Andrew - This may be the hardest thing to really come to terms with, but we have to realize that it was a false intimacy that the affairees created to "justify" their actions. If they could deliberately hurt the ones they promised to love most they had to find something to make it okay - LOVE! Someone once told me if you think you are in love then you are. I believe people having affairs tell themselves this over and over to justify what they are doing - it somehow makes them feel better about what they are REALLY doing - something so unloving and cruel that it defies comprehension. <img border="0" alt="[Teary]" title="" src="graemlins/teary.gif" /> However, the true test of love is time and openness - something affair partners will NEVER have even if they marry. That is why their relationships so often fail when exposed - love can never be built on lies and last. It is a false sense of love that they romanticize and build their affair on.

Andrew:

Don’t worry, this is not about YOU. This was likely to develop if she had married someone else. These things often occur in relatively good marriages as well. IT IS NOT YOUR FAULT even if you did not give her 100% of ENs. Remember plenty of folks that don’t get all ENs do not seek an affair.

Regarding the deception. Once the affair gets going the deception feels natural and it is done with no intention to hurt the spouse. Trust me on this one--- your wife thought she was not hurting you. The deception is part of the ball game and once it starts it eventually becomes part of the dairy routine of the foggy person. That is why it is so hard to accept this deception from people who seem so honest and good hearted. They are still good hearted, but once the addiction of the affair gets them they can do things that are hard to understand. Do not try to understand this------- you never will. Simply accept that your wife is still a nice woman who fell into a black hole. It can happen to anyone.

BTW, my wife has confirmed t everything spouseguess has said. The romanticism was all BS to justify what they were doing. However, the addiction to the affair is very real, do not discard that aspect.

<small>[ October 22, 2004, 10:35 AM: Message edited by: Stanley568 ]</small>

My wife pretty much says the same thing: she tells me that she was in love with being in love. From that perspective, it probably doesn't matter who the OM was.

So far, our NC is going pretty well. My wife nearly called him the other day when something his wife said in an email to me pissed her off. But..she was able to hold calm down and hold back from calling. I appreciate that.

Here's a bit of an ironic kicker: my wife said that what made her "swoon" for the guy was that he respected her statement that the physical contanct "could not happen again." She says that had he tried something after that night they were together, she would have thought he was a dog and stayed away from him.

I think that goes to show exactly how smooth this guy was. I noticed, Stnatley, that he used the strategy that you talked about: he continually praised me to my wife and told her that she shouldn't be so hasty in her doubts about her marriage. And now, I find that he was playing the "genetleman," biding his time until she was ready to get physical with him again.

The deception is what gets me much more than the sex. My husband has had "just sex" affairs - and now he just told me about "being in love" - that is much harder to handle. I was totally blown away - because even though he did this to me 5 years ago, I forgave, we made it work and I trusted him again. It just feels like I got slapped in the face. There was a little nagging voice inside of me that thought, is he? But I did nto pay attention to it.

Stanley, not to thread-jack. but I'd like to comment on your "once the affair gets going the deception feels natual and it is done with no intention to hurt the spouse". I guess I'd have give you a maybe on the "feels natural" - through practice anything can become easy/natural. However, the "no intention to hurt the spouse" gets a big fat NO WAY! WS's may try to convince us of this, but I think it is a grave mistake to accept this. NO WAY WS can possibly believe their actions wouldn't hurt. I believe it's more accurate to say that they simply didn't give a [censored] if their infidelity hurt us.

Been reading Torn Asunder so expressing my anger without "candy coating"...

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">However, the "no intention to hurt the spouse" gets a big fat NO WAY! WS's may try to convince us of this, but I think it is a grave mistake to accept this. NO WAY WS can possibly believe their actions wouldn't hurt. </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I think they know it is hurtful, but they tend to believe the BS will never know about it. It is the “if they don’t know it cannot hurt”

They also use many justifying mechanisms such as a revision of the marital history, ect, ect. If we exclude the serial predatory cheaters (mostly OMs) you will find people who had no intention to hurt the spouse even if they were selfish. Were they misguided or confused? Sure, they were, but they were functioning within their foggy boundaries.

I don't believe it can be either/or because both are so important to a good relationship/marriage. They go hand in hand. My first instinct is to say the betrayal, but when my husband starts to become affectionate, I wonder, is this what it was like with her? Did he learn that from her? Then I shut down. But for me-I have to feel safe and secure with him or it's just an act-it's just sex and that's where the betrayal becomes more important.

For me it has been the deception. To me, a successful marriage is built upon trust. What took 20+ years to build was broken and shattered by an act of total selfishness and disprespect. It's been two years since d-day. It still hurts. I don't know if I will ever be able to trust my wife again. It's scary because our marriage won't survive if my trust in her cannot be restored.

Therapy is helping. There are more good days than not but those bad days are bad. Broken trust is an aweful thing.

For me the betrayal is absolutely dreadful, but the sex compounds it. OM is the only man other than me that my FWW had sex with.

The woman I knew woulkd not have had sex unless she was absolutely convinced if her undying love for him and him for her.

I resent the fact that she still remembers all the personal stuff he told her - his semen is long gone but his flattery, lies and intimate words are always for ever in FWWs head and heart.

I hate it when she brings it up - the other day I said something about fathers in connection with the trail of ex wives and broken relationsips OM has left in his wake and FWW quickly said " His Father died in 1989" as if she were proud to have been trusted with that level of personal intimacy by OM.

Not sure if I can ever get over that. She won't forget that stuff.

Andrew,
How are you feeling? Take one day at a time.

The choice is between the sex and the lies. Someone earlier in the thread brought up another alternative to choose: the intimacy given the OP.

All affairs have lies

Most have sex

Not all have intimacy between the parties.

What bothers me the most? That the sweet image of our early life together is dead and now just a memory.

When I decided to stay with my wife, it's almost as though I married again. This time instead of marrying a sweet 20 something I was marrying a 40 something mother of three. The previous life is dead.

Another way to put it is: The genie's out of the bottle and once out it doesn't want to go back in.

That's what I hate the most. The fact that my life has completetely changed and I had no say in it whatsoever.

The good news is that I have started on a road to self examination. I am a better person today. I have changed. I still widh it could have been accomplished by marriage counseling instead of the proverbial 2x4 between the eyes.

This site helps people but it also can keep people stuck in their misery. It haf both effects on me.

Hope you feel better soon.

Mac

I have equal trouble with both aspects. There is no way my FWH, a cakeman, can convince me as he tried to do, that he "thought I didn't know". I was sobbing " I can't take it any more. I know you are ^%&% her."
And he just denied and made enough changes so that I eased off and believed him. I wanted to believe him. I loved him.
It is not the same any more and never will be but I will stick around to see if it can get better as folks here say it can if you work at it.

I have to second CWMAC and SpouseGuess.
Both are painful, yet the consciousness of lies and continuing to do so when I so desperately seek restoration of trust again, the breadth of people those lies reach, mine feelings of being crazy, it kills me.
If the grass so much greener on the other side, GET OFF the fence, DON't make ME push you over.
There is a reason the affair is called a betrayal, mine whole life, the present, the past, and the future got tainted forever. If we EVER reach the recovery stage this will be the major hurdle for me.
FBOW

Rod Stewarts song sums it up best for me


A Reason To Live

If I listened long enough to you
I'd find a way to believe that it's all true
Knowing that you lied straight-faced while I cried
Still I look to find a reason to believe

Someone like you makes it hard to live without
somebody else
Someone like you makes it easy to give
never think about myself

If I gave you time to change my mind
I'd find a way just to leave the past behind
Knowing that you lied straight-faced while I cried
Still I look to find a reason to believe

If I listened long enough to you
I'd find a way to believe that it's all true
Knowing that you lied straight-faced while I cried
Still I look to find a reason to believe

Someone like you makes it hard to live without
somebody else
Someone like you makes it easy to give
never think about myself

<small>[ October 25, 2004, 03:56 PM: Message edited by: Cymanca ]</small>

First, thank you all for your support. This board has been a God send, in many ways. I talked to my wife about this the other day: I never thought I'd turn to the Internet for support on something like this. It's good to find such a caring community.

I also just wanted to add that, in my view, the Rod Stewart song does express it exactly. We are all looking for a reason to believe. Here's hoping that we won't look in vain, and that we'll coming new year will find us stronger, better, more understading, more fulfilled, and healthier people.

Definatly the deseption.When my H would talk to her on the phone and then clime into bed with me and tell me he loved me.What was/is that? When he can spend all day until he goes to bed on the computer chatting and making plans and getting and sharing pictures with OW what is that?When I'm supporting the family and doing everything around the house while he's on the computer what is that??? There's alot more to my situation than this but these are just a few of the things I don't understand. When he can spend hours and hours chatting with who ever and not even give me 5 minutes of his time.Or the kids for that matter.This has been going on for along time (3 years)now. I've tried everthing.He has had affairs to the point he few to OH to meet her.After his second visit she went back to her husband.That happened two years ago.My H still has their initials at the top of his computer in his chat room.RnV...How long does this last? Maybe I should give up hope that things will be different...I don't know what to do any more