SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

(((Speed)))

There's one WS who posts a lot in General. I just skip right over those posts. I think you can put a stop sign on your post or maybe put "vent" in the title so that WSes can't post in it.

Just skip anything posted by someone whose opinion has no value for you.

Today is 10 years to the day when I went to the bridge with the intention of jumping. I am sincerely grateful that I did not go through with it. I've known more blessings and happiness this past decade than I ever dreamed possible: my son, the gardens, nature journaling and being in nature again, doing art, just breathing. Thankful for all of these blessings, and more.

Just wanted to acknowledge that.

((((silverhopes))))

I am very glad you didn't go through with it! Your life is beautiful and worth living.

And we all appreciate your input here as well. So, selfishly, thank you for not doing it

((Silverhopes))

I, too, am glad you didn't go through with it. I've been there, too. I feel you.

@silverhopes, so happy you made a choice to live. I value you and your opinion. You are one of my favorite members here. Much peace to you, dear lady.

My WH moved out 7 months ago after a false R and the confession of a 3 year affair. He did not leave for the AP. I told him to leave because I found out he sent a text to his best guy friend saying our marriage was probably over. Of course with me he was still making me believe he was rebuilding what we had.

Our backstory is that we literally grew up a few houses from each other. We were best friends our whole lives. Never dated till we were in our 20's. He likes to say that he always liked me but I never liked him and I would have to agree. I never saw him as boyfriend material. Or maybe I was just so scared of losing my friend that I kept him in the friend zone. Anyway, when he finally wore me down and I started to have feelings for him, I realized that he was all I could've ever wanted. I fell hard. It was great for a little while but he did cheat on me while we were dating so I broke up with him. It took him months to get me to speak to him again but he won me over again. And he cheated again. Each time I felt strong because I would walk away from him and he would beg and cry to get me back. Vicious cycle.

Here I am after almost 19 years of marriage finding out that I was never as strong as I needed to be. He showed me who he was when I was 24 years old but I so badly wanted to believe that he really did love me because he kept coming back to me. I just can't justify all the years I've wasted. Yes- I did get my two greatest gifts from him. My daughter and my son, and I will never regret that. I just feel so low because now there is nothing left of me to come back to in his mind. I'm almost 50. I stayed home to raise my kids and they are awesome kids. I haven't worked in almost 15 years. My whole life is being a Mom and a wife. Now that is just not exciting or even interesting to him. He is a CEO of a company and travels to great places and meets new people that can offer him so much more than I can. But to be completely honest I have nothing I want to offer him anymore. I want to be the 24 year old woman that literally walked away from him without hesitation. Yes, he broke my heart back then but he never broke ME. I was a whole person and didn't need him for anything. He hated that. I loved the power I had back then.

After we were married I moved to another state far away from all my friends and family so he could go to law school. I worked and took care of him for those years. Then I got pregnant and he had started a career so I quit my job when my 2nd child was born. I loved being a Mom. It was all I ever wanted to be. I was a good Mom and my kids are perfect. But somewhere a long the way I lost my husband and I still can't tell you when that happened.

I just wonder how a man that seemingly loved his wife and kids so much could suddenly decide they just aren't enough anymore. We did not fight or argue much. There were silences though. Times when I was resentful of his late hours and weekend trips. I knew something was not right but I felt like I needed to keep my kids safe and secure so I was silent. Then one day about 2 years ago he told me he was seeing someone else needed time to figure out what he wanted. What HE wanted!!!! Again, I was fairly silent. Let him go with no tears, no anger, no fuss. I made him tell his kids why he was leaving and I let him go. He was back a week later wanting to fix things. I gave him the opportunity to work on things for over a year.

In the end, I was still not enough. So I told him to leave.

Since he left I have been distant but friendly for my kids. I had him over for Christmas. Made dinners for him and the kids on the weekends. At first I felt like things could be okay like that, but over time I've become more and more angry. I just feel like he has it so easy. He lives in an apartment 40 minutes away from us and never sees the kids during the week. But on the weekends he comes and sits at my house for hours. No one is comfortable with this. The kids barely speak to him. I try to be a buffer between them but I'm so tired of bending over backwards to make him comfortable. WHAT AM I DOING? He is going through the motions on the weekends but there is no feeling behind it. He wants to "look like" a good Dad by paying our bills and sacrificing his weekend to be in the same house, but it means nothing. My daughter told me the other day that she wishes he would stop coming here. She even said that sometimes she thinks it would be easier if he was just dead. I didn't know how to respond to that because I've had that exact thought many times. And I would like to tell him sometimes that this is what his kids think about him. This is how much he was destroyed our family. But I don't tell him. I sit and pretend he's a decent man because he's paying the bills. I feel trapped by the fact that I have nothing I can call my own. I hate him for lying to me all these years until he decided he was done lying. Now he has this big career with a big salary and nothing to hold him back from traveling the World and living out his dreams. While the kids and I are losing our house, and trying to figure out what comes next.

I just feel like a compete fool for not knowing this man was capable of being so selfish. So I guess in the end he did finally break me. I'm not sure if I can be fixed again.

Sleepless, I am so sorry.

Why do you let him come over on the weekends? If it's because he pays the bills, you have options. Have you spoken to a lawyer?

No more cooking meals for him. No more taking care of him in any way. You don't owe him anything.

Yes I went to a lawyer for a consultation several months ago. At that time my WH was telling me that he would take care of me and the kids. He wanted to do mediation. My lawyer said that she could do the mediation for us but only serve as my lawyer. I would have to pay $5000 up front. I don't have that kind of money. Well there is that much in the bank but I'm afraid to take it. I don't know what my options really are at this point. I told him what my lawyer said and showed him the paperwork she gave me. He took it with him and has never mentioned it again.

I don't make him dinners anymore. I can hardly stand to be in the same room with him. We may text a few times during the week about the kids and that's all. He brought a realtor over to help us get ready to list our home. I'm supposed to be cleaning out all the clutter from our 19 year marriage alone. It has not been easy. Last weekend was especially hard because he was angry that I was not enthusiastic about starting the process of staging our home. It doesn't mean anything to him so he thinks it should be fine to start dumping things in the trash. The funny thing is that when he packed his stuff to move out he was crying like a baby. I remember him walking into my room and breaking down. I reached out and hugged him. Told him it would be okay. Now it's my turn to pack my things but there's no one to comfort me and the kids. In fact he was so frustrated last weekend that he threw a basketball at the wall outside. My son came in and told me that Dad was mad. So I went out and told him he should go home.

I would love to tell him he can't come here anymore but he has to help with the house. He wants to sell it so he has to help get it ready. When I do find another place to live things will change drastically for him and he has no idea what is coming. He will not be welcomed at my house. He will have to try and make plans to see his kids but I doubt they will make themselves available for him. I'm not sure it will even bother him though. He has had 7 months to get used to being without them.

Oh, ok. It sounded like your CH was coming over on the weekends and just hanging out and staying for dinner. I guess you just have to get through this until the house is sold. I'm sorry.

Is there a service you could hire to help you pack things up and clean up the house?

Hi all, new to this thread but grateful. I feel more comfortable in the presence of BW's just for the shared experience. Even more comfy with BW married forever dealing with a very LTA, secret life, multiple discoveries, trickle truths, false reconciliation and still trying to make it work. I'm trying to find myself here, so I can tell me what to do, and to tell me what's normal and what's important, and that I'll be OK. This site has been a gift a great resource and a refuge.

I am slowly learning the names, sexes and stories of the members here and have gotten both great advice and some uncomfortable feedback from both sexes. There are so many of us here, it's overwhelming at times. I will say that I find men to be struggling more than I would have expected, and often share their frustrated threads with my WH so that he can try to understand the reality and the pain of being on this side of the fence through a man's eyes. I try to see all our pain as pain, as my counselor said, all suffering is suffering, no sense trying to quantify or compare it, but I find more comfort in the presence of women consoling women than feedback from men. If anyone wants to provide hints of whose comments to ignore, I'm all ears.

My WH acts typically male with his reluctance to have meaningful discussions about our relationship and his desire to rush to acting like this never happened. I'm sad but comforted at how many of us are here sharing our ups and downs, encouraging each other through trying times.

Silverhopes, so grateful you are here, and were so strong in the face of your pain. I find so much joy in my kids and in nature, art and music too, and I hope I never lose my joy for the simple things again. Thanks for the positive thoughts.

Sleepless, so sorry for your situation. You are in a terrible limbo with a marriage that looks like it should have been a divorce a while ago, just to be more fair to you and to spare you this painful and awkward in-between. Best of luck to you.

Best of luck to us all.

Yes, this is a kind of limbo, but not in the sense that I'm not sure this marriage is over. It is certainly over. I guess I've been pretending that I'm fine for so long that everyone believes me now. My WH thinks I'm okay with everything and that we can move on and be friends now. He doesn't understand that I'm still in so much pain over what he's done. My kids are in pain also but they have learned to hide it from him just like their mother. So now when our pain seeps out, WH is shocked at where it's coming from. So I'm left feeling like I'm wrong for feeling anger and hurt because he says I should be over it. Maybe I should be. Maybe it is all my fault. He doesn't feel the need to apologize for destroying our family. But I don't really remember him ever apologizing to me. I do, however, have the letter he wrote to his AP apologizing for choosing to stay with his family several years ago. Now that was a great apology. He spoke of how she deserved so much better than him and how they had such a deep love. I didn't deserve better than him, but she did. My kids didn't deserve better either. Just her. So yeah it sucked to think I won him back for a time, but what did I win. A year wasted. Goodness I'm an idiot.

Sleepless, you are not an idiot. You were trying to save your family. Why are you all hiding your pain from him? He should know what he has done to all of you.

His cheating was in no way your fault. That's all on him. If he was unhappy, he had lots of choices of what to do about it. He chose very badly.

Have you read the thread about getting over it? No one just gets over it.

Hi, whatislove. I don't like to say welcome because no one wants to be here. (But, you are welcome.)

I'm not sure why we hide our pain. I guess we are just afraid of him proving that he doesn't care about it.

Thank you for reading and responding to my ramblings. It really does help to be heard. You made a crappy day a little bit better.

I'm not sure why we hide our pain. I guess we are just afraid of him proving that he doesn't care about it.

Gently, he has already proven that he doesn't care. That has nothing to do with you. It doesn't mean you are not good enough. There is something seriously wrong with him. He cares only about himself.

My fch seems to be grumpy a lot. I have tried to talk to him about this many times. He just denies what I say and doesn't bring it up again.

Last night, I came home from yoga and he was acting like a jerk. I asked a question, and no one answered me. I asked again saying that it seemed like everyone was just going to ignore me. Fch finally answered that he didn't know. We moved on to other things. I asked another question. Again, no answer from anyone. I got upset and said something snarky. Fch finally answered the 2nd question, but he yelled his answer, which was, "I don't know!"

I first told him that he didn't need to tell. I'm not hard of hearing. I just wanted an answer. 'I don't know, " is a perfectly acceptable response. I guess he thinks that, if he doesn't know the answer, he doesn't need to say anything. He knows being ignored is a major issue of mine.

Then,he started fussing at the kids. Now, mind you, he hadn't had one positive interaction with anyone since he'd been home. I got really mad, and asked him why he even bothered to come home. He just looked at me dumbfounded.

So, I sent him a text today saying that I wanted him to have at least one positive interaction with each of us when he for home before he did anything else. I said that it would be nice if he could at least pretend he was happy to see us. If he wasn't happy being home, maybe he shouldn't come home. He didn't respond.

He came home today, started to fuss at the kids about something. I gave him a look. He stopped himself and was nice, smiling and rubbing their heads. He gave me a small orchid and a kiss. We'll see if it lasts.

I've been trying to get him to think about whether or not his behavior matches his words. He says he's happy, but he doesn't act like it. He can't deny my experience. If my assessment based on his behavior is wrong, maybe he should change his behavior.

Oh I HATE that...ignoring and not answering...that is complete passive aggressive crap. My WH used to do that and I'd be an absolute asshole about it. I'd ask, get ignored, ask again, then I'd text him the damned question while he was right there in the room with me. It's not cute and it is deliberate.

that...ignoring and not answering...that is complete passive aggressive crap.

Yep. My fch is very passive aggressive. Although, I can't think of any reason to be passive aggressive about the question I asked. I just asked if anyone had seen the peanuts.

We've been going through a rough patch, ir maybe it's just me. I think my fch is of the mind that, if we aren't fighting, everything is good. He's perfectly happy to just live together and occasionally have sex. We don't need to talk or do anything together. It seems a lot of men are like that.

I told him the other day that I felt like we were just roommates. He gave me a card. He's a gift giver. A card doesn't mean anything if the behavior remains.

Passive aggressive crap is a big deal and it is extremely hurtful behavior. It is totally on purpose, too. He knows what he was doing. The question you asked wasn't the point. The point was that he got to express some resentment by ignoring the question.