SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

You are doing as well as you can expect right now, thank goodness you have your sister to help anchor you. Good for you for being done with ow, I believe you have all you need from her now.

Two things - one, part of the how could he/who is he answer is embedded in his selfish, narcissistic inner self, which he hid from you, and a high level of compartmentalization or disassociation. The compartmentalization will allow him to be happy in this dual life and when found out, to say things like you were never supposed to know, no one was supposed to get hurt, or I made a mistake I'm sorry, now get over it already. Emotionally healthy people can't compartmentalize like that, they don't hide information from others or themselves. So much of my WH's secret life was so mindless that he can't give me detailed information on how often or where, he doesn't bother with trivial details or facts, they were inconsequential to the thrill of the chase and the sexual obsession. It is part of the rationalization program to minimize or erase shameful memories and choices. You may never understand him, and you will spend a lot of time trying to understand yourself and how you failed to see any of it or protect yourself. Don't forget that you are blameless in this, and because you were trusting you were an easy target for a disingenuous man. It is far better to spend time understanding yourself, your wishes and your envisioned future than trying to figure out him right now, trust me.

Two, please don't apologize for not responding individually. You are in crisis mode, all we ask from you is that you take care of yourself and check in when you are able for more support.

You have him dead to rights, any other intel is just more data points that support the same conclusion. He is not worthy of you, or a monogamous committed relationship. You can collect data for years, but to what end? My therapist asked me what more info would tell me beyond the fundamental truth of the infidelity. Gather your wagons, you may not be able to act your way through this much longer, so you need to prepare yourself for their return. On the other hand, your WH has been acting the part with you for years, so maybe you can pull it off a bit longer. Also. Try not to spend all your time in sleuth mode, but if you are unable to stop looking right now, I found lots of surprises on old phones, email sent files and annual credit card statements. He had one he kept secret from me, but I managed to find lots of intel on business meal receipts. He doesn't eat two breakfasts, let alone spinach omelettes. But you already have lingerie, sex toys, what more could you need at this point? You have all the broad strokes figured out, and you are assembling your team.

Best of luck to you, sending you strength and understanding. So many of us have felt your pain and want you to know it doesn't offer much comfort now, but time will help heal your heart and you will find yourself through this ordeal.

I hope I am wrong about him(see my previous remarks) but nothing you have written sounds like a person who will change. This behavior is WHO he is.

That said be prepared for a cruel emotionless discard. He has no depth. His life is on the surface. The only pleasure he seems to get is fooling the people all the time without remorse. It is very telling that he only opens up to strangers on line who have no idea who he is. That way he can keep up the facade of a good guy.

You need to protect yourself financially. It won’t surprise any of us if he is very good at hiding money.

What a story. Well done for being able to contain it and use your brain. I feel shock whilst reading your story, I can imagine your shock. My guidance:

Take time to decide who you tell, once you tell people you can't un-tell them.

Get legal advice so that you know your position and options.

Take copies of all evidence.

Try to find a good therapist who can help you to figure what you feel and what you want to do.

Be aware that you're vulnerable just now. You may get all sorts of advice as you tell people. You seem thoughtful and considered so maybe you don't need to be reminded of this; take time to think and don't rush.

Sadly you're not alone. I'm new on here too, but my D.Day was two and a half years ago. Your story is not the same as mine but I can see similarities. So many people on here will have felt a lot of what we feel.

your WH has had years, decades even, to think about what happens if he gets caught.

Can I ask the group - how likely is it that he has a plan in place for if he was discovered? Do they commonly have attorneys, paperwork, a bank account or other things that they pull like a parachute cord when they are caught?

My H is a planner, and reading this sentence this morning makes me wonder if he has in fact planned for this day.

So good to hear you have your sister. I can hear renewed strength and resolve in your posts after you received her love and support. Draw on the well when you need to and others if you think you them.

I like your plan! Keep moving forward with The List. If nothing else, each step empowers you to take the next one.

Remember self care. Eat, drink, sleep. Rest your mind when you can with whatever activity takes you out of yourself for a moment. A hot bath, a walk, ear buds and your favorite music, etc. Even a few minutes of mind rest a day will help you gather strength. It's painfully slow but over time, vigilant self care heals.

Just a thought: if AP is hellbent on breaking up your marriage and hopes it means he will run to her, she is likely anxiously awaiting to hear from him assuming you've gone nuclear by now. She may grow impatient and reach out to him. My point is, she may play your hand before you are ready. Keep moving.

Keep posting whenever you need it. We're here.

Sigyn, My Wh had a decade to ponder getting caught and the possibility never crossed his mind. Part of the compartmentalization magic. He never intended to leave me, he loved his life, his family and he claimed me, all along. His plan was always to grow old with me, and never to leave me for another woman. At confrontation, he went into shock and self preservation mode, lying, and ultimately getting angry at me the closer I got to the truth. You are ahead of me at this point in the game, I got a minimized, been over for years story, while they took the A underground and he pretended to reconcile with me. Had I known the truth up front, I would not be here now, reconciling, but posting in the D threads.

I don't think you have to worry about him having an escape plan, that seems to be the least common cake eating program. Like most of our WH, yours just probably thought he deserved his secret life, felt entitled to the madonna/whore double life he led and may not have even considered losing you through his own actions. I would not worry about the escape plan option, I would only worry about maintaining your composure, strength and integrity at confrontation.

Take care, don't overthink. Like my therapist said, you already know what you need to know. Now you decide what you want to do. You have done no wrong, but a great wrong has been done to you. Stand firm and proud in yourself. Also to echo a previous reply, and my therapist, be careful who you tell, you can never untell anyone. Choose your team wisely. But be prepared, word may get out, you may want to try to control the narrative. Many WS's try to blame the BS should the marriage end.

Also, to echo my therapist, it's ok to not know what you are plan to do until you have time to work through the shock and make the best decision for yourself. My advice - separate at confrontation, make him "quarantine" until you work through this madness and are on more solid ground. Having the WS's meltdown to deal with in addition to your own, when they often don't even have a shred of empathy for you yet, is just more pain and more confusion. Separate, regroup, make your plan, make your life what you need and deserve it to be, with our without your integrity impaired mate. Hugs.

[This message edited by whatisloveanyway at 2:05 PM, Sunday, August 21st]

I’m so glad you have a great support system in your sister. In all of the chaos, you have a safe person to share your shock, grief and pain with and that is the testament to the both of you. So….. when you are questioning yourself on your ability to be in a solid, loving relationship of integrity…. You do have that…in your sister. Because she is an honest and authentic half of it.

You have made some great progress in a short amount of time. It is a good thing your sister took on the job of investigating his online postings, At this point you could use a break from the specific details for now.

One thing I wanted to mention is that once you shut the door on OW she may give your H the heads up you know. And she’s as much a liar as him, so be prepared for the off the wall story she may present. Maybe she’s a victim of your probing questions. But also be aware he may go into a deleting hiding/frenzy. Grab as much as you can while he is in the dark. You don’t have to look at it but get the evidence while you can. The window might be short on his postings.

Like others have mentioned she has her own motivations here. Not many OW suddenly want to provide truth to wives because they authentically want them to know the truth. She’s been actively benefiting from secrets and lies for years and now wants you to know who you are married to.? Yeah sure.

We can’t know where her head is at but more than likely she wants you to kick him out so she can have him or she wants to bitch up his life for revenge because he hurt her or lied to her(shocker). Be done with her but prepared that she may continue to interact with him in dysfunctional ways.

Sending you hugs and strength. If a confrontation happens unexpectedly just remember you don’t have to prove to him with evidence that you know. Keep your sources to yourself.

You know what he has done and who he truly IS.. by his actions, not words. Be solid and strong in that alone if it happens.

Let Mr Anal Beads worry about the extent his mask has been pulled off. Know that all of the skills he used to conduct his second life will now be applied to keep it buried deep. Charm, manipulation, etc….

Don’t underestimate the fact that 20 years of your loving him gives him special insight to tug on all of those strings. Your head and heart battle a bit in this process. Logic tells you to put everything in context, but your feelings heart can still be informed by the memories of the life you experienced. Gird your heart!

Get through this in chunks. Start with minutes, hours then days. Find distractions if you can. I like to recommend a nice murder mystery podcast or audiobook. It keeps the brain busy 😎

Whatever comes, you have your squad here to help, even if it’s just a virtual hug!!

[This message edited by redrock at 2:49 PM, Sunday, August 21st]

I tend to believe that Waywards are as arrogant as they are entitled.

He’s counting on you NEVER knowing. He’s INVESTED in it. He keeps everything in its own box. He works hard at it and has a lot of success. He expects that to continue.

I find it hard to believe he has a plan in place for when you find out. Because that means he has to face what he’s done and having everything escaped from his carefully constructed boxes/boundaries. Never under estimate people ability to lie to themselves best.

If he has a plan in place then he is in a special category of asshole. But you can investigate if he’s got his own credit cards, hidden bank account etc…. There may be evidence of a plan.

...how likely is it that he has a plan in place for if he was discovered? Do they commonly have attorneys, paperwork, a bank account or other things that they pull like a parachute cord when they are caught?

I don't have any stats for you, but I'd say it's uncommon that they've got their exit strategy 100% ready to deploy, more common that they get one quickly after dday, and even more common still that they were waiting for the kids to get older and don't overly care whether they're caught. That said, my guess it that the most common scenario is the one Whatisloveanyway mentions, the one where they compartmentalize and think they're too smart to ever get caught.

Your best bet is to be prepared for any eventuality. The bottom line is that the WS isn't paralyzed by shock and trauma. They can move and they can move quickly.

Mind boggling that they have years to plan for getting caught and make zero plans for getting caught because not even in the realm of possibility? Just... how?

Unfortunately he has very few remaining posts on the chat group where he met this OW, but a few could be recovered and the only thing I really learned was that his "secret" to not getting caught was that he tells these people he only "lies by omission", he says he's always where he says he will be, he just doesn't mention to me that he's there with someone else. Too bad for him that 'someone else' was apparently tired of being omitted from the story and wrote to his wife, how many women did he think he could do this with with before one of them got pissed at him? Weirdly he also gave the thumbs up to another person who wrote that they only date married women because they have just as much to lose, presumably they think that means a married woman won't tell their wife. I got single vibes from the OW who wrote to me, maybe he didn't follow that rule, or the OW lied to him by omission and forgot to tell him she was single.

I also found the cash withdrawals. Once a month, from the bank and not an ATM, $1000 at a time, stopped during 2020 lockdown, restarted late 2021. He did mention one to me once, that he was buying a bike from Craigslist and he did buy it because it's in our garage right now, but back then he said he took out cash for the purchase. I thought at the time that it was odd he'd say "I took out cash" because it's not really that important of a detail. I remember asking him if he was afraid to carry cash with him to the meeting with the person selling the bike, because why else would he have mentioned it? It's not that we don't talk about purchases with each other, we do, but we usually don't specify what kind of currency we're using, it's all part of the same budget in the end. And we don't use cash much. It must have occurred to him that I might look at a bank statement for whatever reason, see a large cash withdrawal and in my own mind would be like - oh it must have been that bike. But I never looked until now, would probably never have looked.

I checked our credit reports, both of ours, and there are no accounts I don't know about.

Anyway I can't keep this in anymore, I have to confront him. It's eating me up inside. He gets home tonight and whether I talk to him before seeing an attorney or at least talking to one by phone is going to depend on how long the wait is to see someone.

Let Mr Anal Beads worry about the extent his mask has been pulled off.

Thank you so much for giving me a laugh, omg!!

I doubt he has an exit plan since he seems so confident of his surefire way to cheat on you and never get caught, but it's good you are checking the financials.

What he does have, ahead of you, is an emotional detachment to you. There is no way to carry on as he has without creating some kind of emotional distance, or, never fully committing emotionally to you in the first place. Intimacy is hurt by betrayal even if only one person knows about it. His attachment to you will not be as strong as yours is to him so he will not have any trouble continuing to lie and gaslight.

He's had years to justify this to himself. And apparently, his fellow wayward warriors have taught him a thing or two. I'd imagine he's read DDay stories and is somewhat prepared with his excuses / cover story. Of course, we all think we are prepared until it actually happens.

That's why your strategy is a good one. You aren't throwing yourself at his feet begging him to confess (when really what you want is for him to make it not true). You know what you believe and you've taken steps to protect yourself. He won't see that coming. And once on his heels he may not have the wherewithal, in that moment, to remember his script. But even if he does, you keep moving.

From my experience bank accounts do not show up on credit reports unless there is a loan or credit card associated with them. I have multiple bank accounts and none of them show up on my credit report. So just because you don't see anything on the credit report doesn't mean he doesn't have a secret bank account.

Everyone else has better advice then me, but I am thinking of you and sending you strength.

I have one very similar, everyone assumes he's this nice guy Boy Scout, he's a serial cheater and liar, business trips, affairs generally about 6 months he was on numerous dating/cheating sites trying to hook up. He's in his 60s. They don't plan, they're too arrogant to think they'll get caught and even if they do, they think you'll never be able to leave because they're soooo irresistible. I would be very surprised he has any plan, mine still doesn't think I'll ever leave his fine ass while I plotting my escape

Part of the "thrill" can be having more than one being interested in being part of the sex. My XWH said the AP said something about "sharing him" that made sense to him at the time. Just ego kibbles for him and not part of my core values.

A benefit to talking to an attorney would be to formulate a plan and get some control of your life.

Nothing you did or didn’t do made him cheat. Nothing you can do will make him stop. You can take back control by creating a plan that keeps you safe. Hugs to you

Sigyn, if possible, meet with an attorney before you confront him! Understand it is so difficult to continue to keep this secret but you need some solid legal advice.

He may just beat you to the punch, if he meets with the attorneys you selected first, that will be the end of your appointments.

If you confront him, stay calm as possible, and never ever reveal your sources. You don't have to tell him about the ex OW contacting you, the secret accounts you found, the withdrawals from the bank. Make sure you have copies of all evidence in a safe spot, more than one copy.

Give him the opportunity to come clean although that's highly unlikely. He'll probably dig himself into a much larger hole than he already has.

Perhaps you should have your sister on notice in case your husband gets violent, you never know how he will react when backed into a corner.

Good luck!

I am so sorry you are here. I will try to keep this short as I know you have a LOT on your plate. But this comment was completely accurate for me, so do yourself the favor of at least considering the comments you like the least...

The harshest comments I got early on here were the ones I needed to hear the most in hindsight.

That being said here are my comments in random order:

1. You will never know the full truth - ever - not even if your WH magically became the unicorn WS and gave you a full blown timeline of everything they ever did and with whom. You will never know the feelings - what they are and were thinking - not 100% completely - ever. With that in mind, the "need" for more information should only relate (right now) to what other info you may need to help you with any future divorce/separation (as you plan on confronting him soon - so get that info now). You will have endless time to try to get more info for "you" later...get the necessary info now so you can start moving forward with your plans. Trauma needs a focus - if you can focus yourself on this task you can help your mind settle a little bit.

2. Get a lawyer or at least talk to one so they can tell you what information you will need if you decide to D so you can get that info to the best of your ability. This is planning - you don't have to take action - but being prepared is necessary now.

3.The other info will be for you, and remember that you can't un-see or un-hear things so be careful with YOURSELF. If you are someone who must know everything they possibly can, then dig away. If you are like me, then having a basic framework was enough. There was a point way later where my WH decided to do some serious info dumping - things I did not know about despite all of my digging - and about 30 minutes in I asked him to stop telling me all the detail as I really was gaining nothing from being told how many episodes of mutual masturbation over facetime occurred - knowing it was "frequent" as in at least three times a week - was more than enough info. For me, it got to a point where getting more info was just pain shopping and hurtful to me - and I was hurt enough. Just ask yourself if you really want to know somethings - there are a few things I wish I didn't have burned into my brain (good news is now - 5 years out - I really don't care about those things either - which brings me to my next point...)

4. This too shall pass. It will. It seems like it never will but it certainly can. IMO the "fastest way" for that to happen is to focus on you - on the things you can control - your health, your relationships with people in your support system, your future plans... The more focus you can put on making a better future for YOU the better you will feel.

[This message edited by ThisIsSoLonely at 4:20 PM, Monday, August 22nd]

Sigyn,

I second all the good advice you have been given here, and will just add two things:

1. Your rash may be scabies. Do a little research and have your doctor (or urgent care) examine you. It is primarily sexualy transmitted.

2. Where there seems a chance that a WS may be reconcilable material, I always recommend "How to Help Your Spouse Heal from Your Affair" - a really concise, practical guide to how to be a "re-builder" and address the faults of the cheater that led to the affair and change that behavior. I advise to read the book yourself (so you know what to look for), mark it up, and then give it to WS with a 48 hour deadline to read it and come talk to you. Your WS will show his true colors then. In your case, I don't think your WS is re-builder material, but it may help you to take the advice anyway so that his refusal to read the book, or procrastination, or outright rejection of the advice, or gaslighting, will confirm for you that he can/will never change. It will help you give up the fantasy (which we all entertained for too long) that "maybe he can change; maybe we can recover from this?"

Good luck to you Dearie - take good care of YOU!

Odonna

No soliciting

[This message edited by WalkinOnEggshelz at 11:36 AM, Tuesday, August 23rd]

Small update, I talked to two lawyers by phone but can't get in to see any until next week, apparently this is a busy season for family attorneys for reasons I don't even want to imagine. I made an in person appointment with the one I liked best, and am waiting for a call back from one other.

I am going to confront tomorrow. Our son is going to sleep over at my sister's with her kids (this is common and we haven't started school so it's not suspicious) and it just killed me when my H, hearing the sleepover plans, was like "Date night?" and smiled into my eyes so warmly. I can't get over how smooth he is. I see real love in his eyes. And then that makes me think more than ever that there's something fundamentally wrong with him, if he can love me for real and then also do these things without any guilt or regret. I want to sink into the familiarity of him like the rest of this is a nightmare I had.

Also I've read everything you all have written over and over. I want to believe there's some loophole I can fall through to make this salvageable. I suddenly feel so weak and so tired of the stress and urgency and panic and fear, we had sex last night (I know I know) because I just wanted my husband, wanted him to comfort me even though he's the one who did this to us. We have always had a really active sex life even after all these years and my mind goes in circles with WHY he needs more than this. More than me. And so much more than me that it wasn't even just someone else, but a lot of someone elses.

It's stupid to think that I could get over one kind of cheating but not another but I still feel like if it was "just" another woman, maybe we could recover. And then I realize fresh all over again that it's not 'something he did' it is 'someone he IS'. Escorts. Multiple escorts. Multiple long term OW. Our whole marriage. There is not a single safe place I can put my memory. Every single memory we've ever created has sex workers and other women in the background. There is no recovering from this. This is my entire adult life, every single year of it, just one of a chorus line of women. It's unthinkable, but it's actually my reality. I must sound like a broken record but I just have the hardest time hammering it into my head.