SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Haven’t been on SI much in a bit, but am coming up on 6 years post Dday. 10/3/16. Wow, 6 years.
Wondering how others in R deal with wedding anniversaries? While we are still
Together and WH continues to work hard in being the best husband and father he can be; affair season happens to include our wedding anniversary which is a struggle.
18 years of marriage, 5 of which post A is an accomplishment, but not one Id announce publicly due to his A….
We celebrate anniversary privately each year and are in agreement we’d like to renew vows in the near future. Has anyone done a vow renewal post A and If so did you choose another date or anniversary?
Thanks all

We haven't done the vow renewal thing. On our anniversaries, we just celebrate us. It IS pretty low key. We like to travel, so we often plan a trip somewhere we haven't been and just have adventures. We don't even really exchange gifts for those, but experiences.

I have taken vow renewal off the table for the foreseeable future. It just feels like another one sided event that only benefits her. I don't think she deserves absolution or intact vows. Maybe that's too harsh, but that's how I feel.

D-Day is 9 days before my anniversary, but we still celebrate it. I kept the anniversary a sort of special demilitarized/rugsweeping allowed day.

I don't regret that decision at all and we have already booked a very fancy dinner for this year.

Thank you both for your feedback. We also keep things low key and was feeling like even dinner out was too much this year.
Vow renewal is probably more important to me than WH, but the day to day work is what
I focus on for now. Too much pressure to feel fully healed and reconciled by a specific date.
Thanks again. Stay well.

I don’t think I would want a vow renewal for a variety of reasons, but if I were in your shoes and thinking about one at some point, I think I’d pick a different day than the original anniversary.

Our 20th anniversary was a month before D-day 1, and my husband’s lies and activity on and around our anniversary remain some of the most painful aspects of his affair. I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to celebrate our anniversary again; it’s been tainted too much.

Instead, I’ve embraced a different activity, which is to do a weekend getaway somewhere nice in a time that ISN’T affair season, and that doesn’t involve me actively trying to overcome mental images of what he was doing on and around our anniversary.

The short version is that I feel like a vow renewal should be a new beginning. Why celebrate it on a day that’s fraught? Tie it to something new and meaningful.

But I also think you’re wise to hold off until it doesn’t make you feel pressured to heal by a certain date. That would ruin it for sure.

Anniversaries can be very difficult for many betrayed spouses, including myself. There are a number of posts and threads about the topic.

I still get my fWW something small for our anniversary each year and usually take her to a nice dinner.

This past year was our 40th anniversary, so as a surprise I booked us a week in a really nice resort that she has been wanting to visit.

She said she did not deserve it and almost did not want to go because she feels so guilty for everything she did, but we went and had a great time.

It may be true that she does not deserve it. I would never say that to her because it seems unnecessarily mean and she has been trying really hard for the past few years to be an awesome wife and mostly succeeds at that.

Also, I do this partly for myself. I want to be able to look myself in the mirror and know that I am a good husband and did not lose my own ability to live with compassion and integrity just because she did for a time (an unfortunately long time).

I also would not want to embarrass her as it would be extremely noticeable to a lot of people if I ignored our anniversary, especially a 40th. I understand that if she was embarrassed it would be something she brought on herself, but I chose to stay and I fully intend to make the best of it and be the best person and husband I can be.

As far as vow renewals, I do not think I would ever do that, although she has never asked. I do not need to renew my vows because I have always kept mine. Also, it does not seem to me that vows are particularly meaningful to her as a former serial cheater, so it would feel like a meaningless gesture to me. Why would her "vows" mean anything to me when I have seen she does not particularly value them or have a problem repeatedly breaking them? In fact, I think it would probably trigger me and I can see myself spiraling now. I may have some work to do here as far as my feelings on this, but I guess it is actually a moot point at this time for me at least. I do really feel fully reconciled and that I have fully forgiven, but it does not mean some things are not still hard to think about.

Best wishes to you!

Our 19th anniversay is tomorrow on the 13th. My Ww moved out a few days after our 2nd anniversary to "find herself" (but actually it was to get one step closer to an in-the-open relationship with AP). I found the anniversary card I wrote her that year saying how the past few years have been the best of my life, how I loved her so much etc and it just makes me sad. It flies in the face of her reasoning that "I didnt seem to care about her" back then. I couldnt find the card she wrote me that year but would have loved to have seen it again just to have an example of how two faced she was.

I wrote a really nice card and bought her a surprise expensive piece of jewelry this year but debating on returning it / not giving her the card or giving her a basic "happy anniversary" card because its hitting me again.