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Today I got tired of tormenting myself.
I went through all the messages in my phone trying to make sure I had wished everyone I was close to, a hqppy Mother’s Day. I got to the bottom of my threads and saw the message I sent from my H phone to myself on dday, it was the photo he took of them as they were laying in her bed. She was covered up with a blanket asleep and he didn’t have his shirt on. I have it etched in my memory so deep that I don’t think I will ever forget it. Instead of clicking on it and pain shopping I deleted it and told myself I would be ok without it.
It was the last bit of the affair I had left. I deleted the dates he saw her, he got rid of the bank account he used to see her, the texts were never found , they were long gone and I don’t want to see them anyways. I have nothing to pain shop with, to make myself feel something.

I feel sad , I feel sad because the further I get away from the pain the more I get afraid. I don’t even know if that makes sense? I’m so afraid of not feeling anything , of letting go , I feel powerless in a sense , like I’m giving it back to him. I know it’s probably normal for us here but I’m afraid.

H and I had a great time last night for my bday / Mother’s Day. The dinner was amazing and the concert, he held me the whole time and really seemed to enjoy my company and put me first (which isn’t like him since music is his life). Things are changing , he’s getting better, he’s growing , he’s learning, he’s becoming an amazing partner, a better dad. Letting go of the affair makes me feel like I will lose leverage. Maybe I’m afraid that I’m so broken that I am not good enough? Letting go seems harder than hanging on to what he did , does anyone else relate? Am I afraid of healing? Afraid of facing my own demons? I didn’t bring up his A until we were in the car heading home and then he immediately apologized and played songs that made him think of me (music is our love labguage). I came home lit some candles and fell asleep , peacefully and happy and I hate that I did because ummm hey my H had an affair. I should be upset.
I had to cancel counseling this week due to funds, wish I didn’t.

By the way happy mother day to all the mommas here!

I feel very much the same way and I think you summed it up beautifully. I’ve also deleted just about everything at this point. Sometimes I’m afraid I will forget without the evidence. But of course we want to forget. I’m glad you had a nice mother’s day. I feel a bit of that "shouldn’t I be upset.." sentiment today too.

Still confused

There is something about starting to let go that just hurts in a really weird way.

It’s almost like I’m doing a disservice to myself? Like I’m letting my morals and values down , the more that I understand or start to forgive. I feel so dumb for letting go even a little bit. Thank you for taking the time to respond.

[This message edited by Groot1988 at 2:19 AM, Monday, May 13th]

Like I’m letting my morals and values down , the more that I understand or start to forgive.

Maybe. This can be true with the way some people R. Or maybe you are just growing and changing, too?

19 years out and I kept everything.

It's hidden away, I haven't looked at it in years, but I couldn't let it go and probably won't ever get rid of it.

It was a reminder of what a monster (cannot think of another word to described how I felt about my WH after D-Day) he was and the pain he caused and the disgusting things he did and the damage he inflicted on me, our family, his career, the OW BS and himself.

There was no way I could forget what he did, even to this day. Our entire world was turned upside down. The trauma I endured after D-Day with his TT and the PTSD that crept in slowly. WH never asked if I kept the evidence I pretty much gathered on my own.

Everyone has to heal in their own way, for you deleting everything is your way of healing, I hope you can find peace in your decisions moving forward.

At about the 2 year mark I let go some of things I was holding on to. I carried this heavy load on my journey to healing, my fear of letting go was "am I rugsweeping?" I have processed so many feelings, evidence, questions, all of IT, I needed to lighten my load to continue towards healing. You have to travel the journey and it's liberating to let go of things when you have processed them and they become a burden.

Groot, I’m really proud of you. That’s not easy, or at least it wasn’t for me. I kept everything for about 15 years before I worked up the nerve to delete 95% of it. And I still miss it, like an addict misses their drug of choice. (I only kept the things that I wrote - my journal and a couple of poems.)

It’s best not to feed the pain. It only makes it grow. Ya done good.

It really sounds like you are making some real progress Groot 😀

I had no evidence to look at. When I found out through mutual friend and he then admitted everything but had deleted all the messages and cut all contact. I only had the payslips where I could see he had left work early to see her.

I think I’m grateful in a way I didn’t see the photos he told me she sent him or the reply he sent back. BUT sometimes I wish I did because I will never truly know if he has told me everything.

One thing I understand is the fear of letting the pain go. I think it’s because I’m scared if we are having a good time he will think what he did was ok and obviously it was not. The other thing for me (and it kind of relates to my latest post about revenge) is that I feel he really didn’t have enough of a consequence for the way he turned out lives upside down. I to am working on this.

And a big Happy Mother’s Day to you as well. I’m glad you had a wonderful day 💐

How amazing for you to let that go. I can’t imagine it was an easy thing to do. Hopefully this gets you one step closer to wherever it is that you are wanting to be ❤️ It’s a very powerful piece to "let go of" and I too would be afraid of what that could mean.

The only piece of evidence I have of my WH A is the recording in which is how he was caught. While this is a huge thing to actually hear it, I’m actually glad I had this. it was a huge chunk of evidence that helped me piece together apart of the puzzle I don’t think I would of without it. I’m hoping one day to get rid of it, I know that I have enough knowledge of my WH A to make sense to me, so there’s no more need to "painshop" - why keep stuff like that around anyhow 🤷🏻‍♀️

I’m so happy that your Mothers Day/ Birthday was a success. Take those days as they come and enjoy them ❤️

.

[This message edited by Littlepuppet at 6:54 PM, Monday, May 13th]

Owning it you could have a really good point , I do think I’m growing from this and as shitty as how it came about, I am glad that I am.

Annb it was really hard for me to delete what I did but I will say , I pain shopped so hard that it became so UNHEALTHY FOR ME. I don’t give a shit about how my H feels but I know if it is there I will look. I get not wanting to forget or delete , I still have moments I want all that proof back. My H was also a monster but I told myself I don’t need it to know what he did.

Tanner I have also processed all the evidence and emotions which I know I will keep processing the same emotions for a long time. 😞 But yes! I do feel like a weight has been lifted but you hit it with the rug sweeping. I NEVER want to rug sweep , I never want him to forget what he was capable of. He swears to me that because of the trauma created he could not and would not ever forget but in my mind , that isn’t enough.

Sacredsoul thank you! I feel like I made a huge step but sometimes I feel like this step will help my H get off of the hook. I need to look at it from a "me healing" but it’s hard. I feel stupid for smiling and stupid for enjoying any moments with him.

Webbit oh my gosh yes! I feel all of what you wrote. I didn’t see any of the messages he sent or she sent and honestly I’m glad I didn’t. The way this ptsd has me, that could have put my in my grave. I also don’t want him to think good days mean a damn thing to him either but I make that very clear verbally , I tell him all the time that if I forgive him it will be years and years. Supposedly she didn’t send many photos because she was insecure (rightfully so) he sent most of them because his ego was fragile and he needed reassurance 🙄 I had his google time line of every date he saw her/ bank account slips and then the one photo of them two together. That was it. That photo hurt me the most. He looked so happy and content to just be laying in some trashy woman’s bed as a MARRIED man. Reminds me how awful he was and how corrupt his morals and values were, even talking about it has my blood boiling.

Heart broken wife thank you I feel the same way about pain shopping and I got to the point I was going back years and questioning everything and he couldn’t remember why or who he was with at a restaraunt 7 years ago , I became very toxic to myself.

[This message edited by Groot1988 at 9:00 PM, Monday, May 13th]

That is great you were able to do that. Any time you get to have a good few moments don’t worry about forgetting or forgiving too soon, that’s not going to happen. Your body and mind will slowly heal in time and until it does it will keep oscillating like you are describing. You will learn when you have a good moment, don’t question it. It’s a much needed break and a glimmer of your own healing.

Will he take it the wrong way? Who cares? He will be riding this roller coaster with you as long as you need if he loves you and is remorseful.

What you are talking about is called a vulnerability hangover. If you do a search on posts you will find this to be a normal dynamic for most anyone who does have good moments with their ws.

We got to where we eventually went on some dates or weekends away declaring it to be bonding time. And unless there was a trigger, we let the affair go for that day or two and just tried to rekindle our connection. This was 1)after we agreed to try and reconcile and 2) made with the understanding it didn’t mean anything was over.

It worked well for us for the most part, but we almost always had a really terrible struggle afterwards because he didn’t want me to feel too comfortable or forget. He wasn’t consciously punishing me by any stretch of the imagination. I was radioactive to him so to speak. His fight or flight kicked in because I abused him so badly in what I did.’

My advice- feel what you feel. It’s the way through. He will learn to adapt or not. The ws who can adapt and keep adapting are going to be more successful in helping the bs get to R. If they can’t do that, then the bs will grow too exhausted to keep going and bail out. Not everyone does all this but if you keep it simple like that in your mind you will give yourself permission to be messy. And not trying to hold it in or endure something unnecessarily to keep the ws comfortable is so important. The more we see the more we understand.

Enjoy the good moments when they happen. Be unapologetic when it’s different the next moment, hour, or day. I always reminded myself if he didn’t love me, he wouldn’t let me be with him at all. It was a gift that came with a lot of work, but one I would do it all again to achieve.

Be gentle with yourself. You are raising two small kids and when you have these moments of relief let it be a relief. You are not responsible for how he thinks or feels.

Groot, I did not confront for years and by that time we had both grown up. I have written on here before that overall we have a good marriage but….there is always a but, I have never let my guard down completely and after all this time I accept I never will. Unless I come to SI I never think about it. So why do I keep showing up? It is because marriages take work but they do last given two reasonably mature adults who have the same moral center. I hope those bs who are married to narcissists or people who are cruel or people who can’t seem to stop, will give themselves the gift of freedom.
I think it boils down to how egregious the behaviors and the lies are. My husband never behaved any differently. I was told and if not for that person I might not have ever known.
Take care of yourself the best you can. Staying is a gift you give. I hope it is treasured.

This resonates so much with me. Sometimes I feel like if I start letting things go, if I let myself be happy, I'm somehow letting myself and my morals down. So it's like I keep painshopping to make sure I am still sticking to my rights and morals

To me this seems to be connected to the fact that I, like so many others, believed in my soul that I was a 'One and done' kind of person. I would kick him out immediately if he ever cheated. then he cheated, and I didn't. So I bargained with myself, (not consciously but I now in hindsight see that's what I did), I think I told myself that it's ok for me to stay if....for me the ifs were many but the gist of it was he would have to be a perfect remorseful WH that did everything by the book and never messed up in recovery. Turns out that didn't happen EITHER, there hasn't been any repeat offence that I know of but he's let me down in other ways (how dare he be human after all this?!). And still, I didn't leave.

Perhaps I keep painshopping because I feel like A. it's not really ok for me to stay after cheating but B. IF I do stay, I can only stay if WH does a,b and c. And since he hasn't been able to live up to all that, I feel like it's not ok for me to start letting go, to start feeling happiness with him again?

[This message edited by Miserylikescompany at 6:47 PM, Tuesday, May 14th]

I can totally relate. To me, it really was all tied into the concept of winning and losing. Was I letting him "win" by letting it all go? That is how I felt about it - like somehow I had given in. I mean, did I really NEED evidence of the moral high ground I so clearly held? Um, no. If there ever came a point where WH tried to claim certain aspects of the A didn't happen I didn't need to pull out the evidence to remind him - that was and is my cue to leave, delete, and block him forever. So why hold onto it?

But I was wrong about letting go = him (or the A itself) winning - totally wrong. Letting it go was ME winning. Finally. He has to live with his actions forever. I can delete everything but we both know it all happened. People at his work know it all happened. HE knows it all happened. That is his burden to bear, not mine. Unsaddling myself from all that stuff was necessary - it was just weighing me down.

You will get there too - no matter what happens with you and your WS...by deleting that last remaining photo you are free of as much of that hateful and painful stuff as you can physically be. Your mind will follow suit. IDK how it happened but now when I think of the A I am not filled with sorrow or rejection or any negative feelings about myself - none, and I have little energy to waste on thinking about his part it in aside from thinking "what an asshole.". All that has washed away, and while I can still recall most of it, that instant pang of pain and wave of nausea/nervousness/anxiety that used to immediately hit me isn't there. Sometimes I wait for it, wondering where it went, and wonder how I managed to banish it so completely...but it never shows anymore. It's been replaced by wisdom and a newfound sense of honestly in my own life that wasn't there before and a trust in myself that I was surely missing and didn't even know it - the kind of life changing wisdom that only comes from lessons hardest-learned.

All this is to say you are okay to feel the way you do.

[This message edited by ThisIsSoLonely at 4:49 PM, Tuesday, May 14th]

Hiking out

Be gentle with yourself. You are raising two small kids and when you have these moments of relief let it be a relief. You are not responsible for how he thinks or feels.

^ THIS

Yesterday was Monday and my birthday and I just couldn't take anymore during the day, I was tapped and I didn't want to be around my H because, most of the time I dont want to be. He is a huge trigger still, especially on Mondays.

my Ten year old daughter came into the room tucked me in and said "I am sorry you had a rough birthday". I felt like shit all over again... I don't want to traumatize her with my trauma. I don't know I just feel like I need to be stronger for my kids and I am letting them down.

MY KIDS DESERVE THAT RELIEF.

I need to get better.

[This message edited by Groot1988 at 9:21 PM, Tuesday, May 14th]