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.

You don't need to be frightened for me I know why it happened I got all my answers I just didn't think counciling was for us it's not our thing everyone is different but I just wanted to get over it quickly

For those of you who have forgiven and moved on, how did you get to that stage? That calm and peaceful state? How did you get there?

@FrancesDestroyed

Funnily enough I've been feeling peaceful about it today? However I'm a bit of a failed Christian so I've been reading up about forgiveness/Adultery on Christian sites? It's really helping me but I do understand religion is a no go subject so I won't elaborate.

My lying rat of a cheating husband brought me a valentines card, It made me so angry, No I'm sorry, No declarations of undying love, No grand gestures.No heart felt love letter. Just a shitty card, I tore it to shreds, my anger today hit a new level, I don't care about who I hurt or what happens anymore, Its like a release for so long I have been the calm sweet nice person, who tried to do right by everyone, Not anymore I am going to do whatever I want, whatever makes me happy, no second guessing, no worrying about the future, no putting other people first.

Last year on Valentine's Day he had a date with her. I gave him a card and present in bed, like the other 26 years, he pecked me on the cheek. I found a card and a rose from a garage on the windscreen of my car.
He's just tried to tell me how loving and romantic this was. I've tried to explain to him how I feel. He's driven off in the car and gone.
Wow.
He was only kidding himself. Reality just bit him in the backside and he's driven off.
God, it hurts.
He wants me to forgive and forget and move on. He says I'm keeping the affair alive by talking about it and crying.
It's such a mess.
How do you let go and move on?

Alfie you’re not some controlling wife because you’re reacting to what’s going on, and has gone on. You’re just being what this situation can make of very reasonable women. But what you do need to be thinking about is if you like being this person or not, and if not - how can you stop being her. What would give you the best chance of being the woman you like being or want to be and how can you make it happen?

Re Valentine’s Day - is it really worth the upset? It’s just horrible pressure on people to conform to a marketing ploy that seems to grow feet and legs every year. But if is important to people I think it’s perfectly ok to say you know what, I’m not feeling it this year.

How do people become calm and serene and learn to forgive? I’m of the opinion if the eventual choice you’ve made is the correct one you’ll grow into being the person you want to be. Does becoming that person have to involve forgiveness? No I don’t think it does. It can just be acceptance that something happened, and making the best of it so the days and years ahead of you are the best they can because you’re the best you can be.

Calm and Serene? I think that’s just another way to say ‘being in good health mentally and emotionally’.

Broken, Francis, we cross posted. I’m sorry. I’m doing a few things at once where I am.

There’s nothing anyone can say to you right now that will help you feel better. Its all just a bloody nightmare. End of.

Xx

My husband was unfaithful 20 years ago. Getting to the calm and peaceful stage was a very long haul. First 3 years was the most acute I could still get incredibly up set. For a decade any argument would drag that time up again. What’s gone for ever is the absolute trust I had in him in the early years together. I trust him now but not in that very deep certain way. It’s something we are both sad to have lost.
I didn’t want to end the marriage as it was my second. My children and his had become an integrated family, we had had two further children. It was too much investment to untangle and he felt the same.
It was bloody hard work. Even now I feel furious at the absolute utter fucking wasteland of those years. It affected the family dynamic badly. I had less energy for the kids.
Nowadays I am glad we stuck it out. We have that old familiarity of a continuous long relationship. I love that when the family comes together for graduations etc there is no tension for the kids or with exes as there is with our older kids at times. However I think that I could have made it work if the marriage had split - just results in different problems down the line.
As he looks back now he says he cannot understand why it happened. He was going through a very successful period at work, he was working away and just got carried away with himself is the way he rationalises it. Soon realised he wasn’t the type of man who could have a quick shag and it not mean anything although at the time that was what he had in mind.
Counselling helped a bit in the initial raw stages, friends and family were a mixed bag. One was wonderful but some were a bit “ just kick the bastard out” which didn’t help.
My thoughts for you all are that it’s a hard road but if the dynamics of a good relationship were there you can eventually get it back if you both really want that. However if there was a rocky relationship to start with I would use this as the time to cut loose.

Thank you nursy. I was very careful with my choice of card today Iwent for jokey as I’m not feeling the sentimental lovey stuff right now but his ego is so fragile I had to get him one! I wish i’d Known 8 years ago and could see the messages for myself. He’s all “I can’t remember” and minimising but some of the things they did were not small- the first physical contact was while I was asleep in the same room and he brought her a vibrator! I said that I don’t know how to move on from those things alone. He’s trying and the only reasons I am is because he did stay with me although she ended it not me so it feels like second choice. He says he felt trapped into the affair that he just went along with it because by the time it started he didn’t know how to stop and he was relieved it did. They both say there was never discussion about him leaving me. I just look at the last 8yrs and the shit we’ve delt with(all 3 fathers dying, burglary, job insecurity, parental dept, dementia, buying a home with my parents, dc’s rare diagnosis) and the way he’s treated me through all that and feel so sad. Things could have been so different. We’ve been married 14 years together 18 but it’s all been obliterated by the affair and the last 8years of lies. I could have been living a happier life yet I can’t feel the anger. I don’t hate either of them. It worries me a bit that I’m not feeling and when I think about it all the shakes come back. I’m shaking now typing this!

Personally I wouldn’t have sent him a card when you feel like that. It’s pointless really isn’t it.

Screaming do you do a lot of things you don’t really want to do because of his fragile ego?

I have spent most of our life together doing just that. For what? I’m slowly reaching the angry stage now. Our counsellor basically told me I’d enabled his behaviour and that was my portion of the blame for his affair.

I bought him a card he doesn’t usually do valentines but got me a card and some flowers a bunch of white Lillies which I always think of funerals and are toxic to cats we have 2 including a pesky kitten. Not wanting to sound ungrateful but not sure why he didn’t play it safe with roses lol

Do you not find it all a bit false Alfie? I hate these type of gestures when it’s not the norm. It’s almost like a box ticking exercise.

I did find it false today I have always wanted him to do romantic gestures but it’s not him. We had a great week but a then had a row a few days ago as I thought he had messaged her. I remember last year when we were trying again and supposed to be making more effort in our marriage I cooked him a romantic meal and he never bothered so I was miffed. Poor bloke can’t win can he lol

Alfiemoon. I think at the moment whatever the guilty party does is under suspicion. I felt quite crazy mad for a long time, over analysing things and looking for ulterior motives and stuff. like you thinking about Lily’s as funeral flowers. Buying a card is ok even if out of keeping with previous practice because it’s “something” in their steps to try and repair. Try and focus on that.
Screaminginside. I feel for you and hope you can get to calmer waters. It’s horrid I know because you can’t stop yourself dwelling on it. What helped was when I could keep really really busy. Didn’t iron for months and gave up swimming because that was always my thinking time and I didn’t want it. It’s horrible but it will eventually pass.
So much love today to everyone struggling with this. All will be well eventually x.

You can forgive thats the easy part it's forgetting that's the hard part if you don't feel like u can forgive no amount of counciling will help plus counciling could bring up some things about ure self and behaviours that u myt not like or want to hear

We have been together for 38 years and married for 35 . My husband had been very cold and uncaring towards me for months and I couldn't take it anymore, so i confronted him and asked him what was going on and why he was so angry with me. He couldn't look me in the eye so I knew it was bad. Eventually he told me he was in love with a co Worker, he wanted to move in with her. He said were sole mates. She had left her partner several months before and when my husband didn't leave me then, she took off with another man. That lasted 2 months and she moved back and started working on my husband for a second time. They were no longer working together and I had no idea she had moved back. I had previously confronted this woman about her behaviour around my husband and they both assured me nothing was going on. I put her out of my mind. Big mistake. My world has been rocked to the core and my heart broken. I have lost my self esteem, self respect, self worth, and any confidence I had has gone. I am filled with self doubt and the person I most trusted in this world is now untrustworthy. He has realised he made a huge mistake now. He assures me they never had sex and never even kissed but as much as I want to believe him and trust him again, I don't trust her to leave him alone. He tells me he there has been no contact but she still keeps trying. Sends him poems ect about what they has was so sweet ect. How do I move on from here?

You know this whole "soul mate" crap? Why do so many men get taken in by it? My husband appears to have been "love bombed" by the OW- seriously 0-60mph in a day (constant communication). Within a couple of meetings she was declaring her love to him, saying he was the perfect man, the most beautiful man she has ever seen (he's ok looking but come on……), painting a perfect alternative life with her, him her "soul mate", that he "got her like no one else has" and "they were meant to be", visiting psychics about their "relationship" and threatening to commit suicide if he left her.

My stupid, weak, husband for falling for that shit but he can now identify that this was slightly concerning behaviour. But, seriously, doesn't this set alarm bells ringing with men? It would with me. I'm no psychologist but i think that i can identify some mental issues here (she was bipolar too he told me afterwards). Anyone have similar explanations from their DH/DPs as to this being how it happened?

Broken10 I’m sorry. There is some great strategies on the beyond affairs website for coping that helped me to start with. Your husband really want to try again? Do you? Our counsellor said that I needed to look at the fact I had suspicions and knew there was something wrong and use that to see that my world hasn’t really been rocked as deep down I knew. That did help to calm the waters for me. I write everything down I was thinking and feeling, all the questions, what I felt I needed him to do to get us through and have it to him to read. That definitely helped. Take some time out for yourself. Treat yourself(I brought some very expensive underwear on his account). Most of all keep talking. We’re here!

well here a nice one for you all----H told me last night he had forgotten to get me a card or flowers as he had been so busy yesterday, , he apologised 'a lot' and I made him a lovely dinner and champagne. What he doesn’t know is that I know he wasn’t so busy mid afternoon that he decided a 10 minute porn session was in order before calling me immediately he stopped to meet him for a coffee in town (I have an office in town and he works from home) I feel so bloody upset , as this is a frequent secret activity. So far I’ve said nothing about his ‘habit’ because I am getting my ducks in a row, paying down debt etc, I was always kind of ‘unsure’ about staying but I think yesterday was the day when for me ‘love flew out the window’ , the only satisfying thing was he didn’t get Valentine’s Day sex because personally I would rather have been nailing his balls to the wall

Yet more- they never learn do they!

You can forgive thats the easy part it's forgetting that's the hard part if you don't feel like u can forgive no amount of counciling will help

Thats bullshit, have you actually ever done counselling or is this a pure assumption? The right counsellor can help some people, albeit not all!

plus counciling could bring up some things about ure self and behaviours that u myt not like or want to hear

Thats the point!!! Thats how people can learn to change their behaviours and enrich their relationships for the better.

I used to think counselling wasn't for me. In fact I made a counsellor cry when I was pushed into seeing one when I had PND. Took me SO much to go to a new one last year when my marriage broke down. The first , in hindsight, wasnt for me. My current one is a blessing.

I'm sorry but bleating on about your anti-counselling stance isn't helping anyone here. Wouldn't it be better for someone try and discover whether its for them, than not try at all?

Oh that’s grim yet more. Big hugs to you. How do you get passed the triggers or how do u learn not to react to them ? Gawd we have so many yesterday was valentines I remember making loads of effort the year before as we were trying to make things work today was ds parents evening I remember after he moved out going to dd parents evening together which got us talking and him eventually worming his way back home. If I had known we would be back here I wouldn’t of let him back to be honest

For me, a huge thing is the injustice of it all.
Because I'm trying to make the remains of out marriage work, H and skank get off scott-free.
I don't want cheap revenge.....I'd have shown the sexts to her husband, mother and their senior manager if I'd wanted revenge. How do we get justice for their behaviour and the suffering we endure? What have others found helps you?