SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

exhibit A being the fact that she opened p and told you the whole truth.

However, of all the threads I've read here on SI, the one unique factor in yours is that she has unequivocally become better for you over time, with the last few years being the strongest.

Butforthegrace

My struggle has always been with reconciling who she was back then with my own memories, and dealing with the thought that I would have broken up with her and thus my life is "off course" as a result.

CantBeMe123

People don’t just spontaneously confess something out of the blue after many years. Something changed.

Most commonly, the affair suddenly has the potential of being exposed. Now the WS decides that it’s better to get out in front of it and “confess.”

Another type of change is the marriage improving to the point where the WS is confident that the BS will never leave.

Some will admit that the reason they didn’t confess at the time was that the BS would have walked without a second thought.

I know that we encourage the WS to be honest but it seems particularly cruel to delay that honesty until the BS is all tied up with kids, etc.

It’s like jabbing someone with a hot poker. You can do it when they are free to jump or wait until you have them all tied up.

The WS was a cake eater during their affair and they still are. Their BS will never leave them because it was so long ago and the marriage has recently reached a peak. Plus their confession demonstrates what an outstanding person they now are.

During their affair they had stability from their BS and excitement from their AP. Now they had their affair and are a good person because they confessed. Cake and more cake.

The BS often laments that the marriage had never been better and then they find out about the affair. It’s not random. The confession occurred because the marriage is great. That was the change that allowed the confession. Without that, no confession.

Do you think she would have confessed if she thought you would 100% divorce her?

Your wife might be a great human being now but don't give her too much credit for confessing. She took a leap off a cliff by confessing but she waited until there was a net to catch her.

[This message edited by Michigan at 11:26 AM, July 23rd (Tuesday)]

I believe acceptance is the key to healing. You can not take it back. The memory is a done deal.

I feel it doesn't matter if the affair happened before or during the marriage, the pain is still the same. Infidelity is truly a soul crusher. All infidelity is based on lies, deception and then the reality of the life changing damage. Infidelity leaves a trail of destruction.

Work on healing your past. Seems like from the little reading I've done on your post, your WW is all in. She isn't the same person today as she was back then. Neither is my WH.

The truth is we all pretty much understand what you are going through. It all has the same undertone. We've all been cheated on, lied to, mistreated and the list goes on, by the person who we thought had our best interest at heart. We get it.

I have found not confusing the past with the present is key. The past is there to learn from and forgive and heal from or however you choose to take care of it. Or maybe not forgive but learn acceptance. I am learning to stay in the present more and more and not allowing the past to mar my presence and my new experiences with my WH. The past still creeps in from time to time, it's usually the triggers that get the best of me.

In the past,my WH did a number on my heart, soul and emotions. It was severe. Sometimes I feel like he still has hurtful behaviors. Today, it may just be my imagination because I also don't want to let go of the past at times. Sometimes the past is a safe place to be in, to hang onto the hurt so that I hope there will be no more new hurt. But the truth is my WH has worked so hard for change that I am slowly and I mean slowly allowing the horrible memories of the past to slip through my fingers and into the past. Today is a new and better day but I will also tell you that healing takes an awefully long time. It does seem like you and you WW love each other dearly with the exception of what happened before your marriage.

My advice to you would be to take your time and to learn to accept the past and learn to accept the past as it is. The past. And yes, it did happen. Stay there as long as you need to, until you don't want to anymore. Mourn it, cry, feel sad, get angry, whatever you need to do to feel better.

I know it is very difficult to do and no one said it has to be done in a day. My WH tells me that I have until the day he dies to come to terms with the pain he caused me in the past. I will gladly take that and hopefully, I have many more years with my WH.

If you and your WW truly love each other and both are willing to do the work, your marriage and life together will be better than ever. Again, there is no rush to accept or even heal this revelation. Take your time and do what you need to do to do to gain acceptance of this. Your love for each other doesn't have to fail.

Hang in there, you've got this. Things will get better. Promise.

[This message edited by Hurtmyheart at 1:49 PM, July 24th (Wednesday)]

I have found not confusing the past with the present the most confusing. The past is there to learn from and forgive and heal from or however you choose to take care of it. Or maybe not forgive but learn acceptance. I am learning to stay in the present more and more and not allowing the past to mar my presence and my new experiences with my WH. It is nice. The past still creeps in from time to time, it's usually the triggers that get the best of me.

That's just good advice in general but especially relevant to those of us who found out years later. Having been denied the opportunity to act when the A was the present it's real easy to live in rehashing the past.

@anoldlion - I guess all I can say is that my feelings of hurt, betrayal, and everything else don't come with a statute of limitations, and knowing my marriage and having kids and everything else in my life happened without a huge, important piece of information isn't an easy pill for me to just swallow down as you set forth. Your words echo many people in my life, all who minimize my pain and have almost ridiculed me for even considering a D. I know it comes from a good place, but it's not helpful to hear.

I get it.

My XWW cheated on me while we were engaged, but I didn't find out until I had 2 daughters from her.

It still mindfucks me to this day if I think about it too much. My oldest asked me about this recently. She wanted to know:

- if i wished I had known about it before we were married

- if I regretted marrying her knowing that I have 2 loving daughters from her

She didn't like my answers, but she understood.

My ENTIRE marriage to her was a lie, even the years where she did love and cherish me.

So I get it, brother.

And those ridiculing you for considering D, they've never been cheated on.

No matter which direction he chooses, he still needs to work on acceptance that it happened. Can't hope it never happened. Can't ignore the pain. I like the elephant in the room analogy. That hurt and pain is just there taking up the whole room, until it is addressed and dealt with.

I've gone through so many emotions that it scared me. I also felt that I was going to die several times when my emotions would go in waves. Very heavy highs and lows. The emotions were so overwhelming. In the beginning, I couldn't stay up in my mood because he kept doing unfaithful behaviors. Each time I thought we were moving past this, something else would go down. Finally I told him that he needed to go back to IC. He is so much better now because he is working on his own personal issues and insecurities. I was full (and still am at times) of hurt, anger, resentment, why me? I am so shocked that my husband would do such hateful things again me, us and his family.

I can choose to carry the anger, resentment, pain, hurt, hatred, isolation from him, constantly keeping my walls up for the rest of my life and stay in anger, hate, rage and pain, etc or I can slowly allow it to slip into the past. This experience will always for the rest of my life be part of who I am. I'm working on and learning acceptance. Not always easy though.

I can allow my WH to work on himself and change his behaviors and allow him to admit to the pain he caused me. I can allow him to cry and show remorse for his past behavior. I can allow him to do whatever he needs to do to work for change. In his case, it is doing CR (Celebrate Recovery) work through the books and writing, reading the bible and IC. Also allowing him to show me that he truly loves me by being faithful, honest and true and treating me with love and respect. And showing me what a safe partner is. I can learn to understand that the horrible person he was in the past is not that man today. I really hate the past and the terrible human being he became towards me and his kid's. He was a very hateful human being. I didn't want to be around him and my resentment grew towards him.

But because he is no longer that person today and he has and is working for change, I need to recognize who the person he is today. I will admit that sometimes I would rather just hang onto the hurt and hatred I experienced for him, sometimes it just feels safer. Esp if I am triggered and feel like he is acting unfaithful. I honestly will say that my trust for him has for the most part gone away. I do not have the blind faith I used to have for him. We are no longer the same couple we were but we are having better days and I am not going into dark places as often because of the changes he has made. I can actually feel happy in my day. I work hard to stay in the present moment and look at and see who he is today.

My WH was definitely on his way to losing me if he didn't work for change. But I also needed to allow him to change and become that safe person he is working to become today.

Hello,CBM,how can you ever leave your wife and your best friend alone knowing what you know? She had bin fantasizing for other people basicly your whole marriage. How can you past that? What will happen when the next crush is too strong,and that men proposition her? I dont know,but I wouldnt want to live like that. Dont you want to have a wife who trully loves you and respects you?

[This message edited by DjDjani at 1:16 AM, August 7th (Wednesday)]

Do you think she would have confessed if she thought you would 100% divorce her?

Your wife might be a great human being now but don't give her too much credit for confessing. She took a leap off a cliff by confessing but she waited until there was a net to catch her.

I 100% do not believe she would have confessed if she knew it would mean divorce. The whole reason she kept the secret in the first place is because it meant "divorce" (or no marriage).

I've never thrown a parade for what a great person she is for confessing, but I can objectively say that it takes some amount of courage and more than many cheaters will ever find, and I can give her that much credit. I for one had no intention of ever confessing the inappropriate events that happened between me and my former co-worker.

I have found not confusing the past with the present is key. The past is there to learn from and forgive and heal from or however you choose to take care of it. Or maybe not forgive but learn acceptance. I am learning to stay in the present more and more and not allowing the past to mar my presence and my new experiences with my WH. The past still creeps in from time to time, it's usually the triggers that get the best of me.

That is a great outlook. The piece that continues to hold me back is not acceptance of what she did, but acceptance that I am living a life that I would not be living had I known the truth. It is a real mindfuck to feel like you are living in some alternate timeline of your own life, manipulated by someone else for it to play out differently than you yourself know that it would have had you had full information. I really struggle with this.

@GoldenR - thanks for validation

Hello,CBM,how can you ever leave your wife and your best friend alone knowing what you know? She had bin fantasizing for other people basicly your whole marriage. How can you past that? What will happen when the next crush is too strong,and that men proposition her? I dont know,but I wouldnt want to live like that. Dont you want to have a wife who trully loves you and respects you?

I really don't have any concerns about this. It makes me uncomfortable to know she had fantasized about him in some way, but we've discussed it a lot and I understand the kind of "fantasy" it was, and more importantly what it wasn't. It was a very selfish thought process for her, and more about negative thoughts of his wife than positive thoughts of him. The overriding thought was, "he deserves more than what she gives him", and my wife inserted herself as the person who could give him more, because of course that's how her wayward brain worked. Despite giving me much worse than what my friend's wife had ever give him, my wife looked at herself as a much better person and someone who my friend would be happier with (in this fantasy).

I really do believe her that she had no intentions of acting on this or that she even had any real attraction for him. I have had thoughts like this of other women in my life and I feel the same way - it's about me and how great I am (vomit) and not about any real attraction or desire to leave my wife. I think on this particular issue, my wife and I actually have very similar thoughts and I find it easy to empathize with it and not be very scared by it.

Checking in again - R is still a struggle, some goods days, some bad. My wife is still trying very hard to be a better, safer person but it continues to feel like she is fighting against her own nature to do so. There have been three setbacks for R in the past couple of weeks, two "small" things and one bigger. I want to vent a bit and seek opinions/advice.

Big Thing: My wife had a new "confession" last week - she told me that she had accepted an invitation to get coffee with a male co-worker and walked with him to the coffee shop on their work campus and back to their office area. She told me that he was not being flirty with her, that they were having a casual office chat and he asked off the cuff, "I'm going to grab a coffee, want to come with me?" and she said yes. She told me that as soon as she started walking with him, she felt uncomfortable and realized she had made an error in judgement by agreeing to it, but she felt it was too late to change her mind (argh) and so walked with him to this other building and back. I told her I was very disappointed, that it hurt me to imagine her having a stroll across her work campus with another man (according to her, he is our age and physically fit, but bald and not attractive) and that I was hurt yet again because I felt like she does not think about me and my pain. To her credit, she was not defensive and agreed that she fucked up majorly and told me she 'confessed' it to me because she knew it was wrong and she wants to do better. I told her I was glad she told me about it and that it did show self-awareness and honesty, but that I was still hurt and that it's impossible to feel safe with her when she is still so willing to break a boundary.

I told her it felt like a betrayal, because she has written an R plan with a list of promises we've made to each other and one of them is to avoid one-on-ones with colleagues of the opposite sex. She told me she justified it to herself because he is married with kids and she felt no attraction for him and he wasn't being flirty. I told her the whole point of boundaries is because our judgement as human beings can't be trusted (no one sets out to be a cheater), and that by making her own judgement call to suspend a boundary, it shows me that she is still not safe and has wayward thinking. She agreed again and told me she knew how important it is to stick to our boundaries and that she has not earned the right to be trusted with judgement calls. I reminded her that it isn't about "earning it", that we owe it to each other to respect our boundaries and put them ahead of our own judgement or justifications. She agreed again, and while I was upset and a bit angry, I did not lash out at all and we were able to have a nice dinner with the kids without emotions (read: my emotions) getting out of control.

Small thing #1: We purchased a movie to watch with the kids, Inside Out. Our MC actually recommended it as even though it is a kids movie, it is focused on how people use feelings and seems to have a foundation in the therapy world. We thought it would be a nice family movie to watch together and maybe everyone would get something out of it. So we purchased it and made it about halfway through before bedtime.

The next morning, after I am finishing up my routine (I get ready first because I take the kids to daycare in the morning) I head downstairs and there everyone is watching the movie together from where we had left of the night before. My reaction is an immediate WTF. I feel so left out. She has the remote right next to her, and I look at her and say "isn't there something else you could be watching? I thought we were watching this together." She says, "Oh! Yes, definitely. (our daughter) wanted to watch more of the movie, sorry." I said, "well now I've missed 15 minutes of it, that doesn't feel nice." I can tell she then goes to her place of feeling bad and gets quiet/withdrawn.

Small Thing #2: While at the park, both of our young children had to use the bathroom, including one of them needing to go BM. I volunteered to take them and on the way, my wife says "If it's locked, text me, I can help" or something like that. Dealing with bathroom breaks has been a big stressor for me in the past because my wife has a habit of forgetting her phone and then I get stressed when things go on longer than normal, wondering if everything is OK, etc. Due to this, I asked her to commit to me to always keep her phone on her whenever we split up with the kids, whether to deal with bathroom breaks or anything else.

So I take the kids in, and my daughter finishes first while my son is still BMing, and she decides all of a sudden she really wants to tell her mom about something she found in the room. She runs out, and I tell her to stop but she's already out the door. Rather than run out after her and leave my son, I call my wife to tell her to make sure our daughter makes it back to where she is safely. Phone rings... rings... voicemail. WTF?!? I send a text saying "can't believe you're not picking up right now, did (daughter) make it back to you?" 2 or 3 minutes later, while I'm already leaving, she finally texts back to say yes. I was really upset. This felt like another promise broken. She told me she forgot her phone because she had no where to put it and that she went to get it as soon as she realized she didn't have it. Meanwhile, in those 3-5 minutes, our daughter could have run out the wrong way and gotten lost or hurt (she's 4). I didn't run after her because I relied on my wife to pickup her phone, and she didn't, and it really felt like a betrayal of trust.

EDIT - hit submit by accident. Continuing in next post.

[This message edited by CantBeMe123 at 12:09 PM, August 26th (Monday)]

I was upset all afternoon yesterday because of the stupid phone thing and had a little pity party for myself about all the same old shit (Why is it so hard to think about me, why can't you follow up on commitments you've made to me, why do you take me for granted so much, why couldn't you just leave me back then, why why why). I came through it and we were doing better by bedtime.

Big Thing Gets Bigger: This morning, I was dropping her off at her office because my in-laws are in town and needed a car. I haven't been to her office in a while and she works for a big company, so it's "campus" more than an office and she wanted to show me around, and I wanted to see it. 5 minutes in and we're walking outside towards her cafeteria/coffee shop so I'm already feeling a little upset because of her walking to get coffee with the guy (lets call him K) last week. Right on queue, a very fit attractive guy walks past us up ahead and I think to myself, "what if that's K? He has a shaved head and he's our age. No way, he's way too good looking, WW made him sound pretty unattractive." Guess what - as he walks past us, my wife goes "oh! There's K. Do you want to meet him?"

Panic. Anger. Humiliation. My favorite feelings flood in. I feel so lied to. Like she purposely minimized what this guy looks like, which of course then makes me disbelieve her not having an attraction for him. This guy looks like Jason fucking Statham. She described him as bald, like he was older. He's not "bald" he just shaves his head. He's in great shape and looks like all of "mini-APs" she had after her affair, muscular and fit and attractive. I feel fat and ugly and unattractive whenever I'm around guys that look like him. And my wife seems to really enjoy becoming "just friends" with guys like that.

I didn't want to meet this person, I wanted to run the fuck away and hide somewhere. We walked back to my car so I could just leave as I was extremely angry at this point. I accused her of minimizing and lying to me. She told me she has no attraction to him and doesn't think he does for her either, that he just looks to her "for approval" because she's his superior at work and respects her advice. I couldn't believe how naive and/or dishonest she was being. He asked her out for coffee! Even if it's kept professional, he obviously likes her company. She just read NOT Just Friends! What more does it take?

I feel so embarrassed by all of it. I'm tired of her making guy friends who are better looking than me and in great shape, and then I feel like shit about myself when I meet them. Not to mention most of these "just friends" either propositioned her for more or she admitted she developed a crush on them at some point. When will she learn? There is no such thing as just friends.

So here I am feeling like she still isn't safe, that she still thinks like a wayward by justifying all of her breaking of boundaries and promises. That she is still willing to lie to me about what her friendly coffee buddy male co-worker looks like in an effort to "protect me" or make me feel better about her spending time with him. As if that makes me feel better. That she still doesn't respect me enough to keep her phone with her like I've specifically asked while parenting out of the house, or to not watch a movie without me that we were watching together. All this stuff adds up and my mind goes right back to, is this all worth it? Can she change? What would life be like with someone who DOESN'T do these things?

After almost every setback, I will get an email from my wife and it will be really great, and it will show that she "gets it" and that she's very sorry and that she knows she screwed up and that she is working to be better. And I so badly want to believe it. And my wife will say, "I am trying to undo a lifetime of bad impulses, I wish I could do it overnight but I can't, I hate it just as much as you." And that feels great to hear and it makes sense, but time after time the results are the same.

We're 10 months out now, so not "fresh" anymore but not ancient history either. I worry the whole rest of my life will be a series of getting hurt and getting apologized to, when what I really want is to stop getting hurt to begin with. I really do not want to break up my family, and I do still love my wife. The days like today just make me feel so hopeless, like I am married to a ticking time bomb, that all I can hope for is for her to white-knuckle it the rest of her life.

I don't know what I'm looking for really, like I said at the top I just needed to vent. I hate feeling this way. Over the past two months, we've had a lot more good times than bad, but the bad are just so painful. And the good times always take effort, effort to not think about what she did, effort to enjoy sex without invasive thoughts, effort to focus on tomorrow instead of yesterday. It all feels so unfair, and I know that it is and I simply have to accept it if I want to R, but some days it's really fucking hard.

[This message edited by CantBeMe123 at 1:45 PM, August 26th (Monday)]

All I can say is these are some serious red flags with the coworker and she shouldn't be making friends with any men. Especially ones that are carbon copies of the OMs.

Does she have a plan for how to handle this coworker if he keeps talking to her outside of work or asks to get coffee with her again?

Once she realized she had crossed the line by going for coffee, she was unwilling to make the other guy feel uncomfortable; even though it would make you feel awful. Her right call was to say, “O crap, I can’t do this right now. Sorry. And then call you.”

I’ve been impressed at the steps your wife has taken up to this point. However, this is a definite hiccup that shows her boundaries are not firm. She did tell you. So the warning a system is in place, she needs to raise her internal defcon system and protect this marriage!!

My thoughts are with you.

Duplicate

[This message edited by Washashore at 12:29 PM, August 26th (Monday)]

All I can say is these are some serious red flags with the coworker and she shouldn't be making friends with any men. Especially ones that are carbon copies of the OMs.

Does she have a plan for how to handle this coworker if he keeps talking to her outside of work or asks to get coffee with her again?

Yes, there is a plan, a reconciliation plan she wrote out and formalized and it looks like a professional business plan. It's based on advice from many people on here, with different sections for "How I'm working on myself; How I will help you heal; How I will contribute to improve our marriage; Mutual Boundaries." That's how my wife is: over-achiever, perfectionist, eager to show her work. The problem is that she is much better at writing out a great plan than she is at saying "no" to a guy who wants to get coffee. Her written communication is excellent, her verbal communication falls apart when feelings of conflict avoidance, people pleasing, panic, etc derail her best intentions. She knows this and is actively working on it.

Honestly, I think she resents that I feel that this guy couldn't possibly only admire her because of her professional knowledge and good advice. I think she resents the implication that a man would only enjoy her company if he wants in her pants. She doesn't want to accept the fact that a man can (and often will) do both - admire her professionally, and also find her attractive. That's life. That's human nature. I am a man and have been all my life, I know this much is true!

Many men will overcome that part of their nature (I like to include myself in this) or not act on the attraction, but the problem is that you can't pick those men out from the assholes who WILL act on it. And this is the part she doesn't get, she thinks she can pick out the good from the bad which is total bullshit and scares me to death. Or rather, she knows she shouldn't do this and that we have agreed not to do this and set boundaries around it, but this is how she justified doing what she did. So something within her still finds a way to give herself permission.

Once she realized she had crossed the line by going for coffee, she was unwilling to make the other guy feel uncomfortable; even though it would make you feel awful. Her right call was to say, “O crap, I can’t do this right now. Sorry. And then call you.”

Exactly what I would hope for, at worst. I constantly feel like when I am out of sight, she puts the feelings of whoever is in front of her before mine.

I’ve been impressed at the steps your wife has taken up to this point. However, this is a definite hiccup that shows her boundaries are not firm. She did tell you. So the warning a system is in place, she needs to raise her internal defcon system and protect this marriage!!

My thoughts are with you.

Yeah, when she first told me about it, this was my response. I really wasn't overly upset and didn't have the kind of super-angry reaction I would have had just a few months ago. I told her I was disappointed, I was hurt, but I was happy she told me about it and it shows me she is moving in the right direction, even if she can still make bad decisions from time to time.

The other problem is that now that I've actually seen the guy, I think her confession was half-assed and insincere. I shouldn't be dealing with trickle truth on something like this! TT shouldn't exist in our life at all anymore. It's infuriating.

Just in from WW - guess who asked her to get coffee again today! Big fucking surprise, I told her after her confession last week this would happen, she has opened the floodgates by saying yes to him and signaling that she enjoys his company. Green light is on! She has made an office boyfriend and was either too naive to realize it or just happy to have one.

She managed to say no this time, but said she was visibly upset and he asked if she was OK and if he could help at all. Motherfucker. I have hated guys like this my whole life, and my fucking wife can't stop falling for their shit. Flash a handsome smile and say something nice or charming and my own "former" WW is more than happy to grab a coffee and defend it by telling me "what a nice guy" he is and how he's happily married and she can tell he's "not like that" and just "appreciates her advice". You know who's really "not like that" - the guys that aren't asking you out for fucking coffee! This isn't fucking hard!

Why was she upset? Bc she had to say no or bc she was wrong about him?

What a cruel world.

She sounds like a petulant princess.

Honestly, I think she resents that I feel that this guy couldn't possibly only admire her because of her professional knowledge and good advice. I think she resents the implication that a man would only enjoy her company if he wants in her pants. She doesn't want to accept the fact that a man can (and often will) do both - admire her professionally, and also find her attractive. That's life. That's human nature. I am a man and have been all my life, I know this much is true!

Women really do understand this. But the bad boundary is a huge issue. My wife didn't really get it until one of her 'harmless' co-workers went full stalker. She was shocked because they didn't flirt, were always 'professional' and he appeared to respect her. He was playing the long game and ran out of patience and just started showing up at non work place events that he knew she was going to attend. He knew that by following her on LinkedIn.

Anyway, yeah, the need for co-worker validation is a tricky thing, because business leaders DO need to have people who respect them on a professional level. It's just that when it comes to down to it, more often than not, men are finally able to multi-task -- as in be a good company guy and be capable to turn his attention to a lovely co-worker.

My wife, on her own now, still has lunch with male co-workers and vendors, but she always has at least one female co-worker along for the event. A one on one lunch, or walk, or dinner is far more tricky for someone with boundary issues. With multiple folks along, the guy never gets the idea she WANTS one on one time with him.

[This message edited by Oldwounds at 2:35 PM, August 26th (Monday)]

Why was she upset? Bc she had to say no or bc she was wrong about him?

I think because she was already feeling like shit because of how we left this morning and him popping in to ask her to coffee again probably sent her into a immediate shame spiral.

@Oldwounds - I agree with your thoughts, and the story of your wife's stalker is a scary reminder of just how nuts some people can be.

I absolutely believe my wife is worthy of being admired for her professional accomplishments and that her advice should be sought after and followed. I sometimes get the sense that she feels resentful for being attractive, like if only she were less pretty she would be seen more for her accomplishments and I would be less jealous and not think every attractive co-worker wants to get in her pants.

To which I say, first, cry me a river, and second, boundaries apply to all men, not just "attractive" ones because that is subjective and she tends to play fast and loose with who she considers attractive anyway. If I listened to her bullshit, then I am the only attractive man on Earth, which would be great if only it were true