SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

This is long so I apologize in advance!

My WS left in May 2019 after growing distant for months saying she didn't know if she loved me anymore, it wasn't my fault, I did nothing wrong, she just didn't know if she wanted to be in a relationship at all anymore. While she was gone she wouldn't say if she wanted a divorce, promised not to sleep with anyone until she told me if she did want one, and said she needed lots of space. Then on our anniversary in June 2019 I logged into her FB and saw a message to her friend saying "Natalie how old was the guy I slept with last night? Did he look 50 to you?" I confronted her about it (no response). Then I got into her search history and discovered an affair with a guy she met playing video games going back the previous four months.

To give an overview of what I know of the affair.

She had joined a gaming discord in December 2018 from a group she met playing overwatch. Starting in late January with her googling how to send nudes, how to do a strip tease, how to have phone sex etc. I came home from work on February 7th 2019 to her drunk off her ass crying in the bathroom telling me I married a broken person. This matches up to when she googled “how to have a long distance relationship”, “how to tell someone you love them”, and “how to send voice recordings on snapchat”.

He had not wanted to be exclusive apparently because she also googled “what does it mean to not be exclusive, and near as I can tell they are in an open bdsm relationship (she posted stuff about being a sub months and months ago on pintrest), and her search history included a lot of bdsm stuff. Between January and May 2019 I asked her several times if I could join the discord as i’m a gamer too but she told me no with no explanation every time. During the course of the affair she came to me several times weeping saying I had married a broken person and she needed therapy. I set her up with numbers and even got her into her primary care doctors office to get a reference. She never called. As spring 2019 continued she grew more and more distant. She began telling me she wasn’t responsible for my happiness. I began telling her she wasn’t meeting my needs as she was always out with her friends and our intimacy was down to once a month. We had a big fight about this and our “compromise” was her coming home with 20 minutes to spare every night so we could talk, and that she would dedicate one day off a week to “us” time.

One day she was in bed till 1pm and I tried to comfort her and ask her what she was upset about. She responded by telling me that “she didn’t know how to be happy in our marriage”. This devastated me and through the course of the day saw how much it did and told me she didn’t mean it and she was going to sign up for therapy. Several weeks later she told me she was going to two birthday parties of women I hadn’t met over both days of the weekend that I was working. She came home from them wearing a sexy top she only ever wore for me. I overlooked this like an idiot. A few weeks after this she came home from one of her female friends house and I told her that I missed her. She got angry at this and ended up telling me that sometimes she just doesn’t have the emotional capacity to talk to me at night. I told her that I am a better husband to her than she was a wife to me and we went to bed angry. I didn’t see her until the next night when she came home from work and she went straight to bed. I ended up venting my frustrations to her asking if she even loved me anymore or if she was planning on leaving me. She responded that she didn’t know until she got therapy. I grew upset and packed my stuff while she offered to be the one to leave (I declined so she would be home at least) and went to my dads for three days while we barely spoke. She said she had called to set up a therapy appointment. When I came back several days later she said again that she didn’t know if she loved me anymore, that while I was gone she had no anxiety, that it wasn’t my fault and I did nothing wrong, she just didn’t want to live under anyones expectations anymore. I told her all relationships she will ever be in will have expectations and she said she didn’t know if she wanted to be in a relationship at all. I told her I could afford the townhouse we were in and that she should go stay with her friend Natalie and we could fix things with marriage counseling. I asked for her keys and garage door opener as I was scared she would empty me out while I was at work. She called her mom and her mom and step dad showed up with a uhual and half of everything went out the door that day. I was in complete shock. I told her I didn’t want this over the next few days, and I wanted us to reconcile. She promised not to sleep with anyone until she got therapy, and said we could meet after she did, and that she wouldn’t file any paperwork until she did get therapy. She asked for “space and a lot of it” so I didn’t text her for weeks.During this time I barely ate or slept for weeks. I lost ten pounds in the month between when she left and DDAY. My birthday came and went. Nothing. Our anniversary arrived. I sent flowers to her work. Nothing. I logged onto facebook on our anniversary and her account was till logged in as passwords were saved on our laptop on my google account from when she used it. That’s when I found the message saying “Natalie how old was the guy I slept with last night” and then her search history.

I confronted her with everything. Screenshots included. She denied everything, including her search history, told me to never contact her again, then filed a bogus RO against me that she only showed up to court for once so it was dismissed.

It's all so completely awful... everything she's done. I’m still confused as mere days before she left she kissed my head and rubbed my back before she left. That during the affair she kept coming to me weeping saying I had married a broken person. Her search history included "limerance" and "how to get over limerance". She'd also left after I graduated college and became a medical laboratory scientist after she had been the main bread winner the previous 5 years while I was in college. It was her turn to go back to school while I provided. She didn't even have to work. I haven't heard from her really since DDAY, but her mother has sent from truly vile messages to me saying I was emotionally abusing her daughter without knowing it, and that I never actually loved her at all. So much of what i know from everything lines up with limerance being the root cause behind her being so callous.

It’s been over a year now and we have divorced (I filed). I’m now paying her $500 a month in alimony until March of 2022. I have only heard from her about financial things like our shared loan on my car since DDAY. I tried several times to reach out and ask her why. Culminating in a goodbye letter on NYE.

I knew her since we were 12 years old. We had been together since I was 19. Married at 20. She was with me through my service in the Army. She was the girl I wrote love letters to in basic, who hugged me when I got off the plane. The girl who I built a life with when I got out and who was my teammate as we scratched our way out of section 8 housing to being well off and middle class once I graduated. This was my ultimate nightmare scenario.

I think limerance and the new influence of her friend Natalie helped to destroy my marriage. Natalie is polyamorous and very promiscusous. She was giving my ex-wife loads of attention from Fall of 2018 through to when she left. I confronted Natalie over text in August 2019 and she admitted to being the catalyst for the death of my marriage and isn’t sorry….

I’m still finding myself hurting a lot. I still have nightmares. I’m on antidepressants as I nearly killed myself in August 2019.

There has been some good in this shit show of the last year of my life. Even before DDAY when she was just gone I started stepping and made some new friends (my old group dispersed in 2018- early 2019). I got a new job that wasn’t evening shift and wasn’t as stressful. I got a part in my cities opera and performed as an extra in two different productions now. I took up swing dancing and revitalized my entire wardrobe. I’ve even dated several different women.

In some ways i’m more me than I have ever been before, yet it still feels like a piece of me is missing.

I described my relationship to my ex wife to a friend after dday and described it like this.

“She was everything to me. Like my other half. No more likely to hurt me than my right hand would my left.”

I still dig to understand. Analyze. A tornado came through right after she left and she texted me “please please please be safe”. Part of me thinks that the limerance will end and I’ll hear from her again. Problem is I don’t think I could ever take her back. So why is there still a part of me hoping her limerance for this guy ends and she tries? I still love her is the worst part. I hope she’s ok, I hope she finds the success she’s been looking for in her career. I hope she finds a man who will treat her well. I’ve wept over my fears that some guy who picks her up from a bar will hurt her.

I don’t know how to let go. How to not care anymore. How to fill this void inside of me.

Any comments on my story or advice would be welcome.

(((HUGS)))

Welcome to the BEST club you NEVER wanted to join . I just want to let you know that you have been heard.

Your ex may be in limerance...or not. The thing is...NONE of us can change anyone else...we can only change ourselves. You seem to be heading in a good direction. You have gotten OUT of infidelity...which is a GOOD thing .

I am sure others will come along to help. Please don't be discouraged...weekends are normally slow. Continue to post and reach out as you need to...we are here to help !

You take it one day at a time. It is hard. The only way out is straight through, though.

What you love, what you miss, are your memories. It's hard to deal with the fact that the person you love doesn't exist anymore. You don't want this person back. You don't want someone who will lie and cheat and hurt you. You deserve so much better than that.

But it's going to take time to get to that perspective when you're hurting and all you want is for her to say she's sorry and wants to be with you and this was all a huge mistake. I know you're hurting and I'm so sorry. One day though, you will be glad that this was a relatively clean break and she didn't string you along much. It will make it easier to eventually move on and be happy again. And one day you WILL be happy again.

Try and find PTSD treatment in your area. You are hurt by the trama of her betrayal.

You need therapy. You need counseling. You may need to actually move to a different area for a new start.

PSTI

I am slowly getting better. You're right that eventually i'll realize she has no place in my life and be glad she's gone. Recently i've kind of accepted that she's just a bad person. I think the thing keeping me hung up a bit is the idea of limerance, which I think I need to shift my thinking on as being a scapegoat rather than an actual thing. If I can do that then she has no out for her actions.

skerzoid

I've been in therapy on and off since DDAY but the therapist I was seeing kind of plateaued with how much help I was actually getting from him. I starting with a new therapist come July. Hopefully that will help.

You might not see it that way, but I think you're doing pretty amazing. You're only a year away from Dday. You took up a few hobbies, you found a better job, you are taking care of yourself. You are changing therapists because the last one has plateaued. It sounds to me like you really are in charge of your life.

Maybe that's why it's so hard that you're not in charge of your feelings, that you still love her and care for her. Like PSTI said, the only way out is through. Accept these feelings, know they are completely normal. You will read lots of stories here of people still having feelings for their WXH or WXW after Dday and after divorce. It gets better. And if you look back to last year, is the pain just as bad as it was then? Can you imagine that in a year, it will have become even less? Just keep going.

Are you sleeping and eating well? Take care of yourself!

Hedwig

Thank you for the encouragement. I have progressed significantly since last year, and you're right, I'll be even better off next year.

I feel like I'm eating ok, but I wake up with bad anxiety several times a night anymore. Lots of nightmares.

Luckycline,

Sometimes we marry young, and we don’t have a lot of experience on what to look for in a spouse; I know it was my case with my XWW.

You will get through this, you just need time. In my case, I had to date a bunch of times (after my divorce) to better understand what is good for me or not.

You will get better, meet new people, have a ha ha! moment or a few, and your life will improve. In your case, you will probably always feel sadness for your XWW; she will probably go on a path that is not good for her.

But you can’t control what other people do, you can only control what you do. Hang in there, it WILL get better

Good for you that you can care for her well being, yet know that she is not healthy for you.

That’s a tough one!!

Lots of well wishes for your happy future.

Thanks for your service.

Sorry you are here. Infidelity is never easy.

Your XWW sounds like she is a very broken person. She is selfish, a liar and a cheater. It will not seem this way, but you are lucky she showed you who she is prior to having children (you didn't mention any so I'm assuming there none involved). She is clearly only concerned about herself.

Have you blocked her and her family from all communication? It will help. I'm also curious why you haven't refinanced your car loan so she is no longer involved. The sooner you have her completely out of your life the better.

Will her relationship fall apart? Most likely because either her or her AP's will decide they want something different. I have trouble believing that when two people (or more) who don't truly respect a committed relationship join up that there will be a happy ending. Poly relationships work so long as no one becomes jealous. Humans are jealous by nature. Regardless, she is out of your life, so it is not your concern.

Tigersrule-

Poly relationships work so long as no one becomes jealous.

That's not quite true. Poly people become jealous just like anyone else. The difference is that nonmonogamous people are taught two things- that jealousy is not a feeling but a response, and that it is NOT a sign of love or a healthy relationship but instead a sign of toxicity.

My DH and I have both experienced jealousy at different times in our relationship. The difference is in how we handle those feelings.

I agree with you that not respecting a committed relationship is NOT poly, though. That's cheating. Poly is only poly when it is open, honest, and ethical- meaning that everyone involved is aware of multiple partners and consents. Cheating doesn't work any better in poly than it does in mono relationships.

When I am jealous, I examine my whys. I drill down and learn what particular button is being pushed. Because jealousy is not an emotion in and of itself; it's how I am reacting to something. It could be envy, or loneliness, or unhappiness, or a sign of something else.

Most of the time when I experience jealousy, it's because I am missing something in my relationship, that I have needs or wants going unmet. So the issue isn't what my partner is doing or with whom- it's that I want to do more of X, whatever X happens to be. It's so much easier to deal with when you understand that fixing jealousy doesn't come from attempting to control your partner, but actually solving the root cause.

Poly people also consciously practice compression, which is effectively the opposite of jealousy. It's being mindfully happy that your partner is happy, whether that's from a metamour (your partner's partner) or just because something good happened that day.

Honestly, I think just the practice of mindfulness and spending time with our own feelings is such a positive and beneficial thing for any relationship, not just a poly one.

You said you were in the service. Please use those resources or your own health insurance to find a therapist that specializes in PTSD.

You are suffering from a very real trauma. We all get it, we also know that sometimes we need help to get through the shitstorm that is infidelity. Having a good therapist that deals w/ trauma and PTSD is important.

I know you will always have a special place in your heart for her, but she really is a shitty person, and your conflict between reality and memories will adjust over time. You will one day look back and be able to separate those things, but for now know that your heart and brain haven't caught up w/ each other yet.

Also remember healing from this no matter the path you choose takes somewhere between 2-5 years. You grieve, and deal with the trauma. You heal yourself. Then you move forward and have an awesome life, and keep the lessons you learned through this to never ever allow another person to disrespect you like she did.

If you are struggling w/ sleep and nightmares you should talk to your Dr. This is really bad for your overall health and keeps your cortisol levels too high. Continue to make those positive changes though. Consider even going back to school right now while you are single. Getting your advanced degree or special certifications in your field.

Luckycline, the anxiety is the worst. Heart palpitations, a feeling of being on edge all the time, etc. I went to therapy for it (before Dday) and it has gotten a lot better over time.

It's not a one fix for all, you should find out what works for you. For me, I limit myself to one cup of coffee a day, because caffeine has been linked to aggravation and maintenance of anxiety disorders. Another thing is that caffeine makes me sleep worse and that's another thing that aggravates the anxiety; sleep deprivation.

So, I agree with tushnurse, try and find a therapist.

Luckycline,

She WAS with me through my service in the Army. She WAS the girl I wrote love letters to in basic, who hugged me when I got off the plane. The girl who I built a life with when I got out and who WAS my teammate as we scratched our way out of section 8 housing to being well off and middle class once I graduated. This WAS my ultimate nightmare scenario.

She WAS everything to me

Just like the chapter of your life in the Army, the chapter of being in section 8 housing, the chapter of being in school, she WAS a chapter in your life.

That chapter, like all the others, has ended and it appears as though you are writing a new chapter for yourself.

starting with a new therapist come July, I have progressed significantly since last year, I started stepping and made some new friends, I got a new job, I got a part in my cities opera and performed as an extra in two different productions now, I took up swing dancing, revitalized my entire wardrobe, I’ve even dated several different women

Sounds like you are writing a great new chapter!

Tigersrule/PSTI

The poly group my ex-wife got involved with seems to be less multiple loving relationships, and more like swinger culture than anything else.

She also had SUPER jealousy issues throughout our marriage. We were married three years before she'd let me study with a female friend.

Tigers-

I've blocked her mother and have heard nothing from anyone else in the family. I haven't refinanced my car because, get this, I have too many expenses (alimony) and got denied.

Tushnurse-

I started seeing a new shrink. She's getting me to accept that this will take a while to get over. I'm trying not to rush myself anymore.

Fooled13years-

I had a moment recently where I saw the delineation between my new life and my life with her. I like who I am now far more than who I was with her. As I said I've gotten a bit into male fashion (think bowties, lapel pins, and hand made tweed hats). That's something she'd have never let me spend money on without a fight. My new $600 custom fitted suit would have caused her to leave me lol.

Tigersrule/PSTI

The poly group my ex-wife got involved with seems to be less multiple loving relationships, and more like swinger culture than anything else.

She also had SUPER jealousy issues throughout our marriage. We were married three years before she'd let me study with a female friend.

Well, since controlling your partner is the antithesis to polyamory, she doesn't sound very poly. The main focus behind polyamory is to build amazing relationships with individuals and help them to be their best selves and to be our own best selves. It's why unicorn hunters don't tend to do well- they're still stuck on the idea that two people in a couple are a unit, rather than separate people.

Poly people are just regular people in regular relationships- they just happen to have more than one of them. There may be overlap into other subcultures but strictly speaking, polyamory is multiple romantic relationships. It's not even about sex; there are asexual polys.

Swinging is definitely not polyamory. Not even the same ballpark.

Sounds like you really dodged a bullet with her! You deserve so much better.