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Surely I should know 15 months post d-day if I want to stay and rebuild/repair or leave?!

Is there something wrong with me or maybe my love toward the relationship? Like why am I not clear on how to move forward with my own life?

Do you think it’s because I want to stay but too worried about society norm, or am I denying my reality and should actually leave?!

I’m getting angry with myself and frustrated that I’m literally wasting my own life by not being fully committed to a decision and keeping us in limbo.

We get on great but I keep him at arms distance so we don’t show each other any affection or intimacy but I know that if I start showing those things again then he will, as he did before.

I’m trying to do all the work, focusing on me, doing therapy but I don’t seem to be getting a clearer mind. I can’t keep wasting my life I need to just pick a side and move on. By doing nothing I know I’m picking the stay side, so then why am I not showing up and being affectionate and loving how I want to love someone (how I used to love him before he ripped off the rose tinted glasses)

Sorry just needed to vent I don’t want to be a victim in this. Where is my growth and my empowerment why aren’t I getting better!!!

I am sorry you are in this position. I am 2.5 years from d day and still not sure if I will stay in the relationship. You are still very early on, but I completely understand how you feel. The indecision and lukewarm feelings are the worst. I think if we did not have a twenty four year marriage and kids that will be adversely affected I would have made a clean break. I know those things are not enough to stay but in my case those things strongly impact my happiness as well so for now I am staying. I am struggling to open up again as well and have no desire to have a "romantic" relationship with him. He is working hard and is a consistent and caring partner now. So we’ll see if eventually that is enough. Just want to say I do think how you feel is normal. Keep working on your own healing. I do feel like I’m making strides in that area and I’m trusting that I’ll know when I am ready to commit either way. Big hugs.

What you describe is completely normal. There was a phase in the healing journey that I became angry with myself. I was upset that she was getting away with it. In this phase I was about 70 / 30 committed to R and the 30 was a hold back or emotional deposit that would help me walk away.

I am now just past the 5 year mark and have grown to trust her more, but I am still at about 95/5 because I can never forget what she was capable of. I will never feel trapped or obligated if god forbid she does it again.

What is your partner doing to prove they are fixing their broken bits and ve worth trusting again?
Without this obvious work it makes making a decision much harder. Especially if you have e littles or are somewhat reliant on their income to keep the life you currently have.
Personally my kids were still elementary school age and he had lost his job. I would have been stuck with not only child support but possibly spousal support as we were in the middle of the biggest recession of our lifetime. I refused to even consider that. INITIALLY.
But at some point the waffling and half assed work he was doing and breaking NC was enough. When he was in contact and cheating he was a bastard. Just rude cruel and hurtful. I had enough of that though and tossed him. No rage no crying. Just simply handing him my rings and saying go be free. I gave him 15 min to gather things and go to his mother's. I told him my attorney would be in touch about when he could see the kids.
Honestly this is what broke him and got him to pull his head out of his arse and start doing the real work.
Yes there were ups and downs after but I was able to see a path forward and we began a steady climb to rebuild and make ourselves happier and have a stronger M.
But if you aren't seeing f the why's and the work from your spouse how can you feel safe to stay and rebuild. Demand better. They will either step up and be the spouse you deserve or they will show you they aren't capable and that makes making a decision much easier.

They will either step up and be the spouse you deserve or they will show you they aren't capable and that makes making a decision much easier.

This ^^^ my xWS never did step up and do the work. He just expected me to get over it. Plus he's disordered and didn't treat me very well. Still didn't stop me from wasting years in limbo. A long M and kids kept me stuck. I was terrified of D and breaking up the family. One day I just broke and knew I wanted out. When they say the pain of staying is more painful than the pain of leaving is a pretty clear indicator.

I think what you are feeling is completely normal, as frustrating as that is. When I felt like this I booked a therapy session to discuss this. What I found at that point was the list of pros and cons were pretty even so I was finding it hard one way or the other. If I left, I was getting rid of a cheating husband (I mean that a pretty big plus right 😂) but if I left I would have to give him 50/50 custody
Of our son and I was the money earner and he would get half of what I worked so hard to build.

What my therapist said was why can’t you just be his friend. There should be no pressure to be a romantic partner, just be a room mate. And so I did. I didn’t wear wedding rings, I never introduced him as a husband and we were at that stage sharing al the house hold chores. She said give it as much time as you need like this. He should support it and in time you will be able to decide. I found trying to force a decision made it worse.

For the record I am choosing to stay (for now) and am pretty committed to making a go of what is left of this marriage.

I feel pretty sure I want to stay now (at 2.3 years post finding out about the cheating). But at 15 months I DEFINITELY did not. Some days I would think I knew or that I might want to stay but then other days I was in so much pain or was so triggered I would go the other way. Some thoughts - like the idea he might have entertained a long term relationship with this person — I couldn’t even allow to flash through my mind without promising myself I was OUT, I was GONE, I would be AWAY. It was just too scary and upsetting. The last 12 months have really helped with all that. I almost never think I NEED to leave. But the vast majority of the time now I am pretty sure I want to stay. I don’t know if I will ever take the option of leaving completely off the table, which I have some guilt about, but that limbo you are feeling is really gone for me now.

I’m so sorry you are going through this. It is so hard and so crazy making. I don’t think you should pressure yourself in any way. It is totally OKAY to feel what you are feeling.

[This message edited by Stillconfused2022 at 11:41 PM, Tuesday, November 5th]

My experience was: I knew I wanted to R from the moment W revealed her betrayal. At 15 months out, I still wanted R, and W was doing good work - but I still feared I might be wasting my time and energy. It takes years, IMO, to R. Partners in R MUST live with uncertainty until success or failure become clear.

At 15 months out, every issue was scary - I just didn't know if W would work with me (or vice versa) to resolve any given issue. By 2 years out, with a record of resolving issue after issue, I became a lot more comfortable with my decision to R.

That's one scenario. Another is that you're uncomfortable because your gut sees a big problem that you or your WS are sweeping under the rug. Choosing R out of fear instead of desire to spend the rest of your life with your WS could be that issue.

You know best. What do you think your discomfort comes from?

LilRedRobin,

I feel your impatience and share it often. I started out thinking no WAY do I want to R, but I've flipped flopped a couple times on that in the 2+ months since my second dday. (First dday was rug-swept 14 years ago.)

I did not marry my soulmate, my WH sort of love-bombed me into marrying him but we did have a lot of years and two great sons together, and I thought we'd go the distance.

All I can do right now is wait and see. I'm in IC, he's in IC, there's a ton of work for both of us to do. I don't want to live with him and I am happily free of his covert control and entitled behavior since we're separated. I think that might change. None of my feelings are consistent, and when we spend time together I get confused all over again.

As BS I think we owe it to ourselves to give our hearts and minds as much time as is needed to be sure of that choice. I need to see if WH becomes a guy I actually WANT to be married to now. I want to feel I made the right decision for ME, not for him, or for the marriage, or even for our adult kids. This is a *ucked up, complicated process. Don't rush it.

Thanks all, appreciate your input here!
Definitely agree with you Gray that I’m being impatient and I’m trying to rush the process which might be what’s stunting me.

I think what I’m seeing from a lot of these is that so many of you knew straight away if you wanted to try and R and then kept working on that …my issue is I didn’t know and still don’t know what I want. Possibly you’re right Sisoon and my gut is keeping me in this state to push me along the path of leaving! What’s the saying "the universe won’t give you peace in something you’re not mean to settle for".

I feel like I really just want peace in my life and I want to love and be loved.

Unfortunately neither of us are actually doing the work to repair the relationship. CrazyBlindsided I think it’s the same situation as your ex, he just wants me to get over hence doesn’t want to address it and plays the victim when it has been bought up in the past.

But I’m living with such prolonged state of stress that I think is starting to make me ill.

We get on well as friends but we’re both existing, both burying our heads in the sand, not talking about future plans, or him saying he’s so glad we’ve got a second chance to do things right (I don’t know if repairing waywards say things like this after a year and a half out but he’s not said it once) like none of that is a healthy relationship, and yet neither of us are speaking up to address problems and I get myself all prepped with what I need to say to just open the lines of conversation and I physically can’t speak.

I feel like if I leave I’ve not done the work on myself to be able to have difficult conversations but I feel like I can with everyone else but him??

I feel like I’m starting to lose my mind like I might need psychiatric help I don’t feel in a good place at all.

I am 10 years out and still have fleeting thoughts of leaving. I hope I can catch him again. It does not make sense. On one hand I want our marriage. On the other hand I dont. If your WS is doing the work that is fantastic! If not, it is hard to move on. I guess the question is, what is your line in the sand? Do you keep moving it? What can you live with? Sometimes it is a dealbreaker, period. I right now do not see a point forward in our marriage. My son is a Junior in HS and I will stay until he graduates. Unless my WH does any actual work, I will leave then. I am ok with living like this for now, but long term... No. It is perfectly fine for you to take as much time as you need to make a choice one way or another.

I have noticed in my situation and also from reading thousands of posts over the years that we tend to focus on the decision we want to make about the marriage more than anything else.

And you can spend a lot of time judging, trying to solve it from a logical perspective.

But there are so many factors against that working this early on. (I know it doesn’t feel early to you but it still is) The trauma of infidelity changes your brain for some period of time. There is no safety in your closest intimate relationship which triggers fight or flight. . You are still information gathering and processing. Grief is not linear and you are cycling through different aspects every day. In other words, you are living in chaos for a long time as your brain begins to heal. It takes time to also trust your decisions again.

This can really detract from truly focusing on you. Because in that stage you are often very focused on getting a stream of data to analyze.

I think tushnurse said some critical things to consider in terms of maybe he isn’t doing enough from his side. But even if he is, 15 months may not be long enough to make a decision.

Think more about recalibrating with yourself first. Leave the untied ends of the relationship untied. Spend time doing things that you can relax your brain and lose time in the process. Start thinking as much as possible about what is the next thing you want to do or try in a quest to get to know yourself again. Reconnect with you. Focus on self care, and learning to experience and feel a wider variety of things again. This helps us come back to ourselves, and slowing down and listening to things as they come up.

We kind of want to control the process as much as possible because we have this feeling of losing control over our lives. We seek to regain normalcy, security, certainty. I think we have to try and restore those things in ourselves. That way when you chose to leave or go, it becomes an organic response of continuing to do what feels good for you. Because the momentum you have created in focusing on your inner voice, needs, desires, passions, etc will extend into what you deserve and want in your relationship.

We often make the mistake of looking externally to seek the answers. But there is nothing that feels trustworthy externally until you have restored that in yourself.

Healing is not getting rid of the bad feelings- it’s slowly experiencing and allowing yourself the good feelings more and more - a process of replacing. It’s natural you are not ready to feel those things with/for the source of what hurt you. It’s a self engagement thing first, gaining your equilibrium back.

[This message edited by hikingout at 5:02 AM, Thursday, November 7th]

Unfortunately neither of us are actually doing the work to repair the relationship. CrazyBlindsided I think it’s the same situation as your ex, he just wants me to get over hence doesn’t want to address it and plays the victim when it has been bought up in the past.

Are you saying that neither of you wants R enough to do the necessary work? There's no shame in that. Accept it an walk away, I think.

Or are you saying you'd so the work if you thought your H would do it, too. In that case, tell your H what you require from him ... and walk away if he won't provide it. No shame for you that way.

If you're afraid to make the first move, no shame, but let yourself take the risk. In that case, tell your H what you require from him ... and walk away if he won't provide it. No shame for you that way.

*****

I feel neither shame nor pride about knowing I wanted to R immediately. It's just that's what I wanted. I was willing to do my work. No moral high ground there.

I meant to emphasize this part: even though we were both doing our work, I felt no peace about my/our choice until we had basically gone so far that I was very certain that we wouldn't stop. That took at least 2 years.

My self care has slipped a bit but I am really trying to focus on myself and doing things that bring me joy without him.

Thanks Sisoon, interesting way of putting it actually. I think I’ve not found my clarity on if I need to accept that I (and maybe him) actually don’t want to R but I don’t know how to leave or broach the conversation ….i think I’m co dependant 😬, or if I do want to R but am waiting for him to do the heavy lifting - it’s so weird how we’re just co existing atm why isn’t he putting in 90% of the effort and trying to show his love and win back and create a healthy relationship for us!? Maybe I’m expecting too much especially with me not doing any of the work but surely he should be doing the most until I thaw and can reciprocate ?

I am stuck in that I don’t want this relationship, I keep envisaging different lives, looking at rentals / solo trips yet I can’t leave (maybe i still want him but not in the way we currently are). Don’t want to throw away long history as it feels like it’s for nothing when we don’t have kids.

No one wants someone in their 30’s so if I leave I have to accept the life I want I’m unlikely to have (kids and a husband).

Even if my partner did the work, could I really marry him after this?! Maybe I need to deal with this situation using logic and not feelings because sometimes love isn’t enough.

I don’t know, it’s all shit. I hate feeling stuck.

Are you seeing a therapist? I would definitely start doing that to explore your feelings and get stronger and help with the trauma caused by infidelity.

I love Sisoon's idea in telling your WS what you need if he doesn't step up I would 180 and detach and that will set the motion in you feeling stronger to leave.

Don’t want to throw away long history as it feels like it’s for nothing when we don’t have kids.

You are young enough to start history with someone else. I threw away 24 years and I have kids and I am on a new jouney with a wonderful man. I am in my 50's!

No one wants someone in their 30’s so if I leave I have to accept the life I want I’m unlikely to have (kids and a husband).

Again see the above I am in my 50's and have found meaningful love again. Plus you can still have kids well into your 40's. Lot's of time ;)

I am seeing a therapist but I was thinking that I need to increase my sessions as I only go once a month but honestly I feel like I need more than that ….i should be sending the invoice to him for payment!

I do agree that needs to be my approach tell him what I want from a relationship. I’m just struggling to speak up for myself with regards to this relationship and I think I’m angry at myself that I have let us coast along for so long with no progress and wasting my best child rearing years! As much as I have resentment towards him I think I’m feeling resentment to myself when I really dig deep.

As much as I would like to cop out and text him, or write a letter I know it needs to be face to face really. I just don’t know why I’m finding it so difficult to have tough conversation with him. Need to get drunk to loosen my tongue!

Wow I love your bravery leaving 24 years and I can see the smile in your words that you’re building a new and happier life. Love that for you!

You're living in a world of uncertainty - about yourself. A good IC, maybe even weekly, can help you see yourself as you are and make decisions that serve you.

Maybe you're co-d; maybe not. And why would you have kids with this guy? If you do, can you count on him to be a good parent?

You are not washed up. According to actuarial tables, you've got a lot of life ahead of you. If you free yourself, you might make a life for yourself that you love. If you stay, would you not be stifling yourself?

LittleRed - I'm also 15 months and undecided too, it's the most exasperating, frustrating, exhausting, mind-numbing thing I've ever experienced. I often feel like I've completely lost it and flip-flop more than I care to admit. I am SO SORRY anyone else feels remotely like this.