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2019 was when my DDay happened and the ensuing trauma. It feels like that is all I can associate with that year. I couldn't tell you if any note worthy historical events took place. Or how my favorite sports teams did. Or what my daughters favorite toys were then. All of that is just a giant blur. Including the things that occurred prior to DDay (which scares me a little). Everything besides the infidelity is just background noise.

When I think of 2019, the first thing that pops up in my mind is infidelity. Not even my moms passing gets top billing.

I recently flipped by a movie on a HBO and wondered when did that come out? I don't remember that. Turns out it was released in 2019. Of course it was 2019. I even said to myself, No wonder I don't remember it.

Am I the only one who feels like this? For those of you with stories of betrayal that include LTA's stretching past a year, or years of multiple DDays I am truly sorry. That has to be even worse.

This awful association between the year 2019 and infidelity can't be healthy for me. Am I causing myself to stay stuck by allowing those thoughts? How do I combat that? or does it just become less likely to come up as years pass by?

Is discussing it worse? By not letting it die on its own. Would I have been better off correcting myself and saying I didn't remember the movie from 2019 because of .......? I have specific dates that are trigger city for me, like Easter. Since its obviously an annual holiday, I need to continue working towards overcoming it. But what about an entire year!

I'd like to here from BS and WS's alike.

[This message edited by Neanderthal at 10:18 AM, April 19th (Monday)]

In year 4 I still feel like this. Other than the high drama moments (like WH suicide), year 1 is a mostly a blur as well. I engaged in a very high profile project the year of dday, kind of the summit of my work in that job, and it's absolutely in the trunk of my carload of memories from that time.

A couple weeks ago I had a stop-dead-in-my-tracks trigger. I don't know what prompted the memory of a trip my WH, DD and her friend and I took, but something did. And I thought about that trip and how it was really a nice long weekend to visit friends that had moved, visiting an apple farm owned by their family, and then a day in a big city/tourist stuff.

Within seconds of that memory, my mind unconsciously goes to the date and then the recognition he'd already slept with POSOW at that point. And then I have to allow my brain to reconcile the charade/myth of my M with its reality. Something about that memory / trip overwhelmed me and I had to stop what I was doing and have a good long cry.

Given my WH lied to me about his POSOW from even before we were M, I don't know if I will live long enough to process it all, which is complicated by the fact that POSOW told me the PA was in high gear while we dated, were newlyweds, etc, but WH claims it was the 10yrs before dday. In any event, there really isn't a memory with my WH or the bulk of my adult life that is not tarnished by his deceit.

It is hard. It is sad. And it is history that I cannot change. All I can do is find ways to manage the triggers and find joy and peace in the moments of today.

So, you are not alone, and as sad as it may be, I think we can learn to manage most of it.

A couple months ago my daughter had a school project where she chose one event for each year of her life and wrote about it. Of course she had trouble coming up with the ones from where she was very little, so,we spent time going through my Facebook pics. It was BRUTAL. My initial D-day was 2010, but 2012 was when shit got real bad, and everything about that year just reminds me of the emotional anguish I was in. I think you are very normal for feeling this way. And I'm sorry your spouse ruined the year for you.

2016, 2017, and 2018 All of those years are years I look on with sadness and pain.

December 2016 I almost died. I had an infection on one of my ovaries and it began to necrotize the tissue around it. I was in considerable pain. I was released Christmas Eve, after my surgery, and was able to be home for Christmas. My children and my WH were very worried and terrified that I was going to die. When I came home, WH said that I looked frail and unhealthy. I had lost a lot of weight and they could see my bones.

It took months to recuperate. He told me then that he was scared he was going to lose me and he didn't know what he was going to do without me. Well, I guess that feeling didn't last long because in August of 2017 (less than 2 weeks after meeting AP) he was in a full blown PA, that lasted over a year. He told me about it October 2018, but only because she got pregnant and said it was his!

So yeah, anything and everything associated with those years is a blur or diminished. March 2018 I got tickets for a Yankees game and a hotel room for the night for our anniversary. He has since then said it was his favorite anniversary. It was my second worse because of his infidelity. He just couldn't understand how I would feel that way! I mean, hmm, maybe because you were fucking someone else during that time?

All of this to say that I get it. Anything to do with those years is painful because like you said, the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the year is the infidelity and the devastation it caused, and the fact that you were clueless that it was happening!

Year 2012 was my brutal year. I attempted suicide and Ex would not stop seeing MOW and kept re-traumatizing me. The whole entire year is a blur and I was out of my mind.

You’re not alone, Neanderthal. For me it was 2014 when I started the discoveries. A new semester of teaching was starting, it was my youngest’s Senior year of high school, I was on some big community committees assuredly making big decisions. Most if it now a blur.

But then again there are the flashbulb memories of trivial things burned into my brain. Like the location of each piece of furniture in the sunroom that fall, details of my detective work, very clear statements he made about the OW and his As. But the big things not related to my trauma are a blur, some gone forever. It’s embarrassing when I’m asked about something from that time and I can’t remember what they are talking about. Apparently I was there, apparently I spoke and contributed. But I also apparently was just going through the motions while my mind was elsewhere.

It took me several years to finally get back to where I could be present and not have the dialog going on in the background of imy mind. The dialogue of going over every piece of evidence, every detail and how it fit or didn’t fit with something else. It’s hard to believe we lived like that, that we missed out on years of life snd important new memories (like Senior year!! ) all due to someone else’s selfishness and shitty behavior.

[This message edited by psychmom at 4:49 PM, April 19th (Monday)]

I’m the same, when people say how bad 2020 was i think to myself no 2019 was. I lost my Dad in 2020 but 2019 is still worse.

My mother and father died six months apart in 2013 and my wife ended up in the hospital before Christmas. 2013 was the worst year of my life, until my wife blew my world apart in 2017. My mind remembers dates and unfortunately my wife was very busy with AP, so there is now an abundance of bad days. This shit sucks.

Me, it was 2013. After, it's a blur.

Everything that happened in 2019 is a blur.

August 2019 my best friend and the love of my life, suicided.

September 2019, Dday happened... although WH and I were separated, he was constantly harassing me all year.

December 2019 my favourite cousin and my rock, suicided.

Instead of being able to grieve, I was forced to focus on WH.

It’s April 2021 and the grief of losing 2 amazing people still hurts every day.

I blame my Stbxwh for the deaths of 2 people who I loved dearly and the 2 people who have loved me and cared for me.

I was so absorbed by the way my WH was treating me that I didn’t notice that my best friend was suicidal.

I should have been focusing on me and the important people in my life.

2019 should have been the year that I took my life back but my Stbxwh robbed me of that.

There’s not a day that I don’t cry for the ones I lost.

You know...I have been dealing with triggers as well and trying to figure out why.Unfortunately for us it's sadly natural.Think about the grieving process and what people go through.On anniversaries or other things that remind them of the death they get triggered too.It sounds like cptsd.The experience is like a fog because your brain is trying to protect you from the pain.However it trickles out when certain things bring back that memory and we cry,explode,go crazy.It's like steam.being released from a valve after building up for awhile.While looking into what happened to me and why I am reacting the way I do.I have noticed in many traumas this occurs.Soldiers who have ptsd.I had a friend who was brutally raped when she was younger.When we found her.Torn clothes and blood.She was in shock and didn't remember the incident yet through out the years she would have triggers.Being here and knowing I am not alone helps.Thank you SI.It helps me to recognize it for what it is and when I get triggered I look for a safe person or place to do it.For me it's involuntary just like the infidelity I experienced.I didn't sign up for that shit.I didn't sign up for triggers either but here we are.

[This message edited by Bonetired at 7:38 PM, April 19th (Monday)]

The year 2018 is a trigger. Specifically the couple months around the As. To a lesser extent the months just before (when things were spiraling in his mind and I had no idea he assumed we were doomed) and the months just after (he pretended like all was fine and normally when it obviously was not, he was sitting on a huge secret).

The sight of these dates is a trigger. Like, I still almost panic. If Google something I won’t open results with those dates. On several occasions I have opened documents when I noticed their created or edited date fell in that timeframe simply to make some extremely minor change and save it. To change the date that appears in File Explorer.

Really this can’t be healthy? But sounds like it’s a normal sort of unhealthy.

Unfortunately I don’t remember much from the year I discovered my wife’s infidelities. Lost heaps of weight and looked ill. Infidelity is cruel and brutal. Good luck to everyone still trying to move on from the mind movies.

What I do know now is all of us who have gone through infidelity and come out the other end, we are very strong people. Who can withstand the worst betrayal and still go on.

Give yourself a pat on the back. You are strong.