How do I not associate my sons bday, our anniv, my daugh bday, my last preg and delivery with this? All those dates were huge for me but are now huge for them too. He spent the night at her house on my sons bday. He went to her apt for our anniv. He took off for FL to save them or my daugh bday. The dates just keep going too. Its like every date that was special to us he targeted and used for them.

[color:"blue"] DIE TO YOURSELF
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This is a difficult concept - especially for someone in your position. You might feel you've already done this or that you're too far down the line to need to do this. Bro - this is sometimes a difficult concept to describe. It's a humility without self deprication or futilistic thoughts or comments. Dying to yourself requires you to relax, open up, be vulnerable and stop putting YOUR feelings ahead of someone elses. It can't be about YOU it has to be about the "US". You can't have room for anyone else if you close off and become self centered.
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Yes - you lied, cheated, stole, drowned the puppies in a burlap bag, stole from blind beggars cup, picked on the fat kid in school, made fun of old ladies in wheelchairs, waved your privates out the back of the school bus window, whatever. You're dirty with sin, a truly despicable person.
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Welcome to the club. Take a seat and look around. Find one person sitting in the circle who doesn't have the same amount of dirt on themselves. Maybe the offense is different but each and every one of us is just as dirty. Got it? Good, now get over it. Grace is an amazing thing. It washes even the dirtiest of us. So you're just the same as the rest of us. No better, no worse.
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BUT (and you knew there would be a but, didn't you?) you have to do something with this Grace you've been given. You need to pass it on to your wife. You need to open yourself up, lie under the microscope, be examined, poked, prodded, and tested time and time again...with a loving smile on your face. That's a tall order.
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That brings us to part 2.
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RESTORATIVE JUSTICE
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A few years back the United Methodist Church asked a friend of mine to research this concept for them. In the interest of time I'm going to copy and paste someone elses definition of what this is:
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Restorative justice is a valued-based approach to responding to wrongdoing and conflict, with a balanced focus on the person harmed, the person causing the harm, and the affected community. Restorative justice focuses on transforming wrongdoing by healing the harm, particularly to relationships, that is created by harmful behavior. The primary stakeholders in restorative justice processes are the person(s) who caused the harm (offender), the person(s) harmed (victim), and the affected community. By collectively identifying and addressing harms, needs, and obligations resulting from wrongdoing, we are able to create healing and put things right again.
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Here's the rub. We currently live in a PUNITIVE justice system where you do the crime, do your time, and then more often than not live with a scarlet letter the rest of your life. Once people are labeled "criminal" they are often no longer offered the opportunities to TRULY re-assimilate back into life. Fringe people are kept on the fringe and if you interview enough of them you will find that they never seem able to climb out of their past to build much of a future. As a society we love to pick at other peoples' scabs instead of investigating our own. We're good at looking down our noses at the guy who was busted for tax evasion but can't understand that the deduction "guess" we made on our own return for the "home office" that didn't really, really qualify that one time put us in the same place with one exception - we didn't get caught. So in our own eyes we're not really dirty. Am I clear? I hope so.
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Take the restorative justice tack. Restore as much wholeness to your wife through selflessness and humility and you will at the same time be restoring your own standing. I know that if you really put your heart into it you will find that any and all accountability that you must suffer will become ENJOYABLE because you'll see that it is an act of love and an offering of grace to be so transparent to your wife. Then, at some point, it will become HER job to not hold you under the old punitive justice system and instead afford you the restorative system which doesn't paint a scarlet "A" on your chest.
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Remember, this isn't all about you and your feelings. Your feelings matter but you'll FEEL differently once you quit struggling. Be still. Be open. Feel the Grace which you have already received from God. Be graceful to others. Gladly open yourself to scrutiny because those who live above reproach have nothing to hide. Be whole in the knowledge that yesterday isn't today nor does it have to be tomorrow. Be patient and don't try to rush the healing. Instead be the salve that protects the wound from anything that would seek to infect it.
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Here are a couple more quotes from my friend to rest on today:
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1. Do the right thing because it's the right thing to do.
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2. This too shall pass. It's going to be ok. YOU are going to be ok [/color]

Which is so terrifying-I made the classic mistake of wrapping all of me up in my H. Now that he's done this I am floundering around trying to get some air. Instead of focusing on me I'm focusing on what I did wrong to deserve this. I have become so intertwined in him that his wrongs feel like mine. I feel lost without his love.

He seems to be at the place where MrW post might mean something.

Now that I know he is begging forgiveness. I just don't understand.

I loved that part in MrW post where it says that my H should be the salve that protects the wound. I love that so much. He can't take it away but he can protect it. He can heal the wound.