Infidelity - long

[WhenwillIfeelnormal]

Hello everyone

I've been reading such wisdom in these past few days and this is the first forum I have ever wanted to post on, so I am a bit new to this.

Married for over 24 years and have two children. Until last September, would have safely said my DH had never caused me a moment's pain, but discovered he was having an affair. He immediately ended the relationship and has had no contact whatsoever with OW since he ended things.

I love him to bits and I know he loves me, so I have been trying to get past this, but it is the hardest thing I've ever had to do. I know he profoundly regrets what he did and wishes he could erase the past. For the past 5 months, he has been doing everything in his power to hang on to me and to make my life easier. He has been to counselling and has found that a great benefit. He has learned a lot about himself and how his childhood may have affected the choices he has made as an adult.

His counsellor (and me) have encouraged him to establish why this happened. Reading these boards, it is a familiar story. A woman he used to work with got in touch, at the point when he was suffering from very low self-esteem and when he was very depressed at work. He had received a couple of wounding professional knock-backs, had put on a huge amount of weight and this woman wooed him with reminders of how wonderful he was. He says there was nothing wrong with our relationship at all, except we didn't make love as often as he would have liked. He's right, we didn't. Although we got along very well, the truth is that my repeated attempts to get him to talk more, to help more and to care for his appearance more, resulted in some resentment and lack of desire on my part.

Married herself, the OW painted a picture of being happy and in love with her DH. My DH says he thought it was a "safe" friendship, except he neglected to tell me about it. This "light" E mail and texting relationship went on for months.

My DH kept refusing her requests to meet up, but it seems that by this time, he was getting addicted to the uncomplicated adoration. Finally, he agreed to meet her and in the interval between his decision and the meeting (2 months)it became clear that she wanted an affair. By this time, sadly he was hooked - even though they hadn't even met up.

The result was that they met up for sex twice, a few months apart. He says that the sex was disastrous and that he absolutely hated the deception that the affair entailed. The OW was a very needy person who by this time was claiming that her marriage was a sham. She fed my DH with a load of pap about how she had known he was the love of her life for years etc. and kept asking whether he would leave me. He says that he told her he would never leave me, but it is evident from some of what he has told me, that she preferred to believe he was only staying for the children.

Despite only actually meeting twice, the affair was very intense and during it, my DH was an absolute bastard to live with. What makes this worse was that the day before he basically agreed to have sex with her, I myself received a huge professional knock-back. I have had the year from hell and throughout it all, I suffered one knock-back after another, so my self-esteem was already on the floor before I found out about this. He knew all this too.

There are lots of things I just can't get past and one of them is that about 6 weeks before I found out, I cried tears with him because I couldn't understand why he was behaving like such a shit at home. I had an absolute instinct that there was someone else, but what I got that night was a grandstand speech about me being the love of his life, that he didn't just love me, he adored me. He also finally admitted to his work-related depression. He laughed at the suggestion that he was seeing someone else and although my instincts told me otherwise, I believed him.

I still have post-traumatic stress-like flashbacks about the texts I found on his old 'phone, which he had given to our DS two months earlier - and which had been lost ever since. I was triumphant at finding it again that night and had charged it, to be ready as a nice surprise for our DS the next day. Thank God in some ways the 'phone had been mislaid - I would have hated the prospect of our DS reading this stuff.

My DH is emphatic that he never loved the OW and was trying to end the relationship. He had in fact refused to see her just before I found out. One of my problems is that I will never know whether he actually would have had the bottle to end it, had this gone undiscovered. He says he had no desire to have sex with her again, but accepts that he was still "getting something" from the relationship, so he wasn't ready to sever all ties with her. He also knew that she was emotionally unstable and volatile and feared a spiteful and nasty reaction if he ended it abruptly, including the possibility that she might "let me know" (by this time he knew that she had done just that before, to someone else.) He felt that the best policy was for her to end the relationship herself and be allowed to keep her dignity.

He says he always, always loved me, but I just can't accept this. I can't see how you can really love someone, see them getting one knock-back after another, see them cry and express their fears that there was someone else - and carry on regardless.

He is absolutely appalled at his behaviour and had a breakdown after realising the pain he had inflicted. I might add that he absolutely hates the OW now and cannot believe that he risked so much for someone so manipulative. To say he was gullible would be an under-statement; she told lie after lie about various things, some of which he accepts he thought were improbable at the time and others, he thought were truths.

Through counselling and talking to me, he has also realised that the OW is a very damaged person who has always been in competition with other women. She had very few female friends and he recalls that all the women in their former workplace detested her.

She has a history of hitting on men in loving relationships and this has worsened considerably since her own DH had two affairs. Her response to my DH ending their relationship was to post some horrible, spiteful attacks on me and amazingly, our very young DD, on some of these social networking sites. Although it has been very hard, our response has been to ignore this so far - by not giving her tantrums the attention she obviously craves.

I absolutely believe him when he says he couldn't do anything like this again - and tellingly, he adds that he couldn't do it to himself again. He says he hates the person he was last year and it is true that his behaviour was completely out of character. I also absolutely believe that he has never done anything like this before.

In many ways, our relationship is better than it has been for years. My DH was always reluctant to have "chats" about feelings or problems in our relationship, whereas now he will talk for hours. His former laziness has completely disappeared and he will do anything to help. Our sex life is absolutely amazing and has been ever since this awful bombshell. He has started to look after himself much better, has lost loads of weight and looks absolutely gorgeous as a result.

We have been searingly honest with each other throughout and although I think he was in denial for a few early weeks about the intensity of this relationship, by and large he has told the truth throughout and I have been equally honest with him.

Apart from the counsellor, we have told no-one about any of this. Our friends and family know he had a breakdown of sorts, but we have told them that this was work-induced, which is partially true. The only person I have therefore spoken to about any of this is him.

So what help do I need? I need to know, from others who have been through this, when it will stop hurting quite so much? Is it really possible to love someone and not be sufficiently moved by their pain, to end the source of it? Is low-self esteem, coupled with opportunity, the real reason for affairs like this one?

One of my other problems is my own sense of self. For all these years, my self-esteem has been generally very high. I was one of those smug people who thought it impossible that their DH would stray - all that has been shattered and on top of what else happened last year, my view of myself is now very different. I cannot seem to feel joy anymore. My DH has been at pains to try to restore my esteem and professionally, some successes have got me back on track, but I just feel....damaged. When will I get my "mojo" back?

[jabberwocky]

It is possible to get past this. I think going though counselling is paramount. It may sound like a bit of a cliche' but affairs really are many times just a symptom of a deeper problem and when it all surfaces it is a time of pain and then healing on many levels. Your dh should understand that it will take some time for him to regain your trust and he cannot rush that. But I really, really feel that with commitment from both parties you as a couple can learn and grow from this and come out stronger in the end if you both desire to.

I wish you the very, very best in this. It is a dark place to be in while you are there but you can recover.

[N1]

A person can make a mistake - accepted. Wrong place at the wrong time in the wrong environment and the wrong thing happened. What is very clear is that the husband wants to do everything he can to fix the wrong. (credit where due). The man does care very much.

By your own admission, things were not good. You wanted to do something about it but the attempts were not working.

The man was resisting as much as he could for a long time but gave in. He dislikes his actions and the other woman.

Your husband will say that he wanted the affair to end and I am sure he did, but he obviously wanted it to end with the lest amount of negative feelings - reinforcing that this is a caring man. I am sure he had every intention of the affair ending. If he was determined and strong enough - is the question.

You and he have been together for 24 years. Drawing a line under a quarter of a century is not easy and getting another relationship with the same quality which will last 24 years sounds very unlikely. You could never forget the man because you and he have children together and you and he are likely to share the grandchildren in the future.

If you look back over the years and you use the history to project what the future with your husband might be like (keeping in mind that he made a mistake), you should still be able to see a future with him, but you can't see a future alone or with another person.

I think it's fair to say that a sorry person showing their sorrow in a way that you are left with no doubt that they regret their actions speaks volumes. It would be very different if he showed nothing or looked pleased.

You might want to have a little think and perhaps consider a week or 2 away where you and your husband go away and do plenty of fun things together, where the time away is packed with plenty to do and plenty to see - everything involving both of you. You want your time away to be so busy that neither he nor you have much time to think back in the past, while you are away. Get photo's. Use that time away to mark the start of a new beginning, where you, in your own mind, set yourself the new line, the future is optimistic and the past is forgiven.

He made one mistake for a while, if he was making many mistakes many times, then it looks more like deliberate.

If you think that he was so wrong that he can never be forgiven and you are better off without the man and the 24 years of being together then you might want to put your foot down and throw the towel in. Call it a day.

Spending time thinking about the negative past will eat your mind and keep everything in limbo. Nor a good way to live and not a good way to be.

From reading the post, I cannot see any reason for you to end the relationship and I can see every reason for you to forgive and put the past behind you.

Congratulations on the marriage, less and less people can claim that length of relationship.

I don't think anyone will give you an answer that suggests that you and your husband should separate, there are to many good points between you and him.

Best of luck for the future.

[Owls]

Bumping this for you.

There are unfortunately a lot of lovely women on here who have been where you are.

[prettyfly1]

I want to say well done for having the dignity not to respond to the ow tantrums and nastiness. I dont think i could have done that, particularly if it involved my babies. Whatever happens, you sound like an informed, intelligent and sensible woman. I cant say if your dh will repeat offend or if he is genuinly sorry. Only you can know that for sure. What i can say is how proud of yourself you should be and how grateful he should be. I really hope this works out for you.

[SulliedYouth]

Hi,
I am really sorry but don't have much time but really wanted to respond, I will check in later again.
I have had a similarish situation over the last eight months and understand something of what you are going through.
I cant say that it will all be OK, when it will stop hurting or get better as I don't know that for myself yet but I think you are doing the right thing in talking to each other and being as open and honest as you can be.
The attacks and stirring she is doing are the work of a malicious, attention seeking, un-hinged and possibly mentally unstable woman. It is hard having to deal with that on top of everything else.
There are a lot of reasons that men and women have affairs and I think it is very difficult to get to the bottom of it.
As for feeling Joy, It will come again, the sparkle will come back and I think that very slowly things do start to improve. Counselling is very helpful and really helps claw back some perspective sometimes. For both of you.

I wish I could help and give you some proper answers. I hop someone who is not quite as disjointed in their posting comes along to help.
Good luck and as PF1 said be proud of yourself for the dignity you have displayed.

[overdraft]

WhenwillIfeelnormal - Your situation sounds extremly similar to ours.We are 4 years on this year. The pain never goes away but It hurts less and less as time goes by. It is very difficult to understand how a relationship -post affair -is so much better than before,if there is pain. Perhaps the pain is there for that very reason.You now both apprieciate each other so much more and know what is like to nearly loose each other.

You are very lucky to have each other.I would never have wished for it to happen to us, but I believe it happened for a reason. I now have a responsive husband who cares very much. He has grown up and we are now a team in every way. I know he will never do it to me again. He was in as much pain as me and would never want to go through it again.

It is still early days for you. It will get better. I need to go now , but will check in later to see how you are xx

[WhenwillIfeelnormal]

My sincere love and thanks for the messages posted so far. I really appreciate them. I have often feared that if I told this story to anyone, they would shake their head in disbelief and tell me I was mad for staying.

I cannot adequately express my fury and anger when the OW wrote disparaging remarks about our DD. The stuff about me was water off a duck's back - and actually brought me some comfort that she feels anagonistic towards me - I couldn't bear her pity.

I was however astonished that a woman who should only feel shame and guilt, was now attacking a child. None of us (apart from my DH) has even met her. I drafted a really withering E mail, but fortunately perhaps, I didn't send it - and reading that draft frequently brings me comfort when the anger rises again! To me, this is just another example of the OW competing with females again - she didn't make any attack on our DS - and she presumably saw our DD as a huge obstacle to my DH leaving me.

One of the other issues for me, although this isn't as strong (this week!), is that I have had a real need for the OW to hear it how it really was. I hate to think that she thought he loved her, that he was only staying for the children and since he refused to answer her repeated questions about our sex life, that she was offering something I wasn't.

We have discussed whether he should contact her to put her straight, but have resolved for the moment that any contact from him will just inflame her need for attention. I find I live in fear of another "attack" from her though and I miss my peace of mind so much. The last time she posted anything, my anger towards him resurfaced and I felt renewed incredulity that he had allowed this mad woman to invade our lives. For now, though, we have agreed that he will only tell her some home truths if she contacts him or us directly. The longer this goes on, the less I think it is likely and one of the hardest things has been coming to terms with the fact that there is a woman out there who thinks my marriage is a sham. I also fear that one day, she will tell someone who knows us, about this affair. In my darker moments, I imagine we will never really be free of this menace and that gets me down.

I am again so very grateful for the warmth and support on here and would love to hear from others. I was so hesitant about posting, but I cannot tell you the comfort this process brought me last night and today. Thank you so very much. X

[abedelia]

Please don't contact her as it will spark it off again. She is obviously a complete bunny boiler and this may tip her into doing something nasty. From your posts it seems people know she has history as a fantasist and attention seeker so whatever she says about your relationship won't matter - who's likely to believe her?

[SulliedYouth]

Hi again,
So much of what you write hits home with me.
"have had a real need for the OW to hear it how it really was" - It may make you feel better but she prob wouldn't believe it if she heard it, she wants to believe that she is better than you and how could he not want to be with her instead of you.

I hope you can get to a point where you feel secure and confidant enough again to just ignore her without it all raking it up again.
I am going to bow out now as I find this difficult myself at the moment but I wish you all the strength (I think you have a lot already), courage and determination in the world.

[maturer]

Hi,
5 years for me since I went through the hell you are just coming out of. My dh had an affair with a work colleague- completely out of the blue for me- NEVER believed he could have done it. We'd been together then 20 years, 3 great children and no big problems in our relationship.Like your situation it happened at a time of work stress/problems for dh (not an excuse- just part fo the jigsaw to make sense of it)

5 years on we are closer and stronger than before it happened and I honestly believe he will never do it again- he realises he nearly lost so much for so little!

As for the pain it's still there- a ball in the centre of me BUT time does help, gradually it dulls and you just get better at pushing it away. You get better at focusing on the now not the then. I do however think it's like a grieving process, you have to confront all the "demonds" that come out of it, make some sense of it and then be as open and honest as you can with each other -despite the pain of the details. Then, only then can you start to heal and move forward."no more secrets" that was our mantra and to take 1 day at a time- it is like a cancer in your life. It touches so much and the ripple effect in all parts of your world is so painful- yet you can, if you have a strong base (which after 24 years it soubds as if you do)move forward abd truely learn from it.
I believe my dh had (as cliched as it sounds) some sort of a midlife crisis- men of a certain age-escapism from something in themselves!

I believe affairs are fantasy- escapism from some reality- not always from your relationship, more often I think from something in 1 of the parties. They cannot survive the reality of proper life every day love- that's why when reality hits- you find out- they crumble away and are exposed for the feeble "thing" that they were- pathetic and unreal!

How COULD he? well I don't know that one but I did learn that men have a greater ability to put lids on boxes in their lives. the box of the world where the affair happens has a lid which when closed has nothing to do with the box of their home life and vise versa That's how they get on with both situations as if the other doesn't exist!
When the truth comes out the lids can no longer stay on the boxes and they can't cope!

My dh did counselling- he needed to try to understand how'why he'd got to where he had......something to do with the need to be needed ...!!

SHE also turned out to be something of a bunny boiler- wouldn't take no for an answer when he did evetually end it all kept trying to contact him under different names, emails letters to work, even turned up at his new work place......it took the best part of a year to get her totally out of our lives-but we worked on it together by then, that helped.
I still sometimes get the urge to contact her but \i don't- it's best to not open any lines of communication and the longer that goes on the easier it gets.

It's not any easy option to fight for your marriage but it can get better and stronger. All I'd say is if what you had before was good then it's worth fighting for- some people never even come close to a good relationship so if you've had it keep with it, it can move forward.

Hope this helps- you will find lots of support here. It's so much more common than you think- just people dont talk about it.I found it so helpful to talk to MNtters who's been there, who understood, who survived!
Take care of yourself.

[abedelia]

It is just is painful though - we had a better relationship than most people we know, but he just fancied her, had the chance and went for it for the sole reason he wanted to feel the whole teenage mad emotional thing again. And that's something I can't give him because we're past that into what I'd think is better... 5 months on I just found tonight that despite apologies, coming back and working on things and months of hell on both sides etc mine has now been searching for his first love's name on facebook. He wasn't hers - she wouldn't sleep with him as she didn't want him to be her first, so no threat except he obviously hasn't learned and still idealises the whole unrealistic romance thing. Ah well, will think about it in the morning when I've had a chance to process... need to work out how to confront him.

[AnyFuckerForAShiteSoppyCard]

oh nooooooo Abedelia

[wannabe10]

I have found the things written here really useful. I was the one having an affair and now I am asking my dh to forgive me. We don't live in the same house but are gradually spending time together and he has said he wants to go to counselling as he is still as angry as he was seven months ago.
I just really hope he forgives me or at least tries. I sometimes don't know what to do to show him how sorry I am. I am trying to gibe him the space he needs but its hard.

[iris100]

We are a year on from a very similar experience. My Dh had had a breakdown, was beginning to feel better. I felt drained physically and emotionally from supporting him and keeping the family steady through it all and had also suffered a professional knock back. He met someone at work who made him feel good and they had what I can only decribe as a teenage-level affair for a month.

He has admitted he was living in a fantasy world - it was like an infatuation for him. She depicted her marriage as violent and he had a fantasy of saving her from it (I think now she was lying to him - having dug around a bit and also studied DV myself). We had been together for years - we had a strong marriage but we were definitely in a 'down' phase - he was so used to thinking badly of himself and hating himself, and resenting me for being the strong one in our relationship.

I still have her number and really struggled with whether I should talk to her, but decided in the end that the issue was not her - it was my DH and the choices he had made not to deal with his issues and really see the impact that his mental health had had on me. I chose not to ask him to leave, but told him I thought our marriage was worth fighting for. We had a terrible few months while he came to his senses - he effectively ended the realtionship when I found out but still had an emotional tie to this woman and he way he had felt with her which took a long time to get over. I finally told him we were at the end of the road and that he should leave. By that point I knew I could be alone if I had to and had just had enough. That was our turning point - he broke down and finally seemed to realise what he had almost lost.

The hurt is still there, less but still there. I sometimes feel utter rage at what he did to me, and what he almost did to our children. I sometimes have the flashbacks that you describe. I think you grieve that old relationship - the trust that you had - that utter confidence you had in the other person. But for us something new and stronger has emerged. We both know how much we want to be together - we could both have walked away and frankly that would have been easier in the short term. We have see each other at rock bottom and behave in ways that neither of us are proud of. We love each other and in time I think I will be able to see the affair as a drop in the deep pool of our relationship. I can't forgive him for some of his behaviour, but I understand it and can live with it.

I agree with maturer - who gave me some great advice at the time. Affairs are very seldom about the main relationship - they are to do with escape, a simpler, fantasy life where there are no ties, no responsibilities.

I do think you need to talk to someone though. I told a handful of friends - peole I knew who would not judge him too harshly who loved us both. My marriage was seen as perfect too - it was humiliating, but I got amazing support. I also had some counselling alone which really helped - we did a couple of relate sessions but both found the individual counselling route was better for us. Time does heal - like all cliches it's true.

[abedelia]

Wannabe, maybe reassurance is what is needed rather than space? Just be honest about how this is making you feel and talk to him - and keep saying sorry. That would work for me... My H is now acting like everything is back to 'normal' and it is killing me - I know men can compartmentalise more than women but I could do with a lot more reassurance. I am coming to the conclusion he sees me as a best friend he has sex with, not a romantic partner, and I'm not sure that's enough for me for the rest of my life, even though I am absolutely heartbroken about what us separating might do to the dcs. The problem for him is that his dad died suddenly when he was young and his mum never looked at anyone again - her house is like a shrine to his dad. Though he sees her as having wasted her life I do think this might have given him a weird expectation of relationships...

WhenwillI... I also meant to say, what does it matter if she tells people you know? You have nothing to be ashamed of, it is your H who will look like a lying, immoral creep. For instance, how did you feel when you heard about the Gordon Ramsay / scabby mistress thing? 'Useless wife, she mustn't have been enough for him' or 'Christ, what a miserable excuse for a man, didn't he think of his kids, how pathetic'? I guarantee other people will be thinking the same way about your relationship. In any case, you have him back now he is in tip top shape physically and mentally - she only had him when he was overweight and miserable. And as someone on another thread once said and I really liked - he was unfaithful to you once, but he was NEVER faithful to her...

[ivechangedcosimembaressed]

I am not sure you are stil making the mistake of "blaming" it all on the OW - and hence being able to excuse and "forgive" your H - I did the same but I don't actually think it helps..
It took me a long time to let go of my anger and blame of the OW (and believe me I still think she has the morals of an alleycat) but the person to shoulder the blame is your H (funny how so many of them have "breakdowns" when they are caught)...only then do I think you can move on one way or the other -when you accept what he has done!
I wish you the very best of luck but you can move on with whatever way YOU wish!

[ivechangedcosimembaressed]

aggh ignore name change was for another thread keep forgetting to change back

[wannabe10]

I have said sorry repeatedly. I cry everytime I see him and we see each other almost daily. I was seriously ill just before it happened and very low but I know I did a terrible thing. Tbh it has made me look at my dh completely differently. I know see his strength and understanding. I appreciate him more.
He is my best friend but he just looks so hurt and I feel like a bit player with my own family and children. I just hope we can see this as a good opportunity to rectify things and be stronger. I am considering going to relate. Can I go on my own?

[iris100]

I have just had a very cathartic look at a couple of my old threads from last year

here
www.mumsnet.com/Talk?topicid=relationships&threadid=506609-staying-together-after-an-affair-how-do-y ou-ever-get#10254673

It's amazing how different I feel now, but I think from what you've said you are 4-5 months on, so the timing of my thread is the same. Perhaps reading through it will help.

[abedelia]

Cheers Iris - I live in hope! I am just going to spark a general conversation about first love / what he expects being in love to be / whether he misses the feelings of being 'madly in love' and see where it takes us. All morning I have been fantasising about leaving him, unfortunately. To make it worse, just after we got back together I suggested we renew our wedding vows - somewhere hot and lovely as we married quickly in a horrible reg office as we were dirt poor then. I got all the brochures in but he hasn't said a thing about it for weeks so I have left them out on the tabke very obviously for the dc's to cut up. Nothing has been said about this. I take this to be that he doesn't consider me 'worth it'. I don't know, maybe I am being paranoid? I suppose this sort of thing does that to you, especially when you know he told the OW he'd never wanted to marry me as he didn't love me 'like that'? Okay, I suppose that is a lie as he came back but I don't feel very good about anything currently.

Wannabe, yes you can go to relate on your own... Personally i hated Relate, though.

[wannabe10]

Can I ask why abedelia?
I feel like I need something - had a very mentally ill, abusive father and my life was a rollercoaster. I tend to get panicked when all is well and just 'normal' and go into destroy mode. I need to break this cycle desperately. My dh also says I am always taking everyones troubles on my shoulders, I am the oldest of a large family and I should concentrate on me. I just come with a huge amount of baggage and I wonder if I have pushed him to far this time.....

[WhenwillIfeelnormal]

Thank you all so much again - this is really helping me.

Abdelia, I am so sorry for your pain and renewed shock again - I can imagine that the Facebook thing was like a further betrayal. The trouble with stuff like this is that pre-affair, you probably wouldn't have thought twice about your DH's natural curiousity about his first love. My DH and I have both looked up our former loves over the years on these sites - and I think everyone does. That's normal, as long as both are open about it. Don't know much about Facebook, but has he actually contacted her? Let us know if you can, whether you confronted him or not.

In the early days (and pre-counselling), my DH had a need to "get back to normal", but soon realised that this was unrealistic. I am learning now that in terms of our relationship, we won't "get back" the relationship as it was. In many ways, that's a good thing, but as Maturer said, there is also huge grief and bereavement for what has been lost too. Loss of absolute trust and belief, in my case some peace of mind - and a loss of innocence. My DH and I are stuck on some issues; my belief that he cannot have really loved me, at least for a short time - and whether he really would have ended things if I hadn't found out. My DH points out that for him, the unbroken love for me/he would have ended it are absolute "facts" - whereas the contrary is my "belief".

Wannabe - I'm sorry your DH feels he wants space. Maybe that is a gender thing. Since I found out, the last thing I wanted was space. I felt an overwhelming need to be with my DH all of the time, to try to make sense of this awful situation. I'm assuming he has let you explain truly and honestly why you had an affair. If the whole story is now in the open and he is escaping to lick his wounds, he might well need more time.

If there is nothing more to say from you about what happened with the affair partner and why, your repeated and heartfelt expressions of sorrow and regret will help enormously. As will your visible and audible determination that you could never do this again.

Iris and Maturer, your posts about affairs being about escapism and fantasy completely struck a chord, as did the wonderful analogy about "boxes and lids". My DH completely agrees that he thought he was compartmentalising, except that he was crap at it really. He says that even when he could see how upset I was when I thought there was someone else - and realised that his behaviour towards me and the kids was having an effect on our happiness, he still didn't really make the connection between the misery he was making our lives at home and his affair. Like me, he shakes his head in disbelief now at this ridiculous arrogance, selfishness and self-deception.

I have often thought about talking to close friends about this and am still thinking about having some counselling myself. I know people would be incredibly supportive and non-judgemental too. I'm still mulling on that one, to be honest. I don't know if anyone can understand this, but part of my reluctance has been that if our public image of an undamaged relationship remains intact, it will be easier somehow to keep the real thing intact. However I also often think that if people talked about this more openly, it would help with all of our feelings of isolation and low self-esteem. Tricky dichotomy and one I haven't finished with yet. For now, this forum is enough, but I probably under-estimated how much support I would get from it.

Abdelia, I think it's true that if the OW told people about this, to people who really knew us (and her) it would seem implausible. There are actually very few mutual connections anyway and it could be my fear is disproportionate. However I do know she is the sort of person who would have kept "proof" and "trophies" (E mails and texts - there was nothing else) and I'm afraid it does really bother me. I don't want people to think of my DH as a creep, I love him and what ever he has done, he is essentially a kind and decent man.

I also acknowledge though that I have had (and still do) such pride in our marriage that I don't want that tainted in any way. I am realising more than ever now how much of my self-esteem was defined by having a great marriage and a faithful and loving partner. It was the foundation for all my professional and other achievements and I think it is no coincidence that as soon as my DH's attentions moved elsewhere, I felt it sub-consciously and so many other things in my life (especially professionally) started to unravel.

As you may have gathered, I ackowledge in myself that I would hate to be seen as a victim by anyone. I don't like this aspect of my personality particularly, but it is difficult enough restoring my self-esteem - and I know that people's pity would further knock that process.

Thanks for the comment about him never being faithful to her - that helped! He has also said that he takes huge comfort from knowing that physically, he is in much better shape for me now, than he ever was with her.

I have an open mind on whether we are projecting too much hate on to the OW. Some of my closest friends have been (and are) in the OW's position and so I hope I have some understanding of the other view. However, none of them have behaved as abhorrently as the OW in our case and I do have a very different view now of women (and men) who get involved in these situations - and especially of those who actively pursue such relationships. I have concluded that it is too pat to say these individuals are not breaking any vows (except to their own partners) and have no commitment to behave decently to the betrayed spouse.

I accept that this view may be extreme, but I do think that we must never absolve people of their responsibility to behave decently to other human beings. I also sometimes think that if we were more condemning of people's behaviour, they might think twice about continuing. I find an utter dislike for views such as "we couldn't help ourselves" or "the intensity took us both by surprise" etc. I do find I have to watch my reactions about these situations these days though - I was always quite liberal about these matters before, but have found like so many other things, it's different when it happens to you.....

Long post, sorry if other more relevant posts have come in in the meantime. Am finding this so cathartic, but as I'm new to all this, forgive me if I break any protocols etc.

[abedelia]

We just had a bad counsellor. And maybe we went too soon - 6 weeks after the time they met up at last and had sex and two weeks after he finally told her to get lost and never contact him again. At that point he just wanted to close it all off and never speak about it again so I suggested relate as a way of making him talk about stuff and get to the bottom of why it had happened as I honestly couldn't understand what else he'd be looking for aside from what we'd had. Unfortunately the counsellor was very keen to push the line of me having to draw a line under things at some point, forgive him, move on and never speak about it again.

I was so far from being able to do that and felt she was siding with him, especially when he started telling her that this was what he'd been saying to me and she didn't challenge him about it being way too soon, especially if issues were unresolved - I was physically sick after we left and it really messed my head up again as I felt like some sort of freak for daring to express the fact that I felt like my life had been destroyed. I'm never going back. Ah well, just had a chat with H about Valentines Day and feel better - he ran plans past me rather than making it a surprise as he says he feels nothing he does is good enough or me anymore. So perhaps that explains some of his actions, maybe I am being far more assertive than I used to be and he is a bit afraid to come near me...

[abedelia]

Cross post. No, he hasn't contacted her. If he did I think she would be hard pressed to remember him.. I feel he has really romanticised it, but I gather they went out for a couple of months at Uni then she dumped him and he was devastated. As I said, she never even slept with him as she was a virgin and wanted to save herself for someone special. The fact that wasn't him speaks volumes! However, his original behaviour was about escapism and fantasy and the fact that he has turned back to this is worrying so I'll have to bring it up.

Much of my doubt about things (and probably my standoffishness with H now) comes as, alongside the "I never loved her properly' thing he also told me he wasn't sure he loved me anymore when i asked him why he was being so horrible as he was distancing himself from me during the affair. He also kept repeating that he didn't think he loved me enough to come back (as it would only have been for the children) while we were separated and he was trying to convince himself (he says) that the whole thing had actually been meaningful rather than having his bubble suddenly burst and discovering he'd been a complete shit over nothing. Hence the need for reassurance. I'm guessing he feels a bit more comfortable with things now so is toning it down but I'd just really love him to tell me again he's glad I took him back...

[lel1]

Hi all. Am going through a similar situation to some of you here. Found out 9 months ago that my non live in partner had an affair about 3 and half years ago, when we were not really that commited to each other (the acting non commited came from him not me and did drive me crazy) For the last 3 years since ending the affair he has been a changed person and has been commited and reliable.

However since I found out about his affair I decided to put spy ware on his PC and found out he had been chatting sexually on there with someone he had a fling with about 8 years ago. He said the chats had only happened a few times and I could tell he didn't actually want to meet up with her by what he was saying to her, but she did want to meet up with him.

Anyway for the past 3 months we have been going to relate, but I'm not sure its getting to the bottom of why he has acted the way he has. I think from reading a previous post that he should perhaps go on his own to get to the bottom of his problems and therefore his motivation for doing what he has done, and I wanted to know if anyone else found this turned out to be a good idea rather than going for couples counselling, and why it turned out for the better? I think we could do with a combination of the two.

In terms of it getting easier to deal with over time I guess it does, but only if there is an improvement in the relationship. I'm not sure I can ever get over what he has done to me, and I still feel like a mug for putting up with it and staying with him, I have lost self respect I think.