This is my first post after spending a lot of time reading the experiences of others at this site. I am a serial cheater,having been married 4 times and had at least one affair during each one. I am currently married to wife number 1 and swore that I would never be unfaithful to her again. I was loyal for 12 years but succumbed to the temptation when things weren't going so smooth in our marriage. We have been to MC and read several books, doing
the exercises in some of them. I have always been an introverted person pertaining to my personal thoughts and feelings and all of the efforts so far have helped me to open up more to my wife even though it is a struggle.

I haven't been able to let go of the OW even though I know that this realationship was built on lies and deceit. This affair has gone on for over two years. Always in the past, I was able to say it's over and never look back but this time I am having problems doing that. I say that I won't see her again but after awhile, I do. I agree with the concept that there can be NC if I am to rebuild a relationship with my wife. Problem is that I have been unwilling to make that
kind of commitment. My wife has stated that she is willing to do what ever it takes to make our relationship work and strongly believes that we can succeed if I am willing to give her the same commitment.

My problem is that I am pretty much emotionally dead right now and don't really care what happens. I know the tremendous hurt and pain that I have caused my wife but as she says, I haven't shown any remorse. I haven't because I don't really feel any. I take full responsibility for my actions and know that it was me that made the choice to be unfaithful. Problem is that I don't have much feeling one way or the other. Am I just a selfish, selfcentered cruel person with no hope for recovery or has anyone else been here? I'm not looking for sympathy but I would like to know if anyone else has found their way back from here or should I just get out of my wife's life and let her go find someone who will give her what she needs?

YOu must be feeling some kind of remorse, if you are posting in MB. This is a site to try to rebuild marriages, not to carry on affairs.

What I see, is that you could be somewhat depressed, and you feel you have no energy to stop the affair and work on your marriage. For that you need energy and you feel emotionally dead right now. You know you need to go in NC and that seems impossible for you. But I am sure you can do it. We all feel that way at the beginning, but it gets better.

Emotionally dead.....I've heard that somewhere before...ahhh yes, I believe it was my husband.

You have to maintain NO CONTACT with this Other Woman at ALL COSTS.

You need to write an NC letter to her telling her you never wish to see her or speak to her again. That your affair was wrong, hurtful and disrespectful to the most important person in your life. Your Wife.

You need to be an open book to your wife. You need to let her know your whereabouts at all times, and let her have access to your cell phone records, and e-mail. You need to be accountable to her, she can help you with NC.

You may feel, right now, that you aren't in love with your wife, and that you are "In Love" with this OW. But it's a fantasy. You need to buckle down, and adhere to no contact.

Read "Surviving An Affair" and "His Needs, Her Needs" with your wife.

Also I would print off the "Emotional Needs Questionnaire" (Make 2 copies, one for you, and one for your wife) and fill them out. Find out what was lacking that caused you to go astray.

Good Luck and God Bless,

-Caren

That would be her decision - assuming you are complettely truthful with her. Are you?

How arrogant of you to think you can even make such a decision.

Send her here and I'll help her make a decision whether to leave you or not. In the meantime you have to get control of yourself and stop looking for excuses.

No contact, no excuses. THAT'S taking responsibility.

I am speaking from the perspective of a FWW, and this is all still new to me so hopefully this will be of some help to you. I have and sometimes still feel this way but the others are correct in that you must give NC a chance to work. Feelings will gradually return, but be prepared because grief, etc. will be painful as you withdraw from the OP. Only then can you begin to rebuild your M. I too resisted that first step of NC...but it is essential. Other wise people on this board convinced me of its necessity. See, love is much more of a choice rather than a feeling. You, like me, had chosen to give and receive gratification from OP rather than your BS. I know you may not be ready immediately to make this choice, but ponder it, please. Keep posting and listening. Be encouraged by what you read.

Good morning, D...

Glad you moved your post...would love to see any answers to my questions here, when you have the time.

Have to ask one more...'cuz I have little self control this morning...given your pattern, is feeling emotional dead (detached) usual after your As are exposed?

I hear you've made a lot of decisions based on your feelings; if not based on them entirely, but they have some heavy influence...would you say you've chosen to live that way all your life, or is that new?

Very excited for you (since you can't be yourself right now) to be here, and the changes you are striving to make.

Thank you for sharing,
LA

Thank you all for responding. My Norton security system all of a sudden decided to block our access to the internet so neither my wife or I could talk to anyone here.

I understand that to rebuild my relationship with my BS that a NC poicy is essential. That would require quiting my job and probably moving to another city. That would mean a huge reduction in income and at the age of 66, finding a similiar job would be out of the question. My BS states it correctly when she says "that any other choice means that I am putting the job and/or money above our relationship". While I agree with her, I am still having a difficult time making that kind of choice. To move forward takes two people and if I am not ready to commit 100% to the relationship, we are just kind of spinning our wheels. What names people wish to apply to me doesn't change the situation. That is where we are and BS is getting tired of waiting for me commit to NC and to giving 100%. What I am hearing is that how I feel doesn't matter as much as what I choose. If I choose to love my BS with NC with OW, everything else will take care of itself. So why are such simple decisions so hard to make?

Are you stalling her out, D? These are the consequences of your actions, not hers. You know that. I know you know that.

We have a lot of stuff in the way of our simple (but not easy) choices. Our very wishfulness, not wanting for this to have happened again, not wanting to accept those consequences but for things to be different can cause frustration and resistance.

Getting to the why of your choice to do this to yourself, your family and other women's families, is essential.

How you feel right now is how you feel...dead. You said what your BW believed about the choice to change jobs and cities. You only implied what you felt...would you be clear on that?

Why not commit 100%? Have you considered how much accumulated debris you're carrying over your emotions? Resentment is like hardened slime...it builds and builds. First step in MC for us was to do a resentment timeline, listing our resentments from the beginning all the way through the marriage.

It was crucial for me to do this--to get to the whys of my choices. My WH had a really difficult time doing this exercise. He was taught that resentment wasn't manly, it was bad and petty. Didn't mean he didn't resent. Even now, he is surprised when he states another resentment he'd concealed from himself because it conflicted with his image, a couldn't-have, which had nothing to do with reality.

I wanna guess you're sick of being sick. That you tried to be that guy you thought would make life easier, safer, for 12 years, getting it right and it got you back to the same feelings, and you took that route again, the curse that looks like a cure. God will bring on the same lessons in different forms until we get the lesson.

That's a really great place to put your head when you don't want to commit to your wife. You want it to all go away. There's a weariness in your posts. I want to alert you to something I believe is very different than all your previous turns...

You're communicating who you are...what you feel, think and believe...with your wife. You're here. You wanna get to understand yourself as much as she does. That's what I get from your actions and words.

Did you read the love busters section yet? Read the disrespectful judgments (DJs) part as well as the others, but focus on this one. Changed my life. Was the key for me to no longer be a serial cheater.

LA

I have read love busters but did not do the exercise in disrespectful judgements. Am also going back and re-reading some things in "After the Affair". Before I read your reply, BW read my post and wanted to know exactly what are the issues preventing me from commiting 100%. Guess I need to work on answering the "whys" as much for me as for us. Will be out the rest of the day but will think about it and see if I can honestly answer. Will see if I can do
a resentment timeline as well.

What I see you willing to do...

Post, answer and not be defensive. I see you actively watching your automatic defensive reaction and not choosing to react externally that way. Big one that you're willing to commit to doing.

Look inside yourself, in your way and time, to find answers for you...which your wife also happens to be asking. Throwing us into the mix for questions is rather brave and will hold you to your self honesty, I think.

You're reading books, the articles here, studying, really, informing yourself.

Looks like you're willing to commit to doing some really tough stuff. Very much like what committing to the marriage would take. I see why you put percentages. Would you be willing to commit 100% to your relationship with yourself?

I'll look for SC's latest post and the pleasure of being there through this. When she asked for your answers, the whys, did she tell you what it felt like in her, not knowing?

LA

I’m back. Took me awhile to decide to post again. Sundog, in one his post to my BW, described me pretty good based on past history. I guess the only thing he left out was that I also was a compulsive liar, even to the point of being addictive to my BS. From the beginning of our relationship fifty years ago, I would avoid any kind of confrontation and telling lies to do so just became a lot easier. Showing any kind of emotions was a no-no and I became very good at keeping things bottled up inside of me. Sundog is right when he points out how I just went from one person to another and never really considered the destruction I was causing. Once I decided to leave a lover or a marriage, I never looked back and rarely gave it a second thought. It was always all about me. Of course I knew what I was doing was wrong but I didn’t care enough to want to change. I learned to say all the right words but I’m not sure I ever truly revealed how I really felt to anyone. I had every intention of remaining faithful to BS when I married her a second time. Even I did for many years, when I look back now, I wonder if it was still all about me and not about us. Maybe I was trying to cleanse my soul for past transgressions.
When I chose to participate in another A, I was right back to the same place I had been before. Lies, lies, and more lies and not caring enough about the damage I was doing to stop. Even now that the A is out in the open, I still have a problem telling my BW the truth. Hopefully, this is the beginning to change myself forever.
This A was different to me than any before. It started out as a PA but advanced to a EA pretty quickly. The SF with the OW was better than anything I had ever experienced and she reached inside of me more-so than any other person had in my life. I know that
the relationship was built on lies and deceit to my BS and that the OW and I never had to face the realities of day to day living with each other. Didn’t matter. What I saw and felt was, it was like the book “His Needs, Her Needs” was written for us. It was all there already. As my BS has said, I tried to stop seeing her several times but went back again
over and over. So maybe Sundog is right; I shouldn’t be married to anyone. Seems like
I am still a very destructive person. Because I haven’t committed to BS( No NC letter, no IC, no MC) and still having trouble telling the truth to her, she is my victim again. So why am I still here? Why is she still here? It’s like I don’t want to let go of BS or OW
And in the end, do I really care? I have revealed more about me in this post than ever before, not only to BS, but to anyone who reads it. Maybe, deep down, I really do want to change.

I'm wondering why you don't go for some IC? It appears you may have some intimacy issues. It is a very lonely way to live. My WH has had a long string of relationships his whole life.

We were married for 12 years, and he left me for the OW, who dumped him after 3 years. Now he has lost everything. He is 58, and spent his retirement money, savings, everything. He is completely distraught. I'm sure he will find another love to last a couple of years, but what a lonely way to live.

"I never looked back and rarely gave it a second thought."

I believe this is a lie to yourself. You weren't all about you in your life...you left the real "you" out of it. It was all about others, feeling shame, guilt, pain...and running fast and hard from it. You judged yourself by your actions and haven't accepted you without action or word...the self you really are. No judgments. Just a creation, like the rest of us.

You are into do-overs...clean slates...being new to someone who doesn't know the "real" you. You look at life with debt and gratitude...equal measures. Think about it...you wanna cleanse all the past pain you caused (which is fantasy), so you tell yourself to believe you can redeem yourself through others. You can't. You just built up a lot of new resentment to entitle you to another clean slate time due to your lack of respect.

To yourself and your wife.

Begin with ownership. First, who you are, then what you've done. Your feelings are buried beneath a lot of garbage. There is nothing about OW that is different. You are the one who gives yourself permission to believe what you believe; then those beliefs give you the feelings you want.

Own that you believe your wife is as bad as you are...or has been a dolt to believe and love you all her life. Own that. It isn't truth--just your belief. Own that she represents a lot more to you than who she is--she is not your mother, your sister, your grandmother...your brother. She is your authority person you can crush; your judge who can convict; your moral compass who points out all your shortcomings...all your beliefs, not truth. She is human, making choices, as am I. What we choose is not who we are...we are before choice. What we choose determines our lives, our destinies.

Conflict avoidance. Why? Not how...but why? You feel terror in conflict. Irony...adultery is the biggest conflict. Biggest lesson of your life may be that what you've been avoiding all your life is your own inner conflict, just other people got in the way.

Self-honesty is the only cure. You've begun here and with your wife. Tell her all that you haven't...one long dirge, so that she doesn't have to fear truth dribbling out, decimating repeatedly, and tell her not for her, but for you. Know you've lied to yourself for so long, for the exact same reason you lie to others...to keep from hurting them. Well, you hurt anyway, but your reality gets really distorted in process. Like believing OW is so great when she's choosing evil.

Trust you are made wonderfully, complete and whole, by God, for a purpose. Your honesty will get you to that purpose, but it is unfamiliar, not a routine, and you will need to have blind faith in it before you can feel it. No contact for two years, IC and posting will get you to you, the original, the one who wasn't defective, destructive or shame-based. That's what my WH and I committed to--and it is more than half over. Our choices are very different...not from fear, but joyful living. Relief, freedom, self-caretaking and respect can get you there. You could be like my H...OW is nothing at all to him. Equally responsible but my H was in love with the fantasy of clean slate/new person (him). He has that in our marriage now. So do I.

LA

Unable to let the OW go.....Do the OW and your wife a favor, be the man and let her go!!!! Not saying your OW is not responsible for this as well, but it takes a big person to make that first move to honesty, be the big person.
I am in a situation similar to you, the unable to let the ow go, I'm the OW and the cheater....aka EA, walk away, NOW. NO run. I am looking at your post and I have to say thank you. I am staring this post down and thinking...hmmmm, could be me 30+ years from now.
I understand in part the addiction you suffer with your OW. It sucks to let go of that high but you need to do this or do what everyone else will tell you, divorce your W and then be with your OW. I think you really want to be with your wife, you went back and been with her for a long time.
It's just not worth it...move on to the new improved you...let all of this go and heal. Good Luck

I tried some IC years ago without much success; mainly because I wouldn't even be honest with the counseler. Is
that stupid or what? Paying money for help but won't be open to accept it. Maybe I've at least gotten smart enough to try to get my money's worth.

Call Steve H @ MB. Your BS should know about him if she is posting here.

You have more options than you may realize. Then again so does your W.

L.

LA - You give a feller a whole lot to chew on at one time.
Will try to take each point and get back to you.

Orchid; Thanks for the suggestion. Both BW and I know about Steve H. We have seen a lot of referrals to him.

No rush, D...

To your post about counseling...you learned a lot.

Get those lessons.

You value your self-image more than you do your real self. Ouch. You are willing to pay hard-earned money to be able to say, it didn't help. It was worth it to you to be able to say that. You now know that you only get out what you are willing to put into it.

That's a lot. Solid knowledge and choice. I believe IC would be very different...and you value your money enough, yourself a bit more, to be real and honest. I think you are too curious not to, now.

LA