SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hello,

I am the BH.

I will start off that this is not my WW first time cheating. She had cheated on me 2 years into our relationship together. We started dating in 2003. With that AP, that relationship lasted 3 months before I found out. It was an emotional and slightly physical affair, but no penetrative sex. We took a month off from each other. My WW decided that she wanted to be with me during that time. I pushed that affair off to the side and tried to forget that it ever happened since she chose me. Even though I would think about it every now and then. I trusted her for the most part, but sometimes had my doubt. Unfortunately, my doubt became real.

We dated for 8 years before getting married in 2011. We have never had sex with anyone else, so that WAS special to just us. That same week of getting married, I went back to school FT for a 1 year accelerated program. I was consumed by schoolwork and I worked the entire weekend because I felt the need to hold my own financially and not be a freeloader. My WW did offer to support me, but I thought to myself it was only a year and I can get through it doing the hard work. WW worked FT M-F sometimes late and sometimes early. So we would only see each on the evenings, or if she worked late, Sometimes once a week for a couple of hours. I had to get up early as I was making a 1.5hr commute to my 8hr internship, so I went to bed early regularly. I worked 10 and 12 hr shifts on the weekend. So yea, our first year we did not see each other a whole lot. I just assumed she understood what I was doing since I was training to do the same thing she was already doing. I also assumed she was going to tough it out with me for that 1 year especially since we just got married. I was under the impression that is what marriage was all about.

Within 3 months of being married and me starting school, she began an affair with a coworker at work. I knew the AP, and he was also at our wedding. The affair lasted until out 1 yr marriage anniversary, so roughly 9 months. During the last couple months of their affair, I was finishing up school so we decided that we would try to get pregnant. We also searched and purchased a home during the time period of the affair. I shook the hand of the AP when we went to his house to pick up appliances for our new home, unaware that that was not my WW's first time at his home because it was in the mist of their affair. This was only one of the many slaps in my face during this affair.

After the highest intensity of the affair ended after our 1 yr anniversary, their affair continued for 5 more years as a low intensity affair with kissing, touching, inappropriate texting, emails, sexting, communication. They continued to work with each other and would periodically meet in secret at work. I did not find out until last year.

D day was last February of 2018 when I discovered about the affair. When initially confronted, I was fed lies for 3 days. On that 3rd day I was fed half truths that an affair had occurred 6 years ago. For 3 months I was led to believe that. Until I spoke with the AP wife, where I discovered inconsistencies in WW story. I then realized that a 6 year ago affair has been going on for 6 years.

Over the course of 6 years, We were recently married from an 8 year dating relationship, Bought a home, had out first child and had our second child. This affair has tainted my timeline of all my family life mile markers since they are now used a markers for the affair. Both children are most definitively mine.

Despite our marital issues that comes with life and children, I remained faithful and kept myself pure for my wife. Despite now knowing that when our sex life took a hit with our first child, that she was still provoking her AP via text/e-mail etc.

So if anyone would like to be constructive and give me advice I am all ears. We are a week away from our D-day. I have calmed down considerably. In fact, our first 3 months post D-day was moving in a positive direction when I thought it was a 9 month affair that was 6 years ago. It wasn't until I realized that she had lied to me multiple times about details of the affair and that it was a 6 year LONG affair that I have been put into my current position.

We are trying to figure out ways for me to get over this ordeal. Ways for me to forgive her. Ways for me to find some trust in what she says. I know she will never have my full trust, but it would be comforting to know that I would be able to trust her a little bit again.

[This message edited by ReceivedChaos at 8:07 AM, February 16th (Saturday)]

Just for clarity, have you decided to stay with her?

Or are you trying to figure out what the best path forward for you is?

I am sorry

So She is cheating on you from the beginning of marriage and never stopped???

When Dday 1 happened did it stopped??

How was your sex life during this affair

And dude i think you really need some alone time for some thinking.

Firrst of all, I am sorry you are here and in pain.

I am a BS. My story... My husband had affairs online for 5 years before he booked a prostitute. After six weeks he fell in love with her. She was his life love, his soulmate, his best friend. His affair lasted five years.

During this time I took care of our two DSs, our house, worked full time, my mother died and a host of other things. I have never cheated. I have been with only two men, my first boyfriend and my husband. We will have our 25th anniversary (if we make it) this year.

I have been betrayed, lied to, hurt, disrespected, in so many ways it makes me want to scream. He has been selfish, mean, self absorbed, and a turd.

This is a significant betrayal. And I am hurt. I am angry. I feel used. I feel gutted. I want him to know my pain.

So to my point.

His shitty choices do not define me. It is not my fault. His choices and actions define him. Same for your WW. her behaviour and choices have not prioritized you or your marriage. It is selfish hurtful behaviour. She has behaved in a manner that is detrimental to your relationship.

My WH wants to R. He now says he loves me. He is sorry and does act remorsefully.

I am deciding if I want to stay or divorce. My choice.

As part of this process I am trying to heal by going to counseling, doing things for me, and taking a break from him. I go out with friends, exercise, spend time with my kids, read etc. I am taking care of me and putting me first.

Having your wife set up a revenge affair is not going to help you get over this. It will hurt you. I want my husband to pay for what he has done. He is. He broke us. Our kids won’t talk to him. His family is mortified. He is ashamed. He has to live with this forever.

I suggest that you go to IC. She can pay. Start focusing on healing yourself. Do things for you. If your aww truly wants your marriage she will be remorseful. I suggest that you Set up rules. Example- no contact or we are done. Or no male friends. Get her passwords and monitor her activity for her apps and phone. There are lots of good articles it the healing library. One on reconciliation that is most helpful.

It is your choice to R or D. And working to a decision takes time and support.

I hope I have helped a little. Take care of yourself.

[This message edited by Tallgirl at 12:31 AM, February 16th (Saturday)]

Sorry you're here OP.

We only know your wife from what you've written. And you've told us she's a terrible wife.

She's lied right to your face repeatedly for years. How do ever trust someone like her again?

Going forward, I suppose you can trust her to not act like, I don't know, a sociopath. That hasn't worked real well so far in your marriage. Or, I guess you become a detective/her-parent - checking her phone, checking her location, checking her social media, setting curfews, etc. trying to get her to act like a responsible adult.

Six years, whoa that's a lot of cheating. I sort of think that's who she is now.

But people can change, drunks can stop drinking. If you want to try R, read some of the threads in the Reconciliation Forum here at SI so you know what you're in for - years of hard work for your marriage. Do you think she's up for that?

[This message edited by SnowToArmPits at 4:20 AM, February 16th (Saturday)]

Adults "in lurve" that have physical access for 6 years that never have sex. Come on, surely you don't believe that, bc I can tell you, no one here believes it.

DNA test your kid.

6 years is not an affair. It's a relationship. You were the other man. He was the primary man in her life.

Pretty much your entire marriage has been a lie.

There is no reason to stay with her.

We are trying to figure out ways for me to get over this ordeal. Ways for me to forgive her. Ways for me to find some trust in what she says. I know she will never have my full trust, but it would be comforting to know that I would be able to trust her a little bit again.

Why would this be your focus? Your WW cheated on you, lied to you, and carried on with another man for almost her entire relationship with you. She had a baby that could be yours or his. Clearly, she has major ethical problems at the very least. Seems to me that if you are devoting mental energy to figuring things out, it ought to be devoted to figuring out why your wife's version of commitment, honest, and morality is so twisted and messed up, ways for her to make herself into an honorable person who can be trusted, somebody she clearly was not. Until she does that -- until she makes herself into somebody safe -- you ought to be running as far and as fast as you can from this toxic individual.

Just realized that I'm familiar with your wife's posts here.

She reeeeeally comes nowhere near telling the entire story. If she can't come clean here with strangers without minimizing, then what chance do you have of getting an honest partner in her?

After the highest intensity of the affair ended after our 1 yr anniversary, their affair continued for 5 more years as a low intensity affair with kissing, touching, inappropriate texting, emails, sexting, communication. They continued to work with each other and would periodically meet in secret at work. I did not find out until last year.

Sorry man the probability that this wasn't a full sexual affair is low.

At this point you don't know what you're forgiving. As you've seen cheaters lie a lot plus if they still work together the probability of the affair continuing is high. Just because you've found out doesn't mean it's gonna stop.

Maybe you can get more insight from OM wife?

You are trying to force R. Seems to me your are setting yourself up for more.

Better take some time and think. Never jump into R or MC upfront.

She was living a separate life/relationship that you never knew about.

The children are most definitively mine as the #2 AP is of a different ethnicity.

I'd like to think I have decided to stay as I can't imagine a life without her. But I have decided that the first step is forgiving her. I want to exhaust all options before going down the road of divorce.

Jinkazama: After DDay1, I walked in on them sitting on the couch together at her parents house. We took a break for 1 month. She was seeing the both of us during that break period. After that month she decided to stay with me and then separated herself from #1AP. She admitted that #1AP tried calling her several times and have denied him her time. She was upfront and told me what happened and her response to those calls.

Sex life was our normal, but it was already limited due to my school/work schedule and her work schedule our first year of marriage. No major changes in her. She did start going to the gym. But we lived with my grandmother at the time it started and she had reason to not want to be home since they did not get along. In hindsight I now see some of the signs I missed or ignored.

Sex life post 1st baby, our sex life took a dump. She showed bare minimal effort despite trying to spice things up. I'd like to think it was because of the hormones and stress of having our first child.

Should be noted she only had sex with him 4 times during their affair which all occurred during our first year of marriage. She has only had sex with him once during the period of us trying to conceive our first child. According to my WW, only Kissing/touching/inappropriate conversations/sexting occurred for years 2-6 of our marriage. There were apparently long periods of no physical contact for stretches of months, up to a year, since they were not working in close proximity and it was not convenient for them to meet due to work schedules.

Thank you Tallgirl for sharing your story. I know it's never easy retracing the story of an affair. I have been doing things for me. But unfortunately my thoughts, even a year out, are constantly about the affair. Rethinking it, reliving Dday, trying to figure out who my WW is, trying to come up with ideas of R. I've considered IC, but have been through several different MC thus far, and realized everyone is the same and they all think to just follow it by the book. I feel like each situation needs to be evaluated and amended to reflect the individual and situations. Most counselors appeared to not do that except with our current MC. It is also hard since she still works with #2AP. Our field is very specialized and there are not a ton of job openings out there. So the "no contact rule" is hard to enforce since I can spy on her at work. I do have access to all banks/credit cards/phone etc. But I feel like anyone clever enough can figure out ways around such monitoring.

I see #2AP as the "other man" since we continued to live our lives like any normal family. After our first year of marraige, WW states she only kept in contact with him as a convenience "thing". Only texts/e-mail and only at work. She states she never made time for him outside of work short of texting.

When I spoke with #2AP's wife, she claimed she was completely on board with full reconciliation and was putting the affair behind them. So unfortunately I am unsure if #2AP has received any recourse for his action to prevent him from maintaining contact with my WW.

GoldenR I spent some time and read through some of her posts/threads since I knew she was on here and I wanted to know what was going on. There were some unkind words about me, which isn't particular unfair, but given my situation I suppose I had to justify what was going on. The minimizing was my situation with the initial Dday and led to bigger issues down the road in my recovering. Any story now appears they could be lies or could be truths. It is unknown and I am unable to tell the difference. She kept BIG details out of her story. Simply put, she said she is ashamed of everything she has done even though she has complete anonymity. There were also some partial truths to what she was saying on here that continued to paint me as someone unwilling to compromise. I am willing to work with her on some aspects, but she has offered very little in what can be done to fix our marriage. Which is why she posted on here since she did not have any ideas. You may be familiar with the thread of me wanting to have my own affair.

[This message edited by ReceivedChaos at 8:11 AM, February 16th (Saturday)]

One of the hardest truths to R is that you can want it more than anything else in the world but never get it because your WS won't give you what you need to R. That's exactly where you are right now. You don't have honesty from her and it sounds like on some level she blames you for the A if she's talking badly about you so you don't have accountability either. Both are necessary before the real work of R can begin.

Do you have transparency such as open access to her phone, email, social media, etc.? Has she sent the OM a NC letter or message? Are you sure it's over? Is she in IC? Could you get into IC for yourself?

RC, I also must ask, is it true that you want to punish her, forever mark her as a cheater, and have her help you with a RA? It's important for everyone here to know that because it will change the advice that you're given.

Gently, your wife is a cheater x2. No sugarcoating it. Sorry. You rugswept her first affair prior to marriage. That should have been a huge red flag.

Unfortunately, your entire relationship is based on a lie. You were married in 2011, and she cheated until 2017?

If the affair was ongoing for SIX years, IMO they had sex, esp. since they work together, it's not that difficult to find time during the workday.

Honestly, I highly suggest a GOOD therapist to help you understand the severity of her actions. I don't think you fully grasp exactly what she has done...pretty much your entire relationship.

Based just on what you've written, this is going to be your life going forward. Affairs are emotionally abusive.

Why would you want to put yourself through more pain? You've been through hell and back, sometimes love is not enough.

Your wife is extremely broken. You cannot fix her.

BTW, you having a revenge affair will only add fuel to the fire. Divorce first before you begin any relationship even if it's just a ONS. Keep your integrity intact.

[This message edited by annb at 8:49 AM, February 16th (Saturday)]

The things we have already done:

Since #2AP was at our wedding, any wedding photos with #2AP are removed. All traces have been removed from other pictures from other events, ie happy hours, other functions etc.

I have access to our phone account, her credit cards and her bank accounts. I have access to her virtual work schedule. We ahve established that her phone needs to be visible at all times at home. She is to verbally out loud explain what she is doing on her phone. It is as my discretion to validate what she is doing on her phone to check to ensure she is not lying. She has not been doing that consistently.

We finally removed the car couple months ago where their affair began and continued.

We mailed a letter to the #2AP wife to expose him. It took 3 months of me fighting with WW to get that to happen. So it was/is considered that WW could have notified #2AP in the incoming letter so that it could be intercepted. Unclear if I actually spoke with the wife or not via email/phone or just one if his female friends.

My WW got her "tattoo". It was originally requested that she get a tattoo that represents me and to incorporate something into the tattoo to remind her of the 2 affairs she has had to remind her of the pain that we felt/feel now as a way to remind her to not go down that road again. She was resistant to remind herself of anything of the affair. Offered to only get a tattoo of my representation of me, but her idea was a quote with left it open to who she was speaking about. I told her she could get something as simple as 2 small dots (size of the writing side of a pen/pencil tip) on her hand. She already had a single dot on the other hand for an unrelate thing. After couple weeks of apprehension, she did finally got that tattoo.

She does take care of the house so I can have me time to do as I wish.

She has become a little more adventurous in bed in an attempt to try to overshadow what she did for her #2AP.

We still have #2AP appliances from his home, which I am currently considering removing. They are not a particularly strong trigger for me so it is not high on my agenda.

I requested a month ago a monetary payment for a project of mine that is of a significant amount. The original idea was that she would spend as much on me as she did on the affair. I didn't amount to much since only 3 hotel rooms were booked. A lot of it happened at work/garage. There was no showering of gifts to each other as far as I know. But my WW would be considered to be "frugal". So I know it will be difficult for her to make this happen. She agreed to it. We both know it will take time to save the money, but she has not put anything towards this task yet.

I am sure there were other tasks that have been completed or being done, but none that currently comes to mind as I am trying to bring back all of my past memories since starting on here.

nekonamida Is it true, to both.

To mark her blatantly as a cheater, no. But to make a mark that symbolizes the #2. I inititally said she had discretion to make the design of what to do. She already had a single dot tattoo on the left hand that is completely unrelated. Size of the tip of the writing end of a pen. I asked her to get 2 dots on the right hand. A reminder to not stray from the right path in the future.

She has indeed spent the majority of our marriage cheating. However, I do recognize that she spent 6 out of 15 years of our overall relationship tied up in affairs. I do not know if now I am just defending her. I do love her, but I am struggling trying to get over this.

As far as rugsweeping goes, I see that in hindsight and recognize that now and do regret it. Hindsight is always 20/20. But I do have 2 wonderful children now that I love to pieces. With that said, I felt like she was truly remorseful and she was upfront when #1AP tried contacting her. It showed me she meant what she said that she was over #1AP. It was true that she was over #1AP. Its just unfortunately that she didn't mean that part where she told me "she doesn't want to do this to me again". But I was under the impression that she learned from the first time. That is why I feel like if I am to continue healing with my WW, that I am not going to rug sweep this event this time and she will feel the full weight of her actions. She will know how much pain it has caused me and she will remember that pain she has caused herself. In order for me to be able to move on, I need to know that she will never forget and never want to go through this again.

[This message edited by ReceivedChaos at 9:45 AM, February 16th (Saturday)]

I also do not want this to just be a cheater bashing session either. She is on these forums and she will probably be going through this thread. Even though I don't think she is owed that privilege, I don't need her to be upset because of what other people think of her. She already knows that I think the way everyone does.

I am authentically looking for ideas for her to prove herself to me. I am looking for answers that will give me proof that she either means what she says now, that she understands what she has done etc.

I'm with Butforthegrace - you're focusing on the wrong person.

Your W cheated because of her own issues, not because of issues with you or your M. To build a strong, monogamous M (which is what I assume you want, but correct me if I'm wrong), she has to change from betrayer to good partner.

Forgiveness may be for you, but where infidelity is the problem, it needs to be earned. Your W needs to do by thousands of trust-building and love-restoring actions.

R requires 3 'healings.' BS heals BS. WS heals WS. Together they heal/build/rebuild their M.

Your W's thousands of trust-building actions earn forgiveness, if she does them, but you can't really give forgiveness unless you resolve all the feelings of anger, grief, fear, and shame that come with being betrayed. Intellect alone is not enough to get you out of the hole you're in - you need to resolve the feelings.

The only other alternative seems to be stuffing the feelings - and if you do that, they will come out unexpectedly and in nasty ways.

Forgiveness is not necessary for R. Cheating is unforgivable, though some of us do forgive. But the fact is that it's unforgivable, so why forgive? Showing trustworthiness and love is what rebuilds Ms.

I've just placed a few threads on the 1st page of the JFO forum. I urge you to read them. They're identified by the target icon. They include:

Before you say reconcile, recover

Good threads for new members to read

Boundaries and consequences

I also urge you to read https://www.survivinginfidelity.com/healing_library/reconciliation/what-every-wayward-spouse-needs-to-know.asp? If this makes sense to you, I urge you to have your W read it and see how many of the recommendations she'll adopt. Too few, and she's not a candidate for R.

ReceivedChaos,

I posted this to your WWs thread, so I moved a copy here

As for things your WW might do to compensate you.

Did she write out a timeline then take a polygraph to validate her timeline. Then have her take a polygraph every 3 years or so.

Did she apologized face to face with the wife or so of OM1 and OM2, this is painful to do but reminds your WW that it's a crime against many people.

Did she meet with HR to file a complaint against OM1 and OM2.

Have her pay for a PI to investigate OM1 and OM2 generally OM types keep at it and can be caught again.

Have her confess to your children and her parents and your parents, this sounds harsh, but you don't get to keep your reputation once you turn it into a fake.

ReceivedChaos,

I see your WW going to work as a big trigger for you can you get the OM fired?

Another issue is that it sounds like the OM lives close by so the area you live in may be filled with triggers for you, for example if your kids go to school or sports with the OM kids.

Are there mutual friends of OM and you or WW these may have to go.

Also did you get tested for STDs kissing is sex as you can get HPV and as a result oral cancers.

Does your WW have a fetish for people of OM2s ethnicity, I think I have that issue with my WW.

Did she do things with OM2 or OM1 she has not and will not do with you? This frequently makes it impossible for men to recover.

RC:

Please follow the advise of sisoon

otherwise you are looking for

edit for spelling

[This message edited by Hippo16 at 12:20 PM, February 16th (Saturday)]