Have any of your marriages recovered after you have reached the point where the love and even affection you had for your spouse is gone? When you have found out so many awful things about how he has acted and felt over many years that you realize that you never knew him/her. Is there anyone whose marriage has survived when the only thing you had left was a commitment to your promises?

Some folks, like my XW and I, get remarried after a divorce. We killed our marriage years before the divorce. Divorced for over a year, we dated others and came back to each other. It can happen....

I've heard that up to 20% of divorces end up in the ex-spouses remarrying.

Perhaps sometimes it just helps to start again for these couples - a completely 'new' relationship.

Letting go of the old R is the tricky part.

Tru, there are many examples of such marriages around here. I felt even less than a committment to my promise, I felt disgust and revulsion. And I can honestly say that applying the MB principles to my marriage completely changed that. I have a wonderful marriage now. There are many such examples around here.

Why don't you describe your situation?

Thanks Melody. I have posted a few times in the reconciliation forum, but thought I would come over here where there seems to be more traffic.

My story is that my husband confessed last summer to one six-plus-year affair in the early years of our marriage. I had always suspected that affair, but he had denied, gaslighted, etc. He denies other affairs, but he was never actively engaged in our marriage and I believe there were likely other OW as well. The revelation of this one affair has caused so much damage, that I am sure that he will never admit to others. Shot myself on the foot on that score.

He has recently been diagnosed with a personality disorder, and says that explains why he has always been such a user of people, especially me. Throughout our lifetime he blamed me and my "emotions" for all our problems, and painted himself as a laid-back, easy to get along with soul. He says he realizes now that I was a loving wife who fought hard for her marriage, despite him and his total lack of interest or true love for me. He now says he wants to be a different man, and is pursuing individual counseling and marriage counseling.

My problem is that after initial feelings of rage following his confession, I now feel nothing for him but contempt bordering on revulsion. To me he appears to be a fraud, a con man who wore a mask for our 30 years together. I don't respect him or trust him or believe in him. I can barely stand for him to touch me, and after a lifetime of begging him in vain for sex I now consider the thought of sex with him as nauseating. I am still here because of my vows, and my feeling that it is likely better for my two sons than for us to divorce.

What I am wondering is if anyone who has felt similar negative things for their spouse has had their feelings of love and affection return. If so, how did it happen.

Wow, Tru, you just described exactly how I felt after I found out about my H's affair. The only difference is that I had just been married for a few short months. He had defrauded me. I didn't know who he was and he tricked me into marrying him.

So, I know your feelings exactly. I was in an up and down rage for about a year, but the hard work he did resulted in a changed man. He has become a devoted, loving, honest, sincere husband. As long as he strives to change and demonstrates trustworthy behavior, your marriage does have a chance. You will get over the disgust and revulsion if he rebuilds the trust that he lost. I suspect you are alot like me in that your feelings of love are strongly connected to your feelings of respect. If I feel no respect for my H, I feel no love.

So hang in there for awhile, Tru. I won't lie to you, it will be a rough year, but give it at least a year and see how he does. You have put up with it this long, another year won't make that much difference.

p.s. part of acting trustworthy is telling you the truth about anything else that happened. He MUST do that and get it over with now. Otherwise you will die a death of a thousand cuts as it comes out in dribs and drabs over the years. And complete honesty about the past is the first step in restoring trust. He should not have any secrets with other women to which you are not privy.

Many have felt as you have and even after reading further down, what you are experiencing is quite the norm. When the WS comes back before the BS has time to heal, it could look like the recovery has been set back a notch. The revelation that you aren't the crazed one will make anyone angry. Your needs are now screaming for justice and you probably want some blood or some form of payback for all your suffering.

Lack of love for him? Maybe, for the time being. Before you go and do anything rash, get with a good MC. Better yet, call Steve @ MB. Give yourself the opportunity to for one more time, give it your best. Then you w/b ready to decide.

Melody is a great source of suppport here. Pay attention to her suggestions and words of experience.

take care,
L.

I've certainly felt that. I've been know around the parts to say that I could not stand to even watch my husband chew his food. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif" alt="" /> I've since been told by another MB that they observed his eating, and there is nothing unusual about it. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Feelings (such as contempt or revulsion) can be strong at times. But feelings change every day...several times a day.

The feelings you have toward your husband can change but not without some work.

What actions are the two of you taking to repair this damage? What is your husband doing to show his remorse and prove that he wants to work on this marriage?

Susan <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

TruBluz, thanks for posting your questions. It’s a good one for me too. I look forwarded to seeing the repsonces and hope that they will help me to deal w/ my situation.

Yep I too was deceived by my H and felt that I was tricked into getting M. I would have NEVER married him had I known that he was cheating on me. Then to top it off, he supposedly stopped the PA but did continue to have contact w/ OW (who was M also) after we were married. I too began to feel like you. I had no respect for my H and I was very angry with him. I uprooted my 2 children from Missouri to California away from my family, to deal w/ this crap! I wanted a divorce immediately but it wasn’t financially possible at the time. In the meantime, I got pregnant. Now I really felt trapped.

Fast forwarding a bit, I decided to stay only long enough (one year) to put things in order to leave. I also decided that I was going to do EVERYTHING right by my H, despite that I didn’t love him, in fact I hated him! I wanted to make sure that when I did leave that I had a clear conscious. Well in the process my H had a complete turn around. He went from wanting a D also, to realizing the error of his ways. He made a lot of promises and I did see a change. My respect slowly came back and I began doing the right things b/c I wanted to, not b/c I felt obligated to. And for a while I was truly happy and I felt that my H was doing everything he could to try to repair the damage he did. Unfortunately, for me after a couple of months he never really followed through w/ the promises he made. We never saw a MC, nor worked through the MB principles. Then he left for a 6 month deployment. So, my answer is yes, that I believe that my M could survive even though I was at a “point of no return”. But only if the WS is willing to do what they are suppose to do.

Melody:
…” part of acting trustworthy is telling you the truth about anything else that happened. He MUST do that and get it over with now. Otherwise you will die a death of a thousand cuts as it comes out in dribs and drabs over the years. And complete honesty about the past is the first step in restoring trust. He should not have any secrets with other women to which you are not privy.”…

Whoa! This is a wonderfully delievering statement, well put! Even though individually I have moved on past the A, to this day I don’t have complete closure regarding what “really” happened in regards to the A. As a result I don’t completely trust him again. Personally for me what it will take is my H sitting me down (on his own, not b/c I asked or nagged it out of him) and saying, “ok this is what you do know about such and such (b/c I found out on my own), but let me tell you somethings that you don’t know…” Doesn’t it say much more for the WS to confess to the BS then to get caught?