SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

WS: lies, claims they're not lying.

BS: know they're lying, you tell them and they double down.

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It's like someone walking up to you and they slowly begin to slide a knife into your gut.

You exclaim how they're hurting you...they're literally beginning to kill you and end your life. "Please, just stop."

With a heartfelt tone, an empathetic face and deep concern they tell you how you're wrong. You're not in your right mind and they are trying to help you. No knife is present and one certainly is not being slid into your body. You're confused. You're not in your right mind. You need to just trust them.

You begin to say something else but they kindly "shhhhh" you with a soft face. But they don't stop. The knife continues to travel deeper and the whole time you're being assured that you're just not understanding the situation. You're confused.

They have the kind, familiar face of a loved one but your system is going into shock and you're starting to lose vision. Things are going dark. As your sight fades to black you find yourself in the prone position and the last thing you recall is hearing them softly "shhhhh" you as though you're an infant being put to sleep spoken by someone who says they are there to protect you.

Except, it's not some stranger. It's the person you trust more than anyone.

*The void overtakes you*

The closest thing to this that I've seen is the scene in Saving Private Ryan where the German soldier is slowly sliding the knife into the US soldier. There is an obvious battle occurring in that scene and both know their lives are on the line. In that way it's very different for most BS's. But anyone who's seen it, they no doubt remember it.

But unlike the movie, it's possible to wake up from this assault. When you wake up you realize that they are prepared to steal your life and you don't feel pain, you feel anger. For others...maybe me...the knife never stops traveling. It has indefinite length.

Sometimes I can't tell if I've woken up or if I am still in the middle of the efforts to end my life. The uncertainty is it's own kind of torture.

It irks me when I TELL the person I know they are lying and they refuse to admit it.

Real character flaw if you ask me.

What's also bad is when they don't lie to you, but everyone else around you. Their family members, their friends, even mutual friends.

You're not supposed to know it's happening, it's private conversations. If you confront any of the lies being told about you, you're the petty one.

It completely wrecks a person's sense of justice. I almost would have preferred she lie to me and let me confront the affair, instead she was open about it, then lies to everyone else that I was this horrible monster that drove her to it.

Yes,

Every time I bring up an inconsistency in his story, the conversation gets flipped to how evil I am for not believing him

Evil? Oh?

How many times must someone lie to you before you understand they are a liar?

This resonates with me. Mine liked to stab me over and over again. Enjoined watching my pain so much that he did it over and over again. Now he blames me for leaving and healing myself claiming that my leaving did worse than anything he did. He’s a monster!

[This message edited by crazyblindsided at 4:17 PM, April 11th (Sunday)]

This is such a painfully accurate description of what it’s like, and yes, that scene still haunts me.

For years, in my heart I knew he wasn’t being faithful, but could never prove it. I would ask, accuse, beg, and was always met with lies, gaslighting, the relationship would end due to my trust issues, etc. Then all the TT after dday drove that knife in deeper.

After DDAY, I thought of it like Tony Stark (Iron Man), fighting so hard against the shrapnel that was inching its way to his heart, threatening to kill him. The pain of that feeling, feeling helpless, acting in crazy ways to make the pain stop, ultimately realizing you can only save yourself because the person you trusted the most is that one that put that pain, that poison, there.

I guess there’s some solace in knowing that others understand. Thank you for that.

There's a song called Honest Face that has the following lines:

"There's a look in your eye and I don't feel safe.

You're a cheat and a lie with an honest face"

It really speaks to that sense of confusion when someone you love, lies to your face.

Consistent lying and gaslighting takes such a toll on a person, especially when you know in your heart every minute that it’s happening. It’s a trauma. It’s a huge part of why, IMO, infidelity is abuse.

My ex WH is a very unassuming guy. He never picked fights with other people and rarely raised his voice. I come from a family full of tough men and my ex is not tough. However, when all of this happened and I discovered just how many times he lied right to my face and how much he enjoyed making me look like a complete fool, this image of him would appear in my head and it didn’t go away for years. Whenever I thought of him, my mind’s eye pictured him standing over me and repeatedly punching me in the face. Like a prize fighter beating up an already wounded child. He had a look of total rage on his face and appeared to take pleasure in hurting me.

I’m sure it would have hurt just as much, but the lasting psychological damage may have been much less had he just come out and said he was cheating. Instead of feeding me lies and telling me that our marriage was over because of me and how every feeling he had for me was gone, he could have just told the truth. He never intended to give her up so the outcome of the divorce would have been the same, but the impact to me maybe would have been different. I know I would have at least had more respect for him had he just had the balls to say it.

That’s a great description and one I went through for a long time. Maybe still am. Who knows.

It also affects your ability to trust anyone else. Something I’ve noticed is that my ability to trust anyone fir any reason or under any circumstance has been seriously affected.

Every part of his a had to be discovered by me. He didn’t admit to anything until I found proof. Now, of course, I suspect there could have been more but he insists that he would have told me after I discovered the first. Naturally I don’t believe that. Every detail of what I do know had to be discovered.

This reminded me of the time we were on our family vacation, and I found the text that would shatter my entire life. When I confronted him with it, he grabbed the phone, deleted the text there and then and told me I had imagined it. I can now laugh at the utter stupidity of it!

I so get the pain.I was pregnant at the time but instead of reassuring me he would berate and belittle me telling me I was crazy.Unfortunately it was all true.I lost my other family because of his lies to protect himself.I felt so traumatized and alone.I remember the pain.Like a curse.I kept remembering his face and the look of disgust for me every time I looked in the mirror.I lived with that for several years before I found the courage to date again.A part of me remains unhinged.I constantly need to jump out of that rabbit hole the experience has thrown me into.It goes on even after it has ended.I wish they hadn't named a subsection mad hatter because sometimes that's who I remind myself of.A little crazy because of someone else's actions.I want my sanity back.