SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Tell me everything I should know about this subject!!!

Well, the customary belief is that telling is WAY better than finding out IF you are thinking about reconciliation. Of course, the initial telling is just the first step in a long and hard process, but it does give you a smidge of hope that you will get the truth.

If my wife had confessed instead of being caught it would have been much better.
Being caught, forced her to stop the affair.
If I hadn't caught her, who knows how much longer it would have went on.
She did try to stop at one point but was unsuccessful, as she saw the AP all the time.

From what I’ve learned and read is that those who confess make better candidates for reconciliation. Maybe it’s because cheaters who confess have some guilty conscience?

Is it always the case? It would be helpful to have a % I would like to know how many of the people that are caught R successfully also those that separated and the ones who move in with AP but come back to their BS.

R is so much work, it’s disheartening to read the struggles 5,10,15 years after.

The overwhelming majority of stories I've read on SI are those in which the WS was caught or outed. Confession requires the wayward to let go of their control of the situation, and a person who can do that is far less likely to cheat in the first place.

My H and I are madhatters, and we're highly unusual (possibly unique) because each of us confessed before our spouse even suspected the infidelity. However, we also minimized and trickle truthed each other for years after our initial attempts at coming clean.

My impression is that confessions are only a small percentage of revealed affairs, one statistic says less than 10%. Often times even when a WS confesses, it's because they know that they are about to be revealed.

Even the majority of regretful, undiscovered WSs who come here seeking advice usually seem to ignore the advice that they should confess their A. Again, just my impression.

If the confession was not coerced, and of the WS's free will, it is way more than likely that they do not want to keep living this type of life. The ones who confess uncoerced, AND do not trickle truth, are the ones who have let go of the outcome, and want to be a better person. Usually, this person has already done some soul-searching, and has more than likely read information pertaining to infidelity.

In all my years here, I would go with Seeking2Forgive's estimate of less than 10%(probably MUCH less) of the people falling into this category. But is it really that surprising? Almost EVERY.SINGLE.WAYWARD does not expect to be caught. And the default to being caught is to minimize the impact. That's why they are waywards. The actions and thoughts around those actions are not very healthy.

I think also you need to view the data you will receive as very heavily skewed on this site. We are all hear because the road to recovery or at least the path through the cheating is NOT a smooth one.. So is more likely to be based on discovered infidelity, as stated above when it's confessed there has already been some soul searching and introspection so that the WS has already started on their recovery route, not being dragged abruptly onto it at DDay.

My H came home very late one night and I confronted him. He admitted to the Affair.

It didn’t change anything.

He still lied, continued to cheat, planned to D me, put us into false reconciliation and was a lying cheating jerk that blamed me for his affair.

When I was forced to confront him on dday2 about the continued affair, he finally became honest and stopped the affair and made a 100% effort to R.

[This message edited by The1stWife at 7:19 PM, Friday, May 20th]

I caught my 1st H with his adultery co-conspirator. My 2nd H confessed. Both ways damaged my soul .

I knew something was OFF though when both of my H's were having their A's. But the blind trust that I had kept me from believing that I had been betrayed by either of them. My 1st H continued to cheat in his other relationships. My 2nd H has completely changed his ways that gave him the selfishness to cheat. I feel very confident...99 44/100%...that he will never cheat again .

R is so much work, it’s disheartening to read the struggles 5,10,15 years after.

It IS a lot of work. I remember feeling RELIEF when my 1st H left me for the adultery co-conspirator I caught him with because I didn't have to deal with his cheating anymore. BOTH parties have to be ALL IN for R to be successful. But when they both are...something MAGICAL happens !! It feels soooooo GOOD to be OUT of infidelity!!!

The thing is...ALL of us will experience traumatic events in our lives. NONE of us will forget the traumatic moments. It is what we DO after this that shapes us into the people we are . Someone once said on here to go to the "Positive Reconciliation Stories" thread that is pinned at the top of the Reconciliation Forum...and read the taglines of those who posted in there. You will find that some who posted in that thread have gone on to D with their spouse. But the VAST majority of them do NOT...and they are no longer posting on here regularly anymore. They have moved on...and don't need this site anymore .

I never understood WHY people in a successful R wouldn't still be posting on this site to give others HOPE. Now that I am on the other side of infidelity...I very much GET IT . I WANT to stay here and post about how GREAT life is on the other side...but I have so much life to ENJOY . Infidelity will always be a part of MY life...but it is a very small part compared to some of the other things happening with me .

It seems to me like a good percentage of the WS that confess are doing so because out some type of outside pressure. Like they will be outted by a OBS or the AP. That their behavior or tangible evidence (emails/call logs/spending/witnesses) has dug a hole that they can't lie their way out of anymore. An IC might suggest a confession. And then they usually give just the "tip of the iceberg", minimizing and omitting. Did any WS confess with "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth"?

[This message edited by earlydetour at 6:41 PM, Friday, May 20th]

Not based on any studies or factual data but my perception/guess is that confessions in general (before being caught and not after the fact) happen about less than 10% of the time, OTOH voluntary/uncoerced confessions happen less than 5% of the time and this is typically after the A has ended (sometimes years after the A), confession while the A is active are probably 2% or less, again this is just my perception based on reading countless of stories here and other forums and not on any statistical confirmed data/study.

Let;s break it down a little.

Someone who confesses knows they are about to blow their world up. So they are going to do it either because they are in an exist affair OR they know the only way to fix this is to expose it. I suspect that some even realize that they are weak and tempted and realize that by making it public, they will have more strength to stop the A.

Someone who is caught is still in the affair, had no intention of stopping, and had no intention of telling their BS. If they have stopped the A, they intend to take it to their grave, robbing their BS of agency, of the knowledge their lives were at risk due to STIs, etc.

One is someone with a lot more character, moral, and integrity than the other.
Both are cheaters. Both had a lot of work to do. But one has a head start in my opinion.

Did any WS confess with "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth"?

Hikingout. She went to therapy before confessing and prepared herself to do it properly. That's the only instance I can think of where the WS came clean voluntarily and didn't trickle truth at all.

In my case there was a confession and it made a major difference in my thinking toward continuing the relationship. I was deployed and likely would never have known what happened so it counted very strongly as a positive. I was debating what to do but the confession kept coming back to my mind as evidence of high commitment on her part.

Was it a full confession? I believe so but anything is possible.

[This message edited by Trdd at 1:33 PM, Saturday, May 21st]

WH confessed that he intended to NEVER tell me the truth. He says she offered him sex with no strings and he jumped at it. Then she was in control and threatened to tell me. Aww poor baby. He's such a victim right? Lol

Did any WS confess with "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth"?

My W did. She spent yet another almost sleepless life examining her violation of personal and professional ethics and decided she was going to stop the A and start living authentically.

She wasn't going to tell me unless I asked, and I asked. I had lots of questions - months of questions - so she could give me only part of what I wanted to know on d-day, but I think her answers over the months of interrogation confirmed what she told me on d-day, and I think she told me essentially the whole story om d-day. Her answers to my questions were totally consistent with one another.

*****

IOW, confession probably makes R easier, if the confession comes from the right motivations. Pre-emotive confessions - for example, when the WS fears that the ap is going to inform the B - are more like being caught than like a true confession as the first step in getting authentic.

The real issue isn't how the A came to light, IMO. Rather, it's the behavior of the WS on and after d-day. Taking responsibility for the A and deciding to change from cheater to good partner is what makes a WS a good candidate for R. Anything less than taking responsibility and deciding to change moves the WS over to being a better candidate for D.

Livingingrief ( member)posted at 6:42 PM on Thursday, May 19th, 2022

Tell me everything I should know about this subject!!!

IF a cheater confesses because they are remorseful, truely remorseful, then you may have a shot at reconciliation. However they must do all the work to prove that they are remorseful. They must be willing to cut all ties with AP, Tell AP's spouse/SO everything, tell you everything, break 100% all contact with AP, if they met AP at their job, QUIT the job immediately (as it will be a trigger for you), tell all your friends and family what they have done, give you timelines, have them take ownership of everything, etc.......

99.9% of cheaters will NOT do the above.

Most the time the cheater confesses to the betrayed because they got caught by the AP's spouse/SO and they were about to be exposed, so they are on "damage control". Its just as bad as if they got caught by you. They don't regret a thing, they regret they got caught.

And if you catch them, thats 100x as worst also.

Lets face it. Whether or not they confess or get caught, you'll never be able to 100% trust them ever again. Its best to move on and let that relationship come to the conclusion and move on.

It sucks being in this community but damn I feel like I’m on the low end scale of this thing.

My wife confessed at the next possible moment. She got drunk at a work event the day of out of guilt and was hungover most of the next day so she couldn’t tell me until that night (kids were also with us).

She’s confessed every time she went back so as that sucked it also really helps keep trust.

I know she can’t do this without telling me and she knows it too. She can’t simply compartmentalize and not tell me everything in her life, especially huge things like that. So I’ll know again if it happens.

If I caught her and it was going on for a long time I wouldn’t be able to R