First, let me say there are probably going to be some people who think I’m ungrateful. If so, let the 2x4’s fly.
I am stuck in my recovery. Actually, I am regressing I think. Oh God, I don’t know what I am anymore.
If you’d like a summary of my sitch here’s the link.
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/sho...e=4#Post3154169 My first post on this thread sums it up but if you read the thread further, I think around pg 5 or 6, you’ll see where I also had a brief (few hrs of kissing & talking) affair.
It took me 4 months to get the truth about my FWH’s affair out of him. During those 4 months he lied to me about some of the details. Also during those 4 months my H was trying to meet my EN’s. I felt more in love with him than I ever have. Unfortunately, everytime he lied to me I could feel it. By the time he finally came clean on the Christmas weekend, instead of feeling relieved, I felt a loss of love for him.
This scared me and still does. It’s been 3 wks since the last major confession. The problem is that since he lied so much during those months, I still don’t know if he’s telling me the whole truth or not. There are still some important details “he doesn’t remember”. Details that are significant enough to “not forget” so easily in my mind.
This is not my only problem. My husband and I have been pretty distant throughout our marriage and not intimate hardly at all in the 13 yrs we’ve been married.
I married him because I thought he was such an upstanding guy. He hated liars and always showed empathy for other people. He was generous and caring. I came to learn that empathy was something he was willing to give others freely, just not me or our kids. The kids are from my first marriage.
My H and I didn’t have the necessary MB tools that we now have. If we had, 13 yrs of resentments probably wouldn’t have accumulated.
Through this “discovery” phase, I have found out that my husband can lie just as easily as anyone else. He’s admitted to “flirting with intent” all of these years. When his flirting bothered me in the past, he always accused me of being too sensitive. He recently wrote in a letter that he was going to post in these forums that he always felt “intellectually superior” to me. His words, not mine. I always felt he had this attitude because a lot of times he said things that made me feel that way. That was one of the reasons I went back to school (college) so I wouldn’t feel that way.
BS’s seem to be relieved when their husbands come out of the fog and they get their old husbands back. Mine came out of the fog, showed me who is really is and he’s not who I thought I married.
However, the way he talks now and his view of things have changed somewhat for the better. He now understands how damaging his flirting was to me. He has been remorseful about the affair. He knows lying won’t be tolerated but I think he may still be withholding some truths “to spare me”. I think he still feels superior to me though.
Even though I’ve been “in recovery” for almost 5 months now, I feel like it’s really only been since Christmas because that’s supposedly when he came clean.
I have asked him some questions about different things so I can figure out what his true character is like. Remember, we haven’t been intimate in the past so now that we are, I’m finding out all of this stuff about him. I have told him over the last few months that I am only committed to him on a day to day basis so I can figure out if I want to make myself vulnerable to him again.
In the recent past, I could take a break from all of this affair stuff and just spend much needed quality time with him and it would make love bank deposits. Ever since Christmas, when I’ve tried to put the affair aside long enough to spend quality time with him, the deposits haven’t had the same effect on me and I’m scared.
I feel that in time as long as he is being radically honest, transparent and getting IC that I could overcome this.
Even though my H has been remorseful it just doesn’t seem to be enough for me. He has told me numerous times that when I talk about the affair it make withdrawals in his love bank. So here we are. I don’t feel like I can put all of this behind me without thoroughly working through the whys and hows of the affair, and not just the affair, I need to work through why it all started in the first place. He wants me to forget the last 13 yrs and start from here. I can’t allow myself to do that. I want to work through this stuff before I make a commitment to him and make myself vulnerable to him again.
His love withdraws in his bank when I talk about the affair or our past, but it makes deposits for me when we’re openly trying to work through these things. I think he’ll fall out of love with me again if I keep trying to get what I need and I’m afraid I’m falling out of love with him because I can’t get what I need.
I would love nothing more than to commit to man I love and move on to a very happy MB future. I just can’t do it with someone who doesn’t have the empathy or patience to understand how hard this is for me.
I have a feeling this is going to turn out very bad. I have been soooooo depressed over the last 5 months and I feel like I’m getting worse. I am having a very hard time just doing the basic everyday things. I have a ton of homework to do that I can’t concentrate on.
This whole thing has affected me physically too. The first month I found out about his affair, I had a period everyday for a month. After that I have gotten them every couple of weeks before I’m suppose to. The last one lasted 2 days longer than it should have and it started earlier than it should have. This creates more anxiety for me. I do have a doctor’s appt scheduled for this.
I feel so confused and afraid. What is wrong with me?!!!!!!
