SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

It definitely feels like abuse. It certainly hurts like it. I feel like a shell of a person. We both agreed to move on and we had no secrets...or so I thought. I gave him access to everything in my life. I really thought we were good. He did say he planned on leaving when the kids got out of school but he also said that may not have happened. It's hard for him to say now because of this thing. I just thought my love was enough. He says it is and that he's not looking to replace me. I'm so confused.

[This message restored by Webmaster at 4:13 PM, Monday, December 6th]

[This message edited by keljpvs at 7:03 PM, Friday, December 3rd]

OP regardless of what you did in the past this is no way to live in the present.

I do not believe in allowing ourselves to punish and get revenge no matter how bad we’ve been hurt being betrayed and how tempting it may be. I myself fantasised about hurting my WH for months on end post dday, but there’s a long way from fantasy to taking action. Once you start healing you realise how detrimental to you it would be should you choose to take that path. Your husband obviously did not healing for the past 5 years.

He is punishing you big time now. Regardless if he really did fall for the ow, he had no right to engage there in the first place, having been betrayed doesn’t give us the right to turn into abusers ourselves.

Please leave him. If he truly loves you he’ll move mountains to win you back. If he doesn’t then you’ve lost nothing, in fact you’ve at least kept some self respect in leaving your abuser.

I'd just repeat what ChamomileTea, Bigger, and OwningItNow wrote, so I'll suggest you reread their posts.

No matter how much you love your H, your unhappiness makes your M untenable over the long term. Your H is over-entitled and needs to change.

One giant red flag is his comment that he doesn't 'feel' he'd be 'truly' honest in IC. Your H has given himself permission to lie to himself and to others. R, healing, emotional health all rest on honesty. If he doesn't commit to 'no more lies', he's a lost cause, IMO.

If he's counting on you to call him on his lies, he's placing you in the Parent position; that, too, in untenable in a good long-term M (or similar relationship).

** Posting as a member **

I'd like to address the following, in light of the kindness thread:

It's clear your affair destroyed your marriage five yers ago. As you say, he has sacrificed a lot, he clearly still resents you for your affair, and constantly thinks you would do it again - so he does not trust you at all.

You don't know this. You have jumped to conclusions that may be way off the mark. You're doing yourself, keljpvs, and your readers a big disservice.

We don't know the conditions under which these folks stayed together.

For example, the keljpvs implies her H sacrificed a lot by not D'ing her. I take no credit for not D'ing my W. I chose the path that I thought would minimize my pain and maximize my joy. That's hardly a sacrifice. But that's me; other BSes who are happy in R may have different views. If not D'ing was a big sacrifice to kel's H, it may very well have never been Reconciliation. If he stayed while resenting kel, he needed to tell her, and he probably needed to D 3-5 years ago.

Kel's H may still resent her A, but especially after 5 years, what keljpvs says is that her H simply wanted to fuck his ap because he wanted to do it. What she says is the only thing we know. And we know only that she says what she said. We don't know how accurate her reporting is. (It looks accurate, but we don't know.)

And he agreed to terms and violated them.

*****

keljpvs,

What changes did you make to recover from cheating? What did your H do to recover as a BS?

I'm sorry your H is doing this. He's hurting you, your kids, and himself. I hope he wakes up.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 4:59 PM, Wednesday, November 3rd]

Please have some respect for yourself. You are no more obligated to accept his cheating than he was to accept yours.

Dear Sisoon,
I changed everything about myself. I stopped acting like a selfish brat and started tending to his needs. He has my passwords to everything. We did go to therapy for a bit and the therapist told him he had a decision to make. He chose to stay and we didn't go back. Clearly we should have. I had no idea he was harboring such much resentment toward me.

I have changed a lot as a person since. Become more kind and caring, probably went too far the other way in not caring about myself at all. I thought we were truly happy. And I'm as honest as it comes. I own my faults and what I've done to us. He's normally a great man. This behavior is very much unlike him. A friend I'm confiding in told me she thinks it's a mid-life crisis. He's 46 and she is at least 10 years younger. I just talked to him on the phone and cried quietly. He knows he's hurting me but he's going to her tonight. He was in a job he hated for a long time and now he's happy, healthy (mentally and physically) and everyone tells him how hot he looks. Never let your spouse work at the post office. It's a den of inequity!

[This message restored by Webmaster at 4:13 PM, Monday, December 6th]

[This message edited by keljpvs at 7:03 PM, Friday, December 3rd]

It's obvious he's held onto something about your affair to be able to engage in this heinous behavior. And it is heinous--he's basically telling you he's going to stab you every time he goes off to his paramour. And he expects you to take it because he's still extracting his pound of flesh and exercising his resentment over what happened years ago.

See an attorney. Find out what you can expect in a divorce. Knowledge is power. DO NOT tell him you are doing this. If you need help finding an attorney, PM me and I can give you some information that will be helpful.

The only way to deal with a cake-eater is to close the bakery. Tell him that he needs to make a choice. If he chooses to go be with his paramour, tell him you will set up a visitation schedule for his children and that you will be filing for child support (say child support--not divorce--even though in most states you will need to file for divorce).

And then ENFORCE visitation. He gets whatever is normal in your state. Some do the 2-2-5 split, some do one night a week and alternate weekends--this is where your attorney visit will be helpful. Let me tell you--things at the Love Shack get rather contentious with ALL those kids together for an entire weekend. Oh, and he doesn't get to stay at your house any longer. He made his choice.

If he chooses marriage, he must go 100% NC with his paramour and he will be in IC and later in MC with you. No excuses. These are your non-negotiables. He must commit to being 100% transparent and to figuring out why he thought this would be a good idea. You tell him that you will be attending his IC sessions periodically to ensure he is telling the truth.

Do not let your guilt over what you did in the past make it possible for him to walk all over you. I would suggest you get a copy of James Dobson's Love Must Be Tough and read it (your library should have it). It will give you some good advice on taking your life back and not spinning in his wake.

Let me tell you something--you need to be willing to lose the marriage to save it. By doing what is outlined above if he chooses his paramour, you're giving them a whopping dose of reality all of a sudden. Reality isn't as much fun as Fantasy Island. A 10-month old, three other children and your kids too? Oh, I'd pay money to see that.

Time to act. You don't need to be his doormat any more.

Cat

One giant red flag is his comment that he doesn't 'feel' he'd be 'truly' honest in IC. Your H has given himself permission to lie to himself and to others. R, healing, emotional health all rest on honesty. If he doesn't commit to 'no more lies', he's a lost cause, IMO.

This is a really good point. Think about what he's saying here. He's used your affair five years ago to bludgeon you with his own infidelity, but he does NOT value Honesty. He has given himself permission to be dishonest when it suits his agenda. How is that not wholly "wayward"??

I agree with Catwoman... consequences. And yes, it's a risk, but if you do nothing, the chances are good that he'll simply ease his way out of your marriage at his own pace and comfort, convinced by your silent acquiescence that he is in the right. I can't tell you how many paralyzed BS's we've seen who fail to act until it's too late. It's scary to stand up for yourself and you have no guarantee that it will work. But the longer you put it off, the more comfortable your WH gets in the OW's bed, the more he bonds with her instead of you, the less he misses the kids. In not much time at all, THAT is home and your place has become more foreign than hers. Your marriage is probably over. The last ditch effort to save it is whether or not you can cause enough doubt in your WH's mind to make him drop the OW. You've tried meek and mild. If it's not working, what do you have to lose that's not already gone???

He’s agreed to marriage counseling but not going to therapy by himself. He doesn’t feel he would be truly honest if he went alone.

I'm not a native English speaker, can someone explain to me how this could be interpreted as he has given permission himself to lie to himself and to others and he doesn't value honesty?

Is "not valuing honesty" not wanting to get into something (IC) he can't be honest? I think exactly the opposite.

What came to my mind when I read it was that in IC he didn't want to admit to himself that the brokennes inside caused by the infidelity was not healed, that everything was not going well in reconciliation for him, and that his marriage was ending. By accepting the MC he tries to make the marriage work.Yes, in a sense this is dishonest but only to himself and in favor of the marriage.

From this point of view, it would be very unfair to describe him as liar, dishonest and WH. I don't think it's okay for him to have an affair while married, but you're still the WS of this story, not him.

He didn't pursue his AP for a relationship, didn't hide anything from you and asked you to have sex with her. We can say that this is not a good thing, but we cannot say that it is cheating. Do not be misled by manipulations in this direction.

I don't think this is a midlife crisis, it seems to be the result of his brokennes inside caused by your infidelity. You're saying it's something completely out of his character, if you can say that this definitely wouldn't have happened if you hadn't cheated on him, then that's the reason.

It's too late to say now, but you shouldn't have let him have sex with her. You set wrong boundary. The Boundary should be set in action, not emotion. You can't block his feelings, and he can't either. You can't tell someone to drink as much as he wants, but doesn't get drunk.

He may have fallen in love with her, or he may think he is. If this is an illusion, your marriage has a chance to survive, if not, it seems a little difficult.

Just because you cheated on him, you don't have to put up with things like this you don't want. Divorce is an option, but obviously you are not here for that. I might suggest you file for divorce as others have suggested, but it seems too risky to me. I usually recommend this to BSs because I think it's the best route for them in any situation. It forces WSs to strive for R who don't want their marriage to end, if it doesn't work BSs get rid of the cheater. But I don't think your chances for R will be very high if you file as a WS. Because on one side, there is someone who cheated on him, disrespected, lied, stopped loving, emasculated and preferred someone else to him. On the other side, there is someone he fell in love with and has no bad memories with, who wants and desires him. I don't know how right it would be to threaten him with divorce right now. But if you think you can't go on like this, you should get divorced anyway.

If I were you, I couldn't tolerate my spouse being with someone else no matter what. But on the other hand, if I were your husband, I would have divorced you 5 years ago.

Hard situation, Good luck.

I do believe he values honesty. Even though there have been some big lies that have come out, I don't think his motives were malicious. He keeps telling me how much he loves me but he he sees the pain I'm in and continues to see her. He spent the night with her last night and the kids chose this night to talk about him a lot, express their concerns and missed him. I had to be strong and assure them he's ok and stuck to the cover story. That hurt me. That kept me up all night. I'm thinking of asking him tonight to please stop. I don't know if he will. It seems I'm stuck. If I want him to stay, he's made it clear that she is a part of his life. She works with him so no matter what there would be no disconnect. He tells me he loves me constantly. Tells me he's sorry for the pain he is causing me. If you love me, stop hurting me. We have a consult with marriage counselor in an hour over the phone. He's at work so I have to conference him in. I just want this to work. I'm tired of the sleepless nights, not being able to eat. I know I did him wrong but at least I saw I hurt him and stopped it immediately. This is in my face every moment of every day. I know a lot of you can't feel sorry for me because of the horrible thing I did to him and I really understand that. You all have been terribly hurt and can't find empathy for me. I totally get it. I am hurting though and my regret and work I've done on myself to make everything good again is real. All of this has thrown me for a loop. Feels like a nightmare.

[This message restored by Webmaster at 4:12 PM, Monday, December 6th]

[This message edited by keljpvs at 7:04 PM, Friday, December 3rd]

Obviously your situation isn't the norm but there is one principle that applies most of the time when a wayward spouse is living the fantasy life.... the "pick me" dance doesn't work.

Sometimes nothing works and the marriage is over.

I think others have already mentioned this to you... what often works is being strong, protecting yourself and your kids and taking action to get out of infidelity. That does come with a risk that he may leave. But hundreds of cases here show that the odds are far better when taking firm action than pining, pleading, waiting and being a doormat.

You don't take firm action to win him back. You do it to protect yourself and your kids. But a side effect is that some of the actions you would consider will hopefully pour some cold water on his fantasy. And another side effect is that strength is attractive. Confidence is attractive. Doormats, not so much.

I have to ask the others commenting here in your thread.... is there any reason why this highly recommended approach in the SI community would not be recommended in a madhatter situation? I can't think of one. He's had his revenge affair now, bad as it is. Time to wake up and see what's about to be lost.

I do believe he values honesty. Even though there have been some big lies that have come out, I don't think his motives were malicious.

He doesn't value honesty if there are "big lies" coming out. And yes, what he is doing *is* malicious. Just because he believes and says it is not doesn't make it so.

He keeps telling me how much he loves me but he he sees the pain I'm in and continues to see her.

That's not love. It's time you stopped listening to his words and started looking at his actions. His actions are one of a very entitled and selfish person who has zero qualms about hurting his spouse and his children.

If I want him to stay, he's made it clear that she is a part of his life.

Oh, hell to the no on that one. Why is *he* entitled to what he "wants" at your expense? This isn't a marriage--in what alternate universe does he think you should put up with this?

She works with him so no matter what there would be no disconnect.

There is such a thing as a "different job."

Look, many of us regret not taking stronger and more definitive action when our WSs behaved like entitled assholes. Just because you had an affair doesn't make ANY of his behavior right, or any less hurtful. I'd see an attorney and tell him that you no longer want to live in a marriage that includes a third party. He can choose to be with that third party or he can choose to work on his marriage, but he cannot continue his cake-eating. And then be willing to follow through. Set up that visitation schedule. File for either legal separation or divorce (depends on the state) so that you get child support. Let me tell you, it is a LOT less fun at the Love Shack with all those kids for a weekend. Oh, and on his weekends? You're not available to come and bail him out. You have "plans." Those plans could be going to Wal-Mart, but they are plans nonetheless. And no, he's not entitled to know what you are doing when he has his parenting time. Plans. Period. No explanation.

If he chooses the marriage, he must commit to a job transfer away from her or another job altogether. No exceptions. There should be verifiable no contact with her via any means: social media, text, email, smoke signals . . . nada. He needs to write a no-contact letter and send it registered mail to her so that he knows she gets it. He needs to commit to IC and MC. In short, he needs to do the soul searching and changing that YOU did when you realized your entitled behavior and how much it hurt.

Time to lace up those bitch boots and pull up your big girl panties. None of this is right, and you don't have to put up with any more of it.

Cat

You need to get words like "feels like abuse" out of your vacabulary. It is abuse. You are stuck in a cycle of abuse. It doesn't matter if you had an affair before, killed his dog or crashed his car. What he is doing to you is something that a good person would not do to their own enemy.

The first question that you need to ask yourself is that why you think that you want this relationship. What is so good about it? From a third party view I think that you would be happier by yourself or in another relationship.

All of you have posed great questions. There is an update. We has a marriage counseling consult this morning and laid it all out. Total honesty. She doesn't think this is a lost cause. I feel the discussion we had is giving me the strength to ask him to stop this. How can we fix us if there is a third party involved? I'm scared...terrified he will walk out the door but I need him to understand how much this is hurting me. I do need to stand up for myself. All of you are right about that. How he reacts will determine how we move forward. I've never been big on prayer but please pray for us.

The reason I want him. Before he started this affair we were so happy. He makes me laugh. He's kind and considerate and usually selfless. Too selfless which I think he hit a wall with and that's why he has now swung so far the other way. I have been selfless too. Just as an example, I took a job with higher pay for him, us our family. It wasn't something I truly wanted but I stepped outside of my comfort zone for all of us. I do put him first now in everything. I think I have proven that I now put his happiness above my own as it is important.

Money is a factor, I can't deny that. We can't afford an attorney, legal fees or any of that stuff. We are one of millions of couples that just stay above the water line. And I can't support myself and two kids with mental health issues and lots of doc/therapy appointments without him. That is not my driving force for trying to make this work. My love for him is.

[This message restored by Webmaster at 4:12 PM, Monday, December 6th]

[This message edited by keljpvs at 7:05 PM, Friday, December 3rd]

There are men on here that are still struggling with their wives affair 10 to 40 years later. Even in the healthiest situation it takes five years to achieve some level of normality.

Given that, I am less inclined to see him as a willful abuser than someone in a mental health crisis. And I see you as enabling this through passivity. I believe you too are suffering from depression and need intervention.

It looks to me like neither of you dealt with your affair, and by the way you have told us nothing about it so it is hard to gauge the level of damage done, and this acting out cannot be viewed in isolation.

Marriage counseling is a start, but you both need something deeper. There are medical interventions that can help depression and ptsd. I don’t think that right now you can help him, but you can help yourself. You can start by shutting down the sex. If he goes, then there was little to save.

Start thinking about your kids. They need one stable parent. Get some help no matter what he does. The only person that can begin the steps of fixing you is you.

As others say, this situation is untenable. What happens when he gets his coworker pregnant? Or when the supervisor figures out what is going on?

Do not see yourself as helpless. You are not. You want to help him, so begin by taking action to help yourself.

I do suffer from generalized anxiety disorder. I also have depression but the anxiety has always been worse.

As to my affair, here is the story. In 2016 he was not in a happy, healthy place. Due to his nature of constant anger (had a lot to do with his job at the jail) I didn't feel I could talk to him. I didn't feel like he cared if I existed. I do have a past history of abuse and went looking for validation in the most wrong way. In a 3 month period I slept with a handful of men trying to get that validation and my unhealthy connection with sex caused me to put myself in what could have been precarious situations and had one in particular that for some reason was trying to manipulate me into leaving my husband said he loved me etc even though I knew it wasn't a real relationship. He was married too. I took his bs and told H I thought we needed to separate. I didn't even mean what I was saying! At that point he thought something was going on and got a law enforcement friend to help break into my phone in the middle of night and found out what I was doing. When he confronted me it finally hit me what I was doing to him. His pain was not something I ever want to be the cause of again. For months he wasnt sure if he wanted to say but the MC we had at the time told him he needed to make a decision and then work through his feelings. He did make the decision to stay but we didn't follow through with the MC. That's on me. I should have made sure it kept going. From that moment on I worked on myself to figure out why I felt the need to do this and become a better version of myself. I have done that. I put in the work but I had no idea he was holding resentment under the surface and did not tell me how he felt. I thought our communication was open and honest and we talked about how great things have been for the entire past year.

Yes, I agreed to letting him have sex with her due to the guilt I still have. It wasn't supposed to go beyond that. He blew through that boundary. Now the affair is in my face. Every day. I'm in pain as my love for him has only grown even deeper and stronger. I'm not asking you to feel bad for me as I know you all have been so hurt. I just wanted to be open and honest about my part in all this. I own all the mistakes I made. I just want to make him as happy as possible.

[This message restored by Webmaster at 4:12 PM, Monday, December 6th]

[This message edited by keljpvs at 7:06 PM, Friday, December 3rd]

Fear is your biggest enemy right now. Let that sink in. Please see a lawyer to find out what a separation or divorce looks like for you. That will most definetly take away some of your fears.

As for his behaviour... I find it hard to comprehend that anyone that has experienced being betrayed can inflict this type of pain and trauma on the person they claim to love. I can to some extent understand why some choose to have RA's when emotions are high in the early stages of discovery but to start one (or what to me looks like a RA) after 5 years and to do it so openly is just so cruel and abusive I have no words for it.

I agree with others who have posted that his words don't mean much. His actions speak volumes. Please educate yourself on what a future may look like without him. I know you are in schock but loose the fear. Don't accept this version of your marriage. You have worked hard to become a safe partner and he did chose to stay married to you. What has he learned for the past 5 years? What work has he done to heal himself?!

He says it is and that he's not looking to replace me. I'm so confused.

Yet he already has! He is loving life right now because he has the best of both worlds. You say she just had another child is it his? That would be my guess that is why he feels such a bond with her at this time.

In one of kel's posts she reports her H has refused IC because he feels he wouldn't be honest in IC. That leads inevitably to the conclusion that he has given himself permission to lie. I don't know if he would see it that way, but I sure do.

*****

kel,

Your M didn't fail. You failed in conducting your A. Your H is failing now in conducting his A.

You needed to get honest - no more lies. That's the basis of healing emotionally. But you have other work to do.

For example, your H was told he had to make a decision and work through his feelings. He made a decision to stay and not work through his feelings. You say that's on you. It isn't. It's on him. He chose to stuff his feelings. The fact that you think it's on you is a red flag about you. That red flag is held up by something - that's something you need to change. Not change it to a green flag - take the whole flag down.

What you say about your MC gives me hope, but your H will not heal from MC alone. He pretty clearly needs help from an IC to work through his feelings, both as a betrayed and as a betrayer. He needs to change from chetaer to good partner.

He's abusing you emotionally now. Was he the abuser in the past? Was it physical?

I have some understanding of your guilt. Making excuses for your H is not a good way for you to handle your guilt.

My heart goes out to you. I know being betrayed is terribly painful. I read that you're very frightened, too frightened to act.

Very gently, your life will probably get worse if you don't act to protect yourself and your kids.

No the baby she has is not his and her kids don't even live in the state with her. Her dad is taking care of them while she awaits her transfer to be with them. I know all this to be true as their is a mutual friend of all involved that has been a support for me and has confirmed or denied the things I know to be true. So far, everything he has told me jives with what she knows.

Has he been abusive in the past? He's had his moments when he has frightened me but has he hit me? No. Gotten in my face and scared me? Yes. In 21 years he has def had his moments and he was not always a great partner or someone I felt safe with. But after 21 years I can say there have been lots of happy times.

I am scared to be without him. I agree that he needs IC and I am going to continue to gently suggest it. I am in counseling myself. Started it up again in the past couple weeks and going weekly.

I need to try this. I need to see if we can make it work. At the very least, if this ends, I can say I tried.

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[This message edited by keljpvs at 7:07 PM, Friday, December 3rd]

Ok so the OW is moving soon to be with her kids?

Lets say that her moving away will salve the issue of ending the PA and your H returnes home to you. What will you do if he keeps the EA going? What will you do when he meets another woman that he fancies? Are you going to accept this type of arrangement again?

People will treat you the way you allow them to treat you. You are basically telling him that he can emotionally abuse you and you will not do anything or go anywhere.

This must be one of the most painful stories I have read on this site and my heart goes out to you. He knows you will do anything to save your marriage and he is using this knowledge to his advantage.