SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

[This message edited by FromADistance at 12:04 AM, Tuesday, November 22nd]

Welcome to SI. If you are seeking help from WS ask a Mod to move this to General.

Also you can ask questions in "I can Relate" BS questions for WS. Best Wishes to you.

Edit: To answer your questions. My WWs initial remorse was phony, self preservation. When I found her messages to her friend missing the AP I cut her out and headed for a lawyer. I was absolutely headed for divorce and I wasn’t bluffing. She begged for another chance and for the first time I had the upper hand and I called the shots. It took drastic action to pop the A bubble and lift the fog. I do believe they are in a fog of fantasy or LaLa land. Once she stepped outside it and looked back, she was horrified.

[This message edited by Tanner at 6:17 PM, Wednesday, September 28th]

[This message edited by FromADistance at 12:04 AM, Tuesday, November 22nd]

They cannot respond here. Start a new topic "Mod Please". Ask them to move it.

[This message edited by FromADistance at 12:04 AM, Tuesday, November 22nd]

Hello From a distance,

I'm sorry you are here, but welcome to the club no one ever wanted to join. Others will come along with a lot of sage advice.

I understand where your are coming from and the framing of the situation. It sounds like you are trying to fit your WW's actions into a paradigm where logic and rules held sway. All I'll say is trying to place the facts of infidelity within the confines of a logic problem is an exercise in futility. Logic and rational thought never entered the picture.

One description would be your wayward putting a gun to the head of your marriage and blaming you because they repeatedly pulled the trigger. Usually by the time they get to that point they've already convinced themselves of a multitude of imagined offenses on the part of their BS. I liken it to having a form of dementia. When you add massive doses of "feel good" brain chemicals, family of origin issues (ie a crappy childhood), personality disorders, etc it feels like someone released the kraken into your life and they're it.

However, if you've read here long enough you also know there are many former waywards who were able to dismantle all of those issues in their lives and successfully reconciled with their BS. They'll also be the first to admit they were responsible for their own issues, not their BS. It comes down to what your WW is actually doing vs what she's saying. What is she doing that demonstrates she truly loves you and is committed to you? Is she in IC? Is she demonstrating in tangible ways her love and commitment? Can she see and understand what she has done to you and her family? What does that look like for you? Her words are meaningless.

Hope this helps some.Just my 2 cents. As I said, others will come along with much better insights. Remember to take care of yourself right now.

I'll answer in regard to my WW.

1) They are responsible for seriously damaging another human being, emotionally, sexually, other ways.

Seriously damaging. She doesn't care.

2) If family and friends are impacted, the WS hurt and betrayed them.

Hurt, and betrayed, yes. Again, she doesn't care. Only thing that matters is how it affects HER.

3) They feel shame projected at them from all of these groups, and their self-esteem is destroyed - ironically, which maybe lacked in the first place that led to the affair.She apparenlty isn't really affected by this either.

4) This is just the emotional side. They may have split up the family, or be forced to move from their home, lose their children, quit their job, other impacts.Yes. She willingly moved out of our home to live with her AP. She's "happy".

5) Then there's the general social judgement of slut-shaming, or he's a pig that they feel they are wearing like a facial scar. Well...I can't imagine she's going to volunteer to others that she's an adulterer. Her family knows, but she's now estranged or on very awkward terms with them all. I think some of her frineds who are mutuals with the AP probably don't care. She's done with me, my family and friends so she wouldn't be bothered by those reactions.

See a pattern here? Lack of shame, contrition, empathy, remorse etc...Normal, mentally well-adjusted people can't act like this. She managed to compartmentalize basically two independent lives as she carried out a nearly two year affair before leaving for AP. You have to be somewhere close to being a sociopath to pull that off. A normal person would be eaten alive by that level of deciet and the associated guilt. Many of these people don't feel that; at all. That's why they are horrific reconciliation candidates. Those that do have these trait and attempt reconciliation gnerally only do so becuase plan "A" didn't work out and now the NEED you as plan "B". Unitl they find another plan "A".

[This message edited by Troutman523 at 7:32 PM, Wednesday, September 28th]

Hard enough to define an emotion and state that it exists.

Virtually impossible to diagnose "why" an emotion exists. Even in a normal healthy relationship, "Why do you love me?" isn't some easy question to answer. And if the answer is just, "Because who you are" or "because you are you", which is close to the reason you state as appropriate for the source of love (They should want me for what I am). That just buries it into the question of "what are you". Then what portions of that are valid for motivating love. Surely loving you because you make a lot of money isn't going to be satisfying either, but if you do happen to make a lot of money, that is part of who you are.

You are going down a rabbit hole with no satisfactory answers.

Better to accept that the emotions exist as described and ask yourself if you are satisfied with your life as it is. Kinda hard to really believe a liar, but that's why we ask the second part. If we aren't satisfied. If we are anxious, if we need something else from the WS, try to put that into words.

If she can really, truly, definitively point out the source of love and what constitutes love in a way that is even understandable and agreeable to a significant fraction of people, she would be one of the world's leading philosophers on love.

[This message edited by FromADistance at 12:04 AM, Tuesday, November 22nd]

All your questions are exactly why I, and its not a slam on anyone who thinks otherwise, rarely see R as being possible with a WS.
Not that some aren't worth it, I guess, I just dont buy into the "I didnt mean to hurt them" or "I love my (insert BH/BW here)". I literally do not believe that anyone who does this truly loves their spouse. Yes, many claim to, but I feel more like they relearn it or regrow it, if you will.
I've yet to figure out how anyone can reconcile. It takes a sh*tty person to kiss their spouse goodbye in the morning, with an "I love you, have a good day" knowing that later they'll be having sex with someone else. Thats a special kind of cruel, one I feel, for me at least, can't be overcome. Though some do, but I tend to see the WS starting with a guilt love and eventually it becoming real love again later. I dont know if I am weak or strong in this, but I couldnt see sticking around to find out if it became real again. Mine sure as hell wouldnt be, and wasn't, the moment I knew what happened. Some of us can't relearn trust when the transgression is bad enough.
I get where you're going with that suddenly they find how amazingly great and wonderful their BS is, I won't go into exactly what my opinion on that one is because it wouldnt go over well. I'd say all those ego kibbles and endless sex with someone else made our greatness just accidentally slip their mind and once we said "Hey maybe we can save this" it suddenly all came rushing back.
The problem is people are people. People who lie, as WS do, make everything they say/do/claim suspect. Everything you wrote rings true to me. They become professional phonies residing in our lives, letting us believe we have a great life together, and maybe being one of those couples that reach the 50+ anniversaries and then we find out we were had. Top to bottom, it was all a lie, at some point that became a daily lie we didnt know we were living in. We weren't worth the truth.
All that said, if you can work past it, I really wish you well. Some WS are genuinely remorseful and hopefully yours is.

  Moving to General

I think you're on to something. And I would add that some people are particularly moved by the injured and the hurt. It triggers their nurturing side which may be a strong part of the dynamic you are describing.

However, isn't this why we want to see actions, not just words? Isn't this why we want to see sustained effort over a significant period of time? Because someone who has just convinced themselves due to this dynamc will not be able to sustain it unless they really feel it. And it is possible that the start of it may be bolstered by this dynamic but that true feeling may come from that initial wave. Just like true love develops over time and is not the initial feeling we have when we first meet or date.

Just my 0.02 here but I do think you're focusing too much on what she SAYS. I get that because I did it too. But the thing is, words are meaningless after dday. She can SAY she loves you and that you're great etc, but if she's not TREATING you as such, those words are just hot air.

"Love" is actions, not words.

Also, though I get it (again because I did it), you've gotta be careful not to ascribe your own thoughts and emotions to your ws. I did that early on, "he's feeling ashamed" (cus that's how I would feel), or "he's acting like a giant douche because he's having a hard time dealing with seeing how much he's hurt me" (cus I'd feel horrible if I hurt someone like that).

The problem with that in my case is that I made a lot of excuses for him because of how I PERCEIVED and interpreted his feelings. What I should have done was hold his feet to the fire and bail the second he said it was too hot. Because truthfully for my xwh, he didn't want to fix things. He didn't want to do the work. He didn't want our marriage. He wanted to stay married to me for the stability and have his side piece for the fun. I spent a lot of months after dday doing some pretty hard mental gymnastics to make myself believe that he wanted to fix stuff.

As hard as it is, try to focus on YOUR feelings and needs. It's your ww's job to figure out hers.

My husband traveled when we were young and he did not have affairs, he cheated, I assume one night stands. I was told but when you are a young mother, totally financially dependent on your very successful H, you bury it under a thick rug and move on. I don’ think his love was ever as committed as mine until we were married a long time. In fact, I find some resentment from him from time to time creeping in him. It took me years to figure out why. I had a wonderful childhood with lots of freedom, loving parents and a huge extended family. My husband was one of many children of a too weary mother who did not have the time to nurture them. She was a sweet woman but her life was constant cooking, cleaning, etc to give any of them much of herself. Childhood matters and mine was built on solid rock. It gave me a good sense of self worth. My H has to talk himself out of perceived resentments of his. I remind him his parents did the best they could but that does not overcome what was missing.
All this to say you are trying to put feelings into the logic box and they don’t fit. Cheating isn’t logical because it means that the ws is lying all day, every single day. It rips your colored glasses off your face forever. A very humble ws who is appalled at their behavior does not understand the pain they caused. The affair is over so let’s just move right along. Nudging you in the back because you are not moving fast enough.

I don’t blame you for being suspicious of a suddenly devoted loving spouse. "Who are you and what have you done with my wife?" She doesn’t get that you will never trust her completely again. She is hoping you will. You can reconcile if she sticks to her dedication to do better but that takes a long time. See how she is several months down the road. Guilt has a shelf life but bs do not care. They want their pound of flesh. It takes a lot of cooperation between the two to get past the lying, cheating life one of them had been living. You need to look at what you both brought to the marriage from genetics to childhood issues. Sometimes they are so powerful that they need to be addressed before the marriage can be focused on.

FAD,

My thinking is along the same lines as what EllieKMAS posted.

What you are hearing is that you are the best thing around, better than sliced bread. The embodiment of perfection in a spouse.

The WS usually says things like that to overcompensate for the betrayal. To try and apply a salve to the BSs wounded psyche, and hoping that it will work.

Well, those words will only help for a short while unless backed up by consistent action over time.

Humans usually pick up on subliminal observations, and if those observations of the actions by the WS do not match up with the words, the the BS continues to feel uncomfortable.

It is also a well known fact that WS lie.... a lot. The common excuse is that they did not want to hurt the BSs feelings anymore. The truth is, they do that to try and save themselves. Hence the advice is always to observe the actions rather than hearing what is said.

'Actions speak louder than words.'

Edit: Typo

[This message edited by RocketRaccoon at 5:49 AM, Monday, October 3rd]

[This message edited by FromADistance at 12:05 AM, Tuesday, November 22nd]

Hey FromADistance,

First off and most important: Logic failed me in my search for answers. Infidelity is beast mode, whether one is conducting it or surviving it, lizard brain triumphed over all my paralysis of over analysis. I read 31 relationship books, some only covering infidelity, visited other sites on the subject, and did eight months of IC (never ever thought I would spend one minute of my life with a counselor), with an IC who turned out to be a BS himself. I was at SI so much they took me in as one of their own, I was even part of the amazing all volunteer staff for a short time. All in my pursuit of answers that made sense. Ultimately, I had to live through my own experiences to find my own path through.

My WW did start IC, but it's the comments about me being amazing, and so great to be with. I don't know what to think of it. If she was "crazy" in the affair, can't she be crazy now and that's where these comments come from? Suddenly, I'm deified because she betrayed me? I've never known anyone as amazing as the person she now describes me as being. How is all this not bullshit, and therefore, how is the desire to get back together not some kind of bullshit, too?

To find whether your wife’s ‘new’ feelings are intentional AND true — that takes time.

My wife wasn’t crazy during her infidelity. She was deliberate, cold, calculating and as carefully deceitful as any WS who ever made similar choices.

No WS is owed a last chance. So, I do think there is some level of being grateful for one more opportunity to show their best self to you and the world. But it isn’t enough fuel to rebuild a relationship. That grateful vibe lasts a few moths. Way too much consistent work for any gamesmanship.

For me, it is about the total sum of a human to determine worth. Who is my wife overall? How is she with our sons, my family, her family, her friends, the people who work for her, etc.? Some WS are bad people choosing bad and some are good people choosing bad. I have found among the hundreds of stories here, the WS who betrays their own standards and self interest are the ones who tend to have a better launching spot to becoming a safer, better person and partner.

Infidelity is indefensible. It’s a tough place to start when considering the possibility of staying with someone who ripped your beating heart out of your chest and waffle stomped it and then wishes for a ‘do over.’

And yet, logic dictates the very real existence of mitigating circumstances.

My wife’s family never understood the concept of love, at least not healthy love. That doesn’t excuse her choices, but it means my wife had a steeper learning curve than most about love. To be honest, my family sucked at it too. There seems to be a good chance none of us truly know it or understand ‘real’ love until we are backed against a wall. The test should have been bounced with healthy boundaries. Instead, my wife did the epic fail.

In my case, my wife’s family friend AP got all he wanted and dumped her harshly like a bad habit. That kind of killed the fantasy bubble right there. Whatever my wife thought it was, it sure the Hell wasn’t love.

Then she decided what I didn’t know couldn’t possibly hurt me. So, she chose to take this A secret to her grave.

But love — as I understand it now — is something that can’t fully be realized when one person is unable to be all in and vulnerable, because if the truth were known, the M would be over. The secret created distance. I had always known something had gone wrong with family friend guy. The answers were never consistent. That contributed to a marriage that was strained, at best.

Thus, the confession, 18-years after the fact.

My wife didn’t stay out of guilt or obligation, she stayed because some part of her always ‘liked’ me, wanted to be around me. The truth, she hoped, would finally allow some chance at authenticity and a shot at real love.

She is still the most surprised person on the planet that I stuck around.

As with every single betrayed spouse, I questioned her motives.

The primary answer to me, is the same as with every other relationship that works. It is based on connection. It is based on turning to each other versus turning away (and yeah, that’s a Gottman term, but I think they got a couple things right).

Is part of our connection due to betrayal?

It HAS to be.

That’s the biggest adversity possible, and conquering that is absolutely a team building event. I used to say, we are together DESPITE the horror show, but the truth is, that was the reset point. The new foundation is built on those ashes of the previous foundation burned to the ground.

I will always accept the facts as they happened, but I never have to okay with those facts of infidelity. I can always hate what happened and I will.

So where does the love come from? Our shared history, the good, the bad, the horrible, the fun, anguish, parenting, walking the pups, laughter and tears.

I trust her feelings now more than ever. It helps that the love is battle tested.

I’m not "suddenly" the greatest guy ever, but I am the only one who sees my wife, flaws and all, and loves her…..anyway. Which, in fact, makes me kind of cool in her eyes. Is any level of the love based on — because she could have or should have lost me? Sure. But it is a tiny part of a larger picture in our long lives together. As is the infidelity, regardless of the devastation it caused. It doesn’t define me, and I don’t define her by it.

[This message edited by Oldwounds at 6:23 PM, Thursday, September 29th]

You're right. I am assuming her emotions. I've avoided big discussions on this with her for a month. To be honest, I think I'm scared of her. I'm terrified of talking with her about these things.
She feels like a witch whose spell I got out from, and one word could bring me back. Even that feels silly to type because her personality isn't like that (wasn't like that, maybe really was? I don't know the verbs to use).
She was bubbly, brilliant, insightful, easy to talk to. I don't think this is a co-dependent thing either. I never felt weak around her, and she also said I was the strong one. She
just feels like an alien. I know I need some closure, and maybe some questions answered. I just wish she didn't even exist at this time. She just represents more pain.

I think the fear part is pretty normal. But I think it's important to define it.

Are you terrified of her? Or are you scared to say what YOU need and want because you think she'll bail?

Are you scared that one word will bring you back under her spell? Or are you scared that you're buying the pretty words when you know deep down that her actions aren't backing them up?

Are you feeling weak? Or are you just overwhelmed with a bunch of emotions that you really don't even know how to deal with?

For me, I WAS scared as shit for months after dday. Scared to say or do anything, for fear of 'scaring him off'. I was always the strong person too, and dday didn't make me weak - it just threw a whole bunch of stuff at me that I mentally didn't even know where to start dealing with it. It took me time to get my emotional legs back under me and find some solid mental ground to stand on. I did that by stopping looking at HIM, stopping focusing on HIS feelings. Instead I started looking at ME - what did I want? What did I need? I had (with the best of intentions) gotten into a bad habit of always putting his wants and needs first, and that was a very foreign-feeling shift for me to instead prioritize myself.

In my case, once I did start laying down boundaries and speaking up, he totally bailed and we got divorced. That sucked and it hurt, but the truth of it was he had bailed already and me trying to 'work on things' was just prolonging my pain and suffering. My biggest regret with my situation is that I didn't speak up sooner. I did the false R thing for 9 months and I could have saved myself the additional bullshit after dday if I had just said NO.

[This message edited by FromADistance at 12:05 AM, Tuesday, November 22nd]

FaD I hope you stick around because IMHO I think you need to.

I read your other post and you weren't accused of being a WS at all that I can see. I think what was being said is that you should share a little more of YOUR specific story and then ask your questions. While reading other's posts is helpful, you are asking a community to give you specific answers about your situation when when you haven't really shared much about it.

I get the need in the early days (where you are) to try to find some rational logical box to put the feelings in. That's the bargaining stage of the grief process - if I can fit *this* feeling into *this* tidy little mental box, then I can understand it. Man, I SO did that too. I get it.

But the thing is - from what I've read here, you're banging your head on a wall trying to rationalize her affair, and my friend, affairs just are NOT rational. Ever. You're also going squiggly-eyed trying to find her why's. BTDT myself. If you can find the *reason*, then you can do A, B, and C to make sure it never happens again right? But that's not how it works. And that's because HER affair has NOTHING to do with YOU. Her affair is all about her and her brokenness. I really struggled with that early on - it's hard to wrap your head around it when their choices have damaged you so very badly. But really you are just collateral damage in her war with herself. It sucks bigtime.

SI saved my sanity after dday and I know it can for you too. No matter what you are going through/have gone through, I can guarantee you there are others who can relate and that will be here to listen and offer you support.