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Sissoon, could you elaborate? I usually find your posts very thoughtful but there seems to be a missing piece in your post? It’s been a while, but I read all of Mr Fibble’s thread at the time. The decision to reconcile or divorce seemed painfully fine-balanced. You seem to have a different view.

Hmmm ... I have a basic belief that knowing what I want is crucial, even if I can't get it.

When it comes to the D/R decision, what one wants is clearly only part of the equation. I wanted R from the start. My W said she wanted R, but that was after months of lying, so her stated desire didn't give me any comfort or confidence that we would actually R.

No matter how much one partner wants R, it's impossible to get R unless both/all partners do the necessary work. So I watched my W for 3 months, saw the work she was doing and decided she would almost definitely continue doing her work, so I committed to R.

MrFlibble's W was not a candidate for R, so he reluctantly chose D. Now she's shown some signs of being willing to do the work, and he's thinking maybe they can R. He's also distressed about life 9 months out from D.

My point was that the distress seems very reasonable right now. He has to mourn the loss of his M and the loss of the woman he loved. That takes time. He'd have to do that no matter what his XW was doing. It seems reasonable when distressed to pine for the good old days, even when they weren't so good. Sometimes the crummy place you used to live in looks better than an unknown future.

I guess I think MrF's best option is to get comfortable with himself as a D'ed man. Think about what he wants and how he'll know when he's getting it (or not). What his XW is doing is a separate matter. Maybe she's remorseful; maybe she isn't. But R is probably not a good choice if MrF goes into it because he wants to get away from his current discomfort.

JMO, of course. MrF knows his sitch much better than I do, and he has to make his decisions. SI's role is to provide feedback and support. If he voices a concern, I think feedback is the right response. If he tells us of a decision, I think counsel that helps him implement the decision is the right response.

Going back to knowing what one wants even if it seems unattainable, my life has been filled with surprises that I wished for but thought I'd never experience. Many experiences and things that seemed unattainable were unattainable only temporarily. For example, I grew up thinking I'd be stuck forever in my unexciting home town. Without ever setting a goal of moving away, I left home at 22, returning only for holidays and vacations.

My guess is that I wouldn't have had the experiences if I hadn't let myself want them and if I hadn't let myself be aware that I wanted them.

Of course, my home town became a very exciting place to be. I don't know what to make of that.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 3:53 PM, Sunday, June 26th]

I have said that relationships are like a stool in that it depends on 3 legs. In relationship/narriage, those legs are

-Trust

-Respect

-Love

If one of those legs is destroyed, the relationship/marriage is gone. I’m sorry, but in your case, all THREE legs are gone.

Trust

Do you really think that you will ever actually trust her again? If you did try to get back together with her, Anytime she is 5 minutes late, you are going to be wondering if she is on her back in some cheap hotel by the airport. Is she cheating/not cheating with some guy in the back of a car again? Is that the type of marriage/relationship you hope to have?

Respect

I’m sorry, but she obviously doesn’t respect you or else she never would have done what she did.

And the sad part is that she is losing more and more Respect for you every day that you aren’t brutally honest with her and tell her that there is absolutely ZERO CHANCE of you two ever getting back together. Right now, she sees that you haven’t moved in, therefore she feels like you two getting back together is going to happen!!! If she did respect you, would she have ever sent those photos to her lover(s)? Of course not!!!

Love

This one is so blatantly obvious that I feel foolish bringing it up. Do you REALLY believes she loves you? Do you think she was remembering all your good times when she was planning and telling you lies???? Do you think she was remembering how you proposed to her while giving herself to him? Even now, do you think she loves you when she is selfishly worried more about herself and her future rather than the pain you are feeling caused by HER?!?!?

I’m sorry.

I’m not going to tell you what you should do as you seem to know what you must do. It might take time to get over the shock, the disbelief, and anger, but I think you will get there.

As for the dating pool, I am just a bit olde than you, and I have to say that I find the dating pool of women to be incredible. Since my divorce, some 3 1/2 years ago, I have had a great deal of fun with women. I’m not wealthy or gorgeous, but I was shocked at the incredibly high number of extremely high quality single women that are looking for good men. I am actually the one that usually gets asked out. Yes, there are some crazies and incredibly needy ones that want a long term commitment after the first date, but the vast majority are great women. In Florida, I can only assume that the numbers are significantly higher.

In the end, do what you must do that is in YOUR best interest!!! What will make YOU happy?!?!

She has shown you who and what she really is! You now know that the woman you loved was a figment of your imagination, and now see who and what she really is, an incredibly selfish woman

There is nothing wrong if cheating is a dealbreaker for you. It certainly was for me.

Do what you must, and there is no need to fear the unknown. Since turning 50 and having a heart attack, I’ve cone to realize that time is too short to deal with the ridiculousness of people unworthy of my time, feelings, and commitment. The other side is great!!

Good luck

Be strong

NEVER allow yourself to be someone else’s Plan B!!!! Respect yourself enough to say, "HELL NO!!!!" to that!!!!

And do what you must do that you can always look the man in the mirror in the eye.

Time to move on!

I don’t think it’s about being 100% sure, rather doing it for the right reasons.

I toyed with the idea for a bit but I did not R, mainly because my relationship had been dead for a while so there was no point really. But if I may offer some advice it would be to ask yourself some basic stuff and take it from there.

Is the love still there? No - ok then push harder with the detaching thing, you probably need more time to grieve for your old life.

Yes - then instead of asking how can you be really sure, ask yourself what is holding you back from attempting R? You don’t trust she can really change, you fear getting burnt again, can't imagine being vulnerable with her again… you name it.

Kids, family etc are external factors in both scenarios, you need to dive into reasons that are more deeply personal to you.

Just to be clear, I’m not saying ‘Hey if the love is still there then jump to R’. What I’m saying is that identifying your inner obstacles to that possible path might give you some direction and some answers too. Some can probably be worked through, other might be insurmountable, who knows.

(Obviously I’m writing all the above assuming that you’ve seen genuine remorse and progress from your ex, otherwise I believe you would have closed that door long ago.)

I followed your thread here and there and I got a sense that your drive to divorce was more towards leaving that emotional mess behind you, to find some sort of resolution. You made a choice that was right for your healing and short term peace but that left too many things unresolved somehow. Now that the dust has settled, I think Dude67's advice is spot on

figure out what you want divorced from ego, punishment, residual anger, disappointment, etc. You need to tune out the A noise to figure this out. What will make you happy?

I have a question for people who R or were thinking about R long after D-Day.

How long did it took for you to be really sure about what you want? It's been more than year and a half from D-Day and 9 months since divorce was final, but I can't honestly say I have this chapter closed within myself. Like I can let go completely.

Hi Mr. Fibble,

I can see plenty of commonalities in our story. At least from my d-day on. First and foremost you already know what you want. Just like I did. We wanted our ex-wives. It was never a matter of what we wanted.

July 2019: d-day found out XW was having an affair.

Nov 2019: Polygraph completed. Half a dozen parking lot confessions leading up to and including in the poly room.

Lived in limbo. I still never believed her story. I had to fight for every affair detail. I developed pretty severe anxiety due to all the new admissions/d-days.

July-Sept 2020: Filed and Divorced. I moved out and went as No Contact as possible while co-parenting our young Daughter....But I didn't do it long enough! I never really moved on. I never detached. I still very much loved her. I never healed!!

Dec 2020: I screwed up and saw XW's dating profile and messaged her about it. She was finally moving on and I sucked her back in. We began quasi dating. It felt like having an affair. I hated hiding it from my daughter. Not being open and honest about it. I understand why we hid it. Trying to protect any further damage to our kiddo, but it was a detriment.

April 2022: I finally called it quits. Basically I pushed back my healing 2 years. Her healing as well.

Here's what I've learned and maybe will help you.

I believe my XW loved me. But she was also afraid of me. Not afraid for her safety, but afraid that any little thing she did incorrectly would destroy any chance at R. So if she thought lying would help her chances at R, guess what she did? I never got the full truth and I know I never will. I have to make peace with that.

While being with me since D-day, through limbo, over divorce mountain, and down quasi-dating river, My XW couldn't be completely herself and honest. She needed to detach. She needed to realize she's plenty fine without me and so she could become an honest partner. By being in limbo for so long, we ruined the chances of that. Ultimately more lies are what ended things. Unnecessary lies, like they always were.

She never let go of the outcome. Until she lets go. You are in very real danger. She's not a safe partner.

I screwed up a lot too.

I never fully committed. I didn't openly share with her ILY's until way too late. Honestly I wasn't healed enough yet. I wasn't healed enough to be that vulnerable.

Long story short.

She must detach and let go.

You need to heal and let go.

Those things can happen and love still exist. If so, then maybe there's a chance. Just don't force it before then.

Also, you should probably listen to Sisoon better than I did. It'll save you a lot of headaches later on.

Edit to add: this post isn't particularly organized. Sorry about that. I guess I wanted to say I tried the path you are thinking about taking. I just did it all wrong. Listen to the guides here. Get yourself healthy without her. Hopefully she does the same.

[This message edited by Neanderthal at 12:40 AM, Saturday, July 2nd]

Thank you all for your replies, you gave me a lot to think about. But I think it's time to look forward instead of going around in circles

Just had the talk. Kind of made wish she were this open and sure about everything a year ago. I don't want to bother you all with details, but I basically told her things can't continue the way they are now, because it's slowly killing us both even though she might not realise it. I said I want to cut contact to a minimum, no calls, no days out - strictly coparenting. Act like we are divorced.

She was obviously caught of guard, told me later it came out of the blue (it probably did), but we talked it through, I explainted her my reasons and she reluctantly agreed. Let's see how things go and I will take it from there

ps I told her I am thinking about selling our (my) house. That was the only thing she was strongly against, so I will have to think about it a bit more since it would directly affect kids. But I feel like it's just wasting space

psps wanted to put here the whole story, but I felt like writing a novel, so this will have to do, sorry

Not that I am miserable or anything, but I have not moved on either. I know that there is no universal timeline, but.. after almost 2 years?

Every kick in the right direction is appreciated.

Here's a kick: Go NC. I see from your last post that you've finally decided to move more in that direction. Keep moving. I've shared custody for over a decade with an ex who makes yours look like Mother Theresa (I'm not minimizing what your ex did & think you're right to move on, just showing my street cred here). Here is how we co-parent:

We only communicate via email or text, no talking in person or over the phone. I recently even had to put an end to texting because he started abusing that, too. So now we're down to strictly email, which is no biggie as our son is 17. But text & email combined work fine even with younger kids. Phone and in-person conversations are just too personal, even when you stick to the topic of the kids. And they lend themselves too easily to abuse by the manipulative partner.

Child drop-offs/pick-ups only occur in a neutral public location, not at either of our homes. He's never even been to my new house, thank goodness. Our son (who still can't drive due to a chronic illness) walks between the cars at these drop-offs/pick-ups. So ex and I never have to interact or really even see each other.

We have separate holidays and birthday parties. At major events such as important school events, we both attend but sit no where near each other and do not interact.

This way of co-parenting becomes second-nature once you're used to it. Will your ex resist this? Of course. When I finally declined to stop talking to my ex on the phone he raised hell because he loved manipulating and verbally abusing me that way, but it was a one-way decision and he had no choice. Same with the no more texting.

The reason for you to go this far is that no contact is what will allow you to move on emotionally. I've read your threads, and you always struggled to get out of her influence when you would see/talk to/touch her. That's typical for people who are breaking up with someone they love. The only way to snap out of it is to stop seeing them, talking to them, touching them, talking about them. You have to really, truly walk away, not just in words, but in actions. Interacting with her should no longer be a real part of your life.

Once you begin keeping the no contact discipline, you'll be able to focus on your new life, and possibly another woman. You can't really give yourself or another woman a fair chance as long as your ex is taking up so much of your headspace, and this will continue as long as you interact with her, particularly in person and on the phone.

You can absolutely stop loving your ex if you go fully no contact and move on. It worked for me and for many others. You won't hate your ex, but falling completely out of love with her and out of love with your past life with her is a necessity for moving on. You haven't done that yet and you need to.

[This message edited by morningglory at 11:50 PM, Saturday, July 16th]

Limiting conversations to co-parenting is a step in the right direction. Less contact can help detach.

But the mind does what the mind does. If you're still hung up on someone, your mind can stay hung up no matter what you do externally. Your best bet is to change what your mind does. I think in terms of 'self-talk', so I think healing is a matter of self-talk in the end. For detachment, I'd change my self-talk to things like:

I don't need her, even though I may want her.
What do I want her for anyway? She just hurts me.
I chose to D. Now I'll choose to lead a good life after D.

My recos are to use whatever metaphor for changing your mind that is congenial to you and to go for the necessary internal changes. Do the work on yourself that will close this chapter. Then you'll be able to deal with whatever happens externally.

After all, if you rely on NC, what happens when your kids graduate form HS or college or grad school? What happens when they marry?

IMO, it's people who don't do the necessary internal work who later in life cheat on one partner when the one who got away comes calling. If you rely on NC for detaching, it's all too easy to become that guy. Don't do that to yourself or to people you love.

She was obviously caught of guard, told me later it came out of the blue (it probably did), but we talked it through, I explainted her my reasons and she reluctantly agreed.

I know that wasn't easy, but it really was the right thing to do for both of you and your family.

Cutting down contact was the right thing to do. It would be great if it could work right away - the "we are still a family" or "we can be friends" thing - but it’s just unhealthy for the time being if there is no clear desire from both of you to reconnect. I tried it too at the beginning but it was not beneficial for either of us.

Look, maybe since your posted a few weeks ago you actually resolved everything within yourself, so the things I’m going to say are not relevant to you anymore, but I’ll post them anyway in case they could be.

Regardless of how it will be or of who will be in it with you, forward is the only direction really. But keep looking inwards too because I think it’s important for you to understand what your ambivalence really mean and why you haven’t left it behind with the decision to D. What is that you miss really (the past as it was or the chance to reconsider a future).

I disagree that your ex is or was not a good candidate for R (I go from what you shared so obv you’re the only judge of that) and I don’t think that R is impossible either. On the contrary, I think it’s the possibility that creates the doubt. And I don’t know whether you kept a door open to R within yourself because it would have made D less final or because you have been going through a denial phase after D or because there is actually a part of you that still truly wants it but doesn’t know if it’s worth the risk.

Perhaps the kind of certainty you are/were looking for is more about the outcome you will get by choosing one direction over the other, rather than about wanting to be in or out for good?

Whatever it is or was, now that you are going low contact, make good use of the mental space you’ll (hopefully) have. Work on getting clarity on your motivations so that the "forward" you have in front of you will be created more by intention than just by things happening or distance growing as life goes on. Easier said than done, I know.

Fine of course if you don't want to share, but I wonder what you mean by this

Kind of made wish she were this open and sure about everything a year ago.

I followed your story closely, though I don't remember all the details. I, too, thought initially that R was a possibility with your ex-WW. I normally do not root for WWs but your case seemed an exception in my mind. After the polygraph evidently supported her claim that there was no intercourse, I think you may have allowed R to become more of a possibility. But I suspect what finally shut the door was the discovery of the nude pictures she sent to the AP. That is just too much to swallow and probably finally shut the door on any possibility of R.

I hope you are doing well and moving on from this mess as best you can.

Thank you all for your help. I am doing alright, nothing new to report. No overstepping from exW, new arrangement is going smooth. I am taking kids and my parents to Rhodos next week, no ex

Hope you all are well

Mr. F

Thanks for sharing Mr. F.

I read your whole saga and it triggered me pretty hard.

Just know, that I’m rooting for you!

I am sorry for that. I was honestly contemplating deleting my thread/s, but I guess they can be of use for other, I suppose.

Ps I am doing good

These longer threads are invaluable to newly minted BSs who are desperate for a safe port during the storm of infidelity. Yours is among the most valuable. Please don't ever think of deleting it. Plus, for those of us who are further on in our personal journeys, I believe we have a moral obligation to help those who are just stating our, if we are able. Infidelity is among the most harmful traumas one can experience, so it behooves us not to try and guide others through it.

I see that after 81 pages you're wrapping this up, so I'll go ahead and get my parting thoughts in. I wish your ex well. She's paid a hard price for her flirting and emotional affair. I'm not sure you ever will recover, though.

I hope your ex finds another good man to love and cherish and to help raise your kids. Living under the same roof and acting a certain way is not healthy for anyone, including your children. Time to fish or cut bait (you'll figure out what that means).

Mr. Flibble, I wish you and your children the best. We all have our lines in the sand and your ex-wife crossed yours. This was by her choices.

Do not accept weakly disguised barbs that condemn your actions. You did what you needed to after being betrayed.

[This message edited by DictumVeritas at 3:37 AM, Monday, October 3rd]

Looking at truth, one grain at a time

Imagine 1,000 grains of sand in your hand. Whatever that may look like, I want you to now remove one grain. Would you call your 999 grains of sand a pile? Yes? Now remove one more. How about 998, is that still a pile? Yes? Continue removing grains of sand until there is only one grain left, is that still a pile? At what point, did your pile of sand become something else? And what is that something else?

University of Melbourne - said it

I read the beginning of your posting and thought to myself - this is the beginning of the end of their relationship (Married) - you just took your time and stumbled about but the end was - obvious.

What happens if she actually becomes an honest person? You will always wonder: "What could have been."

As others have already posted - since we only get one ride on this planet - best to move on.

Thank you for all the well wishes. As for the condemnation, nevermind that. I heard it all, both here and in person. There are always people who think they know what's best for you But good advice or words of affirmation are always appreciated

I apologize for not coming back here more often and helping out others, but life gets in a way.