SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I have very few friends that I can turn to with this so I'll just put this all here. I was here 7 years ago (or so) when my wife and I first came really close to divorce. For the first 10 years of our marriage, I cheated on her multiple times, couple physical, a couple emotional, etc. 7 years ago she had an emotional+sexting relationship that lasted a long time before I found out. We went through a lot of counseling, and we did a pretty good job of reconciling I thought.

Until last week, I found out she's been doing it again, with the same guy. Started sometime over the summer. I was floored, didn't know what to say/do and then we talked.

At first I gave her an ultimatum, him or me, which was the wrong thing to do. I don't know about how everyone else is, but she's been conditioned to take the other side if an ultimatum is presented, pretty much no matter what. So I back-tracked on the email and changed my stance a little bit. Because as of now, she doesn't want to stop talking to him.

Now, let me stop here and say that if you read this, you're going to think I'm being incredibly naive. It may also come across that I'm playing victim here. Honestly, neither one of these are true. I'm well aware of the position I'm putting myself in and I'm not oblivious to it. As far as being the victim, that's pretty far from the truth as well. In some ways I think I deserve this, and that I don't deserve her.

So, moving on. We've had a lot of conversations, and we've come to a current way of doing things until we both go to individual therapy. (We've started)

Here's how it stands. She'll keep talking to the guy, but no sexting. If either one of them starts, she'll stop it and come to me and tell me. She'll set her own boundary as to when/if it's too much and stops talking to him. Other than that, I really don't want to know about it.

Why? Because until I found out, our marriage was absolutely amazing. Now I'm walking around in a non-stop ball of pain. Not all of which is because of this, a whole lot of it is bringing back the guilt, and self-loathing that we worked through 7 years ago. For 7 years now, I swore to be better. I wake up every day remembering where we were and where we are, and where we're going. And it's been wonderful.

So on to therapy. Obviously, I have issues, and I'm starting therapy again to work through those. She, admittedly, doesn't understand why she wants to talk to this guy and so she's going to therapy for that, as well as some other things she wants to work out.

From there, we'll go to couples therapy, and that's primarily where we'll talk about this guy and some left over guilt/trust issues.

Let me pause a second and say this. When I had affairs in the past, my wife gave me another chance. Every time without ultimatums, limits, no looking at my phone, monitoring where I'm going, nothing. She forced herself into showing trust without actually trusting. The actual trusting came in time, until I broke it again. This past 7 years, I've earned back a lot of that trust. My point is, throughout this whole thing, she's been honest with me. I asked her straight up questions, and she gave me straight up answers. So because she did this for me, I'm willing to do the same for her.

The only problem is... She's still talking to this guy and it's killing me inside.

After counseling and such, if she continues to talk to this guy, I see these potential scenarios.

1. I come to terms with her talking to him, and she stays true to her word and they simply communicate as friends.
2. I come to terms with her talking to him, and she develops feelings for him, and leaves me or kicks me out and I fall apart.
3. I come to terms with her talking to him, and they develop into a physical relationship, at which point I fall apart.
4. I don't come to terms with her talking to him, and the pain eats me away inside until I fall apart.

Overall, odds don't look good for me. But we've been married for 20 years. We have a lot of children. I want this to work, and I'll go through this in order to try. I've put her through so much more than she's put me through, it's only fair. The only thing I have going for me really is I have two friends that know us both well from the beginning of our marriage. They think she's going through something and will work it out in therapy and we'll get past this. Here's hoping.

I was a terrible person to her for a long time, I don't expect sympathy from you all, far from it. Well, I have no idea what to expect.. It's a release just to put this out there.

Ultimatum is solid for getting out of infidelity. You should have stuck to your guns because her leaving you is better than her dragging you through the pain you are feeling now. Your wife is having an ongoing affair, and you are allowing it.

We can't help you reconcile under these conditions.

Sorry you find yourself here again.

She is not willing to go NC with this guy. And that is 100% a problem.

Because at the end of the day that's what it comes down to.

I'm sorry you find yourself here.

I wish I could claim credit for this masterpiece but I can't. It belongs to very wise member from another website. It should be etched in the minds of every man and woman who has been the victim on infidelity.

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Just Let Them Go

The end result?

The end result is to respect yourself in the end,
let go of the people that don't value you or respect you.

That is the end result.

The quickest way to get a cheating spouse back is to let them go with a smile on your face wishing them the best in life and hoping that everything works out in their relationship with their affair partner.

Seriously, the quickest way to get them back.

Nothing else works better or quicker.

Let them go.

Agree with them and their feelings,
"you should be with the OM, I hope he makes you happy, good bye"

Wouldn't that be true love?

If you really loved your spouse,
and wanted them to have what they really want in life which is the other person they're in love with,
wouldn't letting them go be the approach if you really love them?

Why focus on the affair or the drama associated with it?
Just let them go. Give them their freedom.

You can take a good hard look at yourself in the mirror everyday and improve yourself but do it for you, not for someone else, the changes will never stick when it's done for someone else, do it for your benefit and you will probably make those changes last much longer if not indefinitely - because it's for your benefit and you realize the importance and value in that benefit because YOU are involved.

I will never tell someone to change to entice a WAW back when she's been cheating on him. I don't care how bad a marriage, there is never an excuse for cheating. That is a personal decision that someone makes to cheat on their spouse. If a marriage is really bad, leave, get a divorce, speak up to your spouse and tell them flat out "this marriage sucks and if things don't change I'm going to leave you and find someone better" and if things don't improve, leave that person.

But cheating, no excuses.

Think about cheating.
A wayward spouse who cheats on their spouse goes behind their back, secretly, telling lies, feeling guilty, getting angry at their spouse for getting in the way of their fantasies but never owning up to their actions, never admitting what they're doing. If a person who cheats on their spouse felt justified in their actions, why hide and go behind their spouses backs when they start cheating, why lie, why make up excuses about late nights at work and going to a friends place and sleeping over because they drank too much and any other such nonsense?

Deep down, the cheating spouse knows there is something inherently wrong with their actions otherwise they wouldn't lie about their actions and hide what they're doing.

Fighting the affair? For what reason?
To compete with the OM or OW for your spouse?
What message does that communicate to your wayward spouse?
They have lots of value and you have none because now you have to compete with another person for their love? Competing with your wayward spouse's affair partner never works, it just prolongs an ugly drama filled process.

And for your last point,
The easiest way to show you will not tolerate cheating in your relationship is to let that person go. That is the easiest and most effective way to show this.

"Look wife/husband, I won't be in an open relationship with you, I won't give you X number of days, weeks, months to make your mind, if you really feel like you need to sit on the fence on this decision and can't decide between your affair partner and me well I will make the decision for you, you can be with them because I'm no longer an option. I love you and wish you a good life with them and hope it works out for you because it didn't work out for us. Now the best thing we can do for each other is to make this process as graceful and peaceful as possible for us and our children, I'll contact a lawyer/mediator and get started on the process of our legal separation/divorce."

You give them what they want.
You don't fight them on this issue.
You agree with their feelings,
they want to be with the other person, fine they should be with the other person, let them be with the other person.

You will never convince a person to change their feelings with your arguments and logic. You can not find one member on this website in a situation where they are dealing with infidelity where they got their spouse to change their mind about how they feel about their affair partner.

You can't say "don't love them, love me instead",
you can't say "look at me, I'm better in every way compared to your affair partner, pick me instead of them",
you can't say "you took marriage vows, you promised to love me"

I agree, you don't have to make it easy for your wayward spouse to have an affair, but when you let them go, "lovingly detach", you don't have to worry about making it easy for them. It's no longer your concern, they can have you or them but not both and not at the same time and since they've chosen to have an affair, they've made their choice, there is no profit in fighting that decision. Let them go and move on with your life, that is the quickest, easiest way to get them back.

You definitely don't support them financially and enable them, that would be weak, wussy, clingy, insecure behavior - something in you telling you that you need to support them financially while they're having an affair, hoping they'll realize how nice you are and come back to you.

Just let them go, have them move out or you move out and live a good life without them.

NoBetterName - it's your call

Just b/c she have you chances does not mean you are required to do the same.

You can stand up to her and tell her that you will not accept her affair and if she cannot stop ALL contact then it is time to separate. And mean it.

It is not tit for tat. Especially since she KNOWS how it feels and chooses to do it anyway. That is a complete lack of respect for your marriage and to you.

And if she justifies along the lines of "you did it" you have almost a sad situation b:c the fundamental element of respect is missing.

Thw1stWife is right - you don't owe her another chance. You can give her a chance, but you don't have to.

I understand why you want to reconcile. But knowing what you want is only part of your decision-making. Because your W has to be part of R, you need to consider what she's doing before you decide.

She had an EA with this guy 7 years ago, and she's having an EA with him now. She has already developed feelings for him. It's dogma that NC is part of R. It's dogma that a BS can't R with a WS who won't go NC.

So ... I'm sure there are exceptions to that rule. Is your W an exception? Whether she has been in an underground EA for 7 years or only restarted the EA after 6-7 years, I strongly suspect you can't R unless she goes NC with her ap. She's already shown she has lousy boundaries; I wouldn't have much faith in her ability to maintain the boundary you outlined above.

At some point, unless your W decides to live an authentic life (and I hope her IC is guiding her toward that goal), the only way you will have to prevent experiencing further pain will be to force a choice between him and you.

IOW, you need to start including D in your scenarios. That may be the only way to avoid a life of pain. Please, don't doom yourself to a life of pain.

Love and desire are not enough to keep a good M going. M and R require commitment and effort by all partners.

Marriage is between TWO people. Right now there's three in your marriage.

There's no way in hell I'd tolerate that disrespect.

Your bad behavior does not justify her bad behavior.

When I found out about my WH affair, it was my way or the highway. I would not continue to be emotionally abused. Right now that's exactly what she is doing to you, she is abusing you.

She's got the doting husband at home and her little sidekick that she can summon whenever she feels like chatting. That's not how a marriage works. She's playing ping pong with your emotions. I'd stop this little game in its tracks.

I feel like she is monkey branching you, she is keeping AP around, building her bond with him and when it's good she'll let you go and latch onto him.

For my BH, it was #4, and if he could do it over again, he'd give me the ultimatum and mean it. The A doesn't end until she goes NC.

She has been cheated on so she understands the extremely deep pain it causes.

I can understand why she cheated the first time not long after she learned of your affairs, to hurt you back maybe. But for her to do this to you again after 7 years of you having successful R seems very worrisome to me, considering that she is fully aware how extremely hurtful it is having been through it herself and she does not care that she is hurting you so badly.

To me it just seems worse for someone who knows the pain first hand to do it to someone else.

Hi NBN,

I'm sorry you guys are here.

Reading your entry, what stood out to me was this:

When I had affairs in the past, my wife gave me another chance. Every time without ultimatums, limits, no looking at my phone, monitoring where I'm going, nothing. She forced herself into showing trust without actually trusting. The actual trusting came in time, until I broke it again.

I can't help but think this is a big factor of what she's dealing with right now. It looks like she did her best to rugsweep, using it as her version of the "pick me dance." Has she had a chance to really process your affairs, her internal mechanisms that compelled her to act in this way and whether or not she's really healed. Has she had IC in the time between your affairs and her 1st affair? It sounds like her current EA is more about shoring up her self worth after the damage your affairs did to it.

I've been in her situation- being in an unhealthy attachment with a "friend" and using it as a crutch to buoy myself up when my husband was in his own EA with one of my friends. It's likely she has kept in touch (albeit loosely) in the interim between their active affairs. There could be genuine attachment there between them, which she is using to help her cope with whatever is resurfacing from your affairs after so many years.

I'm glad to hear you're both in counseling. There's a lot to unpack on both sides and resolve.

Right now, you can't work on your marriage, not until she ends her affair and goes NC. Otherwise, whatever progress you could make in MC will be continually eroded as she continues to attach her self to OM.

Until she decides to NC her AP, you can't work on your M. Emotionally, there is no M for you. I'd recommend focusing on working on IC on you. How you treat her is up to you. I'd treat her as a friend, no sex/physical intimacy you wouldn't show a sister. If possible, separate into your own bedrooms. This will protect you from the temptation to use physical bonding as a bandaid to get you through this.

Live like brother and sister. Until she decides to NC her AP, that is the best you can be for her and the only way to protect yourself from repeated emotional attachment and pain when she is contacting her AP. Continue to be open in your pain, lead with your pain and lean into it. Don't show anger, be vulnerable. Being that honest with her will prevent you building your own resentment. Whether she decides to have compassion for your pain or not, it's necessary for you to be vulnerable to keep from holding it inside and poisoning yourself. Better the hurt gets out than stays in and poisons you.

I wish you guys the best. There's certainly a lot to clean up here, but you're already making the right first steps in getting into IC. There's hope here for your M as long as BOTH of you are doing the work. Right now though, there is no M until she NC's her AP. Brother and sister is the best you can have for her and from her. Separate bedrooms as well.

At first I gave her an ultimatum, him or me, which was the wrong thing to do. I don't know about how everyone else is, but she's been conditioned to take the other side if an ultimatum is presented, pretty much no matter what. So I back-tracked on the email and changed my stance a little bit. Because as of now, she doesn't want to stop talking to him.

Trust your gut ... you had it right with your first instinct and then waffled into a worse situation. Ultimatums are the way to go because THEY WORK ... you get out of infidelity while maintaining your self respect, now with your approach you have neither.

Stand up for yourself and reassert your ultimatum position ... "him or me, and you have 30 seconds to decide. If you choose your family, there will be conditions. If you choose OM, then pack your shit and go to him."

It may not be easy, but it really is that simple.

BTW, what I'm advocating is exactly what I did. So this message is brought to you by the voice of experience. Now, you very well realize that in the end the "juice isn't worth the squeeze", but you can make that decision without third party interference.

[This message edited by ButAnyway at 3:27 PM, Wednesday, December 8th]

I'm sympathetic because I absolutely wanted to R with my WW and she was very much that same sort of person - put her in a hard situation and she would flee. Give her an ultimatum and she would defy it just to feel that she was in control. So I accommodated that in the way I handled things post-Dday.

It worked out, mostly. But it worked out because at some point the light came on for her and she really understood how much hurt she caused, how foolish she was, and how much damage she did. She became truly remorseful and she backed that with actions. Is the light going to come on for your WS? Because part of that is her commitment to figuring out why she needs validation from this OP. And also why she feels a need to defy your personal boundaries just so she can feel in control.

How long are you willing to wait? Set a date and stick to it. Do the 180 and focus on yourself. I'm similar in that I've never had a large group of friends. Focus on improving yourself. Pursue your interests and be open to making friends around those.

"Just friends" never works for a WS. Until she understands and deals with her need for external validation from other men she's a full blown PA waiting to happen.

[This message edited by Seeking2Forgive at 4:46 PM, Wednesday, December 8th]

Is this OM married,or does he have a girlfriend?

Nobettername: It certainly looks like your WW has not processed your affairs to the point that she wishes to fully commit to the marriage. She is having an EA and possibly a PA. Unless there is a geographical barrier, how can you be so sure the relationship has not become physical? Your wife's lack of commitment makes it easy for her EA to progress to the point where it becomes a PA. The fact that she is openly and notoriously doing it right in your face speaks volumes. The two of you have negotiated some sort of behavior boundary regarding her EA. Are you kidding me?

You haven't provided information regarding the OM. How did the EA start? Is it with someone she has never physically met? Is it with a coworker, friend, or some other acquaintance? Why haven't you confronted the OM and told him to get the hell out of your marriage? I do not encourage you to physically confront him. I understand your guilt, but you did give her one bite of the apple. Enough already. You don't really know the extent of the EA because it is unlikely your WW is being totally honest. But you can be sure of one thing. You have basically given her a green light to have what you think is a light EA after she had a sexting relationship with this guy. It will most likely evolve into something more serious, regardless of the negotiated boundaries. Also, your acceptance of this EA will only embolden her to eventually move on and find someone else if she tires of this guy. Any way you slice it, your acquiescence will most likely result in disaster in the long run.

Your affairs did tremendous damage to your marriage. Your WW has not recovered and may never sufficiently do so. That is life. You fucked up and will have to suffer the consequences. But, if there is a chance to save it, what you are allowing will certainly not do it. If your WW refuses to cut ties with the OM under any circumstances, you have little choice but to call her on it. You will see very quickly where her head is at regarding you and the marriage. Any spouse who loves their partner and wishes to preserve the relationship would dump the potential threat to the marriage yesterday. If she can't do it, why should you be a spectator to her evolving affair?