SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

(((allatsea)))

Welcome to SI. I'm sorry you had to experience the pain of this betrayal but I'm glad you found us.

Weekends and evenings are a little bit quieter here, and timezone differences mean that responses may lag a bit, but rest assured that there are people here who care, and understand, and want to support you.

We have many members from the UK who understand that there are challenges specific to your region when it comes to advocating for yourself. I know that therapy is not as prevalent there as it is in the US, but if there's ever an opportunity for you or your children to get to speak with a counselor and get some help making sense of things, I strongly suggest you try it out.

Big hugs and thoughts of strength to you as you navigate these painful times.

Your story is a sad reflection of just how cruel and vicious a WS can be. Somehow they whip up this resentment and self-righteousness to justify this extreme cruelty. Not a iota of compassion or guilt.

You need a lawyer right away to get the children returned to the house from which they were wrongfully removed. She can only remove the children as a reaction to abuse or a threat to their safety if they remain. The lawyer will send her a letter indicating that court action will be initiated if the kids are not returned.

Play hardball with her. She deserves no less.

the only thing keeping me functioning is the thought of their relationship falling apart and us reconciling, which she says will never happen.

Quite possibly she is right. By the time her affair falls apart, you will most likely have taken your offer of reconciliation off the table. It takes time, and it is unbelievable when you first start out, but you can recover, and when you do, you will not be satisfied with any half assed getting back together for the sake of having a relationship.

she has managed to convince her family that she wasn't happy and she saw an opportunity for happiness and took it.

How pathetic that our culture supports "unhappiness" in marriage as a legitimate reason to betray one's partner.

Good luck to you.

Gosh - I'm so sorry. I recently joined the club nobody wants to be in. I have a very longggg story! (if you have a spare hour you can read it...sorry very long).

It's now four months since my WH told me (1 wk b 4 XMAS, top bloke!), & then left me. OW had been studying in my country, & then returned to Australia in Dec (so no idea how long really - he told me ONLY slept with her in NOV. Who knows & geez thanks). She only returned to my country in Jan so they could be together. He tells me she is the one. Like she completes him. Really, well happiness comes from within Buddy but hey, what do I know.

Yes it's heartbreaking. If I was so bad why didn't you leave me first. I wouldn't have been happy but at least I wouldn't have felt like shit & blamed myself. For a longtime I did blame myself. Yes there were usual problems,( a relationship of 26 years) but we were still going to places, socializing, still telling me how special I was, a good person I was, bring up our children (D 10 & S 7 yrs), etc. Whatever! I take 50% problems in relationship BUT 0% for affair. We can't try & fix something if we don't know what the problem is. After 26 yrs together this is how he treats me? Tells me has never done this before. Ok - what do you do with that? He is the one who is selfish & a coward. He's the piece of Crap. Gosh, the respect for him has gone. I am disgusted at him. He made his bed, he needs to lie in it. I am no-ones second choice & neither are you, or any or you good people out there. None of us are perfect , we are human, and we make the best of the situation @ that time. 20/20 hindsight is marvelleous, and I bet we keep telling ourselves if only I was more accommodating, or I had given him the back massage @ 10 o'clock @ night (note after looking after children, cooking & doing my own study!) he wouldn't have left! But you know what, baloney - it's their problems, their selfishness, their cowardliness. You can't fix their problems. Yes when I see him (children related only, & yes I correspond mainly by email & text) I get the trying so hard to be my friend ( I was his friend, his support mechanism. We were, well I thought we were Friends. Where was he when I needed that?) I'm not interested in being his friend, especially at this moment in time. I now get on with my life. I continue with my degree ( 2 papers to go then finished), I still socialise, do activities with my children (yes this is mind blowing for them. I have to be strong for them - not hard. But they have a dad who has almost changed overnight. I don't know who he is anymore either, BUT what I do is try and be positive) It is very hard & it does hurt! For awhile I kept thinking he is living a fabulous life with her, they are happy!! My sister said STOP - like an affair is fantasy so is what I was thinking. She said he's in a relationship now, they have to cook, clean, wash, hell they now fart in front of each other. BUT they also have to get real (i.e. can't put on the "happy & contented pretence for ever") they are now living in the real world.

He left me, he chose to be with her. BUT I choose to live my life according to my convictions. It's not easy & hell at times you think WTF but if you keep telling yourself & doing the things YOU want to do, it will help.

I know it's only 8 weeks for you, its raw & painful. But you are a good person who didn't deserve this at all. None of us did. Please know you are not at fault. Don't ever think you are. You hold your head up high. There are 2 mantras I say to myself " I APPROVE OF MYSELF" & " I WILL MAKE IT".

Truly this site is a great place. Never thought I would be in it, but glad it's here. Take care.

Thank you so much for your post. The parallels of all cheating spouses are so similar. Their behaviour is consistent with each other irrelevant if they are male or female, young or old, with or without kids. This fact alone convinces me that none of us are at fault. The hardest thing to accept is not the affair itself, but the betrayal by the person we trusted the most, whom we loved unconditionally, have years of history with, young children too, and then throws it away for a crush. To compound matters they then trample all over your heart and trash your history as though you lived a one sided existence of happiness that they were faking. The pain is too much, and some days I can barely function. Thank you to all on here who reassure that we are not to blame. Thank you.

Exactly, it's the betrayal that is the killer. That's the problem. I sometimes wake up in the middle of the night & that aspect pops into my head. You trust them so explicitly. You think they have your back, because you TRUST them. You have children & history, yet they freely give it away.

Sorry that this situation has happened. Your life will never be the same as another person entered your marriage and your marriage partner as you knew her no longer exists. I'd suggest you file for divorce since she's so brazen with her actions with this newfound love of hers. Don't humiliate yourself by waiting on the sideline for her to make a final selection between the two of you. Love yourself enough to get out of that scenario. Wish I had advice on how I was humiliating myself years ago. My life would have been better now.

Scramnbled2, so sorry to hear what happened to you! You'll get better responses to your post if you re-post it in your own post rather than having it buried in this one.

Hi sumrlady, My story is under JFO (4 months) note very long.

Cheers

I have sent her the papers but she is annoyed that I am pushing her so fast. She doesn't see why I should want to close this chapter and move on. She is continually rubbing my nose in the fact that her new man makes her happy and that he acts like a better father to my children than I do. It is soul destroying that this person is unrecognisable to me and can continue hurting me in this way.

but she is annoyed that I am pushing her so fast.

oooooh! Its annoying that you'll now no longer be in her control.

ooooooh! Its annoying she won't be able to see you beg for mercy and make a sad face.

oooooh!!Its annoying that you'll be looking out for someone better looking inside and outside and make her feel jealous. ooohh! aaah!!!

Get out of the mess buddy. And fast.

It is soul destroying that this person is unrecognisable to me and can continue hurting me in this way.

They feed on your pain.

Gently, You now are any other person to her. The man in front of her in a queue at McD, someone in the bus, some random guy checking out stuff at the mall. You mean nothing to her, right now.

Once you are on your own making meaning of your life all by yourself, she will see what a real man looks like and will hold high regards for you. You'll not know but, she will.

The more you show you are feeling pathetic, look pathetic, the more 'prized' they feel. Some many men wanting to be with me feel.

The more you show a straight face and be to your point, the more they keep wondering.

Best of luck. This gets easy with time.

I just broke my 180 plan. Her last comment that 'she never meant to hurt me' and that 'she didn't make the decision easily to leave the marriage' really hurt. So I sent this to her and I'm annoyed with myself

"Whilst I might have had a part in the problems in the marriage I take no responsibility for the choice you made in how you dealt with it. That’s all on you. The affair, cheating, getting your mum to babysit whilst you were sleeping with Dick at the planning forum and all the other lies. That’s all yours. Not mine. You made a choice to hurt me. There was a crossover point where you consciously knew you had crossed a line. You definitely did choose to hurt me and you considered that 19 years and our family unit should be sacrificed because you couldn’t keep your knickers on “because he made you so wet” and “you were orgasming in your sleep”.

YOU have moved quickly.

One could argue that we should have got divorced BEFORE you slept with another man and BEFORE you moved in with him.

But as one of your infamous emails to Dick reminds me, “I never actually stood a chance”. You were turned by a man who flattered you, you’ve always enjoyed the attention of other men, you’ve even had a “regrettable snog” with someone whilst we were married. Blame me all you want in order to justify your behaviour. I just don’t care now. I am not the one who is moving quickly. You never mentioned your unhappiness which is how I know that you were happy until something more exciting came along.

You are not the person I thought I was married to. That person could never have done what you’ve done. You are despicable.

Contact me when you stop thinking selfishly about your wants and needs. Don’t use the children as an excuse to stall. You haven’t thought of how they might be handling the fact that one week you were in my bed and then you were immediately in someone else’s in a new house. I know that they are struggling with this as they ask me many awkward questions. When they are older they will realise that you bed hopped, were selfish, did not think of them and you will look cheap.

When you finally come out of your love bubble you will realise how disgusting you’ve been and you will be ashamed of yourself for the rest of your life. I will always have my dignity and know that I tried to hold my marriage together for my children. You can never have that.

For now I will sit and wait for you to control everything at your pace. After all, this is only about you.

[This message edited by allatsea at 8:38 AM, April 11th (Thursday)]

Ok, now that I am done shaking my finger at you for breaking your 180, I just have to say....

that letter was COMPLETELY AWESOME!

Omgosh, you totally drive home your point without using filthy language or making it sound like you're sitting around mooning over her. It was just perfect!

Now, back to 180 mister! I'm sure she will respond, so be prepared to ignore.

For now I will sit and wait for you to control everything at your pace.

Why wait for you ?

You are letting her know you will be there no matter what.

She needs to know you are not going to be available.

Thanks! Consider my wrist slapped and thoroughly told off.

Sometimes you've got to tell them how wrong they are. I couldn't just sit there being blamed for everything.

I feel liberated and somehow, lifted by the experience!

[This message edited by allatsea at 5:31 AM, April 11th (Thursday)]

happydays,

The only reason I am prepared to wait is that it is cheaper to divorce in this country if we can mutually agree on a settlement without involving lawyers. If I use lawyers to push this thing faster than she wants then it will quadruple the costs. It's not the end of the world although I would like to close this chapter on my life. She has to continue to pay half the loan on the house while she decides. Her loss

[This message edited by allatsea at 5:32 AM, April 11th (Thursday)]

Just seeing the letter you wrote, AWESOME (clapping).

No problem if you broke 180 for this letter. She deserved to know that. Frankly, to me, it sounds like your WW sounds a bit shaken by your confident attitude. Keep it up. You have the power. She does not.

I just read you letter mate, and right now I'm standing and applauding. That was fantastic.

Back on the 180 and keep moving forward.

Bravo!

I haven't had any response from WW about my letter. This either means that she is taking the moral high ground and refuses to retaliate or I've hit a raw nerve. Either way I'm glad I did it.