Just came back to this thread to check on you Inkarnit. How is it going?
Could it be Inkarnit is INTO Hot Wife scheme or cuckolding?
Can we NOT with this bullshit line of thinking? Many, many spouses have engaged in some form of the pick-me dance, but somehow it's only the BHs who get this thrown in their face. It is offensive to try to shame them with inflammatory labels like cuckold on a site about surviving infidelity! You are victim-blaming and essentially telling him that not only does he deserve what he's getting, but he must like it.
Cuckolding is a fetish that some people are into. Those people are fine to do what they will among consenting adults.
The poster here is coming to a site about surviving infidelity for fuck's sake! He's not a willing, consenting cuckold, he is a person in pain, grasping at straws trying to figure out how to save something he holds dear but that he can feel slipping through his fingers. Much of the advice we give is counter-intuitive to newcomers, so it can be hard for them to fully grasp. Let's help him do that!
R at any cost is not a good strategy after being betrayed.
I hope your plan works out for you, but I suspect you don't understand the level of addiction an affair creates.
You allowing your WW to set the terms and boundaries of ending her affair is letting a drug addict set a schedule for when they use.
It takes 1 bad day, or you getting angry or not doing the dishes. Then she is back into the affair where none of that stuff existed.
You’re putting the cart before the horse. You need to get yourself out of infidelity, then decide to R or D. You’re trying to figure out how to rebuild your house while it’s burning down, hint, put the fire out.
Inkarnit, I've read the entire thread and there has been plenty of great advice. I'm just picking out a few nuggets that might help you wrap your brain around this incredibly difficult concept. Your wife is not mentally well. Call it an addiction, or temporary insanity, or whatever you want to, but people in As are not thinking clearly or rationally, and it takes a long time for them to snap out of it.
The comparisons to addiction are apt. IME with the many addicts in my life, coddling them will not help. You are right, shame doesn't help either, it's part and parcel of why they are addicts. But shame is a natural human feeling that is impossible to avoid - we ALL feel it at some point in our lives, and yet we don't all become addicts. The real issue addicts have is their inappropriate and often disproportional reaction to shame, not the shame itself.
It is one thing to rub someone's face in something with the intention of shaming them. It is another thing to state the facts of what they did, and they then feel shame from acknowledging those facts and accepting that they are accountable for that behavior. The first is malicious, and you're right, that's not the way to handle an addict, or any human being for that matter. The second approach is how every single addict in recovery has gotten their wake up call.
Your ability to bear the pain of her remaining in contact with the AP is not a measure of your worthiness of love, respect, kindness etc. I get the feeling, I do. I've been there, done that with trying to be the understanding and compassionate spouse. It didn't effect any change, much like yelling and screaming about it didn't effect change either. Your real dilemma is that nothing you do or do not do will actually cause her to change. It is hard to accept, but it's the truth. The only thing you can do is decide what you will and will not tolerate, and what the expiration dates on those tolerances are. I promise you, the temporary feel-goods you get from placating a spouse and being the "loving, compassionate, understanding" one, they pale in comparison to the feel-bads you get when you realize you've spent weeks, months, or even years denying your own needs in favor of someone who has proven that they think their needs supersede all others.
