SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I hope all is going well for you and your son, Sigyn. I was glad to see your thread pop up today, as I’ve been thinking of you a lot and check in on this thread often to see if there have been any updates. I imagine you’re moving forward and finding your way.

A couple of new arrivals have made me think of you and your situation lately. It’s sad how many are going through this. You and this thread have so much collected wisdom. I’ve seldom seen someone able to navigate the unfathomable with such grace.

Whoever bumped this thread, I hope that newcomers will discover the wisdom of so many posters here and especially in the strength and clarity that Sigyn shared with all of us.

And Sigyn, I hope you’ll check back in sometime to update us on how life is going. Sending you hugs, sister.

@NowWhat106. thank you! I asked to have this reopened so I could update and then I took a deep breath and read back through the entire thread while I was waiting. It is so so painful to relive those early days and I cried reading some of the things I wrote, thought, felt and hoped for. I can't even remember posting some of those things. And I could viscerally feel that awful first confrontation all over again. But it feels so different to read what all of you wrote to me in those early days with new eyes. You all told me everything that would happen, you told me who my husband was inside, you shared your own stories that ended up paralleling mine, you gave me all of the right advice. I kept nodding along as I'm re-reading yesterday like yep, yep, that happened, yep, nailed it, turned out that was also right. And just the collective wisdom and connections everyone drew, so spot on - I think that even more now that I'm in a slightly better place with a tiny bit more perspective but even back then the emotional grounding was clearly helping me in such dark moments. I owe you all so much thanks and more.

Turns out that divorce doesn't end the emotional rollercoaster (official as of November 6th) but there is a new space to breathe on this side of it, and I'm trying to focus on that breathing space now. And it's weird but the thing that actually feels like a new leaf isn't being single - I still don't feel single, I might post in another forum to figure out what I'm supposed to feel now - but the actual new leaf was moving out of my former marital home and into my new home. I didn't realize until we moved that the marital home was the source of an ungodly amount of stress and anxiety, looking back it was like living in a crime scene.

A few new revelations about xWH came out in the last couple of months - the worst of it was I found a cloud backup of one of xWH's old laptops from maybe 10 years ago, searched it and found that he tested positive for Herpes I antibodies and he photoshopped the results to send to one of his OW. The original test was HSV-1 (pos) and HSV-2 (neg) and he copied the antibody level info from the negative result and photoshopped it onto the positive one, saved as a new file. This predates my pregnancy, which means he didn't disclose this even once I was pregnant. Of course it also means he exposed his million partners who came after that as well, but at this point I care more about myself and my son. My attorney knows, I chose not to pursue it legally despite that being an option in our state - but I did tell the Whistlesucker OW and also gave her the info she needs in case she would like to pursue it legally. I tested negative a year ago after dday, but had another much more extensive set of tests for every conceivable STD recently (still negative!) and xWH has to pay for annual testing for me for the next 5 years. So that's awful.

The cloud backup also included a few videos of xWH jerking off in the shower, and nudes of two different women and one man. It also had enough info to piece together the pathetic saga of xWH trying to get involved in the swinger community as a solo man and being shut out, after which he discovered sex clubs and had memberships at at least two. It also yielded some info about an OW from the state we used to live in, which helped our forensic accountant to add to the estimate of the amount of money xWH spent on sexwork and his longer term affair trips, gifts, memberships, etc. The total was in the mid tens of thousands of dollars. Unbelievable. Just so fucked up and self indulgent and grotesque.

Also - how did he have the time?? I swear you would think that he was never home or was a traveling salesman living life on the road, but he wasn't! He travels for work a lot (obviously not as much as I thought though) but otherwise was generally mostly home at night. I would have characterized him as a homebody! But then he also works from home, so I think most of this happened during the day and the rest on real or fake work trips. I'll never know.

And on that note I'm not going to follow up on any of the other women or men or expenses I found, I'm never going to look for anything else, and I think back on wanting to know more about what xWH did and I realize you all were right the entire time - that it doesn't matter. I don't need to know. I will never know why, I can't really figure out the 'how', and I know enough of the what and when and who to last me a lifetime. My sister is the only one who knows all the details and I gave her all of my info to lock away so it's not in my new home. I can't figure out if I need to save any of it now that the divorce is final, if I'll ever want or need it? I can't imagine, it seems like it's a huge pile of radioactive waste. Any advice? Ditch it? Keep it? What do people do with all of the infidelity evidence afterwards?

On the positive side we have a new house! My son and I call it the Tree House because it has a huge deck built around a beautiful old tree! And is otherwise also surrounded by them! I gave myself the smallest bedroom, something about the master bedroom just screams 'marital bedroom' to me and when I tried sleeping in there I had a panic attack. I just feel the need to be in a small, manageable space right now. I hate that I feel so traumatized, I'm back and forth with feeling occasional waves of fury at xWH for this, but I also realize that the divorce and move gave me the space to start dealing with a lot I was holding back through all of this.

Another positive thanks to the suggestions from everyone here, my son is now in fencing class and I'm taking aerial dance! I'm terrible! And I totally love it, it's very athletic and will eventually be graceful, maybe, and it requires all my concentration and a shocking amount of muscle! I've passed the stage where I'm just doing floor and mat work and starting climbing and a few simple moves from there. It was a great suggestion, to enroll in a class outside my comfort zone! I hope I never have a close friend who goes through something like this, but if they do I'll share this advice with them, too, it's been a lifesaver!

Oh Sigyn,

What an awesome update!

You are so very resilient.

I smiled wide when I read:

My son and I call it the Tree House because it has a huge deck built around a beautiful old tree!

That is lovely.

I smiled again when I read about your aerial dancing...and your very honest self-assessment.

You are rocking it in so many ways.

Even in your struggles (how you've handled where to keep the evidence and your reaction to sleeping in the master bedroom), you show such resilience as you overcome obstacles and find solutions.

I get that your struggle isn't over, but you are such a beacon of hope for people who aren't as far down the path as you. So, thank you for taking the time to update.

Best wishes in your continued healing!

What an amazing update, Sigyn! Just so full of the joys and adventures of your new life. It gave me such huge smiles today to see your update today.

I have reread here too. This thread is such a great collection of wisdom and support and sisterhood with you at the center, steering a bumpy course through such difficult waters. You and your story inspired so many to contribute, and your own posts are some of the most insightful and helpful for the new BS. I wish we could keep it near the top of the list so that new BS would come across it quickly.

I loved hearing about your new tree house, you and your son’s classes, and your continuing puzzles about what to do with what is now old information, no longer relevant to your new life. May we all get to that point in our own ways.

It’s so good to hear from you! Hope you won’t be a stranger. You’ve got a lot to offer by example. Looking forward to hearing your next post when you report that your outer aerial grace has equaled your inner grace.

Huge hugs! You’ve been missed!

Nice to hear from you Sigyn. What a legend. I thought of this thread recently when reading about the chap whose wife was cheating and siphoning money off from their business. This is different level of deception to the mid-life crisis type cheater. Of course that's bad but this stuff is psychopathic and scary.

Did anyone recommend Dr Omar Minwalla's work on sexual infidelity and trauma in this thread? Worth a look.

Great to hear back from you Sigyn. What an over all positive update.

This, however:

A few new revelations about xWH came out in the last couple of months - the worst of it was I found a cloud backup of one of xWH's old laptops from maybe 10 years ago, searched it and found that he tested positive for Herpes I antibodies and he photoshopped the results to send to one of his OW. The original test was HSV-1 (pos) and HSV-2 (neg) and he copied the antibody level info from the negative result and photoshopped it onto the positive one, saved as a new file. This predates my pregnancy, which means he didn't disclose this even once I was pregnant. Of course it also means he exposed his million partners who came after that as well, but at this point I care more about myself and my son.

Made my blood boil yet again. My god.

I have made the comment to others in the past who are wrestling with whether or not to R or D their traitorous "spouse" that the WS represent the single greatest threat to the well being of the BS save for other extreme extraneous circumstances. This guy is clearly that on an exponential scale.

I couldnt help but be reminded of what I posted to you many pages back as everything was being revealed due to your valiant and dogged efforts:

You are now past his veneer. Youve peeled back the first layer and found rot. You peeled a bit more and found more rot. Chances are very good thats all youll find from here on out.

Turns out he is, as they say, rotten to the core.

Now, on to your new beginning. All I can say is fabulous! I am so excited for you.

This comment was very poignant:

I didn't realize until we moved that the marital home was the source of an ungodly amount of stress and anxiety, looking back it was like living in a crime scene.

Ill bet. Getting out of that house of horrors had to be incredibly relieving, as in one giant trigger out of your life once and for all.

Now to this:

I might post in another forum to figure out what I'm supposed to feel now - but the actual new leaf was moving out of my former marital home and into my new home.

Myself being decades into my own new beginning, one thing I had to work through was the ""when will the other shoe drop" and "looking over my shoulder" symptomal after effects of long exposure to extreme trauma, aka, ptsd. You may or may not have this but if you do, its normal and will fade over time. I hope you stay in good therapy to keep working through it. I also, wierdly, had a sense of guilt over being so happy. Almost like saying, " Is this really ok?" This too is part of ptsd and a kind of survivor guilt. It also passed in time. If any of this resonates with you then I hope this will help.

Heres to ever increasing brighter days for you and that great son of yours as you build your new reality full of life and love and wonderful memories in that new "tree house".🥂

I sincerely hope you will keep posting here both for yourself and as a contributor to other threads. You are an excellent communicator and have a lot of insight to offer others as they work through their own cyclones of infidelity.

Sigyn,

I was so hoping this was bumped so you would post. It is great to hear from you. I smiled at the treehouse, the fencing and the ariel dancing. Finding joy in your freedom. Awesome.

I can't predict the future but I feel pretty sure that now that the legal stuff is over and you are in your new space, your healing will speed up exponentially.

As for the affair / double life evidence, smart to put it somewhere else. Maybe when your healing is further along or complete, you'll want to have a ceremonial burning of that dark time in your life. For now, you are still traumatized and healing. Maybe holding on to it feels safe for now, like your traumatized brain says "keep it just in case!" Down the road, when you are healed and ready to release the past, light it on fire and let the wind carry off it's ashes. :)

How is your son doing with the divorce?

Thank you for sharing your update, Sigyn!

I am sure the divorce process with your disordered husband was difficult and he went off the rails at times. Has he settled into his new normal and become more stable in his interactions with you? Does he still act bananas and try to be the victim?

Sigyn,
I was brand new to this site around the time you started this thread. I think actually that this may be my first post in this thread. It’s true - you’re a legend here. What you went through, and how you survived all of this is nothing short of remarkable. How you shared your story, every new hurt, every new revelation, all of us could feel that hurt and pain emanating from your posts. But you also showed us that despite everything you were going through you were first and foremost a woman of incredible strength, courage and bravery. I share your insight on how leaving your marital home was such a weight lifted - that your home was a source of so much pain, anxiety, horrible memories - you likened it to living in a crime scene. I can definitely relate. After my fWH’s affair in 2012, the ONLY thing that made sense to me was to move, sell the house, get out, get as far away as possible from the home, the neighborhood, the town. You now have a new home, a new place to make new memories with your son. The trauma is still there - every betrayed will carry that trauma with them; but you’re now in a place where you can start to heal and build your future in a home not tainted with the memories and sins of your xWH. As for the evidence you still have of his secret life; I like the suggestion from TheEnd

when you are healed and ready to release the past, light it on fire and let the wind carry off it's ashes. :)

I hope you drop in from time to time and continue to share and update on you and your son’s progress. All of us wish you nothing but the best in life. You deserve that.

Wonderful update!!! Onward and upward. I love that your son does fencing. My daughter started that at 9 and she still does it at 19. She loves it. And when she went to college she made a lot of friends in the fencing club at her school!

[This message edited by childofcheater at 3:58 PM, Friday, November 10th]

@Vez

Did anyone recommend Dr Omar Minwalla's work on sexual infidelity and trauma in this thread? Worth a look.

No! I just looked it up and found a summary of his book with this as one of the subjects addressed: "Living on Top of the Secret Sexual Basement without Knowing It" Holy moley, that was me in our marital home. I'm going to read more, and thank you!

@DobleTraicion, you were right. I peeled back the rotten layers hoping to find my husband, and I found worsening rot with every new layer discovered. I think I stopped looking before seeing it all, each new revelation felt so traumatic that at some point it felt like I was just harming myself by looking further. Also you wrote

I also, wierdly, had a sense of guilt over being so happy. Almost like saying, " Is this really ok?" This too is part of ptsd and a kind of survivor guilt.

I love that you felt happy enough to feel guilty about it at a certain point! I hope I do!! I feel a weird kind of survivors guilt when I think of how sick x is, like only one of us survived our marriage intact and it was me? But I also recognize that on the most intimate level he doesn't think there's anything inherently wrong with what he's done, so he might very well be thriving in the future with the freedom to do all of the same things as before. I don't know. I haven't reached happiness yet, but I wonder how I'll feel when that hits. I wonder if I'll feel guilty or scared that it will be taken from me.

@TheEnd - my son is struggling, honestly. He's been in therapy since almost the beginning and that's given us a lot of structure and has also helped me help him, but he's experienced his dad moving out, the death of our dog, the divorce and now a move in just over a year. xWH now lives in the marital home but when our son stays there it's his familiar home minus his mother, so it's not as comforting as I'd thought it would be for him? A house is just a house, a home is a place with love and comfort, friends and family and pets. That house, my old house, didn't have those things automatically - they had them from the people who lived in it and one of those people was actively destroying those very things that made it our home. And so I think it's bewildering for both xWH and our son to be in a place that felt like home and have the home feeling missing. It actually makes me incredibly sad, honestly for xWH as well. But mostly for my innocent son.

We've already had a family party at our new home, we moved into a neighborhood near a few of my son's friends, and of course my sister and her kids are always over, so our new home is still feeling new but it starting to feel like home. I hope.

@BigMamma

Has he settled into his new normal and become more stable in his interactions with you? Does he still act bananas and try to be the victim?

It's exhausting. I don't know if he's settled in, he's in fake cordial mode. Whenever he's struggling with emotions he puts on a fake cheerful facade that sounds, looks and feels as fake as it is. Picture trying to have a conversation with Amazon Live Chat, or AI - it's like that. There was no way he could really hide his actions when the forensic accounting came out, so he now has this narration that I somehow 'manipulated' him and 'scammed' him (as far as I know no one has been told how) and he tells mutual friends the divorce was 'mutual' and that our marriage had been declining for 'years'. I don't think xWH knows that I haven't told any of our mutual friends why we divorced. I think he's been trying to create a counter narrative that our marriage was falling apart so that if he was confronted by someone about infidelity, he'd have the excuse that our marriage was ending for years and so his behavior was just jumping the gun on dating, not actually as bad as it sounded? Something like that.

But of course I haven't told anyone any details, I'm sickened by them and it would embarrass any normal person hearing them. I'm sure our friends are talking about it privately and probably reached the correct conclusion, but nothing has come from me. At this point I can't bear to talk about the divorce itself... it's just more trauma on top of all the rest. But yes, acting bananas and like the victim is a good way to describe it.

How is your own divorce going? I'll have to check in to see if you've posted more about it. I hope it's smooth?

@Blackbird

After my fWH’s affair in 2012, the ONLY thing that made sense to me was to move, sell the house, get out, get as far away as possible from the home, the neighborhood, the town.

Same same same. I'm out of the neighborhood, but still have to drive our son to the old house which is pukey! When xWH gets back from his latest trip we're going to transition to picking up and dropping off from school. Even turning down my old street gives me anxiety! Moving homes is the most comforting thing in the world - and as someone who hates moving, this is truly something I never in a million years thought I'd say!

What a great update regarding your divorce, new tree filled home and new hobbies. We are all so happy for you and your son and hope he is adjusting well.

It sounds like you are doing very well, all things considered. It seems like your X’s secret pit had no bottom and I’m so sorry for the last ick you discovered. I would treat that like tax records, destroy in a few years, but have it nowhere near your new life. Bad juju. I hope your support system is still solid and you find peace from all this mess in the busy years ahead. Enjoy your son, they grow so fast! Best to you.

And I have to agree, the collective wisdom in your posts and responses is invaluable here. Thank you for sharing your journey with us so honestly and openly.

each new revelation felt so traumatic that at some point it felt like I was just harming myself by looking further.

How could it not be??!!! I was appalled at each new degenerate revelation that you related while you were on the receiving end of discovering all of that sludge. Im glad you went into self preservation mode and stopped peeling all of that that rottenness.

I love that you felt happy enough to feel guilty about it at a certain point! I hope I do!!

I have a high level of confidence that you will. At the risk of sounding cliche; time, self -investment, and filling your life with new memories will aid in seeing this traumatic chapter of your life fade in your rearview.

But I also recognize that on the most intimate level he doesn't think there's anything inherently wrong with what he's done, so he might very well be thriving in the future with the freedom to do all of the same things as before.

I wouldnt say "thriving" any more than a junky thrives after getting their next fix. Hes a bottomless pit of debauchery and I doubt that any of his habits will ever sate his desires. Tragic really. I pity him. One things for sure, his man -card is, by his own hand, revoked in perpetuity imo.

I haven't reached happiness yet, but I wonder how I'll feel when that hits. I wonder if I'll feel guilty or scared that it will be taken from me.

Again, I have a high level of confidence that the well spring of happiness and joy will surface once again in your soul and that you will be able to overcome any residual dampening effects.

All the best to you and your son.

~ DT

[This message edited by DobleTraicion at 10:39 PM, Saturday, November 11th]

Wow Sigyn! What an awesome update. So glad you and son are moving towards healing (with support!), engaging in new hobbies and building new traditions. Passage of time does help healing, and as you gradually feel more safe, secure and in control of your own destiny I'm confident hyper-vigilance around having hard won happiness "taken" will dissipate.

I sincerely hope you will keep posting here both for yourself and as a contributor to other threads. You are an excellent communicator and have a lot of insight to offer others as they work through their own cyclones of infidelity.

Second this sentiment. Sometimes I wonder if spending time here picking at my infidelity scars could be harmful to my infidelity/PTSD recovery. It always felt okay to jump in here - even helpful for recovery - because if I help just one person get through their nightmare by sharing my nightmare, that helps me. Do what you need to do to build confidence in your safety and security, and eventually heal. If it's too soon to spend time here, that's understandable. Take care of you first. Hope spending time here helping others can help YOU navigate the next phases of infidelity recovery. Your example, wisdom and experiences could be a beacon of hope for other BS who find themselves here.

I can't figure out if I need to save any of it now that the divorce is final, if I'll ever want or need it? I can't imagine, it seems like it's a huge pile of radioactive waste. Any advice? Ditch it? Keep it?

Cassandra has an opinion about this - of course :-). Just as you had the foresight to include years of STI testing expense in the settlement - just in case, Cassandra thinks it's wise to preserve the evidence - just in case. Hope it's never needed. BUT - EXH is truly disordered, so it's difficult to know the depths of his debauchery, or predict how his past (or future) heinous behaviors may impact you and son. You may want to revisit child supervision or other D agreements, etc. Or, as you theorized in an earlier post, there may be others he victimized. That evidence may come in handy to help protect you and son, or help some other unfortunate victim. Having your sister hang onto it hopefully keeps it out of sight out of mind, so seems prudent to preserve it. At least until your son is old enough to make his own decisions about spending supervision time with EXH. Knowledge is power. That evidence has power! It may be good to have it - just in case.

[This message edited by BoundaryBuilder at 11:45 PM, Tuesday, November 14th]

Great update, thanks!

So glad to hear you are recovering and life is finding a new normal. Distance and time will also to help you realize hos choices are just that his choices and you have no shame to bear im any of this.

I'm happy that you are trying new things and working on being happy.