After the affair

[Owlgirl1987]

Just wondered if anyone has been in the same situation as me where their partner / husband had an affair and you forgave them and stayed together ? If so how long did it take for tou to feel like you had got through the worst and was over it and didn't feel the need to ask them questions and question yourself and your worth ?

I know its probably not what you want to hear but you deserve better. X

I left after 4 weeks, some things aren't worth forgiving.

Cut & run.

My dh didn’t cheat but we separated for roughly 6 months around 5 years ago. He had a mental breakdown. I’ve moved on and we are happy but in tough moments I still worry he will leave again. Sometimes if something is on my mind I worry that if I tell him he will think fuck this and walk out. This is bad enough, I can’t imagine how bad it would be if another woman was involved. Im sorry this is something you are going through.

I did, it was painful for ages, and I never could get the trust back. (Quite rightly as [spoiler] he did it again). The questioning phase went on for months.

I'm sure some couples do get over it, but it really tainted what we had. We were married about 16 years all in all, and some of the time I was happy, but it was always there. And he wasn't trustworthy.

I don't regret trying, I do regret how long I tried.

I never got over it. I could never see him in the same light again, so effectively I wasn't living with the man I thought I had married. If that makes sense? The anger and rage become somewhat less after about 2 years (although it didn't completely go) but the pain and the feeling of inadequacy was there for good I'm afraid. And of course the trust was obliterated. I would have laughed at anyone who said he was capable of cheating before it happened. Afterwards the spell was broken and so was I pretty much.

OP - you probably would find better support in communities where people are going through the same. Here on MN people mostly advocate not trying.

There is Ester Perel discussion group on FB. This is people who are trying to rebuild marriages.
There is so Surviving Infidelity website, for all sorts of support.

Generally - some people get through and rebuild. Some - don’t.
A lot depends on what you are actually doing - if it’s just try to move on, as if nothing happened - waiting for pain to subside - then it’t likely to fail.
If you are both making an effort - doing counselling, getting to the bottom of what happened and how your marriage needs to change going forward - than there is a chance.

Get Ester’s book - The State of the Affair. It mat help you.

My dh cheated and I was completely broken with it all. I was always the person that said they’d walk away in that scenario but when it’s your real life then it’s not so simple.

My dh was very open and honest about it all. I spoke to him and the ow which was horrible but I wanted to do it. He cut all contact completely. He changed his phone, deleted social media and changed all his email addresses. The ow didn’t know where we lived.

He put himself through therapy and worked hard to change himself. I was broken but I could see he was broken too and he was genuinely trying for our family.

He stayed elsewhere at first as we worried to work things out. I hit rock bottom, he ruined me, my self esteem and my trust. I ended up having to go through therapy too.

We are now 5 years down the line with a bigger family than before. We communicate better, we feel more of a team now. I will never forgive and forget but I’ve moved on. The ow didn’t contact him again but she contacted me a few years later after she herself had
been cheated on and she finally understood how it felt- I didn’t bother to reply.

I believe he wouldn’t do it again. He told both of our families and our friends what he had done. Everyone was so ashamed and angry with him and I’ll never get over the look in his mums face and I doubt he will too.

I hated myself for staying, I know everyone thought I was a walk over and stupid but i’m here, we love each other and we try for each other.

I think it very much depends on whether you both really want to work at it and both invest in the relationship.
And on both being completely honest with each other.

It didn't work for us but I think it can.

Good luck x

I am still in the middle of it. 11 months in and I still have days where I cannot bear to look at her and it feels as painful as the day I found out….. but we have a lot of good days and after 15 years are getting to know each other much better now - the questions have slowed and feel generally pointless now. Why pointless, because the answers don’t help and don’t achieve anything. You are already as hurt and ripped apart as you will ever be. If they truly regret what they did, honestly want to stay with you, and are working at looking after you - dealing with low moods and being totally truthful, at some point you need to trust them and try to move past it. I am not there yet but I want us to make it, hope you are doing okay, as there is no pain like it.

Micro cheating rather than full on physical affair but the after effects are the same. We stayed together but it hasn’t been easy. I asked questions initially - perhaps for a week or two. Didn’t see the point after that. I was angry for a long time. It never affected my self worth - his bad decisions weren’t about me. Regaining trust has been difficult.
Begging for a second chance, being completely open, answering questions patiently and taking complete responsibility are an absolute must. Even then, I struggled and for the first 18 months (on bad days) I would find myself wishing he’d just left when I found out. At least that way I wouldn’t have had to be involved in making decisions about the relationship. In some ways we are better now than we were before. But I still feel like I lost something the day that I found out (although that would still be the case if we’d separated). We are four years in. We are happy enough but I’ll never feel quite the same about him as I did before.

It takes more strength to stay. Be kind to yourself.

A friend of mine had an affair and told her husband and they stayed together. They both had therapy - separately and together - and 6 years on she says they are better than ever. She puts this down in large part to the fact that his therapist told him not to ask her anything about the affair - where did they do it, what did they do in bed, etc. - as once he knew those things he'd never be able to stop thinking about them. So he never asked. She's really glad because she's forgotten all the detail herself now - looks back on the affair as a period of madness where she lost touch with reality - and says that if they'd talked about those details, it would always be hanging there between them. But they've genuinely moved on and their marriage is great now.

Also if you haven't already, listen to Esther Perel talking about affairs on podcasts, Ted talks, and read her books. She is excellent on the topic. As a PP said: it takes real courage to stay. Not that everyone should stay, but if the love is there and he's genuinely sorry, especially if you have kids together, give it your best shot.

We are 4 and a half years post discovery in a long marriage (31 years). The really raw and angry phase lasted about 18 months. We also did lots of therapy individually and together. I wouldn’t say things are back to normal even now but they are tolerable and staying together has been the right decision for our children and so far for us. Who knows when all the children are grown up though.

In my experience staying after an affair involved a lot of denial, justifying, minimising, and trying to ignore the blatant truth which was that he didn’t love me or else he wouldn’t have done it.

he got back in touch with the OW after about 18 months anyway.

Balls. I hate that. A betrayed partner who stays is not better or stronger than one who leaves. It takes strength to go it alone and to be the one to end a marriage and staying can be out of fear and weakness as well as out of strength. Both choices are hard, both roads are difficult to travel. Neither should be shamed or spoken about as lesser.

I'd personally avoid that misandrist Perel. If you want non judgemental support join survinginfidelity.com
Some of the stories are very hopeful. But depressingly there are many users who post how their H is trying so hard to fix things, remorseful, in therapy blah, blah.
And then pop up months later to say he's done it again (or they found out the affair they knew about was the tip of the iceberg)
What I will guarantee is that there'll be stories that resonate with you. And that in itself can make you feel less crazy. People talk a lot about timelines to when they felt stronger in themselves so you'll get more information than you might here.

Sorry, but I disagree. I'm sick of women being shamed and cast as weak, lacking in self respect etc on MN for choosing to stick it out, often due to their DC or particular set of circumstances including their ability to try to forgive and rebuild a marriage that has been rocked to the core.

Ending a marriage even with children at least gives the injured party a chance to move on, heal and have some control over their future.

Staying in a marriage where one has been betrayed, is taking a huge leap of faith that the guilty party will do everything to make amends, rebuild and not stray again. That must be a tortuous way to live for ever more, which in my mind requires a great degree of strength to live with.

In fairness PP was saying that neither should be held up as ‘stronger’ than the other. Not that anyone should be blamed or shamed for staying.

from experience though I don’t know about strength, but it certainly felt more empowering leaving. At least then there was finally some control over the situation as opposed to waiting for him to do it again.

See, in my experience I didn't do any of that.
I understood my partner did what he did because of HIM.
HIS responsibility
HIS behaviour
HIS response to HIS cheating
It's up and down for me post 5 years.
I had to have a massive wake up call that I wasn't as great financially as I thought I was.
I sorted that.
I had to have a massive wake up call that my lover wasn't the man I thought he was.
I am still dealing with this but I stayed and because I stayed I set boundaries.
We didn't do therapy. In hindsight I would recommend that.
I set boundaries in that MY wants and needs would now be put first.
They weren't before
I don't think we are back to pre affair but I do think we are better partners. He appreciates me, he knows what he could have lost ( and didn't want to lose me)
I don't rely on him anymore.
We have started to find the love back. And by love, I mean compassion, care, and lust.

Same for me. I stayed because I had two little children , but I was a changed person and there was never any trust after that. The good thing was that I went back to work and had an excellent career , which did make up for not having a good marriage, to a large extent . We had separate rooms and life went on as if we were flatmates . The kids had a good life though, which was what I wanted for them.

Finally did leave but it was years later, after another episode of broken trust. When I drove away from the house with all my possessions in the back seat, I felt a sense of freedom and independence like never before. Should have done it years before !

I stayed for 4 years and looking back it was for good reasons for me. So make sure it’s about you and what you feel that you need. I stayed because:

• I would have to move away if divorced 200 miles - no way could I stay in the area financially and many other reasons.
• Our young child has severe disabilities. I could not see how every other weekend would work without really disrupting him, possibly even harming him.
• I was financially not independent, and if I went back to work f/t my disabled child would likely regress.
• DH told me he was full of remorse. He also changed all his passwords and gave me them so that he would be accountable (not asked for by me).
• DH explained how and why he’d starting seeing other women (several of them).
• He took ownership of it and didnt’ blame me.

So I did stay. It was pretty humiliating for 2 years, I had told some friends and family and they thought I was demeaning myself. In a way it did feel like that. For a while it was nice to have DH treat me well. I’d been gas lighted while he was having affairs, and he never complimented me or made me feel loved. So his renewed and remorseful attention to me, making up to me, actually did help me to feel better about myself again.

I didn’t look to him for my self esteem, I did a lot of going out by myself with friends and building myself up. Which ironically I could do whilst we were still together, as he was willing to stay home with our child. Something I couldn’t do so easily as a single parent.

It also gave us a chance to talk through some of our issues, and for him to listen to me. It was like a honeymoon phase. I was in grief and shock, discovering cheating is awful. He’d even cheated while I was pregnant, awful. But for a while I did feel like the power imbalance was rectified. He also went to counselling and told some of his family, so it seemed like he was ‘doing the work’.

Unfortuantely, after a couple of years he started to get angry a couple of times if I got suspicious again. He berated me that he ‘felt hemmed in’ and even then went onto to accuse me of being controlling. I began to see that with Ex Dh, as he is now, the underling had never changed. He was entitled, and emotionally abusive. He could never go for more than a couple of years without devaluing me, and I wasnt’ even that surprised when I realised he’d started cheating again.

I wouldn't say I forgave him but I let him stay as he begged. I could never forget as it literally affects everything. Try buying a "To my husband" card for a cheater. Try to accept a "To My Wife" card from a cheater. He tried to make amends for about a year but then it all started to go down the pan. He was in touch with her again and one day he just left after about 4 years. They are married now.

Same for me. Trust was broken and after that it was almost death by a thousand cuts that killed any love I had left. I restarted my career and focused on my kids and we are just housemates. For many years I didn’t regret the decision (it would have been/will be a very acrimonious divorce and affect us financially a lot! I don’t want my kids college plans derailed by a narcissist ex-husband spending all our money fighting me on a divorce) but now I’m struggling to stick it out for the last couple of years.
Looking back I wish I’d ended it the second I found out.