Okay, is this a male thing or do most BS's go through this?<p>I resent the fact that I have not had any other sexual partners for 9 years and my W went out and played and had a good time. Now that she is done "getting it out of her system", as she put it, she is ready to commit to fidelity once again?! Well, maybe I need to have my "fun" too! Perhaps I am missing something out there! It's bad enough that she has quite a bit more extensive sexual history than I do, she had to go add on a couple more notches! Now I'm supposed to reaffirm this vow with her, to forsake all others, and promise myself to her forever, again?
It pisses me off! <p>Sometimes I want to carry this through to divorce just to punish her and make her really regret the PA's, but will I be spiting my nose to save my face? I am in a very angry and resentful mood today. I have caught myself flirting with women around me. Am I trying to prove my attractiveness? Didn't she do the same thing, and look what happened?! I don't want to make a bad situation worse, so I am trying not to put myself out there and see if I can get a "nibble" of interest from another woman, but it does piss me off that she did this. <p>I almost feel like this is role reversal here where she was the "bored man" that needed something new and exciting during a mid-life crisis or something. I am under the impression that the short-term PA was not really emotional at all, or very little of it was. This was just her living out her fantasy and adding some self-esteem boost to herself. (Oooo, look at this, other men still want me!) I think back to all the times she said to me last year, "Don't take me for granted. Other men still find me attrative you know." Yes, of course she said this during her PA and now I know why her tone was so confident and cocky when she said it. It adds to the hurt I feel too, knowing that she was making all these statements during her A. She was rubbing it in my face and I didn't even know it!<p>Man, I am not in a good place today! How do I deal with the anger and resentment? Anything you have to say is welcome here! Help!<p>[ April 24, 2002: Message edited by: Blind Sided ]</p>

Blind Sided, it's not just a male thing! I've had the same thoughts...maybe I should go out and have an affair, let him see how it feels! <p>But I have too much respect for myself and my body, to do something like that out of spite...and it really wouldn't do any good, anyway...just cause more problems...<p>I have NO IDEA how to deal with the anger and resentment...just wanted to share my feelings...

Its totally not a male thing! I feel the same way many times. I have the same need to prove my attractiveness to my WH. When I first found out I definitely considered getting my revenge. After a while though, I thought why stoop to his level and allow myself to use and be used just to prove a point. That's not who I am and I know I'm better than that. I think it would be a case of letting my anger and resentment cause me to make a rash decision that I'd later regret. I am already hurting enough without adding that to the equation.
Why do they get to have their fun, then come home and try and glue back together the broken pieces they left for so long? I don't know, but it sucks. Sometimes I wonder why I stay too.
Sometimes I do some things that make me feel good about me to get rid of the anger/resentment. A lot of times I end up feeling better. I hope that helps. God bless.

everything you are feeling is normal for our situations. i went through same thing. i lost so much weight i knew i was hot. didnt need anyone else to tell me. felt good to hear though.<p>as far as the anger thing-normal also. i never initially got angry. i always thought something was wrong with not feeling angry. then one day while i was in the bathroom, wh came in and i had this overwhelming desire to hit him with something. i came very, very close to doing this. i also caught myself before i said some very hurtfull things about his "manhood." i to this day have no idea where the anger came from, just out of the blue. i dont go through anger anymore, i have worked through that stage, it does pass. you have to feal it and work through it. you also have to be willing to let it go.<p>good luck to you

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by nikko:
<strong>everything you are feeling is normal for our situations. i went through same thing. i lost so much weight i knew i was hot. didnt need anyone else to tell me. felt good to hear though.<p>as far as the anger thing-normal also. i never initially got angry. i always thought something was wrong with not feeling angry. then one day while i was in the bathroom, wh came in and i had this overwhelming desire to hit him with something. i came very, very close to doing this. i also caught myself before i said some very hurtfull things about his "manhood." i to this day have no idea where the anger came from, just out of the blue. i dont go through anger anymore, i have worked through that stage, it does pass. you have to feal it and work through it. you also have to be willing to let it go.<p>good luck to you</strong><hr></blockquote>

How have you already worked through the anger after such a short period of time???

dear ymart- i will try to explain this as best as i can. here goes-first off i have never been the type of person who puts up with much. and i have a wicked sense of humor and sometimes a sharp tongue,so this all surprised me too.<p>i was of course mad as he// when i found out, i did have suspicions for awhile though. i just realized that i wanted my marriage to work and i was partly responsible for him being vulnerable. i took my share of the responsibity right from the start. i read as much as i could and learned. i learned holding onto the anger was only gonna hurt me. i was in a bad place in the beginning,suicide thoughts and was diagnosed with post traumatic stress. i fell apart. i knew somewhere deep inside me i had to get strong to protect me. husband allready proved he wasnt gonna do that by his affair, so it was up to me. healing me became my #1 priority-even before my marriage. my marriage had no chance if i didnt heal, and my goal was to repair my marriage. in order to do that i needed to get well. hanging onto anger wasnt gonna get me there. i sorted through feelings and decided what i needed for me and dealt with it. i think the realization that i was not innocent in setting up the situation that made him vulnerable had alot to do with it.<p>now dont get me wrong-he made the choice all by himself to have the affair and he has started to take the responsibity for that and that has been a tremendous help to me. once i started to get strong i just started to deal with one thing at a time and try to not get overwhelmed. its not been easy, but im pretty stubborn. i now see the amazement in my husbands eyes when he looks at me-havent seen that since we were dating. he thinks im pretty amazing. i surprised him too.<p>we all heal diffrently and need different things, figure out the things that you need most and do that for you first. and remember that if you truely want to rebuild you must still love them-maybe not in-love feeling but something much stronger and more reliable. its a long road and not easy, good luck to you- if i can help-ask.

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by Blind Sided:
<strong>Okay, is this a male thing or do most BS's go through this?<p>I resent the fact that I have not had any other sexual partners for 9 years and my W went out and played and had a good time. Now that she is done "getting it out of her system", as she put it, she is ready to commit to fidelity once again?! Well, maybe I need to have my "fun" too! Perhaps I am missing something out there! It's bad enough that she has quite a bit more extensive sexual history than I do, she had to go add on a couple more notches! Now I'm supposed to reaffirm this vow with her, to forsake all others, and promise myself to her forever, again?
It pisses me off! <p>Sometimes I want to carry this through to divorce just to punish her and make her really regret the PA's, but will I be spiting my nose to save my face? I am in a very angry and resentful mood today. I have caught myself flirting with women around me. Am I trying to prove my attractiveness? Didn't she do the same thing, and look what happened?! I don't want to make a bad situation worse, so I am trying not to put myself out there and see if I can get a "nibble" of interest from another woman, but it does piss me off that she did this. <p>I almost feel like this is role reversal here where she was the "bored man" that needed something new and exciting during a mid-life crisis or something. I am under the impression that the short-term PA was not really emotional at all, or very little of it was. This was just her living out her fantasy and adding some self-esteem boost to herself. (Oooo, look at this, other men still want me!) I think back to all the times she said to me last year, "Don't take me for granted. Other men still find me attrative you know." Yes, of course she said this during her PA and now I know why her tone was so confident and cocky when she said it. It adds to the hurt I feel too, knowing that she was making all these statements during her A. She was rubbing it in my face and I didn't even know it!<p>Man, I am not in a good place today! How do I deal with the anger and resentment? Anything you have to say is welcome here! Help!<p>[ April 24, 2002: Message edited by: Blind Sided ]</strong><hr></blockquote>

I'm probably not telling you anything that you already know but the problem is that your self esteem has been shot by your W's PA's and her lack of guilt or remorse only compounds your feelings of resentment.<p>Maybe her PA's were in a way her revenge for your EA some years ago. Maybe her self esteem was also shot by your EA that, just like you, she was left feeling resentful that she had not cheated on you and that you did.<p>Mind you that this is only speculation but maybe she does feel guilt and remorse but expressing it to you is so painful that she acts aloof for self protection. A few FWW's have said something along these lines in a couple of posts spread around the boards. Maybe deep down inside she truly wishes that those PA's had not happen.<p>If you gave in to a PA in the coming weeks, the vicious cycle of one upmanship may repeat itself and then what?<p>Look at this way, there are plenty of women out there that would be willing to have an A with you because they are starved for love and attention. Finding them and starting an A is not a problem, but if you truly love your W then consider the devastation that she will be experiencing and do you seriously beleive that she would love you more for it?<p>In any M ,or any relationship for that matter, there is always one that will be the more mature of the two and if that one mature individual gives in and starts emulating the less mature individual, then the relationship has lost it's guidance system and will surely crash.<p>Understand that the resentment that you are experiencing is normal and venting it here can help you avoid LB'ing your W. But remember that decisions guided by emotions and not reason almost always come back to bite us in the a** at a later time. So think well before you do something foolish that you may later regret.<p>Good luck and God bless.<p>Joe

I don't know if this is already the case but you might try beign a bit more loving, tender, and appreciative with her. Let her know how much she turns you on and attractive she looks.<p>The other weekend that I went to drop off my daughters over to their mom's, my xWW came out and she had a long, tight skirt with a slit across the sides and a blouse that was also tight around her body, and I couldn't help but tell her that she looked hot in that outfit. The look of surprise followed by a huge smile on her face seemed to make her day because hours later she called me (my youngest daughter forgot her underwear)and asked me if I really meant what I said about her looking hot in that outfit, and I told her that I did mean it and that unless she wanted to turn a lot of mens heads around that she shouldn't wear it too often. She giggled like a little girl and said thanks and hung up.<p>Now mind you that I did not have any ulterior motives (she is afterall my xW and I have moved on and have a committed relationship with my girlfriend) in my praising her looks at that moment. It was purely a male reacting to the visual sight of an attractive female.<p>My point with this little story is that even an xW can be made to feel special by truthful praise coming from, of all people, her xH. Now think of the possibilities in a marriage like yours.<p>Good luck and God bless.<p>Joe

TooMuchCoffeeMan<p>Well taken and understood completely! You know, I had so much admiration and respect for my W for being so &#8220;big&#8221; a person and be able to forgive me my transgression, but ultimately, she never really forgave me and is now only willing to forgive me if I can find it within me to forgive her for her PA&#8217;s. What are we doing here, trading baseball cards? Now my respect for her is in the toilet. Sometimes she comes across as though she gets brownie points for coming forward with the indiscretions herself and that somehow that makes it better than me having to &#8220;discover&#8221; it myself (but I never would have actually), and perhaps on some level it is better, but it certainly doesn&#8217;t make it any less painful nor wrong in what she did. I am still early in the game here, so forgive my emotional waffling, but I do know that I will not have a retaliatory affair. She has &#8220;reclaimed&#8221; herself, so to speak, through having sex with new partners outside our M, but for me to &#8220;reclaim&#8221; myself and my identity would involve me becoming more active in my spiritual practices, my guitar, my writing, my martial arts, my poetry, etc.; everything that has fallen by the wayside in this marriage. I feel that those elements of myself that were so intrinsic to who I am as a person are merely shadows of my pre-married life. I miss all of it. My entire existence become the family and working to survive. I have lost myself in this marriage, so these PA&#8217;s have had an even more profound effect on me due to the fact the marriage itself has become the one and only thing in my life that mattered and that I had faith in. I lost my center. Now, I want it back! All the things that I have kept my mouth shut about over the years, or tolerated, or just accepted (like her male friendships), I can no longer be silent about. I cannot be totally self-sacrificing any longer. The worst has already happened. If anything good comes of all this, it must be that I regain my own self-worth and self-respect, married or not. Thank you again for responding. I appreciate everyone&#8217;s input and insights.

Yes it is important to reclaim your identity thru the things that were important in your life before you got married, but be careful that they don't become your 'mistresses' that will lead to the creation of a secret life within your M.<p>How many times have we all heard something similar to what your W said that if she ever found out you had been involved in a PA that you would be kicked out the door pronto? C'mon if somebody had asked you before you discovered your W's PA's what would you do if you discovered that your wife was cheating on you? The most likely answer would probably be along the lines that you would divorce her without hesitation. But it's not that easy, isn't it? Not when there is so much emotional investment in the M and your W. What people say they will do and what they actually will do are two totally different things and in this respect you and your W are no different.<p>Joe<p>[ May 02, 2002: Message edited by: TooMuchCoffeeMan ]</p>