SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Inkhulk

You have 13 pages of advice and options, can you give an update on where you stand now?

Has anything changed for you? New ideas?

Speaking as a member

I wasn’t a big fan of this thread at first, but it has helped me and certainly many others.

Tanner

Fair enough, I’ll attempt to pull some summaries out of this.

1. There are kindred spirits here that are willing to talk about some of the worst parts of their lives to help me thru mine. That is amazing and I appreciate you.

2. I’m a trainwreck, but probably not different than anyone else in my situation.

3. RUGSWEEPING IS REALLY BAD!

4. I’ve learned a lot about the values of this community. There is a very strong emphasis on personal accountability to the wayward and almost no extenuating circumstances are considered. I’m not criticizing here, but that is a take away from these 13 pages.

5. This has helped me categorize my wife’s behavior and I’ve come out of this not thinking she is a victim. She may have gotten invited into the dance, but dance she did and that is on her.

I welcome other’s synthesis of this “data”. What did you all learn?

[This message edited by InkHulk at 3:19 PM, Saturday, February 18th]

This thread— and your experience specifically, InkHulk— has made me reflect on what I’m going to refer to as the "reconciliation paradox."

In order to successfully reconcile, a wayward spouse needs to be fully accountable, humble, and selfless. They need to make the BS’s needs a priority, no matter what "extenuating circumstances" existed prior to Dday. But at the same time, if they had the ability to do this, they probably wouldn’t have cheated in the first place.

Similarly, although a wayward has to put themselves second if they want to save their marriage, I don’t think a dynamic where they are forced to grovel and don’t feel like they have a voice in their relationship is healthy or sustainable. But it’s extremely challenging for a BS to relate to their WS as an equal partner while reeling from betrayal.

As this relates to your situation, InkHulk, it necessary for you to hang on to compassion for your wife and continually make an effort to understand her thought processes and motivations if your reconciliation is to be successful. I think I can speak for not just myself but mostly everyone on SI when I say that we don’t want you to abandon those qualities; they make you a good man and a good husband.

But at the same time, your wife needs to take ownership of her choices and cannot be allowed to scapegoat her AP if she’s going to reform herself and become a proactive partner in rebuilding your marriage. If she doesn’t believe that she got herself into this situation then why would she believe she could get herself out?

Besides, even if you ended up divorced or (God forbid) you were struck by lightening tomorrow, she would STILL need to become a better person in the future. She has harmed many people with her actions, lies, and manipulations, so she has a lot of work to do on herself regardless of the fate of your marriage.

Please know that I will keep you and your family in my prayers. The post about your son showing such empathy toward you and thanking you for giving his mother nearly brought me to tears.

[This message edited by BluerThanBlue at 4:29 PM, Saturday, February 18th]

Don’t spend another second justifying what she did. You cant. Decide if your life going forward with her, even knowing what she did, will be better than if you divorce her. That’s the bottom line

You don’t need permission for that by anyone other than yourself to make that happen

Amen. Amen. Amen.

*****

A little more on the blackmail: my W made a mistake with ow more than a year before the A started. She didn't want to accept and correct it then, so she let a little bit of her boundaries down. That led to more little mistakes. Eventually she realized the little fuckups amounted to something that should be reported to her supervisor, so she chose to continue to hide her mistakes. And so on, to the point I wrote about in my profile.

I read a lot of mysteries and thrillers. They taught me that the one way to stop it is to accept the consequences the first time one is blackmailed, because it's too likely for the demands to escalate.

W read the same stories, but she succumbed. The demands did escalate. Eventually she couldn't eat or sleep.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 5:27 PM, Saturday, February 18th]

BTB, I think that is a beautiful summary. I’ve posted a number of times about the story of the prodigal son that Jesus told. I think it fits up with infidelity really well. In order for reconciliation to occur, the wayward needs to play the roll of the penitent returning son and the betrayed needs to take the attitude of the father, that the return is like the wayward had come back from the dead. If we as BS’s submit to the self righteous attitude of the older brother in that story, we’ll never recover. And if the WS won’t be truly penitent and remorseful, it will never work either. It’s a narrow road, and few find it.

You don’t need permission for that by anyone other than yourself to make that happen if that is what you want

Thanks, Waited. I’m trying to figure out what I want, and beyond that what is possible that I can have, because that depends a lot on her. It is true that the best possible future that I can envision for my life is a wholehearted love relationship with her and I want that. But it might not be possible, so I feel like I need some backup plan wants, and as you said, figure out how to make this decision.

You seem like a reader - the Great Divorce, A Clockwork Orange etc. I used to be too. Getting back to it again also, now that my brain is calmer, 2 years out.

Jack Kerouac gave William Burroughs the title for his book ‘The Naked Lunch’ - "A frozen moment when everyone sees what is at the end of every fork."

Esther Perel, who has a mixed and mostly unpopular reception on this site (with some good reasons), speaks of Infidelity ‘lighting up the scoreboard on the marriage’. I couldn’t find a direct quote, but this was the best exegesis I found when fishing around:

‘With the revelation of an affair, suddenly the scoreboard of a marriage is lit up: the giving and the taking, the concessions and the demands, the allocation of money, sex, time, in-laws, children, chores. All the things we never really wanted to do but did in the name of love are now stripped of the context that gave them meaning.’

If there is a benefit to going through this, and reconciling, it is that I am more direct with my wife and less reserved about my values and expectations. I’m no nag and no bully, but to paraphrase Orwell, 2 + 2 does not equal 5.

You indicated your wife is immature. Understanding how much rides on bringing integrity to your marriage, and accepting it, is part of growing up.

Speaking of apologies, has your WW apologized to YOUR FAMILY? She certainly owes your kids an apology, not just for putting their family at risk, but taking time away from them too. She spent a whole week with OM's family after she (supposedly) ended the physical part of their relationship too, right? **So she literally took time away from your family to put another family first.**

Meanwhile, I would revisit what happened that week she was away with OM and his family. I don't really believe nothing physical happened.

[This message edited by WontBeFooledAgai at 7:41 PM, Sunday, February 19th]

How my wife chooses to address this with our children is up to her. I know my parent’s strife was an existential crisis to me as a kid at similar age to mine now, so it’s not to be ignored. But I can’t force her. Spending a week away from us is the least costly part of the bill.

Surreal experience update: had a pretty big blow out with my wife last night over her disrespecting my parenting. Didn’t want to be around her this morning, so I got out of the house early and needed somewhere to go. I decided to retrace her journey to POSOM’s place. I did not confront him, but the two hour drive and all the meaningful landmarks I passed (church we were married in, her childhood home) were deeply moving. Definitely drove home the message that this was not a crime of passion (no pun intended). She agrees and admits it was premeditated. Murder 1 it is, I guess.

Sorry, Inkhulk. This is so incredibly painful to go through.

For me, it was all of the decisions to betray that hurt so bad. There were so many things my XWH could have done to protect the M, but didn't.

I don’t understand the "lighting up the scoreboard" analogy. I get the part about losing the underlying context of duty of the life we built together, that seems really stark. But I don’t get the scoreboard part.

Imagine a counter, ticking away under the relationship. If the relationship was transactional you would treat it that way. Because the relationship is of a special type you stop counting, you figure it will balance, and if it doesn’t quite balance, that’s okay too.

So in my case it was financially supporting everything, including several degrees she changed her mind about. All rent, all bills, insurance, medical, the house deposit, the mortgage payments. Then kids come. So you take a team approach, not much sex, but she is the mother of my kids, so go easy, in her own time, and loving the kids is sort of loving me, isn’t it.

But really, it was obvious to everyone, her family, my family, progressively my kids, and me to be honest, that as the kids became mor independent, she did as she pleased, and I didn’t. But I was painfully aware that if I stopped this whole thing would come down. So I adapted to it.

My Mum was an alcoholic and my Dad a cheat. My family fell apart when I was young. I would have lifted double the load to maintain a functional family.

But when infidelity happens that metaphorical counter, the counter which you have kept out of line of sight, the one you have been ignoring the clicking of, is brought out. You see the raw scores and say, well yes, I did kind of know that, but I thought it was worth it. In the face of infidelity, perhaps it wasn’t. Perhaps I was a rube.

I actually do think it is possible to get back the specialness. I’m part way there and my kids are a big part of it.

I have some intergenerational insights which help. My mother turned to drink after my Dad’s affair, couldn’t parent. My Dad married the affair partner and I gained three step siblings. I had nowhere to go but to stay with my Dad until I was 17 and finished school. I then moved out on my own (my oldest is 16 and the thought staggers me). My mother was just a mess for decades, and was firmly persuaded that the pernicious influence of the affair partner would ruin us. It didn’t. My brother, sister and I are all decent, successful, honest, faithful and sober. We just hung on for dear life, like a Passover, almost literally. My mother was wrong about us and might have done better. I won’t fail my kids in the same way, even in the face of pain. Like you, I have waited and watched.

That was so well spoken, beautiful, inspiring. Thank you, that touched my heart tonight.

Straight up, that was an excellent response. In a culture wired to convince us we only get one life (which is in fact true), I've been thinking "legacy" since I was 20 years old. Whatever it takes, I want to live my life to see my legacy and see it be good. Children. Grandchildren. Great grandchildren. I've always had this desire to build a great big shade tree that gives meaning and roots to untold numbers of people because of the way I loved one woman. I've literally felt and thought that way since I was 20 or so. And you kind of encapsulated that very well. Thar counter wouldn't matter in the end. Of course I pulled way more than my weight. How else could it happen? Don't keep score. But, the truth is I sucked at it way more than I ever realized. I thought the marriage was the rock I could lean on and I just needed to do the work and provide and build and love the children. I neglected friendship. I neglected my wife. I broke her. She became convinced that that legacy meant more than she did. And maybe it did. And I fucked up. I would do anything to change my behavior and my "workaholism". I tried. But it was too late. She was too broken. And shortly thereafter, there was another "man" (not really, he's a bitch who cheats on his own wife and sleeps with married women because he's a dog who only cares what his glands want). But once the infidelity is shown, man you start to really count the cost. It's like watching your life dreams crash and burn. And then you start thinking, "maybe I should balance this, I can be a good father and not be a cuck husband. If I keep letting it happen, then by definition I'm a cuckold." So, I don't know. Now I'm also worried about the legacy I leave my children on the other hand. Am I teaching them that love means letting yourself be abused, or am I modeling unconditional love? I sincerely don't know. But you said it very very well.

1345 Marine

I am imagining the tree now.

It’s a good image.

I have read a few enlightened former Waywards, saying how when they were cheating, they were resentful of their spouse working too much. From their current viewpoint they see that they might have just said ‘thank you’.

I have done enough blaming and enough self-flagellation.

What I want is to forgive, but as I think Ink hulk alluded to ‘straight is the gate’. It’s a narrow opportunity. I don’t want false reconciliation. I don’t want to let my judgment be clouded with wishful thinking. We’ve really only got one good chance at this.

I don’t see that as setting a bad example for my kids. I’m a strong and kind man, and you sound like one too.

My wife even sees it, damn it.

People are weird, aren’t they?

[This message edited by straightup at 11:36 AM, Monday, February 20th]

Marine, I hear you loud and clear. I also had a dream of providing a stable and good life for those around me, especially my kids and wife, being willing to work and use the abilities I have to supply an abundance to them and never worry about keeping score. You described it so much more eloquently than I could have.

Infidelity may be death of that dream. We’ll see.

[This message edited by InkHulk at 12:30 PM, Monday, February 20th]

Am I teaching them that love means letting yourself be abused, or am I modeling unconditional love? I sincerely don't know.

I don’t see that as setting a bad example for my kids. I’m a strong and kind man, and you sound like one too.

In Bluer’s words, I think this is another paradox in reconciliation. Grace can always be abused. The one it is offered to, and outside observes, can always interpret it as weakness. But that doesn’t matter, what matters is why we offer it. And if done right, I believe it is the sign of the greatest strength and character.

The difficulty is that you'll never know if R will work unless you try it out.

One comforting fact for me was Shirley Glass's comment that 20% of those in her practice who said they wanted to R did not R, so I concluded that 80% did R. That makes some sense - if you say you want R you are at least open to doing the necessary work.

If you want R and your WS says they want R, it's up to the BS to decide whether to believe the WS r not. That means cutting through hope and fear and discerning whether or not your WS has started on the work with genuine desire to keep doing the work.

straightup -- you said

I have some intergenerational insights which help. My mother turned to drink after my Dad’s affair, couldn’t parent. My Dad married the affair partner and I gained three step siblings. I had nowhere to go but to stay with my Dad until I was 17 and finished school. I then moved out on my own (my oldest is 16 and the thought staggers me). My mother was just a mess for decades, and was firmly persuaded that the pernicious influence of the affair partner would ruin us. It didn’t. My brother, sister and I are all decent, successful, honest, faithful and sober. We just hung on for dear life, like a Passover, almost literally. My mother was wrong about us and might have done better. I won’t fail my kids in the same way, even in the face of pain. Like you, I have waited and watched.

I am curious about the statement 'I won't fail my kids in the same way, even in the face of pain.' Is that your moms failure, your dad's failure, both, ....? I am interested as my story overlaps quite a bit. The differences are that i have never met my father. He left for the OW before i was born.