SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I haven't been on here for a few days or so because I had been feeling pretty stressed from work which caused my blood pressure to elevate. Generally when I am stressed out from work I tend to go to my unhealthy coping mechanisms of binge eating, drinking, sleeping, or wanting to act out irrationally. This time I didn't. Okay, I did panic a little thinking I would have a heart attack, but I immediately snapped back at the thought and said; "Nope not having this. I just had a physical a few months ago and received a clean bill of health.” So I took some slow deep breaths, prayed to my higher power, sat through those feelings, and came back to reality. I have been working on eating whole/clean and my BW who works out weekly had us go jog and do some intensive ab workouts last night. I woke up this morning, no coffee, and I feel much better. Still feeling slightly off mentally, but I am grateful to be alive and functioning. I am really glad I didn't push myself to the edge like I normally would have or cry and throw a tantrum for my BW to save me.

Some things I want to ask in regards to your experience out there:

For those who are in R or attempted R, what are some things that you did to regain trust with your BS? My BW has not thought of R yet, but I was wanting to know what helped the waywards get there.

I recently had the discussion about what I am doing to regain trust with my BW and she says she likes that she doesn't have to be one asking me where I am etc. I am always letting her know my whereabouts and she has complete track of my phone and such. I have stepped it up tremendously even with the kids. I am still struggling with the triggers, but it's not as a extreme as before.

In the mornings, we talk on the phone on my way to work while she takes the kids to school and she said: "You know when people found out what you did to me, they were like WTH?!” Because she is so beautiful, intelligent, and the most loving and caring person. It really hit me. Wow. I remember how people wanted a "relationship" like ours and anyone would have done anything to be with someone like my BW. It's like every day I am realizing what I had daily now that our relationship is dead and gone. It was what I was internalizing that kept me from seeing what I had with her.

Last night, we discussed the topic of me actually losing her. I get a jolting pain in my heart and it's hard for me to swallow. I am blocking those feelings a little because I feel so much pain with the thoughts of it. For some reason, I can't and don't focus on that now because of how much damaged I inflicted on myself and my BW. Her healing is so important to me, it's a constant thing that I think about. I do try to think it through what life would be on my own without her and it's just very hard to imagine.

It's like I go back and forth every day with the thoughts of what is happening to us while good things are happening too. It's interesting and sad at times trying to balance this out.

How do you find the balance?

[This message edited by ChanceAtLife35 at 11:28 AM, October 8th (Tuesday)]

A word of advice from an oldtimer BS who R'd successfully?

Take trust off the table. It shouldn't be a discussion point at this point in your possible R.

You destroyed that. Don't expect it to come back, for a very long time if at all. Once you have been victimized by infidelity the only person you absolutely trust, when you have healed yourself is yourself.

That doesn't mean that you can't R, and rebuild a healthy new relationship. You absolutely have the ability to do that. But the days of blind trust are gone.

What you can do is be consistent in treating her with kindness, respect, love, and fairness.

What you can do is be an equal partner, who is honest 100% of the time. No more lies of any kind EVER again. That means, no lies of omission, no white lies, no little lies of convience. NONE OF IT.

You have entered into the realm of brutal honesty, and that will always be healthier and happier when done with kindness and grace than any lie you can muster. Every half truth will set you back to the beginning of this marathon.

If you want to save and rebuild your M then you have to be honest with her, and even moreso with yourself. Do the work to figure out your why's, and fix that stuff. Hold yourself accountable. At the end of the day it is her choice to move forward, or to walk away, but for you to ever be healthy and have a meaningful relationship where you don't repeat these mistakes, you still have to do this work.

No stop sign.... BTW, I'm not sure who your BS is. I'm writing from my experience and from what wanted from my W.

My belief is that one of the main reasons people cheat is to avoid dealing with one's own internal issues. The corollary is that the cure is to identify, address, and resolve those issues.

Regaining trust...

Keep doing the next right thing.

You describe being transparent (keeping her informed of where you are). I think being honest is even more important. Every truth builds trust - it happens slowly, but it happens. No more lies.

I also wonder about your focus on her healing. Her healing is up to her. You can support her, but it's her work to do.

I urge you to focus on your healing.

Are you honest with yourself? Some of what you write sounds like self-pity (how could i do this to me?). I think you'd do more healing if you figured out what you got from conducting your A. Just assume you got something of value to you. The go looking for the things of value that you received ... and especially go into the areas that you want to stay out of. You'll probably need an effective and confrontative IC to do that.

How did your self-talk allow you to cheat? What messages did you generate internally? What ne messages do you want to create?

When your BS asks questions, how much does your desire to CYA govern your answers? What do you need to do to simply answer, even - especially - if the answer casts you in a bad light.

You might not remember certain facts, but you probably remember your motivations, thoughts, and feelings around the questions your BS may ask. If you can't answer, you may be blocking yourself from the knowledge.

The above are all issues that could be topics for IC sessions.

TushNurse & Sisson NAILED IT (From another BS)

TushNurse & Sisson NAILED IT (From another BS)

Yeah, they always do.

There is no magic recipe for "creating" trust. You have to let go of any notion that it's something you can stir together, bake in the oven, and present on a pretty plate.

This "balance" thing you're talking about is WAY too familiar to a BS. It's the rollercoaster that we ride daily. How can we continue to love this person who traumatized us? What's wrong with US that we're willing to be with someone who has proved themselves unsafe and untrustworthy?

It's not your job to make her trust you again. It's your job to regain the *worth* to her AND yourself to be trusted.

The way forward is consistency and time, while you demonstrably work on your "whys".

You cannot control her journey. You can only control yourself.

Please try to realize that by trusting our WS we betrayed ourselves. Throughout my WW's LTA there were periods were my intuition was SCREAMING at me, and there were clear signs that I chose to ignore - all this because I trusted her and firmly believed that she would NEVER violate my trust.

This is a huge deal - I was abandoned by my parents and left to fend for myself on the street. My childhood was horrific (I wrote a book about it), so she knew I was fragile and had abandonment and trust issues from the onset of our relationship. In spite of all that, I made the conscious decision to trust her - believing that she knew the stakes and what another abandonment would do to me. And yet, she had her LTA, and used my trust of her against me.

So, trust is not coming back.

Admittedly, I'm an extreme case, but I believe that to some extent this is true of all BS's. Open media (facebook) and email and texting and phone conversations helps. Checking in helps. Using Live360 or the Apple equivalent helps. Even if every aspect of life is monitored, a determined WS could find a way to circumvent the surveillance and cheat again.

There is also the issue of what we don't know. How do we know what we don't know? I'm certain that my WW has held back some information - perhaps not deliberately, but it's impossible to tell a BS everything, and a strong motive not to when our reaction to learning the truth is tears and anger.

Additionally, there are things we can never know. Why did the affair really end? What our WS feels about their AP now? Are we 2nd choice because AP didn't want to leave their marriage? Does our WS still believe they and AP are soulmates, separated by fate and just making do with their lives with us? We can ask these questions, but there is no way to verify the answers, so lying about it would be easy and they can cleanly get away with it.

So, completely trusting our WS again, after we played that game and lost? No. That isn't likely to happen. Some trust? Yes, sure. But for the rest of my life I will see everything my WW does with a shadow of doubt.

ETA: the best you can do it be open with everything you do and everyone you see. Check in. Be honest. If you do this, over time, trust will slowly rebuild - but it will never be what it once was.

[This message edited by nightmare01 at 10:48 AM, October 9th (Wednesday)]

I feel like my post yesterday brought light to so many things to me. My emotions are still unraveling from it. Right before I wrote what I did, my mind was sporadic with thoughts and I felt so many uneasy emotions about it. I am realizing that I am the reason for my own exhaustion. I don’t allow myself moments to cry when sadness or pain that I’ve held in so long bubble up. And I shouldn’t be focusing on R, I have to heal me first. Lately, I have been practicing rigorous honesty making sure that when I stumble on something that may not be true, I correct myself. I am realizing that I am exhausted because I am still doing for others and trying to do everything to help my BW. It’s not going to make her better as there are so many things I can’t do. I didn’t post for the sake of self pity but I can see how it may have come off that way in some of the things I said. My intentions were to check in and what I asked about was not well thought out. I have so many deep wounds that if I fell into salt they would burn immensely. After some deep conversations with my BW this morning, it’s very clear I am still suffering from denial about some things and am remaining very much codependent on some aspects. I acknowledge these things because I don’t care to do the same things that would normally cause harm to myself and others. I surrender to damaging ways and seek the will of my higher power to keep me on a narrow path to sobriety. I know how I got here, I cheated to avoid dealing with the internal issues that have been poison sitting with me for years. I created a false reality and faked my way through life and took everything from everyone in sight to stay alive. I am not ashamed of who I am anymore and I see there are some really important things I need to face. Let her heal on her own journey and let me heal on mine. Forget about anything R related for once, and give it my all to my work with myself.