SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hi everyone,

I totally get it !!!!!

Read my story - this all sucks

I know I will never get over it

Where is your story?

OMG, I would never have guessed this happened to other people too. I have know for 2 1/2 years now, but over the 2 1/2 years there has been TT and a lot of I don't remember. I am accepting that because he also apparently doesn't remember he births of our children either. Anyway, long story shortened, A 's began at 2 1/2 yrs married. Was trying to make it happen but the girl didn't fall for it. Then went off to different city for mil training and met a girl who did go for it. So STA there, returns home we move to new assignment and he starts another affair within a yr. He leaves kids and I for a weekend away from the crazy wife who is ruining his life with her questions and paranoia and sickening jealousy. Goes to the nicest local hotel calls girlfriend and gets to have a weekend with her blamed on me and my insecure crazy personality. He comes back home Monday night without a word of explanation, gets in my bed and acts as if he was never gone. Fast forward 30 years, he seems to be obsessing about a new young co worker, talking about her everyday, laughing to hi self new hen asked says he was just thinking about .......her. Then he starts emailing jokes after work to her, she jokes back so they are sort of chatting. I find the email and tell him I am very uncomfortable with where this seems to be headed. He flies off the handle, absolutely enraged that I would even think he would do anything inappropriate, he tells me I am crazy and trying to control his every thought. I backed down, same stuff going on only now going to work early and late coming home. I was in a panic, couldn't eat or sleep. Lost 70 # in her 6 months working there.

He praises my weight loss as if I were dieting. We fought off and on through it and then one day sits down and tells me I need to tell you I had a ONS 25 years ago, but never have done anything else wrong, can you forgive me, I am telling you so believe me that I am not doing anything wrong. I of course did and feel relieved http maybe I really did misunderstand the whole motel weekend thing. Since then have found out about to e first A attempt, A when he joined the service, and much more about second affair but it has taken almost 3 yrs, this past week still heard more, and I on my own learned how to find stuff on the computer and found out hehad a pretty active sex life all by himself. So he says to me I didn't think that was wrong and thought it was Better than "cheating".

I have better days and worse, married almost 35 years but not sure if any of it was real or lies. He seems to have different ideas on right and wrong, feels lots of shame and guilt, short on compassion and insight and will only reluctantly talk to me, has read the first couple of chapters of several books I asked him to read, went to 2 counseling sessions, and a Retrouville weekend but promptly didn't do any of the follow up. Now says , gee I wish you would just get over it, let bygones be bygones, and turn back into the loving person you used to be. One child knew of the 2A asked me about it, get this because WH took th kids on some of his outings with her! I did contact that AP, she was stunned, but then somewhat helpful with putting a few more pieces together. I also think her story was a little soft on her side, she was young ( slightly older than me), she was naive ( married and divorced once at the time) etc. all in all though I am glad I called because that is what prompted the opening up from WH.

Still struggling to put it together.

Oldernotwiser,

My fwh also was in the military and boy can they keep a secret. Mine kept his for 7 years. He confessed in MC. Even the MC couldn't and still doesn't understand why after all this time he confessed. I had moved out and had no intentions of ever going back. WHen he confessed he had real tears and seemed to be hurting. You know he was HUMAN not a freaking military 4.0 prick.

I have to think that the memories I have are real. I don't know about his. The things that happened after his A and before I found out. Well that is a different story. Taht secret was there between us and yes I also was crzy, too much time on my hands, and watched to much lietime movies. He calls it the manhater channel. Guess what I wasn't crazy and neither were you. If you have gut feelings something is going on now. Do what you can to find out if you are right. I know if I feel that way again I will not accept his answers. I have to find the proof one way or another.

I lik how you put he had sex by himself. In many ways I feel that is worse than with another person. Maybe sex is different for men than women but I like sharing that part of my life as much as other aspects. Mine also had that problem. I have drawn the line in the sand- NO Porn and NO TYPE OF A.

BTW it sounds like your H is getting into an EA. Stop that in its tracks.. Tell him no outside contact with the joker and no alone contact at work. I guess I would also be uncomfortavble with that. No I would be downright pissed at him for being so stupid. Sorry- that's just me if it was my H>

Same here! Military deployments, but it actually started in college.

Most were when he was gone but one was when he was home and I think that hurts he worst.

He confessed 18 years after the last A.

He is a better man now but the pain is still there. All the years he lied to me is so hard to take.

I agree. It is so hard to wrap honorable and trustworthy to a WS. My H's job involved secrets some days I wonder if that made it easier to keep other ones. Military memebers are great at compartmilization(sp). I soemtimes wish I could lock things away in a bix in the back of my head.

Even our MC said my H was a good man. She said he just did something really stupid. I don't know about you but it's almost harder to comprehend how tthey betrayed their own values and morals and lived with it.

Doesn't it seem weird that tfor whatever reason they had A but never again?

Hi - sorry for jumping in here but it's not often that there is a post to this thread.

I found out in February that my WH had an affair 32yrs ago with my then BF.

All these years they have hidden their secret and I can't understand how they were able to sleep at night

My WH has always told me that there has never been anyone since we married - what a lying croc he was.

I just feel now that all our memories have been blown apart

It makes me angry now when I think back over the years and note how he didn't like me going places without him. All the while he kept their dirty little secret

I found out 2 years later. He keeps saying it is in the past, but he does also say that he knows for me it is fresh. It was a PA that lasted at least several months but prior he had an EA with her for years. I am sure there were prior EA's as well with other women, but he was careful to never get sexual. He says the reason he "let this one progress" was because he knew she was leaving (moving out of state). Otherwise, he says, he would have never taken on this problem with all of the possible baggage (she too was married with a child).

I also get a lot of I don't remembers. Part of it is him not trying to upset me, part of it is him not wanting to feel guilty/think about it, but part of it is that he truly doesn't remember/doesn't want to remember.

I actually consider myself lucky that although I suspected it at the time (he kept saying they were just friends, that she was married, and that she was leaving, as though any of those precluded an A), I never found evidence in black and white. I know she has moved and they no longer are in contact, since he showed me a text from her recently where she indicated she has found happiness without him. He never replied. I know I would have been beside myself if she were still around, always wondering if it were really over.

Me BS 41

Him WS 46

1S 8, 1D 6

Married 11 years

together 19 years

D day 8/8/13

My fwh also was in the military and boy can they keep a secret.

Tell me about it! I found out almost 6 years after the last A, but the A's lasted for 5 years. So 11 years of my life (our entire M) he was lying to me. He was military, cheated with 16 prostitutes when deployed at various times in Thailand.

The last A was right after he got out, with a slutty girl he worked with. She had also just gotten out of the AF, although her H was still active duty.

Finding out so late really makes you question your entire relationship.

I am not happy I am on SI but it does feel good to know there are other people out there in my situation.

Another thing that I find very difficult is for month following the 2nd dday fwh would say....don't you see how I have changed? Yes, he stopped drinking and hanging out with people that would influence him, but he was always caring, loving, supportive, respectful. So I thought. I would have never believed if someone had told me he did what he did.

Tarnished Silver- I read in Dr. Shirley Glasses book that (paraphrasing) many times when a spouse cheats several of their friends had or were cheating. This was so true of my H. Many were open about it and many kept it under wraps except to their "friends". It makes me happy to know he gave up those friends. They were bad influences. My H now has a new set of friends and they are friends of the M. I sometimes think peer pressure is harder on some people than others to resist. I think schools just teach -"Just say NO" to more than drugs.

You are so right! He stopped hanging out with those friends the deployment after our son was born. I even contacted a couple of his friends and they all said the same thing. He didn't go out and party with them. Just kept to himself and worked and would just have dinner with them.

My fwh had not been in contact with these friends for over 18 years so they had no idea.

Some of his friends during the time of his cheating I did talk to and asked how could you condone that behavior. They said we were all stupid and young

The one said one of his friends, that didn't cheat was disappointed in him but never said anyhing, this guy has been a good friend of my fwh now for over 20 years but lives in another state and he doesn't see him.

When I told fwh that this friend m we and was disappointed fwh was really upset. He called his friend and apologied to him for disappointing him while they were stationed together. I was there when he called him. I thought that was a brave thing to do.

Tarnished Silver-

I am being nosey. Was he in the Navy? Mine was. I also know statiscally Navy has the had the highest D rate amongst all the branches. Lifestyle I think. The deploy and go over seas on ship and do port calls. If you never been you can't believe the women waiting for them. Many want an American husband so they can leave where they are. My H had a Spanish stalker. She even did the I'm pregnant. He did the I'll take care of the baby but I am not marrying you. Guess what-nobaby. This happened befor I met him, but she was still stalking him.

You're right. What he did took courage and you should be proud of him.

Don't you still want to wring his neck for being so stupid? I hope you can get past the pain and have a better M. We will not have the M we wanted- our H cheated and that is always somethingwe will know. I do feel it can be better because they also want it to be and now we have something we didn't for years. All the pieces and answers to our instincts. We if we want can have a M both us and or WS's want.

How far out are you?

1st day day was in feb 2011. That is when he confessed that the infidelity started in 1984 and ended in 1994.

We were doing good in "R" until dday #2 which was January 2012.

He asked out teenage daughter to add some Christmas pictures on his Facebook because he never used it and she said...dad you need to update. So needless to say when she went to add pictures he had a message from a female he was stationed with (we were married just a couple years) saying lets have a reunion and such.

I asked fwh point blank, I will never forget that day...I said did you have sex with ***** and he looked me straight in the eyes and said...are you kidding, no way.

So I messages her back pretending to be fwh saying I can't believe you remember me and such. She responded back minutes later saying how could I forget my special friend and I wink smile.

At that point I knew. So I asked him one more time. And he confessed.

He started IC right after that and has been going ever since. I sent her a final message because I didn't want her to think he gave her the time of day. And we never heard from her since, he also told our daughter to delete his Facebook.

He was in the navy.

That dday and affair hurts the most because it was done while he was home, right under my nose, so to speak.

She was a big time partier, single mom, and she did everything she could at work, outside of work to get him. Makes me want to vomit.

Yes, he was in the navy. We were young when we married and he had a lot of growing up to do. He drank a lot and I didn't so be spent a lot of time with friends drinking without me and that is how that A started.

It is horrible to fit in so well with the group but so good to find out that what I struggle to overcome isn't unique and hurting about something that is so long ago is common to us. I hate to hear "just forget about all that, I'm not that person anymore, you need to start living in the present instead of wallowing in the past" I literally can feel myself getting heated when he says that. I just don't know if anything I thought was true at all. When we talked last a little more info was offered, so I asked if he wanted to tell me ANYTHING else, I said you have told me about either what I knew or what I suspected. I told him I am sure I am not that smart or in tune that I knew every time you were up to something. He said never did anything I didn't know about, even told me he probably was pretty dumb about the hiding, lying & such. And then assured me I was really smart and good at noticing things. I m thinking there is more, but can't figure it out because he won't talk. How do the rest of you keep from bringing it up?

Welcome Oldernotwiser. It is good to have this,tho apparently fewer of us here than other threads. Wonder what that means. Are our H worst than theirs becuz they lied for oh so many years? Becuz they couldn't own up sooner? Changes your whole past.

(Hugs)

Do you all ever feel just plain stupid? I think sometimes could I really be so dumb that I could be fooled for 30 years. Then I think how I must seem to WH, doormat, pushover. He exhibits little gratitude that he still has a wife after his actions, he can't understand why I have trouble believing him! Sometimes even when he is nice I start wondering is this true, what now? A mess for sure. Anyone else ever confront an unknown AP? Was it helpful or hurtful? I ended conversations with her as I was getting some mixed stories and felt I was maybe getting played. Have wondered about her child with her last name whose father returned to his wife and never knew about the child? Kind of scary.

Do you all ever feel just plain stupid? I think sometimes could I really be so dumb that I could be fooled for 30 years. Then I think how I must seem to WH, doormat, pushover. He exhibits little gratitude that he still has a wife after his actions, he can't understand why I have trouble believing him! Sometimes even when he is nice I start wondering is this true, what now? A mess for sure. Anyone else ever confront an unknown AP? Was it helpful or hurtful? I ended conversations with her as I was getting some mixed stories and felt I was maybe getting played. Have wondered about her child with her last name whose father returned to his wife and never knew about the child? Kind of scary.

Older-

I used to feel really stupid. I would spend hours trying to think back 25 years and put the puzzle together.

All but one of my fwh infidelities happened while he was on military deployments and 3 of them happened before we got married and he was stationed and I didn't see him until we got married 15 months later.

Believe it or not I could understand all 3. They happened within a 15 month period. He said most of his off time he was drunk. Thank God he didn't get one of them pregnant. It was a pretty secluded base far from anything so all they did was party.

Came home got married and we moved to his next duty station. He continued to drink heavy with his friends and I would stay home or be working.

This A is the hardest because I was there, what he has told me I think how did I miss the warning signs or was I just so young and in love??

Looking back I do see some signs. We did get separated at 2 years married, he came to me and said it is not that I don't love you, I just don't want to be married. I never thought it was another woman, he says it wasn't because of her it was the party life style and she was just a small part of it. Maybe it was him trying to do the right thing. Don't know.

We got back together after 3 months and things couldn't have been better, so to find out that 5 months after we got back together he went on a 21 day deployment, she was there working as well and they had sex.

I bring that up most often. How could he try so darn hard to get me back to just do it again?

That is where I must have been so stupid comes from for me!! And the hurt part. He couldn't last 21 days.

Dallas, thanks for the advise about potential EA, I did put a stop to it but what is hard is that I had 3 different people & times when someone "warned" me from his job that he was getting involved. He denies it to this day, what I saw, what the others saw & we r all crazy. He isn't. I feel like he thinks I am so dumb, the closest he has come to admitting was during one argument when he said" I've thought about this and I think it looked like it did because I was obsessing about my job, but never about her"

I wonder if any if you have trouble hearing nice things now from WH after beaming played for a fool for so long. If he says something about my body, I think- plz I am 54, everything isn't even where it should be much less beautiful. I know he is trying which he sure didn't do for me when I was 20+, those compliments got other girls he didn't waste them on me. Just seems to make me uncomfortable because it comes now. I think I'd rather hear truth about his affairs then that.

BTW Hopefull2013, my WH also chose times or partners where he could see an ending through orders or the training ending, or job changes. I guess that was his MO. It would've be to hard for him to put on the intense interest & niceness to keep it going longer. The last "fling" into EA was the longest at about 5 months.