SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hearing a confession was so devastating I can't imagine wanting to compare the 2 ways of learning about being betrayed.

How do you think this discussion will this help you? (honest question, not a challenge)

I found out and confronted my H, but if he had confessed out of the blue, I don't think it would have been any easier, and might even have been harder.

I think it's just plain hard no matter how you find out. Either way, you're in for months if not years of gut-wrenching pain.

I found out by him pocket dialling me while he was fucking a prostitute. Eleven minutes and thirty five seconds of it. I did find out about his infidelity with his ex-wife by him telling me early on in our relationship, but he didnt tell me the full extent. That joy was given to me by his ex-wife in an anonymous email.

I wonder if I would have preferred it to have been a face to face confession, but honestly, I am not sure I could have coped with seeing him say those words.

How do you think this discussion will this help you? (honest question, not a challenge)

It isn't really about helping me. It's about wishing he'd have told me so that maybe I would feel like I'd been important enough to be considered in any of it. Or just wondering if I had not finally caught on how long it would have progressed. I spend a lot of time in the what ifs these days. It's not helpful but it is what it is.

Thanks for the clarification.

FWIW, somebody here used to have a tagline that said the BS was collateral damage in the A, and I found some peace with that thought.

It's also really helped me to remember that the A is about the WS, not about the BS. There's essentially nothing your or I could have done to prevent our partners' As...sort of another way of saying BSes are collateral damage.

[This message edited by sisoon at 10:29 PM, October 6th (Sunday)]

I found out about A#1 and A#2 by my FWW telling me. A#3 I was unlucky enough to catch her with the OM in the act. Not a good way to find out. More details and the history eventually came out from my sleuthing and subsequent talk with the OM when he was desperate to answer my questions while hoping to avoid me telling his BS. They initially both denied "having sex" despite being naked when I caught them. Their definition of sex was like Clinton .. absent actual penetration then no sex. This definition did not hold up eventually either. Well, I am now 2.5 years from Dday and R is going well but the complete trust will never be there. Jury is still out. I promised to give it 3 years and if I can't get rid of the images etc. by then .. it will be time to move on. So for me, I would have preferred being told.

He confessed. As he was walking out on me, he said, "I cheated on you and I didn't feel guilty". Then left and texted me the next day to tell me who it was.

both for me, and it really made no difference. when he confessed...after i ran across clues...it broke my heart. and of course he still tried to minimize the a...like they never spent time together. of course i found out he lied when i discovered photos of them on the beach.

the 2nd dday, i found a dirty text in his phone. he lied...even during our separation about the a. claimed it was only sexting...from someone he met off the internet. truth was that he had been in a full blown 2 year a with a woman 15 years older than us...and a therapist too.

once i found out on my own...i was like a shark in blood infested waters....i investigated everything until i got the whole, ugly truth...all of it.

it was all bad.

i think finding out might be a little worse because had i not "caught him" it would have most likely continued for a long time. i will never know. they certainly werent in the process of breaking up until they got busted.

and honestly....i think a true "confession" is RARE. there is USUALLY some REASON why the cheater is coming clean. not just because they felt so guilty. especially if it was sexual acts that happend more than once...and planned. most of the time cheaters take the time to plan, coordinate, calculate, or deceive with a smile while they are saying "i love you" to the spouse. i can only count a handful of cheaters on SI who came clean on their own, without any prompting in any way just because they felt bad. and out of those handful of cheaters who confessed, there was almost ALWAYS something that made them admit it. and most confessions like that are almost ALWAYS filled with half truths, minimizing, or just plain lies.

It's devastating no matter what. However, if you have a spouse willing to come to you with something that could very well likely end the marriage, well, that's a start in the respect direction.....

Both ways suck.

I am glad I found out though. I put it together, did my homework and investigation. Gave me a sense of empowerment. Not to mention post d-day a lot of skills on the hacking side I did not have previously :)

It also allowed me to hate her more, which was healthy for me for a while.

Comparing this stuff on most levels is silly. Pain is pain and how we deal with it is what matters...

take care...

[This message edited by wert at 7:18 AM, October 8th (Tuesday)]

She confessed out of the blue, but wasn't willing to end it. So she got about another week with him before agreeing to end the relationship, which really meant four more months of continued contact in secret.

The wife just blabbed it all in excruciating detail without warning.

Sometimes I'm comforted (most of the time in fact) but sometimes it seems like just another selfish act- unloading guilt.

Basically I think both are shit.

I was told by the OW's BH, he called me at work. He had known since April, he finally called me in October. I confronted FWH the next day and he confessed within minutes. It was awful!! I'm thankful he finally told me otherwise I wouldn't have known, things were bad but I wasn't thinking AFFAIR!!

I found out by downloading his micro sd card out of his phone which had video of them having oral and regular sex on it. Its a horrible way to find out

There was no confession or finding out for me. OW contacted me via Facebook to inform me of her and my WH relationship. He basically ended it with her and she got pissed. Doesn't make me feel any better though.

I think being told by the AP would be horrible. But what of this isn't? What a horribly wonderful club we belong to. Your responses have helped me view this in different ways. I already knew it would suck regardless but it helps a tiny bit that I probably wouldn't have been comforted at all had it come from him.

Not believing a single word he says is a big struggle for me. I guess I will get used to it one day.