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I had been having 3 affairs. Not all at the same time. 2 of them were no contact, either by phone or computer. 1 was with a co-worker. I never had sex with any of them. 2 of them we exchanged x-rated photos and videos. When my wife found out about this, she was crushed, hurt everything negative you can think of. On multiple occasions I said I had told her everything and hadn't. At this point, I have told her everything. The D-Day was a few years ago, we are still working on making the marriage work. She is in counseling, we were doing couples counseling and I had been seeing a counselor. I am trying to rebuild the trust and have her believe that she does know everything that I had done. Too many times of me lying has caused her not to believe me now. Any advice is welcome. Thank you.

[This message edited by Wolfpack1 at 6:00 AM, Friday, September 8th]

Really basic advice is to make sure that you take a detailed inventory of all the events of your affairs and make sure your wife has the whole truth.

She deserves to know the whole truth, nothing but the truth. You also need to find the resolve to stop lying to everyone about everything. If you are anything like me, I found after the fact that I would lie and exaggerate things to put myself in a more favorable light in casual conversations. For example, in 2019, for the first half of the year, I was still deep in my EA and also while going through a weight loss journey. As people at work or at the gym would remark about how much I had lost (I went from about 290 down to 220 over the course of the year), but I would always tell people that seeing the scale start with a 3, as in 300, was the wake up call I needed to change course. Sure, I only lied about 10 or so pounds, but I told that lie over and over, and eventually it became I was well over 300 lbs and I needed to lose. You may be thinking, but why tell that stupid lie? The answer is, I really don't know why I thought it necessary to lie about how heavy I had been compared to the present moment.

At present, I'm on another fitness journey of sorts, as I had gotten too heavy, but this time around it has a health component as one of my primary issues is Celiac Disease and cutting gluten out of my diet has made a tremendous difference in my weight but also my overall health. I swore off social media following my EA and I nuked my accounts. Earlier this year, after having heard so much about TikTok, I downloaded the app, signed up and I use it. I'm careful about who I follow and interact with, but I also use my TikTok account for accountability. I post accurate weigh-in videos, workouts, etc. I mean, there is no incentive to lie and even if I did, I'm holding myself accountable to not lying with some of my closet friends also calling me on my bullshit.

It sounds really easy and simple for me to tell you that the best advice we can give you to rebuilding trust with your wife is to stop lying, but that is really all there is too it. Tell her the truth, be open and honest with her about every detail. Show your wife that you are an open book to her and you have absolutely zero secrets. My wife took my phone and rifled through it the other day for 30 mins or more while I was playing video games and watching TV in the other room. I don't give two shits what she does on my phone because there is nothing there to hide, there are no instant messages or private messages from anyone on any platform or service that she is going to find that I'm hiding. During my A years, I wouldn't even let my phone leave my sight, let alone hand it to my wife and walk away from it like I do now. I must say, looking back on it and comparing it to now, I used to have tremendous anxiety whenever my phone would beep/buzz at the wrong time and getting asked "who is that?" and all those things, now I don't ever worry about any of that and it is tremendously freeing.

[This message edited by Bor9455 at 2:50 PM, Monday, September 11th]

Bor9455, thank you for the advice. I have quit lying to my wife, she does now know the complete truth. We are still working on ourselves and together to make this work.

I saw a website on lying the other day and it helped me understand myself better: nirandfar contains more info.

- when i lied to my spouse about the facts of my affair i was being deceitful
- when i lied to myself about the facts of my affair i was delusional
- when i lied about my values to my spouse i was being duplicitous
- when i lied about my values to myself I was demoralised.

So you are trying to make her "believe that she does know everything that you have done"

Why do you want her to believe you? Sometimes my spouse asks me the same question many times - and when my answers are always consistent then she begins to trust and overtime she asks less questions.

I think the bigger question we need to work through is why INTEGRITY is not one of our core values?

For me I am trying to make sure that I dont lie anymore.

Im trying to make sure that i dont hide, minimise or exagerate what happens in my day. (facts)
Im trying to be more consistent with living in integrity. (values)

So when i make committments about what I will do or where I will be at specific times I make sure that I consistently meet those commitments. when i don't I lack integrity.

If your wife is still asking questions then perhaps the best thing to do is to show empathy. carol sheets has a great workbook called helping her heal that will help you communicate more effectively with your wife. one way might be to thank her for the question, acknowledge that it was wrong for you to trickle-truth to her and you validate her feelings by understanding that the TT makes her doubt your confession and then reassure her that she has your complete timeline. and then offer to do a lie detector test. (and if you cannot do the lie detector then you probably tell her the rest of your infidelity as well)

and FYI do you think that because you "never had sex with them" that makes it less bad. the reality is that everytyhing you and i did with others online, visual or just in writing told our wives that they were not enough and they dont feel safe being vulnerable/intimate with the person who makes them believe that about themselves. so our job now is to help them change their beliefs about themselves and us and unfortunately it takes consistent and loving behaviour over a long time for that to occur.

all the best with that journey - one day at a time.

I have quit lying to my wife, she does now know the complete truth. We are still working on ourselves and together to make this work.

The first person that you have to stop lying to you is yourself. Once you change your own internal monologue and your self-talk, than you can focus on stopping your lying ways to yes, your wife is an important one, but everyone else in your life. I think lying to others is a behavior that often comes from a deep place of shame and a feeling like we aren't good enough or we don't belong. We are social creatures and we want to fit in, it is baked into our DNA as a desire. However, some of us are not really comfortable with being who we really are and so we put on a front and some of that may result in us lying. I think for me, the biggest thing that has kept me from lying is a total love and acceptance for who I am and rather than running from it...running towards it.

I'm a former college athlete who is now way past his prime physically from the days I used to have athletic prowess! I'm an absolute nerd. I earned two different bachelor's degrees during my time in undergrad, one in chemistry the other in biochemistry with two minors, one in Spanish and the other in mathematics. I'm a diehard sports and video game fan. If I'm not watching sports, I'm either playing sports in the real world (less and less these days) or I'm playing Madden or NBA2K on my PS5. My side hobbies are smart home tech and technology in general. I drive a modest vehicle (2019 Chevy Equinox) and while I certainly an fortunate enough to afford a newer and fancier vehicle, I only upgraded to a 2019 after my 2001 Ford Taurus was totaled out in an accident a year ago. Where I work, company leadership drive far fancier cars and I get shit from my colleagues for not driving a fancy, imported car like so many of them.

I write the above paragraph to point out that yeah, I'm a nerd and I own it. It is who I am and it feels great to own it and live it every day. People are going to judge you rightly or wrongly for all sorts of shit, like the kind of car you drive, the clothes you wear, or any of that other shit. The only people that those things should matter to are you and your loved ones. Own who you are, be who you are and live your life as the most authentic version of yourself you can be and the honesty will come.

Thank you all for your replies and advice. I am now truthful with myself and my wife. I have written a timeline and honestly answer any questions she has for me. We try and talk each night or every other night, sometimes every 3 night. I try and initiate the conversations. I tell her of my work, what I am learning and how it makes me try to change. I am now a stronger person, I don't worry as much as I use to how people might see me. I am truthful with everyone 9n a daily basis. We are still working together and are trying to make our marriage great.