SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Amen steadychevy.

SurvivingIndiana, at this point, I think you are right to detach and move on.

I read another post on Reddit today that made me question human kind, so a bit cynical today!

Take care brother.

SurvivingIndiana

I was in a similar relationship pre-marriage with similar characteristics and events.

Here is what I know. The two of you, as you are now, will never work in a progressively more serious relationship. With what has happened, there really is no viable Near term scenario where you somehow Work on things a bit and go back to happiness together and move your relationship on to higher levels like marriage in a truly trusting way.

One month, four weeks apart is not enough. Unfortunately and I’m sorry to have to say, from experience, that the only way forward is to move on at this time. End the relationship and learn from it. I have experienced the same thing when I was your age. Like others here, I can relate.

Get yourself a good therapist to work with and move on in life, grow and use this experience to change how you approach relationships going forward. Keep the things that worked, discard what didn’t and try again. That is what life is about. There are never guarantees.

That said, years down the road, you don’t know what may happen between the two of you. You may never talk to her again after dismantling your current connection. That is a very likely scenario. You could become friends, that has also happened to me with someone who didn’t cheat but broke my heart nonetheless.

Or you could meet up again someday, after a lot of work on her part, deep diving into her very intricate sounding issues, after you each have experienced more relationships and find the different people you have become can build that trusting relationship that didn’t work this time. You’ll have your eyes open then and find that honestly telling her what you need to start and create a true partnership and relationship and insisting that she only try if she is sure she can deliver on those requirements is the only way forward.

Is it likely to happen that way? Nope. But you’d be far from the first.

Your life is a long journey. Honestly the likelihood she was the only one in this world of billions of women that you’d find fulfillment in spending a life with is as close to zero as you can get.

They say it and it’s true, if it’s meant to be, it will happen, but not with the two people who you are today.

Take this opportunity to work on yourself for a while, and move on officially. Focus on you for at least six months and let yourself slowly detach and stop worrying about her. Then start interacting slowly with other women and find your next great love. Will she be the forever one? I don’t know. But I’m confident you will find her.

The first step is to accept that right now, your WGF is not her.

Take care.

[This message edited by Stevesn at 6:33 AM, August 20th (Thursday)]

I am just re-posting this advice to you from another member a number of posts ago, referring to what her counselor said. It is a nice insight and I would hate for it to get lost in the shuffle. (the general idea has been mixed in elsewhere as well)

ceadugena: Let me briefly summarize what she said because you might find it helpful (perhaps your counselor told you the same thing). She said that trying to intellectualize the betrayal trauma was essentially wrong, because while concentrating on the other person and trying to find rationale for their actions I was in fact suppressing my own emotions of pain, hurt, fear and anger. In the long run it would worsen my already bad emotional state and slow down my healing. Try to make the next few weeks/months about you, not your wife or marriage.

I remember in the beginning thinking no way I can stop figuring this out. All I could do was try to put the puzzle together of 'why'.

Bad news in the end, the puzzle is either missing pieces, or there are to many, or some form of - the puzzle doesn't work. It will frustrate you because there is no answer, just more questions. You on the other hand can pull together all your own pieces, goals, fears, faith, whatever they may be. You can work with that.

Take care, glad you have gotten yourself some breathing room to move forward.

[This message edited by Anna123 at 10:15 AM, August 20th (Thursday)]

You are so young and there are so many great things you dont even know about yourself .

Firstly please make sure you don't accidentally end up bringing children into your evolving relationship , short of that all your options at this age are really really good

You are 29 with no children , you should just spend a few months in IC and get a better sense of who you actually are

Dont try and save her , dont let her save you , i promise you that neither one of you has any of those tools

The adage goes “ you have to kiss a whole bunch of frogs first “ . Maybe she is the one , maybe just the one you need to learn something from and move on

Wishing you all the best

Progress is progress SI. It doesn't matter if it's slow or fast as long as it's progress. Focus on the prize; YOU. You're life is going to be much more successful than before. You have options. You have value. Believe in yourself and make your life great. I wish the best for you.

I haven’t visited this site in over a decade.

My wife and I are survivors, at least thus far, after her confession of her affair over 19 years ago. Your story reminds me somewhat of ours.

I had a trigger this past weekend and it made me instantly swell with emotion. Sadness, anxiety, anger. It is surprising to me that those painful feelings came raging back as viciously as they did. I consider that I have forgiven and moved forward. And, after 19 years it would appear that I have.

The pain and anger I feel now are just as poignant as ever. I can squelch it back down and resume, but frankly, I don’t know if I will.

Similar spouse work environment and similar story of medical setting with a few differences. We had been married for 14 years when she confessed. It was two affairs, one immediately before we married and another right after. We had two kids, 5 & 3, when she confessed. I was blissfully unaware and would have never known had she not confessed. She says she confessed because she wanted to grow closer. Why tell me after 14 years and 2 small kids ??? Did she only then decide our marriage and family was worth something ?

Anyway, it took 4-5 years before I didn’t obsess daily over it and a full 10 years afterward that I didn’t have frequent (monthly) trigger events. The last 5 years gave been relatively good.

My youngest child just moved out for college. We are essentially empty nesters.

Our 33 anniversary is tomorrow. It kind of hit me hard that I have so much emotional pain after knowing this for 19 Nk about it. Ive been with her for 35 years, 33 of that married. She cheated right off the start ! I was unaware for 14 years and have lived the last 19 years as a damaged person. It is difficult for me to admit it but its true.

You have a whole lifetime in front of you ! Marriage is a big investment but creating a family is an investment on a whole different level.

RUN ! - Please run. Leave her and take some time to heal yourself. You are so young. You have discovered your mate has a character flaw that most people cannot live with. Leaving is hard. Staying is hard. You should not have to choose but you do.

You make your own decision as to what is best for you. I did, and I don’t regret staying as I have two functional young men as sons, one out of college and working and the other a Jr. in college.

If I didnt have kids, I would have left. The trigger I experienced this weekend is scary as the rage I feel hit me so hard, my heart is hurting. Literally ! It hurts. I feel as if I might be having angina. But it is real physical pain brought on by emotional distress.

What you feel will be a part of your life forever. But the pain will fade as will mine. The longer and bigger your commitment with her, the more danger you present to yourself of ending up like me.

Sorry for rambling. My heart hurts for you.

RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN and be thankful your investment wasn’t larger.

Sorry. You asked me if I saw a path to her fixing herself. Just saw the question.

I suppose what the word fix means. I think that by the time people are in their twenties, the personality is formed. I was one of the most shy people you could ever meet. In my thirties that changed. So yes, people can be different, based upon life experiences. But it was a change over years after much self doubt.

The problem is when a childhood experience scars development. People who are emotionally damaged to the point that they feel unworthy of love find ways to damage that love. They don’t love themselves, so how can they think that someone else loves them? They might believe it intellectually but emotionally there is a nagging doubt. In my wife’s case she was always saying something like, “I don’t want to do xxxx because when you dump me etc.”. And she was serious.

My experience was so similar to yours. I was the absolute best thing that ever came along in her mind. She could see the potential life ahead, and we were doing well in our careers. We were sex monkeys together. But....she couldn’t accept that it was real and lasting. So very early in the marriage, very much still A person to envy in a perfect marriage (by others statements) she was riding some fat guys dick in a hotel, and of course getting pregnant by him.

It’s inconceivable that someone can act that way. And like you it never even occurred to me she would do that. But she did.

Many years later, is she fixed? No. I know she cheated again many years later. But that is not the issue. The issue is that she is fundamentally an unhappy person, always trying to get strangers to like her. Yet always finding fault with those around her. And always trying to control everything and when something doesn’t work out the way she hoped, she goes into a funk. And of course drives me crazy, cuz it’s always somehow my fault.

Based on what little you have said, I see a lot of this in your future. She may be the sexiest woman to come from Germany since Elke Sommer, but years of wearing behavior is not worth the price of the ride.

So can she fix herself. Maybe to the point where she won’t be unfaithful but the inner self doubt will always be there and that is a sure recipe for misery for you.

[This message edited by longsadstory1952 at 6:49 AM, August 22nd (Saturday)]

Did you tell her about this site,or did she find it on her own?

HellFire, I believe I saw the same post you likely did this morning. Sure sounds like your WW is posting here. Just FYI.

But the fact that he will get to move on from this as if nothing happened, enjoying the knowledge that he’s a 50-something year old predator who got to have the time of his life manipulating the stupid 26 year old nurse into breaking her boyfriend’s heart, just so she could sit on his infected dick a few times...

So just to be clear, your GF is over 25, which means she is an adult with a fully formed prefrontal cortex, which means she is capable of rational thinking. I doubt she needed "manipulation". Make no mistake - she had an equal part to play in the seduction, and happily played that part. She enjoyed him seducing her, willingly went to his place, willingly kissed him, sucked/sat on his d*ck. She enjoyed every minute of it. And afterward, willingly spent hours texting/speaking with him... It was a full-blown affair, emotional and physical. To her, you were a pesky annoyance - begging outside the door for a little chance to salvage a relationship.

And she becomes this new person overnight, and you are the best thing that happened? What a load of crap. You are not her shrink, nor her KISA (knight in shining armor). Please do not waste your prime years on this woman. Reading a book or two will not make her a "new" woman and safe partner. She has YEARS of work ahead of her. You don't want to tag along, considering that she nuked your relationship within a couple of years. It's not worth it, even if she's a Heidi Klum/Claudia Schiffer lookalike. Wish her well, and send her on her way.

Take some time to recover, and like many of us here, you will heal very fast once you are away from this toxic relationship. There are a lot of women out there and you will surely meet one and have a loving relationships with none of the toxicity and KISA effort needed. Give it time and it will happen for you.

There are days when I am eaten up by so much rage I can't function. I was a happy person before this. Calm, easygoing, relaxed. I am capable of so much hatred now. I am so filled with it at times. And I don't like that. I don't like that I've become this new, different, angry person against my will. It's like she wasn't content to take away our relationship, she had to take away so many parts of who I was along with it and replace them with things I never wanted to be.

Anger, bitterness and cynicism is understandable at this early stage, give it time and this bitterness, anger and cynicism will pass. Most of us have been through this anger phase. However, if it persists beyond a few months of parting, you may also want to examine your own outlook towards life in general. Do you consider yourself a "nice guy" and in return, only expect "good things" to happen to you? In that case, read No More Mr. Nice Guy and do the necessary work to recalibrate your thinking.

And her, too: I know she's making progress confronting her demons. She gets to use this as an opportunity to face her past and become a better person, to figure out how to move forward as a complete individual who is capable of genuine love, to find purpose and healing and be stronger in the end. She gets to benefit from this.

So what? Wish her well in life and move on. You are not even 30 yet, not married, no kids - plenty of reasons to start afresh with a lovely young woman with none of the toxic qualities of your WGF.

[This message edited by redbaron007 at 3:21 AM, August 25th (Tuesday)]

Just checking in on you.

How are YOU doing?

Hang in there and be strong.