SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Its funny how when something happens to you, you always seem to notice it all around you more and more. Like when I was pregnant I noticed so many more pregnant ladies around me then I ever do now. I think that can be said for everything in life, including infidelity.

I have been seeing it everywhere and it got me to thinking about the people in my life and how many of my nearest and dearest have also been effected by infidelity or where the cause. My Mum and Stepdad have been together since I was a very little girl and their relationship formed from an affair. They were both married at the time.

I have now had two husbands who have been unfaithful. My first one had an exit affair (I guess you could call it) and my current WH slept with his co-worker basically because he is a selfish jerk who wanted to have sex with someone who showed him some attention because he is to pathetic to fix his own issues. When I think about my best friends who I confided in about this (there are 4) there is a huge array of experience:

1. Never experienced it herself.
2. Her first husband left after 'falling in love' with his AP (did not last).
3. Was the other woman (kissed him and went on a date), who after found our about my story, pulled herself out of that situation immediately because she realised she did not want to be that woman (I was so proud of her).
4. She just got engaged to her new partner after an exit affair with them and who really cannot see the correlation of herself to my husband.

Infidelity to me just seems rife, well around me anyway (lol) and I guess that is why now I am quite cynical about being in relationships. I often ask my WH why he even wants to keep trying to be in a monogamous relationship but his only answer is he just loves me, he is sorry for what he has done and caused and wants to share the rest of his life with me and me only. It just seems silly to me now after he already stepped out of the relationship.

I want to believe in true love again but I think my view or opinion on what true love is has to shift to fit my life experiences.

I would never marry again. Too complicated.

If I D and was open to dating, it would be very very casual. Like once or twice a week at best.

No commitment either. I wouldn’t care who they saw or what they did (w/in reason lol) because I would never be in that type of relationship again.

It’s either fun or it ends.

I think cheating has become a way of life for too many people. How sad.

I was talking to a friend about my situation and he made an interesting comment. He said he sees infidelity as a symptom of a larger societal decline.

Made me wonder about the quantity of affairs in societies in other stages of growth.

1st wife: I completely agree, would never seek a serious relationship ever again. After my first failed marriage it took me a long time to trust my 2nd husband and then he did the bloody same thing. I told him he has destroyed my faith in any man and I will never trust him or anyone ever again. I just assume I’ll get a couple of small dogs and have sex with randoms if I ever feel the need lol.

The event: I often wonder this as well. The ‘rules’ of marriage have definitely changed and the way humans treat each other also. But I do also wonder if infidelity has always been around but kept more of a secret then we do now 🤷🏼‍♀️

I often think this myself. I love nothing more than grabbing a coffee and sitting in my car and watching the world go by, recently I’ve been looking at couples walking past thinking hmm I wonder if they’ve ever experienced this. In all honesty there’s no way none of them couldn’t have in some way been affected by infidelity but every couple looked happy.
I understand what you mean about what your H says about wanting you and you only as my H says the same thing. H has explained to me that a man can be in love with someone and cheat, I didn’t believe this at all but after googling, reading and watching it turns out it actually possible.
I don’t believe love is the problem it’s the morals, I believe my husband loves me I also believe he has the morals of a rodent.

I agree and can also attest to noticing pregnant women moreso when I was pregnant, getting a new vehicle and then noticing every time another one would drive past you, etc. Definitely the same goes for infidelity. Not that I really have a lot of close personal instances of infidelity in my life, but my "senses" are heightened now when I hear the word cheating, love triangles, etc. and my immediate response is to emphasize with the BS. Also, I think because I’m always trying to make myself "feel better" by being on SI, reading articles, etc. all of my content has to do with infidelity … which is kinda depressing 🫤

I often ask my WH why he even wants to keep trying to be in a monogamous relationship but his only answer is he just loves me, he is sorry for what he has done and caused and wants to share the rest of his life with me and me only. It just seems silly to me now after he already stepped out of the relationship.

My H says moreso the same thing. I’m the only person who he’s ever loved, he was never wanting to leave me or the M, he just wanted us to be happy and figure out "our shit." Hmmmm, and throwing away our entirety by cheating on me was going to fix things how?!

HE made the decision all on his own, without my consent, to destroy that "innocence" from our relationship … literally, it was the only thing "we" had left. I mean, isn’t monogamy one of the biggest reasons people become exclusive and get married?

I personally don’t feel "monogamous" or committed to my H like I did before, hell, I don’t even like using the term "husband" to define him (it just feels "sham-y" to me).

It’s like I have a different definition of marriage now (not quite sure what it is, but it’s definitely not what it once was). Legally we are married, but in every other sense of the word I sure don’t "feel" married, but literally just bonded by a broken contract.

It was rife around me too. My own parents were both married to others when they met, left and got married, had me and my sister. My uncle had 3 wives cheated on every single one of them. My cousin left his wife for OW and that relationship with OW ended 2 years later. His ex wife became an alcoholic and eventually died because of it. Every single boyfriend I've had cheated on me and my xWS cheated. Hell I even had my own RA on xWS so I'm guilty too. Just one big shitshow. I know now I will not tolerate ANY cheating going forward. One fuck up and you're done I'm not entertaining saving anything and certainly would never R. If my current partner cheats he's out. I know that I am ok to be alone and am perfectly fine with that.

I am so sorry your experience with marriage has led you to have to think about this. Completely valid contemplation.

However, many bs people show up here and they wouldn’t cheat. There are good people left in the world. That’s of little solace when the one you are married to has been by your description a lousy husband most of your marriage, cheated to boot, and now says he wants to spend his life with you. It’s a big mind fuck that his actions do not align so far with his stated intent. And you deserve better.

For me, I do believe in true love. Despite the scars we have both out in the marriage with the infidelity, I do feel we finally really figured this marriage thing out. I am sure as I can be that he won’t do this again, and know for a fact I won’t. I would rather stick a fork in my eye while fire ants climb my naked body that go anywhere near that again.

It’s taken years for us to get there, and I concede it’s not always worth the gamble.

Like 1st wife I am unlikely to marry again, but like her I am happy that we made this climb. I don’t know what will happen as far as your marriage, but I have confidence in YOU. And after some healing has occurred I have no doubt true love is a big possibility for you in the future should you want it. Whether it’s with him or not, time will tell.

You are in a very natural state having just crossed the year mark.

[This message edited by hikingout at 6:15 PM, Thursday, March 13th]

For me, I do believe in true love. Despite the scars we have both out in the marriage with the infidelity, I do feel we finally really figured this marriage thing out.

Same here. It took us a LONG time, but life is really good. Still, if death or divorce ever renders me single in the future, I'm staying that way. I will never marry again. (Unless he's really rich, old, and sick, and has no heirs. ) My girlfriends and I talk all the time about how we'll live in a little commune of women when we're old. It sounds like heaven, doesn't it?

I've been thinking a lot lately about the "secret sexual basement". I don't have much interest in "buying a new home" that might have a secret basement. I'll just AirBNB it.

No soliciting

[This message edited by SI Staff at 11:03 PM, Thursday, March 13th]

I have felt this way alot recently....like everybody is cheating.

I know not EVERYBODY is cheating, but it is so prevalent now I wonder if I was just too naive and missed it all.

My naivety was bleeding over into the music that I have always listened to. There were songs that I loved from the 80s on that were telling cheating stories and I never noticed while I was singing along until my own run in with infidelity.

"Part time Lover"---Stevie Wonder
"Saving all my Love---Whitney Houston
"Cry me a river"---Justin Timberlake
"irreplaceable"---Beyonce

Let alone the ones that were obvious about it like:

"I heard it through the Grapevine"---Marvin Gaye
"Confessions" Usher

Songs I used to sing regularly, are now triggers. I cant even enjoy music anymore because I am paying close attention to who is cheating.

While I absolutely understand cynicism regarding love and relationships after infidelity, I have found that two people can find joy again after pain.

For me, I do believe in true love. Despite the scars we have both out in the marriage with the infidelity, I do feel we finally really figured this marriage thing out.

Same in my case.

My wife and I look back and we both had some major miscues well before the A. Not that ignorance or mistakes in the M ever excuse the choices, I just understand more about what makes relationships and people more vulnerable than others.

Ultimately, I'm certain there are far less tragic ways to make positive changes in a relationship, and yet, I'm amazed by what copious amounts of empathy, kindness, patience and care can achieve.

I do believe in true love.
I do however think modern society has mixed up the concept of love and marriage.

At it’s very base marriage is a secular contract. It’s a form to decide who owns whatever is brought into the marriage, attained during the marriage, certain expectations and obligations and how to handle things if the contract is dissolved. Be that due to death or divorce.
Hasn’t got anything to do with luuuuvvvve.

Part of this misunderstanding is possibly caused by religious stances towards marriage, but IMHO the biggest culprit is probably Hollywood and the fantasized romantic view on "true love". This absurd habit of a ring costing three months wages, destination weddings with scores of grooms and bridesmaids, a practice-dinner, the real feast, dad-pays-for-it-all... basically setting the young couple off on life deep in debt... Humbug!

A couple can be just as happy not married and have just as good a life. They would probably spend more in legal costs and maybe have to sit down for negotiations when their relationship creates some imbalance.
Like... in the typical gender-role marriage it’s more common that the mom – the wife – the woman – takes a break from her career and work to have kids and maybe stays home for a few years. During this time, the man’s 401k grows, as well as pay, career and so on. The reason being that the couple – as business partners – decided that one focus on the kids, the other in bringing home the bacon.

For a married couple this would be accounted for in a divorce. The stay-at-home mom would get half the 401k and half the assets of the marriage.
For a non-married but truly in love couple then it would make sense to have a legally binding contract outlining financial compensation for the SAHM, or have the husband pay her wages for her work. After all – if once the kids leave home and the man is now the VP in some big company while the woman is trying to get back into basic nursing after a 16 year break – she’s going to have to make some major lifestyle changes, while he can ride into the sunset with the house that was solely in his name, the savings in his name from his income, the 401k in his name...

This is also why so many countries (and even states) have a fixed form of inheritance rights for married couples – seeing the assets as joint assets, joint fruit of the marriage. A non-married couple better have a will in place. Also why alternative forms of "marriage" can be seen, like common-law marriage, partnerships and so on. It’s an attempt to ensure rights when people are "married" in all but action.
That non-married but loving couple also better have a clear contract about who get’s to decide medical issues for the other, and even access in medical emergencies... Something a marriage gives.

I think people nowadays forget this basic factor about a marriage, and enter it solely based on infatuation, love and some sense of this is what’s expected. I met you – I still like you – we have been together for 18 months – let’s marry.

I think traditional Indian and Jewish parents were possibly on the right track with arranged marriages... At least it more-or-less guaranteed compatibility, and that in turn could develop into care and even loving. IMHO more likely than the love based on desire that leads to marriage where the couple realize a year or two later that they really have nothing in common...

I have long been a spokesman for obligatory pre-marital classes. At the very least that the couple sit down and sign item-by-item the marriage contract as outlined by the law in their state, including terms for a general divorce. That instead of people entering this long-term contract and only looking at the free toaster and initial payment, they realize the commitment and the seriousness of what’s going on. That after a honeymoon weekend in Hawaii it’s a decade of diapers, limited rest, and tight budgets. Probably with the first three years paying off that practice-dinner and the 34 rented tuxedo’s.

My wife and I? We married to commemorate the 20th year since our first date.
Yes – it was a romantic day and possibly the highlight of my life. It was something I’m so glad we did. But the reason we got round to it was when I realized I forgot to put her name as co-owner on a vehicle we bought. Something that would be automatically assumed and done had we been married. Purely a business transaction.

"but IMHO the biggest culprit is probably Hollywood and the fantasized romantic view on "true love""

I find many of Bigger’s posts to offer helpful thoughts including this ^ one

I think a long term faithful marriage is a series of decisions and behaviors that focus on both partners needs and desires. It is compromise at best. But I believe love exists and I believe people can keep and do keep their commitments.

I think Hollywood romance is based more on what feels good.

Well, I'm limerent married to my limerent object. Fidelity is apparently not one of my absolute requirements, perhaps because I've stayed limerent. I believe in true love even though I know some people are unfaithful. I believe in true love - giving what one wants to give and probably getting what one wants to get - even though my W betrayed me. I loved, love, and will love her, and I showed I did. She loved me as much as she could, love, and will love me, despite her A.

The counseling Bigger suggests - I'm all for it. W2b and I did a lot of work to imagine what our life together would be and to prevent conflicts before we got married. Even so, I think the counseling envisioned by Bigger would have helped us.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 3:31 PM, Tuesday, March 18th]

I don’t think love has anything to do with cheating in many cases.

I think as humans the "spark" starts to dwindle, people get complacent and then the AP appears. Suddenly there is a bit of excitement and intrigue lol.

They laugh at the right times. They are interested in your Aunt Tilly story your spouse has heard a million times. They find your forgetfulness "cute" instead of irritating, like your spouse does.

You linger over lunch, grab a coffee together, enjoy your "stolen time" together. The cheaters stupidly believe it’s true love when it’s mostly infatuation.

For many cheaters they never intend to leave their spouse. They just want a little extra on the side.

How sad this has become so common.

And as someone mentioned earlier, most of my BFs cheated on me except 1 or 2. I thought I had moved past picking people who had moral issues lol.

Well, I'm limerent married to my limerent object.

While I understand what you are saying here, because I too am very in love with my husband, the word limerence means something very different to me.

If you read about the way this is used in other places, the idea of limerence is really not love, nor is it infatuation. It’s not unrequited love, but there is an imbalance, an addiction. And it isn’t that you care about that person. An excerpt from Wikipedia:

"Joe Beam calls limerence the feeling of being madly in love.[31][32] Nicky Hayes describes it as "a kind of infatuated, all-absorbing passion", the type of love Dante felt towards Beatrice or that of Romeo and Juliet.[33] It is this unfulfilled, intense longing for the other person which defines limerence, where the individual becomes "more or less obsessed by that person and spends much of their time fantasising about them".[33] Hayes suggests that "it is the unobtainable nature of the goal which makes the feeling so powerful", and occasional, intermittent reinforcement may be required to support the underlying feelings.[33]"

The addiction in affairs are built on that instability. The push/pull dynamic of a romantic relationship with an unobtainable person.

You of course are welcome to use whatever words you like, the only reason I point it out is because it’s a little confusing in the context of a forum where limerence is often experienced in affairs, and I don’t think most affairs contain love.

Just throwing that out for consideration, because I think limerance is more appropriately looked at as a "love madness" meaning it’s an unhealthy attachment.

Everyone has their own interpretation. And I do not want to be seen as trying to tell you how to write or think, I just thought it might be worth mentioning for further consideration.

I fell deeply in love with every woman I ever got involved with, but all bar one betrayed me - one of them multiple times - and by doing so destroyed my ability to trust enough for me to be willing to ever risk becoming involved in another relationship.
Since the end of my last relationship I've had four women come on to me. All four were married - one of them tried it on with me while her husband was in the room! - which only reinforced my by then well-established, extremely cynical belief that a woman's definitions of trust, loyalty and betrayal bear very little resemblance to those of a man.

So, in answer to your question, I'd say yes, true love does exist, but it only lasts until the first time she elects to take her knickers off and spread her legs for another man.

..married 53 years, together 57 years... do I call it "true love" ??..NO!

Social media .. internet ..cell phones.. all make it so so easy..

People are attracted to other people. Egos love to be stroked. Having sex is always fun! Blow jobs are easy to give and get!!

How can we even wonder why it is so common an event in society? People will always find a reason to justify their betrayals of promises made and vows taken.

Why should any of us be surprised when it happens to us??

smy

Shakespeare wrote around 1600. Chaucer in the 1300s. Lots of infidelity. Dante reserved his worst circle of hell for betrayal of trust in 1321. The 10 Commandments have been around for 3000 years.

Does art follow life?

I doubt infidelity is any worse. It’s just more visible due to SM.