SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Chaos,
I’m so sorry. The mind f@*# aspect of the whole thing is crazy making.

My situation has been similar though slightly less bunny boiler. Seven years ago affair, physical and emotional, husband just revealed the truth 5 months ago.

It started when she was his secretary 7 years ago. It may have been above board in the beginning but then…there was a four month EA I realized what was up and said fire your secretary, it went underground (that’s a new word for me but it’s accurate). He said he needed 3 months to get rid of her. I agreed thinking they were just too friendly friends (what a fool i was). She must have got wind she was on the chopping block because she upped the ante and kissed him and then they started hooking up in the office over that next 3 months. We were in marriage counseling- him claiming to be handling things but really hooking up. He does tell her she needs to go be someone else’s secretary and puts her on a six week leave, paid obviously. He says in counseling she is never coming back to his office etc etc. After her 6 week leave he lets her back as his secretary but without telling me. After a week of that some kind soul from the office calls and says she’s back. I freak, then she gets kicked out of the company for good, with severance. I think the nightmare is over. Then two years later she finds a way to get rehired by a different part of the company and she has to be kicked out again. My husband has to embarrass himself in front of his board to make this happen so I’m pretty sure he had no hand in her return. But she sends her parents to see him as patients and he doesn’t tell me (that was 4 years ago). Then simultaneously with him coming clean this summer he admits she showed up at his office and parked across the street in his line of vision and did a drive by at our house (maybe cause we just moved?). Why is she doing all this? Why after seven years? If he is involved why is he telling me? He sounded scared but did he provoke her in some way? So confused

It is possible that because in a way she could think "we" got her fired twice. And when she came back the second time I berated my husband for letting it happened. So he figured out where she might work last spring and called to confirm with a receptionist at her new office. She may have gotten wind of that and been scared she would be outed to her new coworkers? Or she is just really mad at him because she lost her job twice? Or she is pining after him? I just literally can not make sense of it.

He broke NC to put a letter on her car telling her to stay the hell away from him and his family. I approved this plan but now I kind of wish we had a lawyer draft a letter. But for what…it was just parking her car across the street. Not illegal. Ugh

It's so good to dip in, be reminded that it's not just me that feels the way I do. I think you guys are brilliant...there's no bullshit and you call a spade a spade. I've been coming to terms with something that TheEnd mentioned earlier, when her counsellor said her WH hadn't cared for her.
This has been a massive tough one for me. It's obvious, but my brain just wouldn't let me go there. I was full of 'but how could he?' 'we had something special' 'we were such a brilliant couple, everyone thought so' (except for the bitch obviously)
Over the last maybe 8 months I'd begun accepting that what he did wasn't love, that he didn't love me, that you don't do that if you love your wife. He broke up with AP 8 times in their 4yr 4 month relationship...and he went back to her every time until the last time, when he told me. He made a million micro choices and many macro ones too.
Anyway through much talking over the years since DDay, and his brutal honesty that I asked for...eg he told me he would make me a coffee and bring it to bed then head 'out to work' early on a day off to have sex with her in a hotel, then come home to me....and when he looked at me with that coffee, he didn't care that he was betraying me..he was looking forward to fun in a hotel bedroom. I'm convinced the love and care for me wasn't there. The shitty thing is, what do you call it - a Mindfuck - is that I couldnt tell. I mean just thinking now, that example is a perfect one. Bringing me a coffee in bed before he goes to work and I get up to see to the kids?...how could I know?
Where I am now is a place where instead of seeing the evidence of their million emails and everything he's told me since DDay, but not able to absorb it.. I'm now cognisant of the fact that he didn't love me, he didn't care for me enough, we didn't have something special, we didn't have a good marriage.

You don't know what you don't know 'til you know it. Looking back now, I can see our marriage was flawed. We'd been together since 1988, we talked a lot, I thought that meant we were good at communication, but we didn't talk about our vulnerabilities or fears, we blamed eachother for things, we kept our 'weakneses' private from eachother. We put full effort into our lives, our home, our kids, and not so much effort into us. We both came from families where you didnt talk about emotions, and to talk about such things when we were kids would have induced ridicule from our families. Because we got along really well and enjoyed eachothers company hugely, laughed a lot together, in many ways highly compatible, I thought we were the perfect couple. I believed the fairytale. I didn't know better, I mean I didn't know what I was missing and I didn't know it could be better. Stupid huh!. Well niaive and ignorant for sure.

Next month will be 3 yrs since DDay 6th April. I think I've come to terms with a lot and learned a lot, we both have. We're still together. No divorce, no rings, no promises. I love him, I can't tell if he loves me because evidently I'm rubbish at knowing. I know him much better, we have shown eachother more of ourselves.
But what so far I have been unable to do is to bear the thought and knowledge of the two of them together. Whilst I know it's over, I still know that they made love, went on holidays, made love in our tent, in our bed, heavy petted in our car etc. A million places but it's the actual sex and touching and kissing. I don't know how to bear the pain of it is acute. I cry a lot less about it and for a shorter period but the pain is intense...suck it up and stay in your lane I suppose.

Booney,
I am so sorry for what you’ve been through. I understand the desolation. The story about the coffee really resonates. I keep asking about what he felt when he would be looking at me and the kids, knowing he would be going to do something awful with that OP the next day. I have received similar answers to what it seems like you have received. Essentially, not feeling guilt in the moment. I find that gutting. The actions themselves (the kissing, touching, lying, deceiving, etc.) are of course terrible. But sometimes I feel the lack of guilt at the time is worse. My therapist told me it was "unrealistic" to think that people would feel guilty the whole time…otherwise they wouldn’t have affairs. I guess that is sort of true, but there are twenty-four hours in the day. There weren’t some times when you were consumed by how disgusting your actions were toward people who had blind faith in you? I know I shouldn’t try to put myself in those shoes, but I just feel that I would be feeling guilty. How were they not disgusted with themselves when they did these things. I know why you think he could not have loved you. My husband is one of those who says he did. I guess it is all semantics. They loved their children for sure, at least in some form, and yet they did a horrible thing to them. It is scary to think that this whole thing may not get easier. I wonder how many hours you can go without thinking of it. I also love my husband. At times he is the picture of remorse, but whats done is done. I don’t think he had some grand plan to destroy my life but it feels like that’s what happened anyway. I wonder if you think about leaving. Do you hold that option in reserve somewhere in the back of your mind? It has only been 7 months since I learned about the physical part, but 7 years since I learned of some pretty extreme betrayal. I almost understand the 7 years of lies and sometimes I am glad I had those 7 years without knowing. I could never have enjoyed those last years with my older children at home if I had known. Right now I dont enjoy anything. I hope that changes.

Did your husband say he felt guilty? What are your thoughts on forgiveness? Did he do a timeline? Do you think that is really important once you know the facts anyway?