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Has anyone had a better marriage after a EA just wondering if it's just me thinking maybe it took this to make a person realize how important their relationship truly is and I was taken for granted and now my husband truly is remorseful and wants to do anything it takes to make me feel safe and loved. Or is it just me waiting for something bad to happen and tear that all apart because of the betrayal and all the lies that were told maybe there is no hope for a future with a person who had a lapse in judgement and didn't know what they truly wanted.

,Better marriage? Possible. Definitely. What does your heart say? One thing I have learned after reading plenty of stories here and through my personal experiences is that heart does what it wants. No amount of reasoning and evidence can make a person do what his/her heart doesn't want. See, it's not the wisdom of this forum or guidance of your personal therapist that will help you make the choice of divorce or reconciliation. It's the amount of pain and trauma you are exposed to. If it's too much handle, you choose divorce. If it's manageable, then you choose reconciliation. So tell me, where do you stand now? Is your pain and trauma manageable? Is your pain decreasing as days go by, or is it increasing day after day?
If it's increasing, then one day you will reach the breaking point when you can't take it anymore and will choose to divorce.

Your pain and trauma management not only depends on your ability to accept the affair and forgive the cheating partner but also on the amount of lies and gaslighting your partner throws at you.

Coming back to your original question. Yes, better marriage is possible, but it depends on where you stand in this wide spectrum of pain and trauma.

Remorseful and safer partner = less pain and trauma = happy marriage.

Definitely, a much better marriage post LTA. That being said it will never be as strong as it could have been had he not needed to be a cheater to finally fix his F’ed up head. However, I know he never would have had his secret never been revealed. I appreciate and am Grateful for the closeness we have now. I will never be happy at how it came to be. We have something better now, but not as great as a young me dreamt of.

My wife and I are both children of divorce. Infidelity on both sides. Borderline poverty on her side. Professional level affluence on my side, but alcoholism and other less good things so attention and affluence didn’t trickle down to the kids (good grandparents though).

We saw in each other, I think, someone who would recognize the pain and not add to it. A low bar but better than we were used to. We were both allergic to grand statements and no follow through. It was mostly do the right thing and say nothing.

So much for that.

We did both sincerely want to raise our children well and we both did that. If it wasn’t for a mutual appreciation of that, we would not have made it this far.

In reconciliation I am more outspoken against fence sitting. I am hopeful that will improve our marriage. It seems to.

There is a sword of Damacles over the relationship now however. If it happens again all bets are off. For months I was concerned she was maybe just playing along until she was in a better position to take off. But she seems sincere and glad of the chance given.

I had a very good marriage and my husband was a good guy. Until his ego took hold of him.

Much better marriage now.

I’m no longer a doormat and I don’t negotiate on anything that is a firm no.

Should have told him to "get out" after his first affair. Lesson learned.

Thank you guys for the thoughts @ OnTheOtherSideOfHell, totally agree with what you said and to say as well if my husband didn't have to go out and do what he did to fix his own thoughts he wouldn't be a better man but it does suck to let myself understand that he did it and now knows where he wants to be and be married to me and do whatever it takes to make it right . Takes some getting use to getting over to make things better in my head and heart. Still a process one day at a time for me, but I also now hold some more power and not to be treated a certain way as a result. I suppose with time I will find my way to the right option reconcile or divorce however I know one thing for sure I will not give a chance number 2 my heart can't take that and I hope I never will have to experience it.

The fall out from the affair is that you stop seeing your spouse or partner through those rose colored glasses.

You see them in a whole new light.

And it’s eye opening.

True statement however as bad as this sounds he was never a good husband because of his drinking and uncertainty of being married to me in the first place.always told me he wasn't sure about why we were together I always felt like I forced my relationship on him. But now it's just a little more complicated and painful after the affair even though he is working towards becoming what he should have in the first place. Sad but so true

Gently, no one can make you feel safe. You choose to feel safe or not. I know that can be a mind-boggling idea, but it's true. External validation simply does not offer much support. My W cheated. If she hadn't changed from cheater to good partner, I would have decided not to feel safe with her. She did change, though, and I chose to accept that, and I therefore felt safe. But that was because of the work we both did, not because I gave her the power to make me feel anything.

When a WS is an alcoholic, IMO the alcoholism has to be treated first and foremost. That's because, IMO, alcohol makes it too likely that the alcoholic will make lousy decisions. I would never feel safe with an alcoholic partner who is not treating their disease effectively.

So is drinking still a problem? What is your H doing about it? If he's still drinking or white-knuckling, I would understand why you don't feel safe.

He is still drinking and we are taking that one step at a time for me I told him that may be the real reason I walk out. It's been the reason for 6 years and now beca8se of the affair I know nothing is safe but me and my decisions to stay or go. It's been a challenge he wants to get better but a small part of him doesn't want to let the drinking go the affair was the easy part drinking not so much. Everyday is a new challenge with alchol I agree not what I signed up for a affair to add to my already complicated relationship.

I feel a lot like 1stWife.

My marriage was good before. My wife is off the pedestal. We weren't bad at communication before. Now we are really amazing at it. We have build great marriage skills in the aftermath.

I stand up for myself more, not that it was a big recurring problem before. But it definitely used to be in the rare instances we did fight, I would always back down and apologize first. My theory was something like, "She's my wife. We're a team. The words 'I'm sorry' don't cost anything."

We are definitely a team. Usually she apologizes first now, though I still apologize first if I'm actually in the wrong.

If I want to do or buy something for myself, I just tell her I'm doing it. I don't make it a question.

We are more unified and better parents together.

Sex is better than before.

Overall we really have reconciled and made it to the other side.

He is still drinking and we are taking that one step at a time for me I told him that may be the real reason I walk out. It's been the reason for 6 years and now beca8se of the affair I know nothing is safe but me and my decisions to stay or go. It's been a challenge he wants to get better but a small part of him doesn't want to let the drinking go the affair was the easy part drinking not so much.

I used the affair to finally persuade my wh to join AA. It finally gave me the strength to say alcohol or me, and that was the beginning of healing for my whole family. I wish you the best.

I agree the sex is so much more passionate now and he says now things are different we do communicate where before it was always me talking about my feelings so it's still a process but I'm glad there have been success stories gives me hope. I have tried the AA or me theory but as a last resort to I'm out I have been through enough unfortunately for mine it hasn't worked he keeps saying he needs to do it for himself and he isn't ready for that step yet and I'm not quite ready to leave but definitely will need to re evaluate that soon. It's so unhelpful for my recovering.

I expect AA won't work unless your H chooses it. IMO, you need to find the strength in you - and it's in you already - to mean 'alcohol or me', and you need to leave if he chooses alcohol. After all, what do you get from staying with him if he keeps drinking?

Have you considered Al-anon for yourself?

I've been active on SI for over 12 years, and I do not remember a single case of successful R with an active alcoholic. I HAVE read of successful R with a recovering alcoholic.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 4:25 PM, Tuesday, May 30th]

My personal belief is you don’t get a new marriage until the ws (and occasionally the bs) learn new skills and spend time and effort understanding how they came to this point.

Marriage is only as strong as its weakest link. My advice is to make sure he focuses on therapy and making sure he understands what has brought him to this juncture. Remorse is a good start but it takes deep introspection to start a different course on how you conduct yourself, integrity, etc.

In other words, it’s about the individual first, then a "new marriage" can be built. And that usually means the old marriage with some important improvements.

Hard lessons have taught me to never trust or negotiate with an active addict when it comes to their drug of choice. The drug will always be the primary relationship in their life until they decide to end it. You get to decide whether their addiction is a dealbreaker for you or not.

My H and I almost got divorced over his addiction to smoking. He made a deal with me to buy a motorcycle, which he said he'd pay for by quitting smoking. After the bike was in the driveway, he continued smoking and I called him on it. He freaked out and insisted that he had never made any such deal and I almost lost my fucking mind. Fifteen years later, he's still smoking. He insists that he's working up to quitting, but he's not. Not really. I've set a boundary that I won't be the one hauling around his oxygen when he can no longer breathe. He's on his own with that.

I also lost my sister to addiction. She left behind two children. It tore her apart to hurt her children like that. She wanted so badly to live...but not badly enough to stop using.

Sorry to be Debbie Downer, but if his addiction is something that you can't live with, and he's not doing anything to quit drinking, and even telling you that he's not sure that he wants to stop, don't hang your hat on anything changing. I second the suggestion to look into Al-Anon.