I did read your entire note.

My (discounted) contribution was merely an attempt to support your conclusion metaphorically, for other readers, if not for you.

BTW and FWIW: As an example of the attention I pay to the written word here, I would point out that your use of "must of" is fallacious and nonsensical. Presumably you intended the use of "must have" or the non-standard contraction "must've".

I apologize. I didn't mean to com across as discounting your contribution. I just thought you may have misinterpreted my intentions. I appreciate everyone's help in a time that I need it.

hello rrr,
i am new to posting on the boards but not new to this board or to affairs and have like you, experienced some of the horrible pain that comes with it.
I read your entire thread and wanted to tell you, to put things in perspective that you are INCREDIBLY lucky. And that whenever the resentment and imagery hits, you should remember this.
Your wife never wanted this man. She wanted the illusion of the attention. And yes, we women can even take sexual attention (sexting etc) and turn it into the emotional attention, validation, affection etc that we truly need inside.
In essence you should remember that your wife actually is JUST as hurt, upset, unhappy and resentful about this affair as you. She did not truly want for this to happen to her life.
She is obviously willing to do ANYTHING and everything to put this nightmare out of her life as she hates the fact that it happened just as much as you did.
Do you know... how LUCKY you are to have this?
The enemy here is your ex-best friend. And you should team up to see him as someone who stole something out of your marriage from BOTH of you.

My wayward had an affair for 5 years. FIVE YEARS. But that's not the worst of it. The worst of it... is that he actually loved and desired this woman. he had certain sexual needs that I didn't want to indulge in - and so what happened? Something I could never have imagined. he simply found a way to meet these needs behind my back. I would never have suspected it in a million years.
And the worst of it? I read diaries that he foolishly kept later. Where he talked about the MAD desire for this woman, how much she turned him on, about their encounters, about how he doesnt know how he can live without her, and on and on and on. Talk about IMAGERY. The worst part is it was all true. He could not disguise it as lies he was telling her but didn't truly feel, because those writings were not even intended for her to ever read!! It was just him writing down his real thoughts!!! Thoughts that will haunt me forever.
this was all 2 years ago, and I am still suffering from terrible resentment. I come here to read the article on resentment sometimes and finding ways to cope.
What I would GIVE to have had him close his eyes the entire time cause he didn't even want to have sex with her and to know that he doesn't even love her. To know that he was practically drunk and unable to make good decisions when with her.

And let me tell you, emotional dynamics are ironic in how they work. When our lying cheating half is not repentant and wants to leave us, even in the face of the horrible things THEY did, suddenly the emotions turn that WE want to save the marriage and we want to keep them and have them love us and fix whatever is wrong. Imagine for a second how you would have TRULY felt if your wife wanted to leave you. It might not be what you think. On the other hand, when our spouse is guilty repentant and dying to make it up to us, we want to KILL them. We suddenly don't have to worry about feeling rejected and unloved, we don't lose that emotional security, so we focus on our rage and on our resentment and when in that state NOTHING can make it up to us, short of a time machine that will change what happened entirely.
So in essence a lot of the TRULY lousy louses end up with supporting and loving spouses that want to fix things, while some of the truly repentant people who just simply really ended up in a BAD situation and want more than anything to get away from it, are judged for it and hurt by it for the rest of their lives.
You have one of the good eggs.
Focus on your resentment fading with time and put things into perspective. This was truly not the case where your wife fell in love with another man and wanted him sexually and had hot passionate amazingly good encounters with him. This was just a terrible mistake - one that SHE hates that ever happened to her marriage.
Both of you team up, mourn what happened to YOUR marriage, and stop seeing her as the bad guy - it will help with you not resenting her.
Otherwise, this situation will win over you and cripple your marriage. The bad guy here will have the last laugh.
He stole something from BOTH of you. It is imagery your wife hates too - not just you.
think about the blessing in that.
And the difference between if this had been imagery that she regrets but forever remembers as something amazing.
You are LUCKY.
And whenever resentment hits... think about just how truly lucky you actually are that your wife resents this having happened to her just as much as you do. You is yours and always was.

It would help if you'd start with posting your own story so you can be responded to adequately without us threadjacking.

This poster probably doesn't feel very "lucky". A communication technique I've learned is when you tell someone what they SHOULD feel, it invalidates what they DO feel, so that is best avoided. Each person here has their own story and each one has experienced the heartbreak of infidelity.

Yes it helps to focus on the good that there is, sometimes that is a process that can take a while to get there, AFTER things have been turned around.

kaycstamper, you are totally right. I'm sorry.
I was actually writing up a big post to put up on here and then got caught up in reading this thread and decided to chime in.

My intentions were good - I was trying to be encouraging and point out to rrr what I see in the good side of things.

I *do* think that cheating spouses fall into two categories - those who really got in a bad situation and have absolutely no love or desire for the OM/OW and hate the fact that the affair even happened, and then those who actually fell in love/WANTED it to happen, have a hard time letting go and so on. Dr Harley explains this also, about how affairs that did not involve any feelings for the lover are much easier to get over.

I didn't meant to try to imply that the fact that this situation happened is "lucky" in any way. Just to say that sometimes the worst things happen to the best of us.
I also do think that the resentment after an affair is one of the worst things that remains after all is said and done, and definitely ruins happiness for both involved. Perspective helps resent less sometimes and I'm sure it helps when you know that your spouse did not even ENJOY anything that did happen...

And you do understand that 99% of affairs are the former and not the latter? One night stands are very rare. Most people do not take such chances with their marriages unless there is a powerful addiction to the person or the person is addicted to substances. In this case, the OP's wife is an alcoholic. When a spouse has an affair when their is no feelings - a rarity - it points to an even bigger problem, such as an addiction or a mentality that does not believe in fidelity. There is nothing fortunate or lucky about that.

When I say lucky, I mean that it is wonderful when the wayward spouse felt nothing for the lover, realizes that they were in a bad situation and wants to do everything possible to recover from it.

I'm trying to be uplifting and point out the great things about rrr's situation - what's so wrong with that?? Since when is looking on the bright side a bad thing?
It seems like the reaction here so far is that I should not have even talked about any cup-half-full facts.

I know you mean well, but telling anyone they are lucky after their spouse has had an affair is really stretching it. IT is the worst thing that has happened to him. Dr Harley equates it with being raped, physically assaulted or the losing a child. For betrayed wives, the most painful aspect is the emotional attachment; for many betrayed men it is the physical aspect.

RRR, how did your appointment go today?

What type of questions would you ask in a polygraph? Specifics about incidents that occured, or more general questions such as

Have you had any other extramarital affairs?

Did it only last x amount of time?

Were there only x amounts of encounters?

Were you in love with him?

Have you had any contact, by phone, email, text or otherwise since the no contact letter?

etc.


More specific

Was the sex good?

Did you have an orgasm?

Did he ever perform oral on you?

(these are all questions she has addressed and answered for me about affair)

I am also curious as to the accuracy o polygraph and what effect nerves have on them. The guy I contacted charges $350, 32 years experience, and does not use voice, but a real polygraph. Did a little research before I chose someone in our area. Just want to know what the accuracy of a poly is.

Appointment went great. Jennifer made me feel very comfortable and had great suggestions for us. She was very happy with the progress we had made on our own, and was very convinced my wife was telling the truth. In just a few days of following her advice I feel like we have connected more than we had in 6 weeks. I'm very happy we stopped seeing the other therapist and moved to someone more experienced in this area. She also spent almost 2 hours with us, which shows she truly cares and wasnt trying to get us off the phone at 45-50 minutes.

Wife passed polygraph over the weekend. I hired a local respectable polygraph examiner in the area with 32 years experience. It answered many questions I had. Most importantly she was telling the truth on:

How many encounters (minus one, see below)

no true feelings for him

She did it for the attention, not the sex (which wasn't even good for her). I still struggle with why she would do it if it wasn't good, she wasn't physically attracted to him, and she didn't want the physical part of it. But I need to let this go and work on the future. I'll never understand this as sex is more physical and for attraction for men.

How long it went on for. He initiated contact. She ended it.

No other extramarital affairs.

She is genuine in her remorse.

etc.



Seems the only thing she was still keeping from me was an encounter they had where she gave him oral (he never gave her oral). No intercourse. This was in the middle of the affair, not something that happened before or after. She didn't want to do it, but he begged until she conceded. This came out before exam started when examiner first talked to us and made sure nothing else needed to be told before we talk about what questions needed to be addressed. I was disappointed there was still anything still left at this point and it took sitting in the polygraph examiners office to come out. But we'll address that with Jennifer on Wednesday. I guess there could of been a lot more, but 100% honesty is a must to get through this.

I now know all encounters, and everything else is the same as I was told as that was one of the questions.

All in all, I was happy with the results, just knowing she was 95% honest with me from the start. Knowing this puts the wondering behind me and I think will help us to try and move forward with the present and future without questioning "do I know the everything from past."

rrr,

I was disappointed there was still anything still left at this point and it took sitting in the polygraph examiners office to come out.

Don't be disappointed, your W would have thought about this lie every day for the next 20 years or whatever, and especially every time you asked for oral. You on the other hand would have had no idea why she had formed an aversion.

This was the last step on the stairs to recovery.

The flip side of what you wrote about your W not being attracted to OM, is that our Ws are often not really attracted to us, but they stay with us because of the other needs well meet.

God Bless
Gamma

That's probably a better way of looking at it. At least she was honest for the most part, and ended it on her own before she was exposed. She said it was easy to end because of the lack of feeling and attraction for the OM and realizing she wanted to get those needs met by me, not him.

I noticed an increase of affection toward me at the time it was ended, and now I know why. At that time, I wasn't returning it because I knew something had happened. But she was attempting to try and re-establish some sort of connection between us so she could get the attention she felt like she needed from me. D-Day kind of put a wrench in that attempt for a while.

In talking after we met with Jennifer, I think we came to the conclusion that the only thing we had left for a while was physical attraction for each other and fulfilling each others sexual needs. No other needs were being met on either end. It was basically a good friendship with an attractive friend who was good in the sack. Nothing more, nothing less.

After the polygraph we took Jennifer's advice and had the parents watch the kids for the night. Went out to dinner, came back and had some one on one time. Not watching TV. She has told me she is happier than she has been in a long time, and I'm getting there. Will take me a little more time, but we are doing the little things to make deposits that we haven't done in years.

Good for you! It sounds like it's going well.

rrr,

I think, based on what my W has said to me, that a large part of why my W will not tell me about OM2 is that she gave him oral. For whatever reason that's more degrading to many women than anything else they have done.

God Bless
Gamma

glad to hear about the poly results, too.

Made a HUGE mistake yesterday. I went back to the old house to get it ready for the renters. It triggered something in me I thought I was over. Now I want to leave more than I have at any point before. I don't know if I can continue on recovery or not. I mean, it was my best friend and neighbor. How do I forgive that?

I can't keep getting to the point to where I feel like were getting better, then having a trigger to bring me back. Even if I don't go back to the house, will I not have triggers pop up from time to time?

I wasn't real nice about it last night, and it just feels like we went from a great place to ground zero. Not sure if I should continue, leave, or maybe take a little time away to see if I miss her or not. All the deposits made are gone and I almost feel numb to my wife right now.

Not sure if I should continue, leave, or maybe take a little time away to see if I miss her or not. All the deposits made are gone and I almost feel numb to my wife right now.

Well, the bad news is that you suffered this setback. There are two pieces of good news that accompany it, however:

1) You'll never find that particular trigger as a new problem again. Right now your job is to analyze it, work through it (see below) and position it within the life you want to have going forward. You have the ability to separate bad stimuli into two groups
a) historical, can't-do-anything-about-it-any-longer triggers like your former house, friends you had in common, dates which recall what was happening, etc.
b) current, WW-caused, or rrr-caused actions which can, and must, be halted

The second group you just STOP. The first group you ride through, accept the fact that what WAS is no longer what IS, and continue your MB-guided recovery.

2) This is no longer your problem, at least not primarily. It has now become your FWW's burden to get you through these, with whatever pain and effort is required on her part (She broke it, she better eff'ing fix it!) It does require you to ...rationally, non-violently... inform her of your pain, and its cause. Let her go to work on it. If she has not yet internalized that concept, hand her this note, or better yet, print out the articles on this site about "just compensation".