SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hi,

My heart is breaking. I found out last week that my partner of 8 years and father of my two daughters has been having an affair - 8 months long.

I feel shocked, angry, in the most pain I have ever felt.
I’m only managing to get through each day because of the children and that’s a struggle.

He is still denying it however she has confirmed it and there is evidence that it is true - I had a gut feeling for the past few months also. He has said it was purely a friendship & someone to talk to and that he has stopped talking to her now

Where do I go from here. The man I loved, still love so much. Has done the worst thing, has broken all my trust, broken my heart.

I can’t think straight. Is all I feel now is I need to try and keep him - which is ridiculous, I feel pathetic.
We have shared 8 wonderful years together, the past year has thrown us some tests but I just can’t believe he has done this to me.

I can’t bear the thought of life without him.

I’m also worried if I push to hard, tell him to leave - will push him to her. I feel weak, pathetic, stupid

They say that "a good man can't be stolen". That guy needs to fight for you and for his family dynamic, and yeah.. it's so scary to drop your end and see if he's willing to carry it, but if you don't, how will you know he's for real?

There's quite a bit of information to be found in The Healing Library to get you started, and of course, you'll want to do the usual things like get STD testing and talk about stress management with your doctor. Speaking with an attorney can provide needed insight into what your options are as well, and doesn't mean you need to run right out and file for divorce. All in all though, taking a tough stance is typically the best thing you can do and I can tell you from personal experience that it's what worked for me. A WS who doesn't EARN his way back isn't trustworthy.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 6:03 PM, Monday, September 19th]

Thank you.

I feel so vulnerable, I can’t see how anyone can get past this hurt and excruciating pain.

I’m having to hide from my children to cry, I feel like I’m living in a nightmare, that I can’t wake up from.

Willing even day to be over, so I can just lie there and cry and cry.

I just don’t Understand why he would do this, risk us and our family.

I’m also really struggling as she is not very attractive, which is making me feel worse about myself

It's a really mixed bag when the AP is dumpy, I can attest to that. It just feels like the WS threw it all away for nothing, right? OTOH, it also illustrates pretty clearly that the cheating is about the cheater.

Our tendency after intimate betrayal is to try and figure out what we did which would cause our WS to betray us. What were they not getting at home, so to speak. But it's NOT about us. None of it. There's nothing we could do or say that would make someone else throw their own integrity away. The values that we believed matched our own were either too weak to create solid boundaries or they weren't there at all. The scariest part of recognizing that the cheating is all about the cheater is that we have to acknowledge that there was no way to control it because we can't control the WS... and if we have no control, we can't make sure it won't happen again.

So, you see why it's so important that your WH earn his way back into the relationship. If he can't remediate his poor character and make the real and lasting changes you need to see, you won't have anything to build on anyway. It's really tempting to do what we call "pick me" dancing, trying to attract your mate back to the marriage. But the reality is that he's got to want it more than anything, enough to do the painful, introspective work he needs to do.

((big hugs))

[This message edited by SI Staff at 6:49 PM, Monday, September 19th]

I am so sorry you are going through this. Never forge you are the prize. Why did your WH do this? Because he is supremely selfish and he thought he could get away with it. Nothing you did or didn’t do in your M caused him to cheat. Accept no blame. He cheated because he wanted to do it. Period.

Always value yourself.

It’s up to your WH to deal with his own brokenness, and his own lack of integrity and honor that would allow him to betray your trust. If he is in denial he is not remorseful. Take your time. Be strong and remember he has to earn his way back. Earn your trust.

Good luck.

So sorry you find yourself among us, but know you are surrounded by a group of individuals who have been where you are at.

The pain after discovery is immense and your emotions will be a rough rollercoaster ride for a while. Take a deep breath and believe you will get through this, as bad as it feels at the moment.

I was a basketcase after D-day 1. I couldn't eat, sleep, think, move or function in many ways. I was on autopilot as I sorted through the nuke dropped on me. It's a difficult thing to deal with in a rational manner. Your thoughts will be inundated with your SO's lies, deceit, actions, inactions, decisions, behavior and words. Triggers are everywhere, sometimes in the most innocuous things.

Just know, and remind yourself often, that you will get through it all. It won't be easy, but it's definitely doable.

When you emerge from this - and again it will take time (four years for me) - you will be stronger than you ever imagined you could be.

In the meantime, take care of yourself (eat, drink water, etc) and seek professional help if needed.

Hugs for you...

Whafdoido,
Much love to you, if I could live everyday trying to save every person from dealing with this and feeling this pain I absolutely would.

I'll reiterate what Chamomile says here, you need to call the shots, it's not time for the pick-me dance. YOU are the morally correct person, you stand on the side with the rest of us who have been cheated on that chose to do right for ourselves, our children and to stand respected.

Repeat the above to yourself, you are devastated but you are morally correct. You will never have the dark cloud over your reputation and your kids will always see that and respect that.

Just as Numis67 says, you will come out of this stronger, after my first WH's round of cheating in 2015 I was a wreck, it took awhile but my now recent discovery after reconciling 6 years later, yes I fell apart for a few days but I am moving forward with divorce. I'm putting the pain into building a life without someone who has ZERO remorse or care for anyone but themselves.

Your girls (I have 4 daughters) need to see you not accept this behavior as okay. Even if they're small and you go your own way in this relationship & understand later what mom had to do, they will see this as unacceptable in their own future.

Yes, they always say, we were just friends, lie and say it wasn't intimate, it meant nothing, you were too busy for me (with his kids of course), you did that one thing to me in the past, they'll try and blame you over and over until they think you believe it and THEN beg for you give them one more chance. This^^^ is the cheaters playbook to shifting the blame.

Cheating isn't about upgrading with AP's (affair partners) it's about filing the empty void in a morally corrupted person's self. My WH didn't discriminate, if he could get them into sex that's all it was about, for my WH it was about the filling of his low-self esteem by thinking he was "attractive" enough to get something sexual off of someone.

Stay safe and strong, you are the prize in whatever you decide.

He didn’t "do this to you" as a means to hurt you and devastate you. He did this because he is so broken inside that he has decided that his selfish needs overrule monogamy, respect, etc.

It’s not the OW that is what he’s after. She could have been anyone. He’s after the ego boost he gets from his affair - the sneaking around, the getting away with something, the illicit sex, the person he can pretend to be for the OW.

See, the BS doesn’t have one thing. Newness. The thrill of the chase. Mystery. Gullibility. Naïveté. You can see where this is going.

The OW believes he’s unhappily married. The OW believed the lies about his wife. The OW thinks she’s something special and believed it’s "true love". Well it’s nothing more than a fantasy and altered reality.

When you accept an affair is just about selfishness and disrespect, then you can start healing yourself and getting out of this nightmare.