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I just found out a couple of months ago now that my wife had been sexting an old boyfriend. It totally crushed me and I am having a really hard time accepting it. She says she will never do it again. How do I move on?

Welcome J1h, to Surviving Infidelity. We all know how painful this is, to try to reconcile your previous life to this one and the spouse you thought you had to the person you are currently married to. There is tremendous collective wisdom on this site, but keep in mind that people are in various stages of recovery from the trauma of infidelity, and their comments may reflect this. You will need to "take what you need and leave the rest". Please know, however, that most posters have your best interests at heart.

Cheaters follow predictable patterns of behavior.....they all lie, for example. This makes what they SAY untrustworthy to the extreme. You need to watch the ACTIONS of your wayward spouse to determine her willingness to change and do the necessary work to become worthy of your marriage. Sometimes infidelity is a dealbreaker, and that is perfectly OK, but most of the advice here is to give yourself some time to make any big decisions. It is also OK to ask for a separation so that you can have some time to think and process. You need to make yourself the priority and take care of yourself.

Please know that NONE of this is your fault. There is something inherently broken in cheaters, a basic lack of integrity, that makes cheating an option. You both were in the same marriage, good or bad, and you did not cheat. Your wife had many options, other than cheating, to deal with whatever issues she was having. We do not recommend marriage counseling at this point. The marriage was not broken, the CHEATER was, and is. Marriage counselors can do more harm than good right now. Your wife needs an individual counselor to help her fix what is broken in her. Period. This should be a non-negotiable. She should be doing everything in her power to prove to you that she is worthy of you and your marriage. At the very least there should be full disclosure of the affair (and ALL cheaters try to minimize, so be ready for more ugliness to come out), a 'no contact" letter approved by you, full accountability for the affair by your wife (no blaming you or your marriage), full accessibility to all devices whenever you want to see them. There is a lot of good information in The Healing Library (top left, in the yellow box).

Sometimes the weekends are a little slow, but others will soon add their input to mine. Hang in there and keep posting. We are here to help you.

Sorry - just wanted to add that infidelity is a trauma, so counseling is always a good idea for the betrayed spouse (you). In terms of "moving on", please be careful not to do what we call "rugsweeping", where your strong desire to get your old life back causes you to let your wife off the hook without asking her to fully deal with her issues. That will not fix your wife's issues and gives her the message that cheating is ok as three were no consequences.

JB please look at the link this is from the wayward side. Has your wife done any of the following things in the link? Has she given you a timeline, gone NC with OM. If OM is married or has a gf does she know?

https://survivinginfidelity.com/forums.asp?tid=324250

[This message edited by BigNoob at 7:01 AM, December 20th (Sunday)]

Very sorry you've been forced into this journey. First, get yourself together. Second, don't accept or put any blame on yourself - you or your M is not responsible for your WWs actions. Third, start doing some reading on here. I found many resources and many good books to read that have helped me.

Other than promising not to do it again then what has your wife done to a) make this right and b) make you feel safer that she won’t do this again?

A promise not to do this again is about as reliable on it’s own as a promise never to drink Whiskey when you wake up with a hangover.

What was the context of the sexting? Was in in text form or did they share pictures? If so then how graphic? The issue here is to prevent OM from distributing the pictures. If you have kids you don’t want your child to come home crying because someone found his mom’s crotch on hotmilfsdotcom. Frankly I’m OK for her to take the consequences, but would be concerned for you (if you reconcile) and your kids.

What actions have been taken to end the infidelity? A base rule we recommend in nearly 100% is that you let OM wife or partner know. Another base rule is that a clear unemotional NC letter is sent. It’s very short and clear:

OM – I realize that the interactions we had are infidelity, harmful to my marriage and disrespecting my husband. I want to focus on saving my marriage and will cease all communications in all ways and form with you. I request you do the same. If you try to contact me my husband will be immediately told and can result in legal action.

[Add this if there is any sexual graphic content: recordings, pics…]

I remind you that all context shared between us was intended for personal use. I request that you delete all pictures and/or files we shared and in no way share them or risk them being shared. If they are distributed or shared in any way it would be breaking revenge-porn laws and will result in criminal charges.

That’s it. Business like, non-personal and clear.

[This message edited by Bigger at 10:24 AM, December 20th (Sunday)]

I'm sorry this happened to you. How do you know it was "just" sexting ? do you have access to her phone/emails ? have you run text recovery software ? For how long had this been going on ? One of the first things you will learn here is that CHEATERS LIE a lot and typically only admit to what you can prove.

Very sorry you are here. If you are like most of us you just got hit with a serious trauma. It hurts, bad... we've all been there. Be sure to pay attention to yourself (fluids, eating, sleeping) seriously, focus on you.

Do not beg her to stay or tell her you love her. Just take some time to think...it's going to take a while for it to sink in.

She's likely minimizing whenever she discusses it. Cheaters always minimize. Chances are good that what you see it the tip of the iceberg.

Be very wary of the phone, email, and social apps. Open, honest, transparency is essential right now. If you're not getting it, trust your gut. Your gut always knows.

Check in here often and read everything you can. Google "betrayal trauma" to get a sense of what you might be experiencing right now.

Good luck.

Oh, and old flames re-light very quickly and very easily...trust me on this one. I have first hand experience. They already have history so it's super easy to break the ice.

Jlh,

I'm so glad you found this supportive site, and I'm so very sorry you needed to seek it out.

I truly feel your pain. My wayward husband (WH) was sexting a random woman he friended through FB....and then I found out there were 2 other women prior to her. One lady was mainly a flirting relationship and emotional affair. BUT his initial affair was a 2 1/2 year emotional and sexting affair with a coworker.

So, this is a mixture of advice from what I did "right" after Dday 1 and what is wish I'd done differently (being about 10 months out now from Dday 1):

1) Take really good care of YOU. Care for and be easy on yourself. Do something good and/or relaxing each day for yourself. Be kind to yourself emotionally; you are doing the best you can moment by moment. Look for joy wherever you can and hold those things tightly.

2) Prioritize individual counseling as part of your self care (even if that has to be online for right now).

3) Look at the 180 advice others are suggesting. THIS I wish I'd done!! I truly believe that I would have saved myself some ongoing pain and probably would have motivated my WH to jump-start his OWN work more quickly and with more effort.

4) Along with this, if you decide to try to work toward reconciliation, avoid doing more work toward that goal than your WW. The work should be HERS. Set clear boundaries about what you expect to see from her, before you even consider the path of reconciliation (again guidelines about the 180 will offer great suggestions about boundaries).

I realize that nothing I do (or could have done) can guarantee a specific reaction from my WH, but me requiring much more from him before I did any work on the relationship would have spared me the resentment I felt when I realized that I was working WAY harder than him, AND it would have helped break the codependent cycle.

Like I understand so clearly now: You and your WW can't "nice" your way to healing. Individual healing and healing of the relationship is HARD work and will require brutally honest conversations and clear boundaries that are consistently being reinforced and adjusted.

I wish you strength and as much peace as possible on your difficult journey.

Dob they not have physical access to each other?

Jlh9251

I just found out a couple of months ago now that my wife had been sexting an old boyfriend. It totally crushed me and I am having a really hard time accepting it. She says she will never do it again. How do I move on?

First, I'm sorry you're here. It sucks and it's gut wrenching.

Second, this is exactly how my marriage was destroyed. My STBXW was inappropriately texting an old boyfriend five years ago. I caught her, she said she'd never do it again, I trusted her. It became a physical affair two years ago. I'll be divorced from her five weeks from January 2nd.

Okay, so what I didn't do after that initial D Day was monitor her texts/FB messages. I want to say that maybe if I did that things would be different, but probably not. Your mileage may vary.

Make no mistake about this, and don’t let her tell you otherwise....

This IS cheating!!!

Even if they didn’t FaceTime, exchange videos or pictures!

Do what you must for yourself!

If this is a dealbreaker for you, then it is a dealbreaker!

I often see here that a marriage it’s like a stool in that it relies on three legs. In marriage those legs are love, respect, and trust.

I do have questions on whether or not she truly loves you. Or, at least loves you using a definition of the word that most people would except. How could she love you, and be Sexting an old boyfriend? How could she love you and cause you this level of pain?

Respect: do you really think she respects you? With somebody who respects you be playing with her self while talking to an ex boyfriend?

Trust: I’m not sure if you trust her right now, but that is something that you’re gonna have to figure out. Whenever she goes online, whether it is at work or at home, Are you going to trust her enough in that she’s not going to contact her old lover?

Whenever she is late by five or 10 minutes, can you honestly say that the idea of her being late because she’s meeting with him or some other lover isn’t popping into your head? When you’re making love to her, and she closes her eyes, are you going to trust her enough when she says that she’s envisioning only you and she’s not thinking that it’s the old boyfriend or some other lover that she is having sex with?

Do whatever you need to do for you.

At this stage, I think at the bare minimum she needs to go 100% zero contact with him. If This scum bag has a wife or girlfriend, have your wife contact her and thane your wife tell her all of the details of what the two of them have been doing.

She also needs to admit Her actions to her closest friends and family members. Do not allow her to change the story and somehow blame you for the troubles that you are having in your marriage.

I wish you nothing but the best. Good luck, stay strong, and never allow anybody to disrespect you

Also, tell her that this year for Christmas, her only gift will the gift of a polygraph exam!

How far away does the scumbag live? When was the last time they saw each other or had the opportunity to see each other? You might have only discovered the tip of the iceberg.

Remember the first rule about cheaters.... #1: Cheaters lie!

Right now your wife is in crisis management mode. Right now she needs to protect it’s a comfortable life that she has with you. And if that means lying to you about actually being physical with this guy, she will lie to you immediately and without thought. at the very least, her reputation is in danger of being destroyed if this gets out among her family and friends, which you should do. For no other reason than than to protect yourself.

Sorry

[This message edited by Newlifeisgreat at 5:47 PM, December 20th (Sunday)]

I went through this almost exactly 5 years ago. A 10 month sexting affair with someone my wife knew from High school 35 years ago, though they were never close them. Reading your story, You have the knowledge that your wife had an affair with her previous husband, and this man, so you have to ask yourself

1. If its possible that he came out to see her, or they met somewhere?

2. Since there is a past history, are there other affairs, emotional and or physical, that may have happened.

3. What prompted this, after all 40+ years?

Ultimately, its up to your wife to prove to you that this was a one-time event, should you decide you want to reconcile, and if so, she needs to do whatever it takes to convince you that something like this could never happen again. That's a tough job, given her previous indiscretion.

Good Luck.

Hi. Sorry you’re here. Thought I would give my 2 cents since I’m going through the same currently. Accidentally found photos of naked women on my WH phone. He had no answers as to why he had them there. 4 days later I snooped and found he had been having online affairs for a long time. I pulled phone records and found sexting. Found links on his phone where he was going to sex chat rooms and uploading his pics and downloading others. Then I found out he was also on a swingers sex site.

Found this all out in August. Kicked him out in September. He still can’t give me details. He still can’t give me a time line. He still doesn’t think it’s a big deal. He still wants to reconcile. I don’t think I can ever trust him ever again. He messages me multiple times a day. I have told him I don’t want to be contacted. I’ve told him he has crushed my soul.

He is a 50 year old man living with his parents right now and he can stay there. I just can’t see how I can be happy with him and our marriage ever again.

So, dig further. I’m sure my WH is hiding more than what I found. As prepared as I was to find more, it still crushed my soul.

I also did a lot of journaling at the beginning to remember how awful I felt when I found out. Just in case I get stupid. 😂

I’ve just been taking care of me now.

We will all get through this.

The one thing I wish I had believed as my world was falling apart was that cheaters lie and as a general rule minimize, trickle truth and are not safe at any speed. Oh and that the initial inappropriate stuff I found was just the tip of a fecal iceberg that would sink the Titanic.

If I was in your situation I would immediately get myself tested for STDs including herpes type II. A lot of doctors tell people to not test for that because you never know where you got it, but someone I know definitely got it from the one of the exes affair partners. But private std labs do test for it and I think for good reason.

I would not risk my life again over someone who has shown me they could lie to me. I would protect my finances, my mental health and my heart.

If I am not mistaken your cheating wife has cheated on someone else before? Mine cheated before and was a habitual liar with a secret second life and was raised in a cheating family so your mileage may vary. But I regret not leaving the first time I found out he had had sex with someone else while married to me no matter what the circumstances he claimed it was under. I also regret not leaving the second time when I found inappropriate stuff on his phone. No love. No respect. Not safe for me at any speed.