How would/did you handle this betrayal?

[avrilinca]

Has anyone had a D day where their H has sat them down and confessed to an affair (in the past) but neither apologised nor said they want to leave? He says he can't apologise or ask for forgiveness because he doesn't regret it. He also says he doesn't want to be with the OW now but he does want to be in touch with her. I can't find anything anywhere on the internet that has a similar precedent - seems to be either apologetic (cathartic or pre-emptive) confessions or unplanned discoveries. It seems just unbelievably cruel and crazy-making to me.

You're right, aren't you? My reflex is to start making excuses for him. I need to find someone who doesn't need excusing. It should be that simple. I went on a date the other night and found myself being touched that the guy would bother to iron a shirt to come out with me. It didn't escape me that I was setting the bar pretty low.

Just noticed you are the OW. The man isn't worth the angst. Sounds like he wants to stay married to his wife but continue his relationship with you.

He wants to be NC while he has something material to tell you ?

Read between the lines. He has told his wife he has chosen her and given you up. He will contact you again (in secret) when he thinks the dust has adequately settled and his wife thinks they are reconciled again.

You want to be part of this ?

No, handful, they're not. And I'm so sorry, I know you're a BS, I followed your thread, partly to try and kick myself up the arse and sort out my behaviour. I hope you're doing OK.

Wow, AF, I thought I'd been cynical enough but I hadn't thought of that. It would be quite hard to cover up the lack of material news if he still lived with her, though?

(my 'you're right' above was to willpower)

Think it through, love. Men aren't divided into shitbags and non-shitbags. People who have affairs lie. That's how they're having affairs. He's already a lying shitbag. You just thought it wasn't to you. Well, surprise surprise, he has been lying to you. Managing you. Manipulating you. I'm not saying about everything, but enough, enough to get you seriously to wait around for a man you feel passionately about who is 'going to leave his wife' sigh. (no you feel passionately about the affair. You have no idea if you would feel passionately about him in a real relationship which is totally different.)

Why would he not want him leaving her to be about you anyway? If he was actually going to leave her, what would it matter? If he was actually going to leave her it would be better for it to be about the affair because she could get angry and the split could be acrimonious but clear. Even if he ever were to leave her, he wants to do it in a way that makes it look like IT WASN'T HIS FAULT. then what? He gets together with you and somehow maintains that it wasnt actually about you? Bitch, please. So wants it to be 'amicable'. He wants it not to be about you. Even if he were to leave her, which he isn't, OP, why would he, the manner in which he's prepared to leave suggests a coward who wants to hide you and stay on intimate terms with his ex wife. Whoop for you.

Seriously. Stop. And stop projecting on her stuff you know nothing about. HE has manipulated both of you to stay in the boxes he wants you to be in. You can't understand HER behavior? seriously dude, who's got the house, the man, the life, the money, the shared parenting, the holidays, the vast amount of time with him? What about your behavior? What sort of mindset is it that judges a man on how he's treating his wife when she is treating that woman in the same way too? Wake. Up. You are not a bystander. You are doing this. you are torturing her too. just as he is torturing you. He will not leave while he has no reason to go. Start your life, OP. Start your life. As soon as you are strong and happy, I promise he will turn up on your doorstep saying he has left and that he misses you. And then. When things are crumbling and your new independence and strength eroding and you're moulding yourself round him again, then he will go back. What we want is to be loved and to feel important to people and not to lose them. And we'll destroy them to get it if we have to. Stop.

You hadn't thought of that ? Oh dear. You are not cut out for this OW business are you ? You are going to have to get a lot more ruthless than this and start to think like this married man like an emotional abuser

Then you know a little bit of the extreme pain an affair can cause.

I'm not going to flame you but if you are soul searching then you know this is no way to continue, why cause such pain to his DW and yourself?

Get some strength, you can let him go, just like I've had to let my stbxh go - although I had no choice in that. He's getting a kick out of it and it just shows how little he values his DW and you.

There are some good men out there.

I would bet that you're not the only OW.

Oh god, I read the NC bit now. OP, HE'S NOT GOING TO LEAVE AND HE IS DEFINITELY NOT GOING TO LEAVE IF YOU KEEP CONTACTING HIM BECAUSE THEN HE GETS EVERYTHING HE WANTS AND NO NEED TO FEEL GUILTY BECAUSE YOU ARE THE ONE DOING THE CONTACTING

Jesus.
I'm sorry to shout but it pains me how much of the same old things is everywhere and how everyone behaves the same. Yes, of course he has told his wife he wants to stay and work on things and he is not in contact with you, though that is difficult because it's like an 'addiction' (note the correlation with something negative that you are going to give up). Of course he has.

This is all a bit confusing but I think what you described in your OP ie not leaving, a ton of betrayal and indecision about leaving happened to me a long time ago. It was emotional torture. I had a breakdown and fell apart.

OW got him and 90% of 'his' money eventually though if that's any comfort to you.

(What does BS stand for, in this context?).

Its either front or he's just not a good guy....suspecting both.

Its what you want that's important and you need to respect your own feelings because they'll come and bite you in the backside if you try and pretend that this is ok

and this is kind of what Im getting he wants you to feel....that what he's done is ok in some way shape or form because he doesn't regret it. He's kidding himself. He'll know exactly how badly he's behaved....he's perhaps hoping you don't by blowing lots of hot air and smoke your way

Respect your feelings....

He has done that already, when I started seeing someone last year. Said he wanted to leave so I broke up with the other guy (who actually was slightly creepy anyway, and far too keen my issues) and then surprise! he couldn't do it. Oh god. I am just a classic mug. But why tell her? OH WAIT MAYBE HE HASN'T.

This time it's not different. Sigh.

I KNOW I should have the strength. I hate myself every time I go back. I have tried and tried to work out why I do it but it's so hard when like an addict all my wily brain does is think of excuses to get in touch with him. I resist 99% of them and then suddenly my fingers have called him. I KNOW I have agency and I am not trying to excuse myself, I'm just trying to describe what the experience feels like.

BS - betrayed spouse.

oh my god, avri, can't you see that he doesn't want to leave but he doesn't want you to have anyone else either? no matter how articulate or emotionally relatable his explanations, look at his actions. It is the same story as anyone else. It is why the cliche is a cliche. Please pleas start your life. This man is no good. He is treating you the same way he is treating his wife, please stop thinking of yourself differently from her. Block his number and delete it. get a friend to help you. Gee a therapist. You are using him to plug something in your life and that is the problem. You are either fucking desperate, or commitment phobic yourself and so actually want a torturous half-arsed absent relationship over anything real. Either way you need to solve this shit and show some compassion to a woman who is probably on her way to a breakdown. You are being taken for such a mug. Get angry.

The "experience" sounds pathetic.

Soooo - the affair "ended" 1 year ago but you're still in contact, usually because you chase him? Have you had any sex with him in the last year?

You do see, don't you, that he's got completely the best of both worlds here. He has to put zero effort into you, because you're no longer in an "active" relationship; and his wife hasn't yet kicked him to the kerb (although GOD I hope she's making his life a fucking misery - maybe not so much of the "best" in that world).

Get some dignity woman. Stop contacting the cheating arsehole, and stop comparing other men to him.
The biggest "connection" I ever had was with someone who was a pathological liar and a cheating bastard too - it took me a while and also shitloads of therapy to get over that but I did. I let him treat me like shit for over a year and half - can't believe I was ever that stupid but chemicals make you do weird things.

Get over the "addiction". Sort it out, go non-contact, cut him out of your life and do it genuinely, not in some sort of vain hope that if you stop contact then he'll come running back. If he does come back, tell him to FOTTFSOFATFOSM.

Isabeller - I'm so sorry. I know I'm (by far) the less wronged one here. From what everyone's saying about the model you're better off without him, I hope it felt like that pretty quickly.

Well done, BTW for a) admitting to being the OW on MN and b) taking on board what the other posters have said. That takes some balls, so you are clearly a tougher cookie than you think

(my 'you're right' above was to willpower)

Yup, I think I'm right.

This man is poison. Attractive poison but poison.

Please walk away. The very best you could hope for is that you become his second wife who accepts his infidelities?

Do you really want that?

No man is better than him.

xposted - delete his number from your phone, then you won't be able to call him. Delete his email address and any other contact details you have for him. If you've memorised them then change the numbers around and say them out loud about 100 times until the memory is overwritten - might work, can't promise it will!

STOP CONTACTING HIM!
*GET SOME DIGNITY!"

Do you really not see that he doesn't give a shit about you?

Stop wasting your time trying to interpret the meaning behind a conversation with his WIFE that is a pack of lies anyway.

You said you've had therapy - stick with it.

Whilst I don't like to kick people, you do deserve to hear that you are doing a horrible thing. A really shitty, nasty thing.

It's not doing you any good either, but my sympathy for you is v v v limited.

Stop contacting someone else's HUSBAND.

Are you the poster who repeatedly starts threads just so you can talk about your angst, and how difficult it all is, and how wonderful he is really because you actually have fuck-all of any of it in reality ? You pissed people off massively the last several time you did that, if you are she

It's all in your head

This bloke is with his wife and when he feels like it, he will start shagging you on the side too

But only when his wife thinks they are reconciled and you have been put on the shelf for long enough you will be desperate enough open your legs without question and continue to do so for as long as he sees fit

This thread will limp along another couple of pages. OP will get her fill of talking about the situation because she has no where else to do so and then she will disappear

tell me I have the wrong person, OP