Add my name to what is apparently a long list of folks who have their spouse go astray...I don't know what to think...it has been two weeks since I confronted my wife...I am still in shell shock. After 15 years, the one thing that I thought I could count on has been decimated. I seriously have been walking in a fog... unable to work, or really do anything. I haven't shed tears about anything since our first born was delivered 14 years ago... and now, I find myself crying uncontrllably. I don't know what to do...she has cut off all ties to the OM..I believe she is sincere in wanting to rebuild our marriage...There is plenty of blame to go around....but I just can't get over the dishonesty....I have not been able to get past pain... She asked me if I was angry...and oddly enough, I have not been angry. Just incredibly hurt. I don't know what is next.

You will most likely get angry before you are done, just make sure you have a way to deal with it that does not destroy your recovery. Recovery is possible. My mariage is MUCH better today than it EVER was before the affair, and I don't really feel like we are "recovered" yet. The positive take on that is that things are still improving. Click on the link in my signature line for some good tools to help you along the way.

DOA welcome to Marriage Builders and whether you beleive me or not, the hurt will subside over time. You and your W need to keep in mind that what both of you are feeling is very normal. The best advise I can give you at this moment is not to make any life altering decisions so soon after d-day (discovery day: the day the BS(betrayed spouse) finds out about the WS(wayward spouse) affair) for they almost always come back to bite us in the rear.

You are wise in not playing the blame game with your W(wife) because even though she is 100% responsible for chosing to have an affair, you two are equally responsible for the bad shape of your marriage.

If you find yourself unable to function normally in your job or your personal life because of the emotional turmoil, then I suggest that you go see a doctor and have him/her prescribe you anti-depressants. Dr Willard Harley (the founder of Marriage Builders) recommends them to BS(betrayed spouses) so that they can regain control of their emotions and not sabotage their hard to save their marriages by committing love busters (destructive habits that destroy romantic love such as angry outbursts, selfish demands, dishonesty, disrespectful judgements, independent behavior or annoying habits).

There is hope, you are not alone.

I just finished posting my own story, and then saw yours. I just had to respond to something you said - you want to get mad but right now you are sad. I have made that same comment many times. In fact, friends and family keep telling me to get mad, but after two months I am still so sad. I have finally gotten to the point where I have moments where I get mad - especially when the kids are upset with him. But as a general rule I am still sad.
I feel sorry for myself, my boys, the loss of our family. And then I also feel sorry for him - for everything he is losing. I am not sorry for his affair - that is his own doing. But he is losing so much. At the end of each day I still have my home, and my kids, and my self respect. I am much better off than he is.
What a shame.
My husband is still in the middle of his affair. I know some day it will end. Why? Because it is only based on fantasy. His story changes every week, and all he can say is "I'm happier than I have ever been" when, you can tell by looking at him that he is a miserable shell of a man.
Pathetic.

It's been 6 weeks for me and I am still numb. Anger is starting to set for he and my wife. I need to move on... but I can't. I am totally consumed by this hideous act of my wife's.

Though my wife and I are actually getting along quite well, no NC Letter or telling the OM Wife is an option at this time. I spoke to my therapist last night and she wasn’t too keen on me telling the OM wife just yet. She feels my wife will look at it as another form of me wanting to control everything in our life.

My wife knows she did wrong and hurt me tremendously but is not looking to be forgiven at this time. I need to forgive her so I can move on but she says she's not ready to ask for forgiveness. ???????? I just don't get it.

I have to tell you DOA anger feels better than hurt. I love my wife, always will but no one is going to hurt me again. - Guy

I have been trying to move on... lots at stake. We have 3 kids 15, 13, and 9. They mean everything to us. My W says she doesn't know why it happened...it just did. In all fairness, we have become distant in the last year because of many circumstances. Career change, open heart surgery on me, kid activities/pressure...we did drift to some degree. But I just can't reconcile a momentary bump in the marriage road with going out and having an A. It seems so extreme...My W is very, very sorry and is hurting too. I have forgiven her and I have tried to get back to normal.. and for most of the time it seems to work. We are talking more and spending more time together, undistracted. I am pragmatic about things, and know that we love each other will probably continue on. But, still, a part of me has died this month.

DOA and Guy

It will get better. I'm aproaching 2 mo. My W just last week said that she loves me. It took her that long to release her anger toward me. It might be the same with both of you. I told my W on D-day that I didn't want to hear "I'm Sorry" I wanted her to ask me to forgive her. I did that night. Its been a rough ride in the past 2 months. Still have many ups and downs, as for me my flashes and imagination has slowed down, not as many, but then there are days when I must lean on God, because I can't handle it alone.

The hard thing I'm finding out is forgiving myself. I know where I went wrong, I know how I helped open the door. I even know that it could have been me and not my W that walked through the door.

It will take time, and patience.

DOA,

Get some books on infidelity "not just friends" is a great one. Also read all you can on this site and try and start rebuilding that love bank that went into default. You will find that your not alone but that your situation is similar to many on this board.

I felt very close to what your feeling in the beginning. Totaly lost, zombie like for 5 weeks. I lost lots of weight and questioned everything about myself and my marriage. Then one day for who knows what reason I decided that the only person to pick me up and fix me was myself.

So I began doing anything and everything I could to get stronger. I meen everything - meds, started walking, posative self talk, new hobbies, cleaned out all my old junk and gave it to charity, reading, sports and never turned down a chance to meet with friends or do something no matter how bad I felt. AND IT WORKED WITHIN A MONTH I FELT BETTER AND EACH MONTH IS BETTER.

AS for the OM he was a married friend of ours and just recently my anger towards him is starting to become evident.

DOA, womanoffaith, Guy,

i´m with you all... we had 16 years and a marriage and family which people looked up to. Then BLAM... I find that her friend is more than a friend, and she leaves to be with him.

Like you, I can´t summon anger, only sadness.

Strangely, she CAN summon anger (to prevent guilt from taking over, presumably)!

No remorse, no compassion.

But like womanoffaith, I´m with the kids and I believe in that. I believe that I have a life, but without the kids, I think my wife has nonsense.

DOA,
I really felt bad when I read your story. I completely know how it feels to feel convinced that your spouse would never, ever cheat and then face the shock that they did. My WW has been involved with an A for about two years. I found out last fall and felt exactly the same way you did: the fog, the tears, etc.

After a few months of her “wavering” between the two of us, I was ready to get out.
That’s when she decided to end the A (or so I thought).

I went another 10 months before I found out that the A never ended. It started back up in a few months and continued –despite the fact that I checked EVERYTHING. They just got very good at hiding it.

I found out again (d-day) about 1 month ago. At first I was very depressed (for a few days) and then immediately became very angry and resentful. I had so much anger that I really couldn’t be sad anymore. I honestly believe she’s serious about fixing our marriage and ending the A for good this time, but I just couldn’t get past the anger and resentment. This time I really wasn’t shocked –after all I knew she was capable of having an A now.

Well, I just returned from a weekend marriage session and feel like I can get past the anger and resentment (see my other thread). I really believe it will be different this time around and am willing to give my marriage another try.

Please hang in there. TMCM and Silverthorn have given me some great advice along the way. I completely agree with their advice to you, too.

One comment on some of the posts in this thread:

How do you really know when the A is ended? From the sounds of some of these posts, I question if the WS is really over the A. From my own personal experience, the A can continue despite the fact that you check everything and can’t find any clues. My wife told me how much better our marriage was for the last 10 months and I really did believe we were moving forward. Little did I know that they just got very creative in hiding the truth.

Guy,
I worry that she isn’t asking for forgiveness because it really isn’t over yet. My wife admitted she was wrong and felt horrible 10 months ago yet she continued the A. She was very defensive about things like a final NC letter to the OM, confession, etc. THIS TIME, she’s doing a lot of those things on her own (finally).

goodguy007,

I felt that same anger for the OM. During the last 10 months it built up until, one day, I saw him riding his bike through the park. I stopped my car and got out. I proceeded to call him every name in the book, tell him that I hated him and would never, ever forgive him –all the time about 1 inch from his face. I wanted so bad for him to start something, but he never did.

The irony was that he was still in the A with my wife at that time and I ended up looking like the fool. What I thought was a great way to get rid of my anger only backfired on me.

RedWine,

People were shocked when they heard about my wife’s A. They thought our marriage was perfect because we always looked so happy and respectful of each other. We were happy and that’s why I’m having such a hard time trying to determine how this could of ever happened in the first place.

I appreciate the comments and words of support...I am fairly confident that my W has ended the A permanently.. although I guess we never can be 100% sure...My position is that if it hasn't, we are over with anyway...so I must assume that it has to be able to go on. I do feel that the A was almost a "cry for help" from my W, although I am sure many of you are shaking your head at my naivity(sp?)... I do feel she is not the kind of person that would do this type of deception...it goes against her very being as I have known for over 17 years. However, it did happen...nothing can erase that. As I mentioned in my earlier post.. we have had a lot to deal with recently. I failed to mention that in addition to these pressures, two friends of ours, at our ages, died tragically from unexpected swift illness. This seem to have a significant effect on my W, more than me, and it seems that is when things went downhill...I am convinced that the A was only for about a month...during this traumatic period,..so maybe that is a positive..(if there can be a positive). There are so many questions that I keep coming up with, and many with answers I may not want to hear. It seems that we take steps backwards whenever I feel the need to talk about it with her..I know that I must satisfy myself with the answers to be able to move on....this has been so difficult.

HI DOA

It will take a while for trust to return. Before D-day I trusted my W completely. In fact when she headed out the first time to meet the A@@wipe I told her I trusted her. (In hind sight very painful). I do trust my W now, but only as much as I trust anybody. Well actually less because I'm on guard. I know her A is over because the shark has moved on to other easier targets. My W also realizes she was used. But she knows that trust has to be rebuilt. I hate that but that is how it is.

I to never imagioned that it would happen. She didn't either. Sometimes it happens so slowly and they are not acting in their right mind. My W has some other issues but she is still unable to forgive herself for her actions.

I to had and have questions. Many of them asked before and answered. I guess I could only process so much of the answer. For most of the questions I decided to wait and see. I've pushed them back to sometime later. Most will be question I will probably never ask, they will be just not important. Our MC acrees with this by the way. Those questions that I need to ask I will and have.

We were taught mirroring by our MC that helped with the flow of communication. Its good to talk without arguing. My W has been getting help from people on this sight. I encouraged her to post here also. I promised not to read her posts, and she won't read mine. (Topics I've started. or she started.) She also doesn't make it a habit of reading anything I post, but for the most part I don't mind.

She trusts me not to read, and she feels free to post. Many have been of help to both of us. Maybe you can get your W to start doing that.

I've learned and been told not to hide your feelings or emotions from your W. She needs to feel that she can come to you with them, but you need to be honest about your own and share with her. I now have a better openness with my wife. We do pick our times to talk about things.

Our MC suggested to set aside a time to actually talk about the A. 45 min to an Hour at the same time everyday. Its hard to stick to but it works.

Just be honest with her and tell her you want her to be honest with you. Keep loving her. Its a bumpy road. Very hard. I just had a couple of days of bad flashes of images, feelings, rememberances. They happen, reach out to your W when they happen seek her comfort. If she is the same as my W, your mood has an effect on her. I trigger her downs. She can read me so well at times. (Don't have much of a poker face at times <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> )

Time Patience, and Love. You both need time to heal.

Thanks for the advice Silverthorn--- Your last two paragraphs of your last post are helpful...it is exactly what we have been experiencing..Talking about it is tough though...because it is such a downer. Part of me just wants to ignore it and move on, but I know that will doom us. Believe it or not, I feel very badly for my W when talking about it.... as I know it makes her feel terrible. I am fairly confident she has not had any contact with OM since Dday...he has run scared, now that he knows, that I know ( he has a family, I did not expose him) I am continually afraid (although perhaps unwarranted) that I will lose her again, and that though kills me every day... I guess deep down that is my biggest fear.

I'm glad I had some good advice.

Unfortunatly there is pain enough to share. It does hurt like hell talking about some of it. I do know that some of the question just won't be important and never be asked. Myself I don't need every sorid detail. I read enough on D-day for most of that.

Have you found a good MC. I would find a Christian based one. We started MC 3 days after D-day. Well actually 2 days because we both talked with our pastor together and seperatly. He sent us to MC on the third day. Called in a favor for us. The funny thing is is that we knew the MC, he was a guest pastor at our church. I've seen God's hand in everything.
We also at the suggestion of our pastor study 3 chapters of the bible daily (we started in John)
We pray together at the start and finish. It has brought us closer to God, and to each other.

A month ago, I wrote a letter ot the OMW, to let her know what was going on. I felt an obligation, well to be honest revenge was probably my main factor. I typed it up, printed it at put it in a cubby hole until revenge wasn't my main drive. I talked to my W about her writing a letter to ask the OMW for forgiveness. She did at the beginning of this month and I knew it was time.

I felt that the OMW needed to know so she could make some decisions for herself. Nothing wrong with daylight being shed on the situation. A weight was lifted from both are shoulders.

You and your W might want to talk sometime about this. I don't know if it a good time for this now, but sometime it might. You can only imagion the lies he told his W and your W. I guess at this time PJOA should be used.
(My W (POE) actually felt relief when I took the letters down.)

Well, I've had/have the same feeling. That it could all happen again. And yes its my fear also. This to needs to be shared with your W. I've shared it and in some ways the fear has lessened. I now work on meeting my W EN's, and now she is meeting mine. Lots of ups and downs at time. I believe my W when she says it will never happen again. But, only time will build back the trust I have lost. It is growing though. Heck my D-day was 2 mo's ago. Time is the key, not trying to rush your W, she has to heal to at her pace.

Do you see hope for your future, that your M will not only survive but be stronger then ever. Look for it. Have faith, and hope.

God Bless