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[This message edited by rewritemyending at 9:54 PM, January 30th (Thursday)]

rewritemyending,

It sounds like there is a lot of confusion but at the root of it you saw that the grass looks a bit greener over there and now you want to see for yourself if it really is - "it was mostly an exit affair". Yes you went for the thrill and excitement of the illicit affair, but it also sounds like you have checked out of your M a long time.

Now that your AP had the affair exposed the ticking time bomb is if the OBS tracks you down and tells your BS.

You're still grieving the loss of that affair, although I think you already are starting to see it wasn't the man but what he embodied that mattered.

Since you and your BS are already so far removed from a healthy M why not be forthcoming and advise your BS that you want to D, and let him know that you did have an A, and why it is you want to D. Then get a lawyer and start the hard work. Are you prepared to do that this week?

I don't get why finances are such a big to do as you seem to have a guesthouse and can afford trips, but can't afford IC. Priorities perhaps. Maybe you like your current lifestyle your M affords? It is hard to turn that mirror on ourselves and see we are not such good people.

[This message edited by MrCleanSlate at 3:26 PM, January 21st (Tuesday)]

[This message edited by rewritemyending at 9:54 PM, January 30th (Thursday)]

I actually started IC before my A was over. I knew i needed help. That continued and also started MC with my BW and we still go every 6 weeks or so just to keep working on our M. As for cost, well I quit smoking and drinking and that pretty much pays for it....You also get from it what you put in.

So - if you were to ask your BH for a divorce how do you think he will react? Will he be relieved, shocked, be wanting to work on things?

I think you are starting to understand that the AP could have been a green troll for what it was worth - it was what he embodied for you - the lust, being desired, made to feel special. Oh did I ever eat a lot of those ego kibbles during my A.

So why don;y you and your H get along? complacent?

I won't diagnose.

I will say this, you are a typical cheater like all of us have been.

You write all the "woe is me crap", guess what most of us had more woe than you, like you are what... different than other cheaters.

You are not. Never will be.

Now if you want to be divorced, the guess what, that can happen.

Problem is that you don't have the courage to divorce your husband.

That made what you did wrong, no matter how you try and rationalize any of it.

I can answer some questions for you.

"Did I mean anything to him" - Yeah, not really. Because if you did he would have left his wife.

Some other women will say different, but as someone that had many OW, no you meant nothing more than a side piece.

Understand, I am not saying the you did wrong by wanting to be divorced, I get that.

It is wrong to cheat, bottom line, so just file for divorce and move on.

[This message edited by BluesPower at 3:39 PM, January 21st (Tuesday)]

I could have written your post. Almost everything you said is exactly what happened in my situation.

You are right - you only like the idea of him.

I had an exit affair too, except I learned a lot about myself that made me realize I wanted to give my marriage another chance. I went to IC and learned the things that I had been doing to contribute to me feeling the way I did as well as the dynamics of my marriage. We are still married, and we are happy.

I don't think that's always the ending, but I know the dark depths of where you are and how hard it is to climb out of it. I have some advice for you, but I am short on time now. I only wanted to chime in because sometimes people come to our site and they leave pretty quickly. Hang around, I promise I will get back with you tomorrow.

[This message edited by rewritemyending at 9:55 PM, January 30th (Thursday)]

Hey BluesPower,

Thanks for giving me some straight talk. Yep. Those are all the questions that keep me up at night and why I'm asking for your perspective. Divorce is scary so just making sure I have thought through everything. Is my marriage sunk?... is this normal? .. obviously some have seen worse but it seems reasonable to pull off another year of "normalcy" for the remaining child in the house?

So some of this is different than the opening post, at least the tone.

But, let me say this. You need to decide if you have the balls to divorce. If your marriage is bad enough to divorce.

Here is the reality. If you tell your husband the truth, then in pretty short order you will know if he is willing to pull his head out and work on the marriage.

Problem is that, when you tell him, if he stays, the marriage is not the thing that needs to be worked on. The betrayal is.

On the other hand some will say if you are going to divorce anyway just let it go, don't tell and move on.

So step one, do you want to divorce and have a lower standard of living. Is it worth it, it may be and it may not be.

Oh, and if you want to waste another year, go ahead, but realize that TIME is your most important resource.

What do you want to do?

[This message edited by BluesPower at 4:13 PM, January 21st (Tuesday)]

You're still dancing around the issue of the A!!!

You may think it best not to tell him. That is wrong. Know that at some point it may come out. The OBS may contact him, you may throw it in his face in anger or exasperation, you will have guilt well up and feel the need to tell him.

He deserves to know the truth.

The best way is for you to do it gently now. Write out time line of the A along with details of what was said, done and where. Be prepared to give it to him when you tell him.

You know the whole point of my questions to you was to try to see if you really wanted to D. Right now you seem to be cherry picking. Your BH doesn't have that same benefit at the moment, does he?

The excuse of staying for the kid is lame. I bet you will be off looking for another A on your next trip - the lure of the ego kibbles is too great.

[This message edited by rewritemyending at 9:55 PM, January 30th (Thursday)]

Am I too broken, and old, to start over and find someone to love me?

Unknown. I think, though, that your goal should be to love yourself- And that can be a tall order. The reason I come out and say that so plainly is you have laid out some detail that highlights what you need from others. Love comes from giving freely of ourselves: That openness and honesty is the gift we give a partner who is doing the same with us. And I think already focusing on the, to put it crassly, rebound, should concern you. If you can’t be comfortable in your own skin this isn’t gonna magically change.

Further have to point out that you’re here telling us your BH was/is complacent. It merits repeating that he was one piece of this partnership. I understand that there’s a lot of history but from what you described I don’t see a whole lot of fighting for this from either side- Just a subtle reminder that you can’t pin this on things your BH didn’t do, when it sounds to the uninformed observer like there’s just as much you didn’t do...

Bottom line is we only know what you present, and I think that potentially living a life of integrity as a divorcee is a good thing. Waiting for some long lost feeling to come back while doing nothing to encourage/enhance/foster sounds far worse. This decision is far more about who you’re going to be as a person and far less about finding your next fix. We’re not necessarily best equipped to diagnose, but we are to help make informed decisions.

[This message edited by rewritemyending at 9:56 PM, January 30th (Thursday)]

Hi Rewrite

I would like you to reflect on something and see if it could possibly apply to your situation.

Prior to my A, my life was a mess. I had gone off the rails after my mom passed. I wasn’t cognizant of it, but I had started to turn away from my marriage. By the time my A started, I had myself fully convinced that my wife no longer loved me.

About 3 months after I ended my A, I trolled my AP’s FB page. Surprise surprise, she found her new soulmate. It was at that moment I realized what I almost lost. I was finally made to see that the problems in the marriage weren’t because of my wife, it was because I disengaged.

Obviously you know your M and your H best. I would just ask, could your H apathy be because he senses your detachment? You mentioned that he doesn’t like to hike, have you both looked into doing another activity together? It’s ok to have separate interests so long as you don’t become disconnected.

[This message edited by rewritemyending at 9:56 PM, January 30th (Thursday)]

[This message edited by rewritemyending at 9:57 PM, January 30th (Thursday)]

I even actually announced my disengagement about 5 years ago

You told your BH you were done, and you're surprised he didn't have sex with you last 3 years???? What did you expect him to fight for you? Maybe he expected you to fight for him. So he wrote you off. It sounds like he pulled a soft 180 on you - go to the healing library (left side of the website) and read up what a 180 is.

SO my question is ...is this marriage even repairable?

No. You dropped a big old A-Bomb right into your M and it is ashes - just your poor BH doesn't know it yet. BUT, you can start over. You can try to make a new M if you can do the hard work and if your BH decides to allow you back into his life.

I don't know. I met my BW back in college when I was 19 and she was 18. Married at 24. 2 kids, home, adult shit. 23 years later and I am a selfish ass and go and have an affair for a lot of made up excuses. I wanted my ego stroked and I wanted attention. My AP was a class A nutbar but i didn't care. She was feeding my ego. I ended the A because I came out of my stupidity and realized I loved my W and wanted to fix my M, then the AP nuked my M by going to my BW before I did. My BW was a saint - literally. She saved me and our M. We have been rebuilding for 4 years and yes we get along better now than ever before and we talk, we enjoy each others company. It was a lot of hard work. It is still a lot of hard work. I forgot that along the way.

So, you're like an onion and we need to peel away the layers. You sound like you miss your H.

[This message edited by rewritemyending at 9:58 PM, January 30th (Thursday)]

Rewrite

Can the marriage be saved? IMO, it depends. Do you both have the will l to do what’s necessary to rebuild? From the WS perspective, this shit is hard. It’s one thing to say you’ll do the work, actually putting in the effort is a whole different ball of wax.

I always thought I was a great guy and always sneered at people who cheated. Now I’m eating a big plate of crow. I’ve had to look at myself in a way that I never did before. I had to see myself and my actions for who and what they were. It was a very sobering moment to realize that you’re not the person you thought you were.

Cleanslate..... I want someone to talk about me one day the way you talk about your wife

Then you earn that. You need to be in IC immediately.

As far as the marriage:

I resented my husband for situations and expectations that I caused. Over time, I told myself stories because noone wants to be the bad guy in the story. The affair amplifies that because of cognitive dissonance. We tell ourselves stories to justify and make ourselves feel better about our decisions that we know are wrong.

When I fixed the lens in which I was looking at the situation I saw my husband very clearly for the first time in a long time. I hadn't appreciated him, and was ready to throw away a man a lot of women would give their left arm to have.

The story you are telling yourself about him not touching you in 3 years doesn't include your responsibility in that. You have laid the blame at his feet while feeling entitled that you deserve more or something better. We create narratives in which we don't always acknowledge all parts of it and with empathy.

As for the pining:

Stop looking at his facebook page. I know it's so tempting, but block him on everything. Read about Romantic infidelity by Dr. Frank Pittman. You need to see what is happening to you is just a very typical reaction to having a limerant affair. That was helpful for me to dispel the star crossed lovers, soulmates, etc because the intensity of the feelings is nothing but addiction. And, the addiction really isn't to the AP - it's to the story you are telling yourself. The feelings from that make you high. Until you stop doing that, you will remain addicted. So as you are stalking his facebook page, you are telling yourself stories that fit your narrative, but when you really stop and look there is no proof. You are going off your own confirmation bias.

Withdrawal is a bitch. It helped me to get a lot of cardio (replaces the endorphins), practice self care - get enough sleep, take vitamins, eat well, etc. You literally have programmed yourself to get all the dopamine hits from this fantasy you have.

You did the same as me - you escaped your reality. You blamed others for your reality. We are responsible for our own happiness, and we can not hold other people responsible for it. You are filling a void with something unhealthy, it will take a lot of time to answer the questions of what WILL effectively fill that void for you. How can you be excited and happy with your own life? It's certainly not through trying to take someone else's husband, and possibly someone's father from the family.

When you think about him you need to learn to change the channel. You need to tell yourself a different story. The true one. That anyone who helps you destroy yourself and your spouse is a POS. You will also have to acknowledge the way you were being is the same and start looking at why you had become that person. The ways you mismanaged your life.

So, what I did was, I got in IC. I spent a short time sorting through my issues there. I read "How to help your spouse heal from infidelity" Then, I confessed. I told him everything without blaming him or the marriage because by this time I could solidly see they were my issues.

R may or may not be in the cards for the two of you but these steps you will be taking will help you remove the barriers you have that you will either take into your renewed marriage with your current H, or in future relationships. We hold the keys to our own reality and our own future. As long as you stay in this mode you will remain a victim. In your eyes you are victim of a loveless marriage and a victim of a man who didn't love you enough to stick around. You are not the victim, you are the creator.

Love is effort. And, honestly when you are a healthier person you will see that the biggest deepest feelings you can have is really doing things and being there for your person. The effort we make is where the butterflies really are. You felt that with the AP because you put in the effort and you liked how that made you feel. You liked you could be someone else than who you were before. But, this was not authentic, and both of you were manipulating each other and lying to each other.

It's very difficult to get out of this circular obsessive thinking, but if you step forward and take control of the situation you will find you will be miserable for much less time. The way you are living now is not what you want.

[This message edited by rewritemyending at 9:58 PM, January 30th (Thursday)]