that if i had not done what i did then she would have never pursued another man.

the dangers of this tit for tat attitude is that a person can always justify their actions if they reach far enough back in history to find and equal or worse comparison the significant other has done to them. it also has added a whole new layer of jealousy, paranoia, and low self esteem i now have to manage while still trying to give her the space and support she requires for recovery.

Granted her pursuit of this OM did not end in a physical act it was still deceitful and lying and hurts. See if i said that to her she still would get angry because to her it sounds like i'm taking the focus off my wrong doing and putting it on her.

you were lucky he responded to you with affection in your moment of worry but that could have easily not happened. as long as this subtopic of RA is laying under the surface then it will disrupt the healing process. Speak openly with him about your concerns. speak in 'I' statements so he doesn't become defensive. tell him how it is more difficult to give him the support he needs when you are wrestling with the 'what if's' that is being placed in your head when the topic of RA comes up. Ask him to agree to a few basic rules of engagement when his emotions flair so that he doesn't use RA or threatening divorce, etc out of anger.

your actions emasculated him and he probably throws out RA as a desperation play to regain some of that self esteem back during hard times. as long as he doesn't feed that revengeful emotion and remains focused working on himself and keeping life simple so both of you can stay calm and relatively at peace then this will pass.

Everything BBFF said.

I am a madhatter, our DDay was at the same time. My BH/WH cheated first. If I had known, I most likely would have left. Yeah I'm a POS that can dish it out but not take it. I know. I would rather have left than have had an RA. Doing it specifically to "even the score" and "get back" at your WS would have seemed to me like something childish that belongs in the Kindergarten sandbox. To me it is just a messed up way of rugsweeping. Using a knife instead of a brush. For me it would not have fixed anything.

That said, everyone has to make their own choices and who am I to judge a BS that absolutely has to have an RA in order to R. I think a lot of IC and MC would be needed to establish that an RA was the right thing to do.

IMO one big difference between an A and an RA is motivation.

I believe that *most* WS dont consciously say "I think I will go cheat on my BS today"

But the RA is a diff animal. After experiencing the pain of an A, the WBS purposely and maliciously intends to inflict that horror on the person they want to R with.

That math only leads to disaster.

BS here

I want to say that I can relate to your husband. The night I found out about his affair (a 6-8 month long relationship with her), I did say to him that I was going to go out and sleep with someone else just so he could feel what I felt.

Truth be told, I could never do that. As much as I want to (and yes I use the present tense, even though we are in R, he doesn't understand nor empathize well enough to understand how broken I really am), I cannot do it. Our wedding vows meant something to me, and I cannot just have sex with someone either out of spite, anger, nor out of revenge.

It may sound good as a thought, but overall, it's never the best idea. I know personally, I would feel like shit if I did that, not only because it would also make me a cheater, but I would have let my morals and beliefs go.

I hope MC works for you guys, and I sincerely hope that your husband works on this issue in MC, I know ultimately for me, mad hatter-ing isn't the best solution and only creates an even bigger problem.

Good luck!

He feels almost trapped by those virtues, that they set him up to be hurt.

Yup, this really resonates.

I think the whole revenge affair situation is a hard one. Its easy to just draw a line and say cheating is wrong, no one should do it. But that is too simplistic. If it was good for you, why not him?

If a marriage was a scorecard, my gosh no one would ever be even. There would always be something to win.

So if an H had 2 A's and W had 1 EA, my by scorecard W is down by at least 1.5 A's and should get busy!

If a scorecard M is what one is after, then that should be agreed on by both parties well in advance. I believe that most would agree RA's are never the answer. This is the first time I have read of someone on this board defending their choice of RA as a good thing.

MUC - If he had an RA, would he see that he would have to put his own hurt aside to help you heal yours? That might be the direction to take such a conversation.

One thing you can do is practice holding back the tears.

That automatically puts you in a place to be comforted when he is basically telling you he is hurting.

I do not think your BH would go through with it..he is merely telling you how he feels. He wants to even the score so to speak,he feels duped. He knows "evening the score" would not even make things better because he would then compromise his integrity.

He's on the rollercoaster and hurting very much.

I believe when he's says this he is just looking for comfort and venting.

Wow thanks for the responses everyone!

lucky2have me: I agree with your post. Those are the types of things that I have brought up with him already which does help. I tell him a little bit about the pain I feel from being the betrayer in our marriage and how I don't know if I will be able to forgive myself for it. It's such an awful feeling and I don't know if/when it would go away.

HBH:

His patience really helped. Hearing him say that it would hurt him but he was putting my feelings first, REALLY REALLY HELPED!

I hope you can find the strength to comfort him. Sounds like that's exactly what he needs. He needs to know that you're putting him first and not yourself

Thanks for the comment. I understand what you mean by that. I don't want it to be about me but it always comes across that way when I worry about an RA.

BBFF:

First, I would not stick around if my BW had an RA.

Second, the idea that your BH feels like he has a leg up, or that he has more power over you and/or the M because he says he wouldn't/couldn't cheat is disturbing. An M is not about power.

I agree, I wouldn't want to stick around if he actually did have an RA. I'm already at the lowest of my lows..

On your 2nd point, perhaps I didn't explain myself well. BH is an A-type and so am I. It's not disturbing to me about how he feels because I understand where he is coming from. He just wants to feel like the head of the household and my cheating knocked me down a few pegs.

Whatnow999: thanks for the insights. I think that's how my BH is feeling.. I'm not too sure what a cuckold is so I'll have to look it up. I have a feeling it's an ugly term for how a BH might feel..

caspersiwish:

As a WS, we learn that having an affair is a really poor way to cope with our problems. A RA is just another affair, and a poor way to cope through feelings, pain, etc. I think it's natural to want to get revenge, even if it's only in thought, it's good to process those thoughts and where they are coming from. Keep communicating openly and honestly with each other.

Good point, A's are a really terrible coping mechanism and an RA is just another form. I did tell my BH that I'm happy that is expressing himself to me about his thoughts.. even if they are about that. I want to keep the lines of communication always open with him.

badchoice: Yes you're right. Hurt on top of hurt would make it harder to heal. Especially when we have so much potential to build a stronger marriage right now.

Brandon: Thanks so much for your post. Everything you said seems to hit the mark. You have given me lots of good advice on how to help my BH. I really appreciate that.

hardlessons:

My BH doesn't even know the term RA really. He says he thinks about getting even with me and wants me to feel the same pain.

While he is expressing anger in a poor way I understand it and am sorry he says that. At the end of the day though what is he doing to get healthy and or heal? You can learn to communicate better, but if he doesn't then what?

He isn't doing anything to help himself get healthy or heal. At the end of the day, he wants to forget about it all and move on quickly from it. He has never yelled at me for cheating yet but he has been verbalizing his pain better now that he has been able to process his thoughts.

I'll post more replies in a separate post. Thank you guys so much already. Gave me a lot to think about and educated me on how I can help

I think this is fairly common thought for BS' this early in the process. Over the months, I've gathered little tidbits of advice from SI, and other sources, to help me deal with these negative outbursts, and unproductive 'revenge' fantasies. I keep a note on my phone with these quotes of encouragement... the first being the most helpful for this RA fantasy. These kinda read like a "Stuart Smalley" list from SNL, but maybe could be helpful for your BH.

While ThornyRose may have broke our vows, I did not. "Forever" is an absolute term.

what brings you closer together.

And I can relate to your husband too. I think a lot of people are going to say revenge affairs don't help anyone. I don't know about that. Sometimes people need to be on even footing. I don't know your husband. For me, I couldn't stand being a cuckold. I acted our motivated by revenge. It caused us a lot of problems that we are still going through today. But if I didn't have the revenge affairs, could we have R'd (or tried to)? I don't know. I need to feel like things were back to how they were.

This is not the thought process condusive of a healthy, successful R. Please do not accept it as such.

He thinks that I should just accept that if he wants to do it, he will.

We all have to accept this idea, I think it is a very healthy attitude. The key is having faith that you chose a partner that, on balance, would not want to do it. On some level, almost all of us want to, and all of us want to avoid doing it. Where those two desires balance out, coupled with opportunity determines if it will happen.

The way you describe your BH, he has a far more powerful urge not to cheat, and if he is anything at all like me, when he is so upset that he would actually be willing to cheat... well in that state I was a very unattractive mess.