SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I think it helps to get past the idea that we were not good enough sexually. It is not sex nor sexual attraction that causes infidelity even if it is something a WS says. No matter infidelity does a number on our self-esteem until.we.no.longer.let.it. This is much easier said than done.

The emasculation I'm sure is real. The middle age woman not feeling she can hold up to the AP half her age (my case too DevastedDee) is life altering. I had PTSD so badly that my WS's touch made my body twitch as if I had been physically abused. It has taken me YEARS to be able to be touched again. YEARS.

You know what helped? Knowing I could have been that 20-something perfect body woman and he still would have cheated. Same goes for the guys. You could be the best in bed, the biggest, most phenomenal lover who made your W's soar to the moon and back and she still would have cheated. It isn't that we're not good enough for them. Rather it is that they are not good enough for themselves. When we really know this, we can understand that our beauty and/or prowess is meaningless to someone who is disgusted by themselves.

That's the first step. The rest takes a lot of time and processing to release the emotional remnants of the self-esteem hit this takes on our soul.

[This message edited by ISurvivedSoFar at 7:56 AM, October 7th (Monday)]

I think men and women might deal with this a little differently, but for me as a man yes I absolutely felt/feel emasculated. I am jealous/have great respect for those who have posted that they never felt this way or where able to overcome it. That takes great metal and emotional fortitude.

Perhaps the fact that we've reconciled has contributed to the fact that I still feel this way. I was never able to end the feelings/love towards my wife and hence her actions will always be with me.

Our reconciliation has been mostly positive but as you can see from my post our marriage is far from perfect.

That takes great metal and emotional fortitude.

Overall, I think recovery from any trauma, however we get there, takes some serious fortitude.

But staying specifically with the concept of emasculation, and really that's all it is, a concept, an idea, a social definition -- getting over those perceptions by others or myself -- that had zero to do with mental toughness.

No one can 'weaken' me or make me less than through their shitty choices.

My validation isn't based on my wife's broken/lowest moments of her life. I no more defined by her actions than I am by choices made by anyone else in my life.

If she becomes an alcoholic or an astronaut, those choices don't change who I am either.

Hi Humbled,

I am glad you are still here and reading. I wanted to say what Old Wounds said could not be more true. While I understand how the emasculation works, when I cheated it really was not a statement of who my husband was, but a statement of who I was.

I am authentically a man, a strong man physically and emotionally I’m resilient. I have been a faithful provider, a good father and a great lover. I have not only done my job. I’ve done it well. Being a man of integrity is a very different experience, and one that should be honored, from being a woman. We don’t get very many positive messages about this from the mass media or society at large these days, so we have retake the high ground of our masculinity.

Thumos wrote something my own husband could have written here. My husband not only did his job, he did it well. He was everything Thumos is describing. Do you know how many woman who would give the their right arm to find a partner and husband like my husband? I don't know but it's a helluva lot. And, what did I do, I ignored it. Didn't appreciate it. Wanted to leave it. I was the biggest idiot of the highest order. But, it didn't change these things were true about my husband. It only changed that I was not a woman of integrity. It was a statement about me...not him at all. By blaming yourself or feeling less, you may (or may not be) giving your wife an out for the work that is really hers. She is the one who didn't do her job well, what has she done to change that? Is she a woman who now works to deserve a quality man like you that has been described here? I hope so, because to me you both understanding that is part of the keys to what it is you are looking for.

It was a statement about me...not him at all.

While this makes sense to me logically, emotionally it feels like I wasn’t enough for the one person whose opinion mattered more than anybody’s.

While this makes sense to me logically, emotionally it feels like I wasn’t enough for the one person whose opinion mattered more than anybody’s.

These are early days, Stumblington. Of course you feel that way. In time, if your WW does the work, figures out her whys, you might have a deeper understanding of what I am expressing here.

A hard thing for a BS to accept, also a hard thing for a WS to admit, is often we don't consider the BS in our decision nearly as much as a rational person would believe. So, in moving forward, my best advice for you for now is to watch and wait if you want to reconcile. Don't try and force those feelings to catch up with your logic. Often for some time after the affair we are the same people who had it. Change and reflection takes a lot of time, and some WS's never do it at all. I am sorry you are struggling, I wish I had a better message for you.

I think feelings of emasculation largely caused by being in limbo. When I was younger and I wasn't being productive, I remember my dad yelling at me saying, "do something--even if it's wrong--just do something."

emasculate verb

emas·​cu·​late | \ i-ˈma-skyə-ˌlāt

emasculated; emasculating

Definition of emasculate

1 : to deprive of strength, vigor, or spirit : weaken

2 : to deprive of virility or procreative power : castrate

3 : to remove the androecium of (a flower) in the process of artificial cross-pollination

When you do not take action, you are depriving yourself of your power (strength, vigor, or spirit). You are allowing others to make choices for you. They have power over you.

I totally get why some people cannot commit to a path, for various reasons. But you have to accept that is ultimately a choice and that choice should be processed as one, not an easy or appealing choice, but a choice nonetheless. Divorce can be expensive, but you must consciously process that you are choosing "x" amount of dollars over your mental well-being. In other words, you are valuing your happiness is not worth "x". Again, nothing wrong with that but it must be acknowledged as a choice.

Once you have committed to taking an action--follow that course. Even if at the end you may have decided it was wrong, at least you did something. You didn't leave anything on the floor. I can take a loss where I played my best game; the ones where I gave it away are the ones that really keep me up at night.

humbled - while I was reading kingrat's explanation - I thought maybe that's true for you. You only recently decided you truly want to pursue R, perhaps it will take some time to realize the powershift of making the decision for yourself. Knowing you could have gone either way, but chose this direction. I could see how that would be more powerful feeling than waiting around for the universe to decide something for you. I think you should consider Kingrat's hypothesis as it makes sense to me when I look at your situation.

I think most of us in your boat humbled have felt that on some level. In the cases where our WW where too cowardly to own to their own choices this tends to linger for much longer. It is easier to let a BH feel this way versus doing the very hard work. All too scary to admit to fault when your ego is only propped up by attention from sleazy people with no intent on being truthful with you. When your eo is inflated by lies then. . . well I feel sad for those people that live that way.

I will tell you this. As I worked on my own co-dependency the sense of emasculation got better. Everything my W did, does or will do reflects on me. Hell most of the time it isn't even about me.

IF you know that forgiveness, grace, atonement and redemption are not real achievable things in your current M, then may you have to think about moving on. You tried and honestly not everyone even tries. M failure? Ok, but why ? You can't R by yourself and someone who doesn't feel remorse is not worth reconciling with. Tey need to feel the pain they have caused you in their bones. Further they have to communicate that you know that.

You see being in a position to grant forgiveness/grace is a very strong position. You have the choice and thus all of the power. Those needing forgiveness don't get a choice in the matter. They are at the mercy of those that do have that power or strength.

I really do think you need to see an IC, man. It is the really the only way you are going to be able to unwind decades of bullshit programming. Trust me it is amazing when you see it. Everything you've done without rhyme or reason begin to make more sense now.

What Oldwounds wrote!

An excellent thread that has provided much food for thought.

From a biblical standpoint "the two will become one." While I understand that the husband and wife are two separate, unique people, spiritually they become one at marriage. Some may not believe that, which is fine, but I do.

So perhaps all along I have been confusing this feeling of emasculation with the tearing apart of the marriage union from a spiritual sense. The two are no longer one but merely playing house.

From a Betrayed Wife’s perspective, I wanted to tell you that my Cheater accuses me of emasculating him when I bring up how one of his APs complained about his performance

Infidelity sucks!

I feel decimated on a molecular level.

Sex is the worst. In my mind I am no longer "the man". The mind movies during sex are too much for me, I would rather do without.

Infidelity is to marriage as Roundup is to plants.

[This message edited by Jimmy1962 at 12:15 PM, November 8th (Friday)]

While this makes sense to me logically, emotionally it feels like I wasn’t enough for the one person whose opinion mattered more than anybody’s.

They preferred someone else. No matter what they say, their actions prove this. It's devastating. But the truth is not that we weren't enough. Quite the opposite; we were too much.

It's taken me the better part of a year to get this and in a sick way I think my ww having multiple APs helped me to see that it wasn't anything about any of them as an individual, especially as compared to me. It's all on her.

I'm a successful, independent dude. Her primary AP is close to 40 and still lives with mommy and daddy. She preferred someone less successful.

I'm caring. I held her hair and brought her food and nursed her through 3 alcohol quits and the nasty withdrawals. One of her APs brought over a bottle and got her back on the sauce. She preferred someone who doesn't care about her.

I'm decent looking and in decent shape. More than one of her APs were overweight, poorly dressed, and bald. She preferred someone less physically attractive.

I'm charming and not afraid to go after what I want. More than one of her APs were such wusses, they didn't even know what to say when she was giving them obvious signals. Took me about 6 seconds reading their messages to come up with one sentence that would have gotten them invited over for NSA sex. She preferred someone less bold than me.

I'm honest. Not one of her APs would have ever acted around me they way they did in secret behind my back. She preferred someone with less integrity.

I fuck like a rockstar. I saw a message she actually sent to one of her APs telling him that we(me and her) had been banging for 2 days straight and that in one session she came 5-7 times. He couldn't even get hard without a pill. She preferred someone less sexual.

I'm fun. One of her APs had nothing original to offer. Whenever we were at a movie or bowling or whatever, he'd say "oh ww you and me should do that sometime." She preferred someone with nothing better to do.

I'm loyal. At least 3 of her APs were in "committed" relationships. She preferred someone who doesn't value morality.

I'm interesting. She tried to get more than one of her APs to take up some of my hobbies and was very disappointed when they were unable to converse about books and topics we had shared. She preferred someone less intelligent and whole.

My point is she preferred someone less masculine than me. I'd be willing to wager this is true of most ww's and likely wh's as well in their own way.

The only thing I feel emasculated about is that after all that crap, I still love her. And that is probably at the heart of my work whether we R or D.

Since I'm on a roll, 2 other quick things.

1)wife recently admitted that she was looking for anyone other than me. I think hearing her admit that has gone a long way towards relieving me of the responsibility that I felt.

2)my biggest breakthrough came when my IC asked me to write a letter to my wife, pretending it was the day before her first A, and try to talk her out of it. I couldn't do it. I wrote 20 different drafts coming at it from different angles. Some with future knowledge some without. I even tried writing a letter to myself with tips and future knowledge. I couldn't do it. Because none of them would have worked. I realized there was nothing I could have done. Nothing.