I'm being gas lit aren't I?

[wearyapple]

Am I being gas lite?

I think I know the answer….

Just over 4 and a half years ago my wife told me that she had been having an affair over a couple of months. She would see the AP pretty much every day and be in constant communication from the time she woke up in the morning until the minute she went to bed.

For the first few months she was in the fog. We worked hard at our relationship and thing started to get better in some ways and got worse in others. But the hurt never went away and to this date remains at the forefront of my mind. Fast forward to now and everything has changed.

I love her. Thats one thing i must stress. If I didn't I wouldn't be putting myself through this. I will do what ever it takes to fix this, but I feel I still haven’t had a reason why or how she could do this to me, to us or our family. I ask time after time for her to think hard why this happened and I get “she was stupid” and “she doesn’t know why or even how she could do it”!. She even says that she never wanted the affair and wish it had never happened. It just happened and she was stupid.

I have tried to explain that how can I trust and forgive if I don’t no what I’m forgiving. I stated that she was a cheat! How do I know it won’t happen again when the right person comes along? She just keeps saying she is not a cheat! Yes she was then, but she isn’t now! It feels like everything I say, she is brushing past like it didn’t matter. Like my feelings don’t matter and its history.

I feel stuck. To me her life hasn’t changed. She lost nothing and she didn’t have to face any consequences.

I wake every day with this constantly on my mind. I feel I wasn’t enough. It feels like she is getting dressed up, going to the gym and trying to better herself because she wants better. Just like she did at the beginning of her last affair.

I know people will say to leave or will say once a cheater always a cheater. That’s not the advice I’m looking for. Im looking for people that have been where I am now.

I feel like I have lost everything. My family, my wife, my self-esteem. My ability to trust! I constantly feel on edge. While she is out there loving attention, having fun and living a care free life, while telling me that it’s been 4 years and at some point I need to just get over it.

She does put in the effort. She does try and be affectionate and communicate through the day. Am I the one with the problem?

I don’t want to leave. I want fix what’s broken. But I just don’t know how.

Don’t be daft. The ONLY reason he keeps bringing it up is because she a) has never accepted fully that she cheated. By claiming she is not a cheater she is compartmentalising her cheating as something over there. Not her
b) she has never acknowledged that there was a reason she cheated. Whether it was dopamine chasing, low self esteem needing validation or an issue in the marriage. She has avoided any real work on herself by exploring why she cheated by just claiming she doesn’t know.
By not accepting, acknowledging and working on herself, she is very clearly not taking responsibility for her infidelity.

Until she does there is no moving forward. He has stayed with the desire to move forward but this will not happen until she does the work. His bringing it up is his futile attempt to prompt her to do what she must do if there is any hope for a future together. He knows this. She denies this to herself and him. Moving on and putting things behind ONLY happens when the cheater filling accepts, acknowledges and work on themselves.

sadly i think he is beating a dead horse. She cheated. She still, 4 years later has not accepted responsibility. This very likely means she will do it again and has very little thought for anyone but herself.

What answer would satisfy you? There is no excuse/reason she can give that will make you feel better. It is how you feel about each other now that matters. It is understandable you may not be able to move past it. But I dont think a "reason" for the affair will help you move on.

To be brutally honest, I think you feel like she's not being honest because she's not.

And I would presume she's not being honest because she knows you'll dump her if she is.

You say you love her bur I'm not sure she love you.

Many people will now come along and say that cheating on someone doesn't mean you don't love them and maybe that's correct; so I suppose I'll put the qualifier "love you as you deserve to be loved, love you with respect and decency, love you with equality". Some people's "love" is not really worth having ...cheaters being high on the list.

As a non cheating, loyal, reasonable sounding, non addict (I presume) man you are very hot property on the dating market.

You will meet some else sooner or later, and hopefully they'll be a decent person who truly loves you and who had integrity.

Your love for your wife will fade and that will be focused on and grow for someone else. Someone who deserves it.

@wearyapple I haven't been asking here very minute of the day for over 4 years. But yes it is the first thing I think of and the last thing at night and yes it is unhealthy! But so as an affair.

If I was in your position, I'd have got to the point (after 4 years) of realising that I wasn't any closer to moving on, and would have to leave the relationship. But I'm not you, and I know you didn't want that answer. I'm not sure what you need - people who have felt the way you do for years and years, and suddenly got over it as if by magic?

FWIW, I don't think you're the bad guy at all - she is.

@Maitri108

Well we will have to agree to disagree.

Everyone says that they would leave if their partner cheated, they would be straight out of there. I don't believe that for a minute. When you in it, when your going through it, its not that easy. No matter what you say.

Yes some people leave, some people stay. But for you to say nothing I'm doing is sane or rational is probably true, but its also completely unreasonable.

If you say caring about my family is obsessive than OK. If you think that I'm the one in the wrong here because I'm trying to get answers then OK.

Yes we may need help as a couple and I do see it from my wife's side, but I'm not being unreasonable here to ask for answers, even if its 4 years or so later and she is refusing to give them.

You say that I could leave instead of asking for answers. But my wife also could have spoken to me before starting an affair!

There is right and wrong's to every situation, but not mater what you say an affair can not be justified, where asking for answers can!

It’s is gaslighting because she’s knows he knows the truth and she’s deliberately trying to convince him that it’s not reality. He knows she’s a cheat. She knows she’s a cheat. She’s asserting that reality is wrong, that she’s not a cheat. That’s gaslighting.

@wearyapple There's never an excuse to cheat, your wife doesn't have an excuse.

My point is that you chose to stay and now it appears you have children involved in this shit show.

You need to decide to move on or leave. You can't continue like this because it is bullying. It's not fair on anyone involved.

If you want to stay in the marriage then work on your relationship and try to put the affair behind you. If you can't, then you need to end it.

I think some people cheat and do regret it and won’t do it again for others they never learn my partner recently split up hasn’t given me proper answers always says it was a mistake he doesn’t know why most recently it’s I didn’t show him enough love and that he likes the feeling of feeling wanted only problem with those answers is he had all that here it just wasn’t new and exciting like in the beginning I’m slowly convincing myself that I’m not at fault and cheating is a choice, I’ve always wanted and fixed things when broken and sometimes been met half way by him but if they can’t see the damage and hurt that’s on them I hope you find a way forward that is best for you which ever way that might be you deserve to be happy life is to short rebuilding is hard and scary

Some people break up in the short-term. Lots of people break up in the longer term when it's clear, over time, it's not working (the position you are in). Some people break up when their kids have got to a certain age. Some people don't break up but are not happy. Some people cheat themselves, once or more. Some people stay and say they're happy and maybe they are (?)

You sound pretty tortured. You're not getting the answers you need and as I said I'd suspect she can't tell the truth because you'd realise either her full character or the truth of her feelings for you. I think she's probably biding her time for whatever reasons.

I would stop torturing yourself,. If you don't want to split until the kids are older, don't. But do what you can to enjoy your life and cope with this. Oh and you're due an affair of your own incidentally.

I'm going to start off by saying there is a lot of bullshit spoken about this situation, no one person has the answers. A lot of people stay in the relationship after cheating, a lot of people don't get help either so they end up in a pretty crappy situation all round.

You need individual therapy because there is a lot in there set in over several years and no doubt a great deal of hurt. You need to be healthy to work through it with her in couples therapy if that's what you both want.

Despite the flack you are getting it's perfectly normal to feel how you do about this and bringing it up is pretty normal too. So many people need answers but sadly you are going to have to accept she is never going to tell you what you think you need to know. You are also going to have to accept she did this for a reason even if she isn't clear on why herself. You have to accept also that she might not care much about how you feel, saying sorry, saying you did something stupid is easy. Being sorry is quite different to saying sorry.

Things that cause cheating are usually lack of communication, emotional availability, opportunity, sex, sexuality, or even that she is just a person who cannot stick to one man and many more besides.

If the reason is for anything other than she's just made that way or you are sexually incompatible, then it can be worked on. Trouble is you are never going to fully trust her again, ever, that's broken and lost, that you have to accept. If you want to stay, then you are going to have to swallow a lot more shit pills than you have already. I'm sorry but that will happen.

We can never be sure of anything and we can't control what others do. We can choose to live with acceptance that something happened that hurt us deeply or leave the situation altogether.

I lived with the acceptance but it did stop working for me in the end but I left on my own terms and in my own time, that was important to me. I've never forgotten the pain even with therapy. I really feel for you because I know the full extent of the pain you've been living in and what's to come.

Whether you stay or leave, do get therapy fr yourself because it will help stop it happening again, you will spot the signs and make the choices of what you can live with.

Nope, in this case, it’s a difference of opinion. OP thinks once a cheat, always a cheat. His wife thinks the label no longer applies, since the cheating happened years ago. She is not trying to psychologically manipulate him, such that he loses his grip on reality and ends up in a mental institution. Therefore, she is not gaslighting him.

That’s not gaslighting.
What you are forgiving her is the affair. Why she had it - there may be no answer to that. Could be a multitude of things and why does it matter? She did it. That she felt it exciting, felt ‘seen’, felt flattered, whatever is not really the point.
Trust has been lost, and she , and you, have to be more present in the relationship. But she’s not going to open up and bare all - do you? People like to have a bit of themselves to themselves. And after four years of you still doubting and questioning - well it’s almost surprising neither of you has ended the relationship.

If you want to finally move forward then therapy.

Be very honest, what answer would work to make you feel better? I have no idea if she's lying (she's not gaslighting) you about WHY she did it. it may be that she genuinely doesn't know. it may be that she does, but she doesn't want to say (sex was boring, she was bored, he was relentless, she enjoyed the thrill, she was unhappy and considering divorce) - the possible reasons are endless but I doubt any of them will mamake you happy.

The issue is that either way, you're not getting answers and she is unable/unwilling to provide those answers.

which means, I'm sorry, that your ONLY options are either to accept that, or to leave. Becuase @Maitri108 is right - after 4 years ,if you have said you want to stay in the relationship but you're not happy with the work she's done towards this, you're bordering on bullying or abusive behaviour if you keep goign on about it.

My first husband cheated and I ended it. I'm very glad I did, because my second husband and I have been very happily married for almost 40 years. Don't settle for a wife who cheats. Trust, once lost, is almost impossible to regain. Move on.

Well I disagree. She is a cheat. She’s trying to portray herself as something else c despite him knowing the truth. That’s twisting reality. That’s gaslighting in my book. You don’t agree. Fair enough.

I agree, she is a cheat but saying she isn't, that's manipulation and saying what is true isn't = gaslighting surely.

Look up the Wikipedia article on gaslighting, then compare it with this he said/she said situation.

"Gaslighting involves two parties: the "gaslighter", who persistently puts forth a false narrative in order to . manipulate, and the "gaslighted", who struggles to maintain their individual. autonomy."

From Wikipedia

OK so it's an attempt to gaslight the OP then which OP is resisting

So every time someone persistently lies about something, they’re gaslighting? No, that is absolutely not the correct use of the term.

It's not an attempt to gaslight the OP because it's not gaslighting.

Gaslighting is where you try to make someone doubt reality. For example, you hide their phone, let them look for the phone, replace it and pretend it was there all along.

Persistant lying is an attempt at manipulation of someone elses emotions.

Manipulating someone’s emotions is not the same as manipulating their perception of reality, with the specific intention of making them mentally unwell. Is that OP’s wife’s aim here?

Please see my previous reply.

I have seen it.

So lying isn't conducted with an end goal to alter the person being lied to perception of reality?

That's an interesting perspective.