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Brother sorry for the shit show.

Breathe in, think, ask the question, breathe out, think and repeat.

Unfortunately there is more to this, and she is trying to minimise her actions in this PA.

Trickle truth, big time to minimise the fall out and control the situation.

Take your time here. Rome wasn’t built in a day. So there is no need to make a rash decision relationship wise.

Presently there should be no trust until you verify what is said. Carful how you phrase your questions as once she has divulged something it can’t be unheard.

Medical std checks regardless of what she says.

Try to control you temper when in front of the children. She is their mother. DNA test the children as she is a proven selfish lier.

One day at a time.

[This message edited by Buffer at 7:37 AM, Friday, July 1st]

If you've read here a lot like you say, you'll know that they all say they used condoms, but none of them really did.

Hi OP.

Respect to you wife, she's the mother of your kids. On the other side of the ledger...

Doesn't work
Middle aged
Cheater, liar
You said: "largely just placing the blame on me over and over again"
and: "our sex life has been bad almost our whole marriage"

Given this ^ she's acted with such recklessness and no regard for what she's bringing to your marriage, to your relationship. I wonder if she thinks she has you wrapped around her little finger, and/or she's mentally unbalanced to act as she has.

Sorry you find yourself in this mess. Four kids, not easy mate, stay strong.

I have given her notice that I want a polygraph.

Did she ever in the history of your relationship, do this for you?

Very minimally. Very occasionally if we were apart for a time (work trip, girls vacation) I could convince her to swap sexy images, but never even wrote sexy messages like she has said she did with him. And it always came with this sense of hesitancy.

Yes, trauma from her past has made our lives difficult. Combined with her stonewalling and unwillingness to introspect and try to deal with this stuff, it was a cancer. I was willing to tough thru that for the sake of my love for her and my wedding vows. It’s a completely different game now.

I think an error you are making is being a little too forthcoming with your actions and also too trusting in what she says.

Can you clarify what you think I’m being too forthcoming on?

I hear you on the trusting her, that feels like it’s slowly setting in. I’ve spent almost 2 decades cultivating trust and love with her, it’s hard to even remember to doubt what she says, and then it’s painful when I do. She continues to give a mix of really hard to hear answers with mundane answers. It has a texture that feels like truth to me. But I know I have to be cautious. And there is no limit to what she could be lying by omission on.

I just realized that OM was who we got our pet cat from, and it would have been after the sex. So now my son’s beloved pet is a reminder and potential trigger.

What you are going to learn, from this time forward, your new method of dates and times will revolve around your discovery. it is like a date stamp is burned into our minds.

--"When did we see that movie with the kids? Right---it was a month after you had sex with the OM."

--"Where did we go on vacation last Year? It was to so-and-so. You were sexting OM during this time."

And so on. Trauma like this, although it will get much better over time, does give us a very accurate data point on which our life now revolves around. At least for the time being.

Who do you even talk to at a clinic to get tested for STD’s? Tried to set something up online but don’t even know what to request or who to see.

I dont want to speak for any one else, but when you asked about being too forthcoming you have to attack this more like your wife is an advercery, almost sleeping with the enemy. Right now she isn't on team InkHulk and you have to treat her as such. Keep your thoughts and movements more closely guarded. Her knowing too much can give her ammo to use against you, or manipulate you.

I will give you an example from my life.

Out of the blue, my wife got me a very expensive bike, I'm not really a rider so it was odd. I knew it was a high quality bike and looked at the statements to see just how expensive. When I looked I noticed that it had be charged twice. I mentioned to her that I was going to look into it. Couple weeks passed and it slipped my mind. When I recalled I called to check and the account had been paid in full and closed. She claimed the double charge was just a mistake and she had taken care of it and closed that card because of the fees. Which was partially true as we had discussed closing it in the past. This caused me to have to dig deeper costing me valuable time. In the end she was covering the fact that she got the OM that bike, and in her mind she had to get it for me, in part because of guilt but mainly to cover the cost...
Dumb right, how does an extremely intelligent person think paying twice as much could cover it up? Wayward thinking. This is was you can't discount anything.

Typical cheater behavior:

Blame the betrayed spouse for cheating ✅
We only had sex once
The sex was not that good
I didn’t really like the sex
It didn’t mean anything ✅
Trickle truth ✅
Avoidance ✅
Lack of remorse✅ (Especially if she continues to blame you for her reason to why she cheated)
Doing the bare minimum to make amends ✅

The green check marks are the ones your wife has displayed that we know about.

It seems most likely if you wish to R you will be dragging her down that path. I did that for 6 months. I thought we were reconciling meanwhile my H was still cheating.

Dday2 was very different b/c I no longer wanted to R and I planned to D him. But it was at that point he was willing to change - his attitude, his understanding of the damage he caused, willing to make amends.

I hope your wife has the sense to see the continued damage she is doing. If not, she’s doing more damage in her current mindset. How sad.

Typical cheater behavior:

Blame the betrayed spouse for cheating

We only had sex once ✅

The sex was not that good ✅

I didn’t really like the sex ✅ (but does admit to multiple orgasms)

It didn’t mean anything

Trickle truth ✅

Avoidance

Lack of remorse

(Especially if she continues to blame you for her reason to why she cheated)

Doing the bare minimum to make amends ✅

This is how I would fill out your list.

-She isn’t blaming me for the cheating, she has blamed me for all our relational problems over the years.

- Claims a single sexual episode but backed by months of EA and sexting.

- She isn’t attempting minimize the sex, she knows the significance.

- I’m worried about trickle truth

- She isn’t avoiding it right now, she is promptly answering all questions. She took on an attempt to recover deleted text messages. She is working on the timeline.

- She has enormous remorse right now. I don’t doubt that.

- we aren’t at the stage of making amends yet, but she did make a comment about doing whatever I wanted and being willing to "jump thru hoops" which was a huge red flag to me. I told her that would not be good enough.

[This message edited by InkHulk at 9:45 PM, Wednesday, July 6th]

Something you need to look at. She knew the guy in high school. I’m guessing there was a major crush on him or an actual relationship. If you wander around this site long enough you will find so many WS who had affairs with their high school sweethearts. Even 30 years later sometimes.

Sexting with pictures. I’m not sure what made it easier for her to do this but I am absolutely astounded at the utter stupidity of people who put their private parts online. That guy can post them anywhere.

The OBS is probably still in the dark. Sorry, I just think finding out your spouse cheated with a woman who babysat your kids would make you hungry for more info

She isn’t blaming me for the cheating, she has blamed me for all our relational problems over the years.

That there is selfish waywardism. Each partner own 50% of relational problems. Best case they just silently resented you for something you were doing without discussing it with you. Next would be the tolerating it and not holding you accountable. Most times in reality waywards, in their wayward mindset, were the root of the problem. Sniping at you to get you mad. Pulling away and putting distance between you. Etc. All so they would have more rationale why they were justified in their betrayal. That puts your responsibility on allowing that without confrontation or getting out of the relationship.

-She isn’t blaming me for the cheating, she has blamed me for all our relational problems over the years.

"I'm not blaming you BUT- I did it because I felt disconnected due to all of the things you did and didn't do over the years." If she is saying that feeling disconnected/distance is at all part of why she cheated and that you have any hand in that, she's blaming you.

What she needs to be saying is, "Our relationship may have had our ups and downs but I justified my cheating based on those instead of talking to you about how to improve our relationship. I allowed resentment to build instead of confronting those issues and solving them with you instead." Hell, she even could have decided to divorce instead of cheat. It would have kept her integrity intact and would have been more respectful to you. But instead she decided to make those issues WORSE by looking for a solution in the OM. Whatever distance she felt got WORSE because she was investing the time and energy necessary to fix things with you into OM instead. She is 100% at fault for that.

First, you've got a long life ahead of you. The decisions you make now will have impact, I hope, for decades. You're 2 days out. If you spend some time making your decision, it may feel endless while you're doing it, but it will be a brief interlude in your whole life. So take your time figuring out what you want to do. You'll know when you know - and you will know sometime, probably pretty soon.

My reco is to focus on your own healing first. Eat healthy, when you eat. Sleep when you can. Drink water, even if you have to force yourself. Don't drink alcohol or use drugs. Move your body as much as you can, with healthy bounds. Find a good IC or clergy person to talk with. Post here. You aren't alone.

I also think the best approach to figuring out what to do is to figure out what you want. Maybe you do want to D. Maybe you don't. Your W failed by cheating. You didn't. Her A was about her, not about you. Even though you may feel humiliated, she actually humiliated herself.

You may feel that R is humiliating. Many people, especially men, view R as 'eating a shit sandwich'. I wouldn;t have R'ed if that's how I viewed it. I thought and continue to think that R gave me my best chance for leading a good life - a good life, not a minimally bad one.

If you think R may be the way you want to go, look at your W. How good a candidate for R is she? I think the primary requirement is getting honest. At this point, and for months to come, you can't believe much of what she says, but ... confession is a good sign that she wants to be honest.

I’ve been peppering her with questions and her answers are credible in how awful they are. But not every answer is awful, so I don’t think she is hiding things that way.

The truth of an A IS awful, so I agree that she may very well be telling the truth. Continuing to admit to doing awful things is a good sign.

As time goes on, your gut will give you guidance. If you stay true to yourself, your gut will probably be a very good guide. Eventually, you will say to yourself, 'This is the way I want to go.'

The sign that you're being true to yourself may be that you're following your heart, head, and gut in deciding what to do, without thinking about how your actions look to others.

*****

I found https://survivinginfidelity.com/topics/324250/things-that-every-ws-needs-to-know/ to be very helpful. It gave me guidance on the behavior to look for from my W to see if she was doing and if she was likely to continue doing the work needed to R.

R requires consistent work for a long time. In a sense, R is forever. I say that because R is a process of resolving issues that stem from the A, and M is a process of resolving issues that come up in every M. Maintaining a relationship is a process of resolving issues no matter who one looks at it.

******

If R is a possibility, I urge you to think about requirements. Common ones are:

1) No contact with ap.
2) Honesty - no more lies. You can spin things, but no lies about anything. If your W asks yo, 'Do I look fat,' and you do think so, your answer has to be some kind of 'yes' - if one's self-esteem depends on someone else not being authentic, there's a problem.
3) Transparency - you keep each other informed of location, activity, and companions at virtually all times - at least that's the end goal - at first, it seems common for a BS to want to keep the WS in the dark for a while.
4) IC for the WS with a goal of changing from betrayer to good partner.
5) IC for BS, if desired
6) MC when desired - a good MC (one who will address the A first and who addresses the A as the WS's failure, not the M's failure) - will help a lot, but most MCs see an A as a symptom of an M problem. As mentioned, an A is a WS issue, not an M issue.
7) Things you want even if others don't - for example, my W had to arrange weekly dates for us. She turned out to be better than I am at finding enjoyable things to do, and she still arranges more dates than I do, 11 years out (as I said, R is M). Sex was an issue for us, too - we both wanted more but thought the other already gave as much as they could. You talk about unsatisfying sex - you can perhaps work together to make it satisfying, if your W works on separating you and M from her trauma (but that's very difficult - recovering from rape is very hard work).

*****

I think it's best to see recovery as:

You heal you. Your W can support you, but you have to resolve your own issues and your own anger, grief, fear, shame. You have to restore or find your own self-love and self esteem.

Your W heals herself. You can support her, but she has to resolve her own issues and her own anger, grief, fear, shame. She has to restore or find her own self-love and self esteem.

If you both want to R, you work together to (re)build your M.

If you both heal yourselves, however, the R decision will grow organically. You'll find you still want to be together ... or not. If you heal, though, that decision will come from your desires and your strengths, even if it's you deciding to R because your W refuses to do her work, or vice versa.

Thanks, all. Definitely feeling the roller coaster, going from rage to disgust to sad to wanting to comfort her in her distress.

We just had our first significant face to face interaction since she confessed. I told her that I am making no promises today and the promises that bound us together are broken. But similar to the post above, as I think about my future, a life with her where she has addressed these issues of resenting me and silently holding grudges, and investing in the bedroom, that sounds like a good life option to me. If she won’t address them, then I leave, no question.

It feels funny right now, my marital state. I’ve always believed that the love and the promise in marriage were complementary forces keeping people together. I’m still married, but I’m not really operating under any vows, those are null and void. I still feel love for her, but no doubt that is in danger at this point.

Take her phone and tell her you are going to run some comprehensive recovery software on her phone that will show all deleted texts.

Tell her that if you discover something that contradicts her story or is missing from her timeline, that would be very, very bad and will most likely lead to summary divorce.

It’s a bluff. I did this with my WW and she sang like the Tabernacle Choir.

You need to get your arms around as much of the truth as possible and make INFORMED decisions going forward.

It sounds like your FB messenger notification to the OBS got intercepted and replied to by him. Could have been done without your WW’s collusion.

It’s possible but unlikely that messages could be recovered. I’m delaying any serious attempt until after the reading of the timeline so that she has that hanging over her head as she writes it.

I was out running today and it occurred to me that the reason I was so drawn to this forum is the stories felt so familiar to my own. I thought it was the RJ stuff, but I’m seeing now that I was actually unknowingly living a nasty thread. I saw similarities to my wife’s tendencies in descriptions of waywards. I was fascinated, but never believed she could do it. I still can’t believe it, to be quite honest.

I’m trying to get OBS phone number to reach out and confirm she got the message. Stay tuned.

I’m sorry for your pain. It sucks all around.

I’m still married, but I’m not really operating under any vows, those are null and void.

I am so glad to see you realize and write this. I know it’s painful to come to terms with. I was wondering how to get this point across to you and then you go ahead and state it. Many dont come to this realization so quickly.

What it means, is that no matter what you both do to try and repair things, the marriage you both had is over. All the kings horses and all the kings men… well … you know.

What is import is that you convey this fact to your wife. Your marriage was created on vows. Those are precious tenants of what make a marriage. They are so easily broken. And when they are, while legally you may still be married, emotionally and logically and even physically, you are not.

From my 5 years here I have seen that while some may reconcile without divorcing, they are truly creating something new. If it were me, I’d have to make that official by legally ending the marriage and then seeing if she could do the work to fix herself and build something new for me to be willing to even try again with her.

That’s the message I would want my WW to understand. That every marriage has issues. It’s how we communicate them and work together to address them that makes us a real partnership.

Instead of doing that, your wife chose to drop an A-bomb (pun intended) on not just the relationship but your whole family. That’s unfortunate. But Hiroshima can’t be rebuilt in a day or month or even a year. Now she will have to do it for a lifetime, day by day, with no guarantees that you will be able to forgive and start anew, if it’s truly you that she wants.

One thing she had going for her is she confessed. You’ll find out if that was under duress of the OBS (count me in the group who believes your OBS still doesn’t know). But if it’s not and it truly was a moment of guilt w a little bit of disgust and empathy, then maybe she will show herself as a candidate for R. We will see.

But as I said at the top, you need to be honest with each other. You are now different people than you were a year ago before she chose to give away what is precious in a marriage. I hope she comes to terms with that and starts down a path of true rebuilding and self aware building.

Good luck.

[This message edited by Stevesn at 6:56 PM, Wednesday, June 29th]