SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I stayed because I love my wife. I mean, there were mercenary reasons back in the day (didn't want to take the financial hit of divorce, wanted to be there to raise my kids, etc.), but it always has to come down to love, in the end.

Plus, you know, my wife has done a pretty great job of managing her mental illness over the last 12+ years since her diagnosis. She is, after all, a psych nurse, so that generally helps her keep a handle on her process. This last time, we both just missed it, I think. Between the stress of the seizure disorder she's been struggling with over the last 3-4 years, the (constant) stressors with the kids we adopted, a ton of instability at her job...we should have been paying more attention to transitional triggers, and we just didn't, and the complacency caught up to us.

I think we caught it before everything went to hell, so this latest episode just gets filed under my "7-Day Angry" experiences (i.e., those things that are temporarily upsetting -- for about a week -- but don't really have any long-term emotional impact.)

Now, if it turns out that the recent stuff is something she'd go after in her right mind just because it's been 12 years, then we've got a different problem that love isn't big enough to solve. I'll cross that bridge when/if I come to it.

Yep, I think complacency could be true enemy maybe with a hidden partner of denial in my case.

Having been through infidelity before, somehow 8 years later there was an incident where she wanted to show me a pic in her phone but insisted that she keep holding it. I keep thinking back to what was inside of me to not stop the ride right there and demand her phone.

Along with expectations that she not ever go back there, I don’t ever want myself to be that person again.

And yes, love and valuing someone’s companionship that you connect with are strong reasons to try to make it work somehow. I totally understand that.

Dang WAL. I, like sisoon, never read that part of your story and somehow missed that.

Bro hugs to both you and Tim.

I forget sometimes that y'all are "younger" than I am (in the SI sense). I've never gotten around to putting the story in my profile.

For the curious:

What brought me to SI was my wife's 2 year affair with my best friend of 20 years (since high school) that started while I was recovering from a near fatal case of encephalitic meningitis. The whole thing would've worked out swimmingly for them if I'd just had the grace to die like I was supposed to (because then the public narrative is the KISA best friend who swoops in to help the grieving widow and love saves them both).

But I was too stubborn to kick the bucket.

I'm skipping over a ton of nuances here, but that's the bare bones of it.

And that probably explains why I have a pathological fear of failing to be/do enough or failing to bear whatever burdens I'm carrying. Life has taught me that when you start needing help from anybody or get sick or show any sort of human vulnerability, that's when the knives come out -- even and especially from the people you're supposed to be able to trust the most.

I'm working on that, which is why you guys (and SI, generally) have been so important to me over the years. I lost my entire support structure on D-Day -- since, you know, for most of us, if we had no one else, at least we'd have our best friend to bitch at. And I've never set about to rebuild it in real life, with real people.

ETA: OMG, I had to fix that subject/verb disagreement in the last paragraph before anyone saw it. That, gentlemen, is why you should always proofread your own posts.

[This message edited by wincing_at_light at 4:18 PM, October 26th (Friday)]

I forget sometimes that y'all are "younger" than I am (in the SI sense). I've never gotten around to putting the story in my profile.

Not all of us

I didn't know the back story, WAL. I just knew you to chime in with inciteful observations and cutting to the chase. I've appreciated it.

I've written technical stuff, consulting reports, training materials and more. I'm 67 and don't do any of that anymore. I'm okay with dangling participles and incomplete sentences. I start sentences with "but". And I don't care. See. Misuse of their, there and they're still irks me. I don't think auto correct helps.

Long way of saying I wouldn't have taken you to task on a little disagreement on subject/verb, WAL.

Did anyone sample some beer tonight. I'm trying to land some Grimbergen. Seems to be not easy to get in northern Alberta.

WAL, you had me at

I forget sometimes

. Probably why I can't quit you.

Glad you stick around and keep dispensing your wisdom. It's funny over time how we go from pouring our life stories out and analyzing how all angles of environmental, situational, and past experiences shaped our experience to "she cheated on me and it really sucked. I made it through it". I know I got into infidelity fatigue.

And good to see Badass posting as a member.

Ah, I thought your answer would be 'love.'

I agree: love is enough to want R, and love really helps staying in R with a W who's doing the work, but it's not enough to stay in an M with a W who doesn't do the work.

Your W a psychiatric nurse? Mine was a LCSW (she gave up her practice immediately after d-day and her license, but that took a few months).

I can't imagine how difficult it is to love someone who's BP. My heart goes out to both of you, and I wish both of you the best.

I truly believe it's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved.

[This message edited by sisoon at 12:07 PM, October 27th (Saturday)]

Hi all. Just a brief update.

My wife has her second group therapy session on Friday. This is the one where she shared her story to the group including details about the sex and cheating that must have been tough to say. I must say that in this big pile of crap that shows me she is trying. It’s not easy for her to talk about her feelings and she certainly has blocked the cheating stuff deep away to avoid facing it. There apparently were a couple women in the group that were able to ask questions and respond that gave my wife some comfort that others have the same experiences.

I’m still processing this new info she shared last week but with everything else going on it’s just been a swirl in my head. Maybe I’m finally starting to grasp that her actions weren’t about me or her even thinking she fell for another.

Next week is a big week with two group sessions, a session with new therapist that will be better able to work through the bipolar diagnosis, and an appointment with the psychiatrist to get med prescription. She’s also supposed to be released from medical leave back to work after that appointment. I also have an IC appointment to talk through some of what I’m feeling. One thing I want to discuss is this obsession I feel googling info about bipolar just hoping to see her specific actions. It seems I’m trying to convince myself of something. I need to understand a better balance for me as this progresses.

Can I ask if your wife st that time embraced and wanted treatment? Did she acknowledge the severity of the situation and at least want to try to get better?

Sorry I didn't respond sooner - had a busy weekend.

Yes, she embraced the treatment - until she didn't.

Her biggest issue was she would take her meds, but not go to/lie at therapy. I think she really just didn't want to confront herself, and was content to say she was ok and I (and everyone else) was the problem.

And with BP, although it is treatable with meds, I believe they just work to slow/delay the onset - it's the therapy that helps the patient identify when they are going manic, and adjust their behavior/get help. But if you don't do the therapy, well...

I also think my ex was personality disordered (borderline/narc/historonic) - one therapist said she thought she was BPD (borderline PD) and ex stopped seeing that therapist about a month later (see statement above). The PDs are very much like bipolar, but don't respond to drugs - it IS their personality.

At the end of the day though, just like any other attempt at R, all you can do is wait, and watch. Time will tell if they are just placating you, going through the motions of therapy, or really working on themselves, and making progress. Nobody gets well/fixed in a month - it takes months and years - so all you can do is watch their actions, and not listen to their words.

If you get lucky, you'll end up in a position like WAL where his spouse does the work (but notice she did slip recently) - this is the best case scenario. Or, you end up like me (and countless others) who try R, but learn a few months down the road that it was just you doing the work.

Unfortunately, there's no way to know which result will be you.

I think like WAL, a lot of us stayed/tried R because we truly did love our spouses, so we rolled the dice and hoped for the best.

I've read a lot about Bipolar due to trying to help figure out my W. There is something there and since medical insurance requires official diagnosis before they allow you to seek medical treatment, it has been frustrating to say the least. So it gets labeled as the catch all of "depression," and they give you meds. Therapy is too expensive and not always "medically recognized" by some health plans.

Anyway guys, I am glad we have this place to share our struggles.

On a completely unrelated topic, has anyone played Red Dead Remdemption 2 ?

I have have and it starts off kind of slow . . .I also heard it was the game that define this generation of console games.

Well the wife met with her new therapist today and her notes that are being forwarded to psychiatrist diagnosis her with moderate to max Bipolar 1 with PTSD for good measure.

This freaks me out a bit. Honestly beside her really bad cheating spells where she was out of control with coworkers I haven’t seen other areas of her life and our marriage impacted. Not until she broke down after sharing last of info with me did we ever approach needing care for this. Up until the tail end of her latest periods she was able to keep her lives pretty separate. I mean the cheating was bad with no regard with risks or self respect. She let herself be used like a free escort and it felt good to her to be wanted. So I mean obviously something was firing wrong in her synapses during that time. Some of this was in offices in a busy workplace or in cars in the daylight in a spot I could have potential caught her. She just want thinking of nothing besides filling that need. Despite the advice given which I get, hard not to take that personally..

I have to wonder if it had just recently gotten worse and that’s why our life has been fairly normal to this point.

Well anyway, still anxious to learn more. It’s all very overwhelming right now. The therapist told her she really needs to manage the self loathing or her progress will be tough. I have to understand my part in that to be honest.

[This message edited by Tim3167 at 6:14 PM, October 29th (Monday)]

My understanding is that bipolar is one of those things that progresses with age. It could be that she's been able to manage (for the most part) up to this point and hidden the pieces that don't make sense from you?

I also think that there's an over-diagnosis in the immediate aftermath of infidelity. That is, a person crosses a whole series of lines and everybody freaks out about it, which puts things on a crisis footing that may not reflect the day-to-day reality. (An example here: after D-Day, my wife was diagnosed with Bipolar 2, some borderline features, and some schizoid features. The only one she "kept" once things had started to settle down was the bipolar diagnosis.) I think some of the early diagnostic stuff is covering bases, dealing with crisis, and a heavy dose of "Hey, I just met you, and this is lazy...but here's my office number, 'cuz you're fuckin' crazy."

Or, rather, because they don't have a baseline established with the new client, it's hard to tell what's "normal" for them and what's crisis-induced mania.

I'm a strong believer in the notion that if a diagnosis for your spouse doesn't resonate with you (and you're a more reliable narrator than your spouse about your shared life experiences, and probably even her personality than she is right now), then it's probably off. That said, if she's not blaming the diagnosis for her behavior, there's a ton of good, guided therapy at her disposal with this diagnosis. Even if it's not a complete fit, she'll acquire some insight and life skill techniques that are likely to prove beneficial in the medium and long terms.

So I'd roll with it for the next few months. Nothing gets people onto the straight and narrow quite so much as a signed piece of paper saying they're fuckin' nutso. It's scary, and life-altering, and a solid nuclear option in your corner in the event of a divorce. (Not sure if you have kids in the home or not. If you do, it's a pretty big chip in the child custody/welfare debate.)

Here's what I want to warn you about, though: one of the first things my wife's psychiatrist said to me in our private meeting was that I was going to need to put my feelings and shit on the back burner and deal with the mental illness rather than the marriage. Since I was the healthy one, I needed to carve out space for her to heal rather than making it about me. He acknowledged that this was a shit sandwich and flat told me that it would probably be in my best interest to divorce.

I can't say I was particularly good at keeping the rage genie in the bottle, so I didn't really take his advice to heart. But you're going to have to prioritize taking care of you, because no one else is going to do it.

On a completely unrelated topic, has anyone played Red Dead Remdemption 2 ?

Waiting it to come out on PC.

Of course, I'm still waiting for RDR1 to come out on PC, so we'll see how that works for me.

Here's what I want to warn you about, though: one of the first things my wife's psychiatrist said to me in our private meeting was that I was going to need to put my feelings and shit on the back burner and deal with the mental illness rather than the marriage

x2

My therapist said the same to me. That it would take at least a year or two for WW to work out her shit and get better to be able to help me/the marriage - in the meantime, I was going to be on my own.

In the end I found that to be true. (Well, she never really did work for more than a month, but...)

Yep. I get that she’s very fragile right now. There was no new infidelity per se but it seems to her fully admitting more infidelity from the past seems to have brought it to the surface to face and put her in crisis.

To your points it’s tough giving her some time to work through this when I’m working through new information that changes how I see the last 11 years of the marriage. Yes, there was an 8 year gap in the cheating but we were reconciling back then under false pretenses. We did all the work on the guy I found out about but the one she was too afraid to tell me about would have changed everything. I would have seen that this wasn’t just s friendship that crossed boundaries. She was in full hyper sexuality mode just fishing for that feeling of being desired. I also feel so betrayed that she continued working in the same building as this guy. She thought she could handle it. Apparently she did until triggered to a manic phase again.

I’m really trying to wrap my mind around to to care for myself while being there for her. She is very afraid right now of what the diagnosis means.

The responses here help me a bunch as I work through this. I’ve been on the infidelity ride since 2007 but apparently just learned a critical piece of info 11 years later. I’ve so struggled with how she seemed to have normal values until she turned into this crazy affirmation seeking woman with no regard for anything except that fix. I guess as I process this maybe I now have some answers.

I’m anxious to hear more after her psychiatrist appointment tomorrow.

Well, looks like WAL’s advice about rolling with it for a few months is just what I’m going to have to do.

She had her psychiatrist appointment today and I probably expected an unrealistic outcome. This seems like a gradual process of letting meds kick in and see how she reacts. She is only on Wellbutrin now for depression. The doctor even mentioned to signs of BPD but I dunno, as I read up on that it doesn’t seem familiar to what I’ve seen in her. Those traits seem consistent and she is much more like alien cheating lady and then I loathe myself and can’t understand my actions lady.

I’m just struggling with obsessing over these diagnoses and looking for signs she just isn’t that person that acts without any regard for anything during those periods. I mean in some sense I know she is ill. At her deepest part of this hole she actually hooked up with two of the coworkers she had been hooking up with within hours of each other on same day. I have to believe that is an illness. That isn’t who I have known her to be. She just describes that overwhelming feeling of being wanted when each of them asked and didn’t consider anything else.

Oh well onward on this ride I go. To others points I do still love her and believe I am out of current infidelity. That is what o tell myself for my own healthy place.

Maybe you are looking for the "magic bullet" to understanding why she did it, and then that means she's "cured"?

It sounds like thats what you were hoping for - the reason which would lead to fixing the problem. I know - I hoped for that, too.

But it's just not that simple. You're right - you'll just have to wait and she how she responds.

Yep, I WAS looking for a magic bullet today. I think I was thinking much too simplistic like a regular doctors visit. Oh you have this, here’s this pill.

On the hopeful side it is clear to me she is not minimizing this and WANTS to be better. To this point she is putting the work in. One of my concerns with the whole monitor and adjust meds is that does it take more manic behavior at some point to realize she needs different meds. I can’t go through that again or at least sure don’t want to.

I do think I may also be a bitter smarter now on what to watch for. Things that just seemed odd to me before with acting over emotional will be seen through a different lens now by me I hope.

Hopefully she can make it through this hating herself phase soon. Being unhappy with herself is great but where she is is not.

Thanks again for responding. I had shyed away from SI for quite awhile because her story was already so terrible and I got some really bitter and terrible responses pointing out just things I already struggled with but I do feel more support here.

Hello Gents,

I’m new to SI and relatively new to being a BH. Just curious as for those of you who had been left by your WW for the AP. Did your WW regret it and then try to reconcile with you later?