Affair Part 5 - fab phee kicks arse wearing her skinny jeans

[OpheliaRose]

Many you will have read my threads 1 2 3 4

A month ago I discovered my Husband had been having an affair with a girl from his work. I thought it was one of the most painful moments of my life but the subsequent day where far more painful when the full extent of his betrayal was exposed to me and he has shown no remorse or sorrow over the loss of our marriage in fact he has left me for the OW

I have started divorce procedures on the grounds of adultery each day is proving a struggle but I am getting through it with the help of all of you.

All I want when this is over is for me and my Twins to be happy. We all deserve so much better than him

BeyonceRiRiMadonna I've asked my brother to come round later so he's there when H drops them back. I'm too weak to deal with his crap at the moment and I think it would break me. DB said he'd do the lawn for me etc so will be there when H arrives back.

I hate calling the Dr. It seems such a silly system that you have to call at 8 and if your lucky they have appointments that day and if not your told to call back tomorrow.

Phee.
At the drs be specific about your actual symptoms.
The sleep
The anxious feelings
The low mood, sudden crying etc.
The lack of appetite.
Any intrusive or disturbing thoughts.
Feelings of hopelessness or thoughts of self harm, if any.
In 5 minutes you need to use the time wisely.
Id avoid seeing h for a good while now.
See your situation as an illness that you need to try and treat.
If you developed any other illness you woukd take steps to get better wouldnt you?
Fight this a little bit each day love.
Fight for your new and exciting life.

Our Drs are the same, you have to go through s triage system and the receptionist asks "is it an emergency?" So you end up saying yes even if you just have a sore throat or piles

@ledkr - My DRs is the same. I actually asked the receptionist was the definition of an 'emergency' was and she was completely stumped!

*what

Thank you ledkr that post was really helpful

It seems so hard not to see him mainly because I feel like the twins mean we have to see each other but also I've spent the last 12 years seeing or talking Tobin almost every day so not seeing him fed weird.ike I've had a limb chopped off

phee my broadband has been down so just catching up.

I cannot believe someone named you as a troll on another thread! Your posts are genuine and heartfelt.

I'm glad you are seeing the doctor. Please don't see it as a weakness, see it as strength as you are strong enough to say you need some help. You have in a way had a major trauma and probably could liken it to PTS.

Dont see H....ask that DB/dad arrive at least an hour before drop off (in case he has another idea to come unannounced earlier than expected).

Sending . Please be kind to yourself

Xx

It is a big change for you, don't be hard on yourself for feeling how you do. It's still very early days.
Glad to hear your db will be there next time so you don't have to speak to him.

Hi Phee. I posted on your first thread under a different name and have been following your posts since.

I haven't read all the replies but a lot of what you have posted recently has really resonated with me from when I went through something similar with STBXH. When we initially broke up, aside from the gut wrenching pain, I was also scared to go out and felt anxious a lot of the time. I felt like I had an identity crisis, I no longer knew what clothes suited me etc.

In hindsight, I realise that so much of my self identity was tied up with being my H's wife. I had been with him 12 years, since I was 17, I'd never spent any time as a single adult. Without my husband, I didn't know who I was. Plus all the self blame crap I went through believing his affair was in part because I wasn't good enough. It was very scary at the time.

However, I took strength from any and all progress I made. I kept a journal to remind myself of how far I'd come. And actually, it was really good for me ultimately. I got the chance to reinvent myself, be whoever I wanted to be. I found my independence and worked out who I really was - what I loved, what I didn't - without the influence of my dickhead H. Much of this was helped along by a new job. And because STBXH was having our DC eow, I got to spend some time working out who I was as a person other than just a mother. I began to enjoy my time apart from the DC which enabled me to enjoy my time with them more.

Life is really good for me now. I've had shit to deal with like most people, including a fairly recent chronic illness diagnosis, but I handle it all so much better than i would have back then. When you've been to hell and back, your self confidence and self believe soars.

I know how much this hurts right now, I know you probably don't believe us when we say it gets better (I never did at the time either), I'd probably have been cross if someone had told me it was the best thing that could have happened. But actually it really was. I'm immeasurably more happy now than I ever was with H. You're doing so so well even if you don't think you are. Take it from all of us who have walked this path before. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other. You might not know where you're going yet, but I know you're on the path to bigger and better things. You're walking your way to a much happier life. And the posters here and the people that care about you in RL will be happy to hold your hand for as long as it takes until you get to that place where you feel free.

So glad you're going to GP. Take sunglasses with you as talking about it all may open the floodgates of tears. It's to be expected.

I didn't see you mentioned elsewhere, but members here will be the same cross section of nice and nasty, with all variables in between as in real life. Because though your life has been knocked off its axis, you feel more vulnerable at present.
As to that person who completely invented a thread, well they do have a severe problem. It's just not the one they were writing about!

phee I remember the realisation that all my memories were with h but I've made lots more now and they are better.

As for parenting the twins, at some point ofcourse you need to talk and discuss the children but you have a lifetime to do that and now is not the time. Your priority is getting well so any communication with him can wait.

I converse with my ex now and we seemingly get in ok but underneath I still loathe him for what he put me and our chikdren through, I just hide it well

Good luck at the doctors Phee if you manage to get an appointment

Phee, I have read your posts from the beginning and have joined mumsnet so I can speak to you. Please lean on your family and friends and don't worry about it. When my ex had his mid-life crisis one of my friends was wonderful. Unfortunately she is now in poor health but I am able to remember what she did for me and try to repay her.
Ledkr and others have given you good advice.

There will come a time when you are able to look at your ex with indifference but if possible, later on, try not to fall out with him too badly. There may be graduations, weddings etc. and it would be good to be able to both attend these without any atmosphere.

Others have suggested you treat yourself to something nice. My treat (silly as though it may sound) was a very pretty china cup and saucer and it was mine and nobody else could use it! 23 years later I still have the rather battered cup.
Please be kind to yourself and don't worry about others either here or in RL.

Phee I didnt see that post naming you and I will assume the poster leads as loney as life as the actual trolls who make threads up in order to get attention.

And well done on the Dr's appt.

xxx

Good luck at the GP, Phee.
Stop off somewhere afterwards and treat yourself to something.

Hi phee , can I just say that I think you have coped really well, and shown great strength and dignity in dealing with this horrific situation.

I think at this stage in my husbands betrayal I was still on the floor, so please don't feel you're not doing well, you really are, and if you need some help from the gp then so be it, whatever it takes to get you feeling on a even keel again.

That may be in the form of counselling or some chemical help, it may only be for a short time, but could make a real difference to your physical and emotional well being.

Please take care of yourself, x

The post naming Phee was more of a "please don't tell me Phee's post is not genuine" rather than actual troll hunting. I don't think the poster meant any harm, but the whole thread was harmful and upsetting. I'm glad it got pulled in the end.

Phee, I'm sorry you're not doing so well. I think you will have phases where you go backwards a bit, it's perfectly normal. It's also normal to get a bit of help from your GP to get you through this shitstorm. I hope they were understanding with you.

What a fabulous post Peggy

Hope you're ok, Phee.

Thank you all for your post

Its taken me a while to catch up. I went to see the DR who was very nice and understanding they prescribed me citalopram on a low dosage but said I should make a follow up appointment for next month so we can review it. if needs be then up the dosage and also see if its helped my sleeping at all. the Dr was still against giving me sleeping tablets but thought citalopram would help me with the depression / Anxiety therefore possibly leading to better sleep. He said if its still bad in a month then sleeping tablets may be the answer. I guess thats a very sensible way to look at it

we spoke a bit about counselling however the NHS referral where i am can take a rather long time so my Dr suggested if I didn't want to wait I should look into "private" options

Twins had a lovely time with their dad which stung a bit (a lot) It sounds like he cooked them dinner (he rarely cooked when he was here) and made them ice cream sundaes for pudding. I stayed out the way upstairs when he dropped them back letting DB do all the talking but i was practically sobbing at the ease he's taken to this new way of life. I also felt really bad because he never made an effort like that when it was us together I didnt ever resent it at the time because he worked very hard for us so i was happy to do cooking and everything else at home but I was thinking how can you be so ready and able to do that now but not before!?

Its very easy to be a disney dad when you don't have to deal with the consequences of over indulging your DC on the few occasions they see them.

Guilt sundaes! He has to make the effort Phee. The effort is all he has left now he isn't there for the day to day daddy stuff. Pity him for what he has lost and all that he will miss in the future. Actually don't pity him, he doesn't deserve that, just focus on it.
Well done for being strong with the GP. It takes a lot of courage to ask for help. I hope you are able to get some rest now

Look at it a different way Ophelia; you get to give the twins your love, care and attention 90% of the time. He only gets 10% of the time, so should be making a massive effort every single time. Agree that it's much, much, much easier to do when you aren't taking full responsibility for them.

Well done phee glad you got on okay at the doctors. Fingers crossed these tablets help a bit.

Agree with other posters. Everything he's doing now is because of the guilt. Because of the fact he isn't there to actually be a father on a day to day bases. No amount of sundaes makes up for the fact he abandoned them.