Infidelity support thread for the betrayed party

[ppandj]

I recently found out about my partner's affair, which occurred while I was pregnant and had a newborn (plus a toddler). My partner's behaviour was vile to me for a long time (turns out it was part of the guilt of the affair) and I had been considering ending our relationship anyway. Then I found out about the infidelity and our world has come crashing down, we are both devastated and my partner has had a wake up call- all the illusion of his affair has been shattered and he realises what he jeopardised when he made those choices. I have not yet decided what to do long term; whether we stay together depends largely on him and whether he can have a good look at himself and learn his lessons, but also I need to build my self-esteem and think about what I actually want.

Since I found out I have been on MN (more than usual ) and have read some old threads where the betrayed spouses were supporting eachother. I have also seen that there are many coping with this shitty experience currently posting. So I thought maybe we can have a thread to know that we aren't alone.

Because some of us do. Some of us look at the bigger picture. Some have no choice. Your comment does sound critical.

Well I am at the angry stage and my H cannot deal with it. He says he cannot deal with the hatred he sees in my eyes...

I asked him to do things to make me feel worth it, to make me feel like he is worth staying together and he didn't do any of it. Stuff like showing me I'm in his thoughts, organising things for us to do together, showing real empathy. He did initially but now he says he lost the desire to do so and wants everything to go back to normal...

I don't feel loved, I don't feel he's fighting for us, I feel he just wants me to forget about it and move on...

I think the 'lets forget and move on' is very common and as you know BrokenLife, it isnt that simple. Your head may say yes, but your heart sort of dies a bit.

So what do I do? I feel that instead of him fighting for us I am expected to save this marriage. And of course there should be two of us saving it but I can't see any fight on his side. Do I suck it up? How do I deal with my emotions then? My anxieties? My desires?

www.affairrecovery.com/survivors/Samuel/ambivalence

This sums up what I'm getting
Hope you're not suffering the same, brokenlife x

This is the same for me, I am now at the angry stage, I see no effort in him. He says he loves me, and wants us to work it out (only because she stayed with her husband) I hated what he did to me at first, now I hate him. Everyday I feel something different, how am I supposed to decide what to do like this?

DOES upset me

I am not sure where my other posts went??

Castadrift - sums up the last 8 years of our marriage. He won't talk about it, acknowledge his responsibility, acknowledge my pain. It's like being left in limbo.

Plotting my escape atm x

Hi, I found this thread and have been reading it for what seems like an age but now feel ready to post here. My h is a liar and a cheat and I discovered he had been visiting prostitutes over a four month period. I have no respect for him anymore, in fact I find his actions abhorrent and can barely look at him. I have known since discovering a message in October and for some unexplainable reason I actually listened to his pathetic apologies and oh those tears and the shows of utter self pitying emotion.
I agreed to try and work through it, heck I was stupid enough to actually try... until last week, when it felt like I suddenly woke up, suddenly found the real me.

So, I have now told him that I no longer want this and am preparing to conquer life alone with my dcs. I am scared and feel sad but I cannot cave in, I cannot let him talk his way back (a skill he excels in unfortunately)

@Newerversion , good for you, It sounds like you have found your inner strengthen, I hope I find mine soon x Mine to has a skill in talking me round, Its hard to resist :(

@Newerversion you sound really strong. You can do this! A friend of mine is just finalising her divorce and tonight has shown me some photos of the new house she is making all her own for her and her DC. It has made me realise that actually once you are on "the other side" you can do things your own way and life will have fresh new possibility in it.

I am still with DP, we had our Relate assessment a fortnight ago and starting sessions next week. My partner is also in the "let's have nice days and build new memories together" but doesn't want to talk much about it. He does talk when I bring it up but never brings it up himself. I think Relate is make or break for us but I'm feeling hopeful now. The triggers are fewer and farther between and I don't feel sad every day. Things have changed forever but that doesn't mean there is no light.

Hi to everyone who has had to join. I have read all your posts and really feel for you. It must be especially hard to have to see the OW.

Brokenpromises (amazing how we all feel broken by their actions and they can sleep at night no problem) I feel exactly the same.

I actually don't know which way to turn, I don't want to make a rash decision while I am still emotional, I want to call it quits when I feel that the anger, pain and hurt have gone. When I look at him and feel no love left and look at the situation with realistic expectations and realise there's nothing left. Does it sound realistic? Is it possible to achieve that stage?

I had my counselling last night and we talked about the change in behaviour. Before Christmas my H was all in, crying, being upset, making (empty) promises of how he'll fix it etc. She told me that is sounds like he suddenly realised the magnitude of what he's done and he now entered a stage where he believes this isn't fixable therefore he's detaching.

She said we are in a vicious circle, I don't feel like I can move on because of his lack of actions and feeling insecure because of it and angry which triggers my H to detach which then triggers more insecurity and anger in me.

So she asked me to be the adult (once again) and reach out and pull him out of his rabbit whole, remind him of our happy memories and why the marriage is worth saving, explain to him that if we divorce my pain will not go away and similarly, his guilt and shame will not disappear. When seeing the kids he'll always feel guilty for destroying their world and not doing much to save it. He'll have to carry the weight for the rest of his life from this so detaching currently will help him in the short term but in the long term he will not feel better about it.

So I have been the adult (again) last night and told him all this. He said it is the most useful thing he's heard in the last four months and he sees now realising that is what's going on with him. He feels overwhelmed by all of it.

Anyway I asked my IC how will I deal with the resentment of me being the adult and putting in the effort and she told me we'll deal with it later on, I should not think of the future now, and if it helps me understand that I am doing this for my kids. Ultimately I will be able to look back in a few years' time and be able to say I've done all I could while if he doesn't start putting in the effort he won't. And that by then my kids will be more prepared if it gets to divorce as they will see the atmosphere changing in the family environment while now they won't know what hit them as we had a happy family all this time so it would come as a shock to them.

I don't know if what I have written helps anybody but that's where I am at (today).

@Brokenlife Does he have his own IC?
My DH is doing so, and has done a period of CBT which he feels has been really helpful, he won't have a bad word said about it.

As for me well I'm okay. I won't go into details in fear in outing myself but I saw the OW this week (nothing was said) but just the sight of her staring at me knocked my MH back a bit. When I told DH, he was actually angry and disgusted that she even dared look my way. Now this is the first time I've really seen any serious negativity towards her from him. I think as a BS we kinda want to see that, even in cases where its not so justified.

A weird step has been made, I think.

15 months on. I'm still breathing! And finally kicked the smoking habit I pulled back up after discovery.

DotCotton yes he has his third session today. I asked him to stop talking about moving forward as we are not there yet and talk about why did he do this and what can he do to make himself a safer partner.

What do you feel your H has done to put his work into your marriage recovery? I feel like I need something but even when I get it is not enough. Nothing feels enough anymore. I feel like everything he says or does I pick on.

Sorry to hear you've bumped into the ow. At the beginning I thought I can control myself and I had a speech to give her, she tried to bump into us after I checked in on FB in a location and within an hour she was there (she also posted on fb). Luckily (even though deep down I wish we would have bumped into her) we didn't see her. Now, almost 4 months later I think I'd jump at her throat if I'd seen her. That's how angry I am.

Oh and I am smoking again too since all this happened. Started on DDay and thought I'd be done by now but I can't cope with the withdrawal symptoms as well now.

I am booked to have some dentist work done in March and I the end of it I have requested teeth whitening so I plan to pack it up after.

We are strong women and we can do this.

The OW texted me. Threatened my DC. Said dh didn't love me when..... threatened to buy the house next door to me. Kept ring8ng dh daily for more than a year after he said it was over...during their thing threatened to kill herself. Apparently tried later and her dh messaged mine . I know I should be kind and feel sorry for her but no way after she threatened my children

I have just caught up with everything on this thread. Sending you all big massive hugs. Sorry I haven't been around. Had stuff going on unrelated with the affair and that and also my health hasn't been that good.

So it's now over 18 months since dday. We are still together. Still in marriage counselling but looking to making bigger gaps between appointments and then finish. How do I feel now? That's varies. Sometimes I have quite a good period of time that it is good and other that's aren't. I still struggle with my feelings over the affair and think I will never get over it. But it just isn't the affair. It's his behaviour during and stuff that's happened since. I find what I need from him has changed from before the affair and also stuff I never brought up that I minded with or upset as I always felt so lucky to be with him. 🙄

I don't know if year 2 is different as I feel I have decided to stay. Now it's the making it work and making changes so your both happy. Changes you didn't need before.

It has helped so much him no longer working with her. Also he has heard she is going after another married man at work.

I don't know what else to say. Again sorry I haven't replied sooner but I have read what everyone has posted and makes me so sad to see you all going through this.

X

How long ago was the affair @brokenlife , if you don't mind me asking?

None of the recovery happened overnight. There was a LOT of selfishness to get over. There was no doubt that he wanted to be with me, there was no doubt he wanted to be away from her. But no-one mattered at this point, except him.

I do remember feeling "There's actually nothing ENOUGH that he can do". Yes he was trying. We did marriage counselling too, but in hindsight we were not in a good enough place for that. It did help. Odd little things happened which made me see how protective he was, how much he would drop anything for me at any time. I saw him sign up to survivinginfidelity, which he doesn't know I know about. He read books too. Checking out the 5 Love Languages was an eye opener , for the both of us.

It has been months of brutal depths of talking. Every hour was hell, there was not an hour I didn't think about it. It's better now, there's still not a day-off from thinking about it but I do get the odd hour off. Part of this is down to the fact that we are both actively fighting for our relationship.

A recent thing I did was watch Esther Perel's TED talk. If you haven't watched it, I suggest you do now, and again in a few months. If anything it just might ease the weight of it all a little. I am going to read one of her books, and i dont read!

I can't believe the OW had the audacity to try and intimidate you. It should be utter shame. I've had my day of pulling up the OW face to face, all I saw was a pathetic, desperate woman who thought she was important to someone, and she wasn't.

5 months. Well 4 and a half started middle of May and I found out in September, I believe he gave an accurate timeline as he deleted all his emails to her within that timeline even the work related ones. So he would have deleted further before May. I only have his story. Never talked to the ow but she went mental on WhatsApp and social media trying to torture me with memes about how deep their love was, she wasn't realising she was torturing him as he was the one crying when I was telling him to go to his slut as she's waiting for him and he kept crying and even self harming telling me how stupid he's been and he's thrown away an amazing family and a wonderful woman for that.

I guess recently he just realised how hard this is. I swing from wanting a fresh start on my own and remembering what a beautiful family we had. He says it all happened because nobody paid him any attention before and she offered herself to him on a plate, stroke his ego (amazing, I mean I can imagine what a great person she is, oh you are so great and amazing seeing that you cheat and lie to you wife, who the hell believes such a man is worth attention? She obviously needs some soul searching if she believes a man who's willing to hurt his kids and wife is amazing) and I was never meant to find out. He keeps saying he was happy. But just felt, when it was offered to him, that he is entitled to more. Have his cake and eat it.

And now dealing with the fallout he's losing motivation, that's what my IC was saying, he's realising the magnitude of it.

First three months we've spent it taking turns crying. Him saying he can't live without me. Being suicidal. Saying there's nobody in life he wants to be with.

Now he still says those things but everything he does is pointless to me. He spent ££££ on me seeing that I got to size 6. Branded stuff, no expense was spared. He reads, goes to counselling...

But I guess I want to see him hurting. I know it isn't right but I am hurting so badly that if feels unfair he can sleep at night.

And the irony of it all? He's jealous and he said if I would have done that or I would do that to him he'd take the kids and leave me.

It scares me to read of your experiences 18 months out. It really does. I don't want a marriage where I cannot be happy. I believe in fairytales and now my world is shattered. I thought I can go back there but all I read says "no chance". So I feel like what's the point? My kids only?

I read a post on Survivinginfidelity.com that really helped. I asked DP to read it and it seemed to help. It's called "Things every WS should know" and it's in the Wayward Side forum.

@brokenlife i had a feeling things were still quite fresh :(

At 5 months there's no way I'd expect you to even see some glimmer of light, and it might take him time too.

You will forever be asking the same questions over and over and over. It's the grieving process.

DotCotton the affair was 5 months. I am not yet 4 months out. I am past the asking the same question again, I tried to explain though that his behaviour recently is making me insecure again. Not because I won't be able to move on on my own but because I feel like "what's the point". So I feel like throwing in the towel but luckily for him my counsellor reminded me last night that there is no rush, I can make that decision when I am less emotional and be at peace that I have done it with a clear mind.

Seryan my H read it a few times, I think now he's bored with all the reading but I just asked him to re-read the "How to Help your Spouse heal". Maybe he'll see the mistakes he's making now.

Your counsellor is right lovely. This is up to you, when you are ready, you are at liberty to decide whenever

Brokenlife-how do you feel about that Irony bit? I have to say that bit would piss me off no end! The jealous ones can often be the worst. My ex was. Spent all his life saying “I would never to do that someone” etc etc....guess what! He did it more than once!