SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Great topic. For me, I still want the future that I signed up for when I married. Now that I see everything for what it really was, I realize that it was all imaginary, and how can you really mourn the passing of a fantasy? I still have an emotional attachment for what I believed was a future filled with fulfillment and happiness. I know that this is not the woman I thought I married, and I am perfectly fine separating myself from this very messed up person. I'm not sure what would happen if the figment of my imagination suddenly appeared, or what I would do.

I think in my heart I cannot endure more hurt from my STBX. That is how I know. Leave it to a guy to quote Lord of the Rings, but I feel as though this about sums things up:

"How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when in your heart, you begin to understand, there is no going back? There are some things that time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep...that have taken hold."

For me, it wasn't wanting a D. It was NEEDING one. I couldn't handle the lies and deception anymore. My M was destroying me.

D-Day #2 was the day that I knew I wasn't crazy and that he had been gaslighting me. I was so done with him by that point.

The D was to save my sanity and self-worth. How could I stay with someone who treated me with so little respect? He saw me suffer the first time...he did it again. He could claim "denial" of what it would do to me the first time....the second...he KNEW what he was doing to me. Just absolute cruelty. How could I stay M to that?

I never wanted one. But there was no way I was going to put up with lying and cheating.

This was me too. Even after I filed I told her a number of times she still had a chance to come back and try and fix this. She flat out refused and I was really forced to move on. Now I am about 10 months out from d-day and my D has been final for over a month and I know it is what I had to do. No one should have to choose between sharing their partner and a D. That isn't really a choice.

Disclaimer- I didn't know my Xh was cheating/had cheated on me when I left him.

I realized D was what I needed when I stopped giving a shit about him. About the same time I got pregnant with our son (which was an accident- switched from the pill to the Nuvaring and... anyhoo). I had never wanted kids with him and now one was coming. I didn't want to raise my son in a household so full of tension and anger and emotional abuse.

I stopped caring. All the lies (over money, drugs, his whereabouts, etc) for 3 years just piled up. All the fights, name calling, staying out well past when he said he'd be home and turning off his phone, walking in the next day like he'd done nothing wrong and then getting furious with me for being upset. It all just chipped away, until there was nothing left.

One night, he went out with friends, was supposed to be home when the bar let out (2 a.m.). He didn't come home until 10 a.m. And I just didn't give a shit. That day I started saving $ for a divorce and I basically just let him do whatever. He was the happiest he'd ever been. He started telling everyone I was the coolest wife ever. Little did he know.

He was completely blindsided when he came home and found all his shit on the front porch. Later, I learned he found great comfort in his girlfriend.

Great topic. For me, I still want the future that I signed up for when I married. Now that I see everything for what it really was, I realize that it was all imaginary, and how can you really mourn the passing of a fantasy? I still have an emotional attachment for what I believed was a future filled with fulfillment and happiness. I know that this is not the woman I thought I married

That was the key for me; realizing that the person I loved and married no longer existed and the person that was left could never be who I wanted or needed her to be.