SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Just found out my Wife was having an affair for what She said was around 3 months. Our DDay was supposed to be our 20th Wedding Anniversary. I am leaning towards reconciliation right now, but I still haven't received the whole story.

I asked for the timeline of when it started.
I asked for the when, where, time of day, and day of the week.

Still no answers. She says they would hurt me, and that I wouldn't be able to handle it. Well, I have figured out how strong I am the last few weeks! Am I crazy for wanting to know those details? I want to know how long the lying has been going on. Looking through old texts between us, and looking at photos through her accounts - I believe it started earlier.

I believe if I finally get the truth I will be able to advance in my self-healing. I'm sick of falling down the "rabbit hole" everyday looking for information.

Hi there.

I was one of the people that was in the " I need to know it all camp"

Of course my H was much like your W at first and didn’t want to tell me any details and trickle truthed me almost to death. He originally told me that the affair was four months and my gut kept screaming that it didn’t make sense , come to find out it was really 6 months. Why didn’t he tell me? Because it spanned over a vacation, our anniversary, and three of our kids bdays…. Yeah.

He wasn’t concerned about hurting me , he had already did that when he made the choice to break his vows. He didn’t want to have to face what he did , sounds much like your W. It took MONTHS to get the truth from my H (or at least what I think is the truth). I remember finding his google timeline and realizing he was still lying , I fell to my knees and he had never seen me so broken, that is when he finally started to come clean. I remember he handed me his laptop and let me go through his bank statements to verify that the timeline matched his bank account. He cried because he felt relieved that he finally had come clean.

As far as the details and days and times my H also lied and told me it was once a week and I found out later it was twice a week. That one hurt, bad but without it our reconciliation would have been built on continued lies. In my opinion the truth , all of it that you want to know has to come out and you deserve proof of whatever it is you ask for. Remember cheaters lie and they rarely tell the truth when they are first caught not because they care about us but because they can’t face what they did.

As far as looking through old pictures and texts , I know it’s hard but I would highly recommend deleting them when you get to a place where you have an idea of what happened. Also I have all the pictures from that time locked away in a hidden folder I can’t see. I can’t look at them anytime soon.

I still fall down the rabbit hole sometimes and dig for things, it sucks.

Just remind her that keeping the truth from you only hurts you more. The pain is excruciating to say the least and my H saw me not be able to get off the floor for days, I really don’t think he would have came clean if he didn’t see the pain first hand.

I hope you get what you need in order to heal YOU regardless of your marriage.

[This message edited by Groot1988 at 2:22 AM, Wednesday, May 1st]

A lot of times in a situation like yours, it will take strength from you to get the answers you want. You will have to decide if a complete and truthful timeline is a dealbreaker or not. If you want that timeline, let her know that it is a dealbreaker and that any further lying will result in starting a divorce. If at that point she’s still not cooperating, get to a divorce attorney and start the process.

That’s what I would be doing in your shoes. Don’t make threats or promises you won’t carry out on. Pulling back from an ultimatum is one of the worst things you can do at this point so you have to be sure. Let her know the longer she avoids this, the more likely you will proceed with leaving the relationship.

I needed to know the truth. We would not still be together if my husband had stonewalled me; I can’t live like that.

A lot of the hurt and betrayal of infidelity is perpetrated through lying and secrecy. For me, even if the relationship with his AP was over, him continuing to keep secrets was a continuation of the betrayal. Only by coming clean and discussing it all, getting it all out in the open, could I turn the page and start to heal. it’s like an infection. You have to clean out all the nasty pus, even if it’s painful, because if you don’t, it’s going to fester and cause more and more damage.

Welcome to SI and sorry that you've had to join us. In the JFO (Just Found Out) forum, there are some posts pinned at the top that are good for new members to read. Also, there are some with bull's eye icons that are helpful. One that you might want to read are about before saying reconcile to recover. The Healing Library is a great resource and includes the list of acronyms we use.

Your WW (wayward wife) should read How to Help Your Spouse Heal From Your Affair by Linda MacDonald. It's a little over 100 pages and is a good starting point for her.

She needs to provide a written timeline with dates, details and things such as feelings and thoughts. If you want, this could be followed by a poly.
NC (no contact) with the AP (affair partner)
Complete electronic transparency and you have access to her passwords
STD/STI testing for both of you because you don't want another problem to come from all this
See a doctor for meds if you need them

If you can, IC (individual counseling) with a betrayal trauma specialist can be helpful. She needs IC to figure out her whys and to work on being a safe partner.

Cheaters lie, and then they lie some more. I was one who needed details, too. I also got the "I don't want to hurt you more" line. I told him he better tell me because it's possible that what I was imagining was worse than the truth. I got enough of the details to where it really didn't matter any more and I didn't need a poly to confirm. One thing about details, though...you can't unhear them.

R (reconciliation) is a lot of hard work, and many WSs (wayward spouses) don't have the fortitude to change. There are those that do the work and change, so it does happen. If both spouses aren't in 100%, then R doesn't have much success.

Please keep posting and we'll be here to help you out of infidelity.

Don't lie to yourself. You need to decide if you want to continue to live in lies, yes, even by omission.

I myself cannot. It's the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I won't ask twice. This seems like the least she could do after what she did.

If you cannot handle the truth (i e. it results in divorce), then so be it. She took the actions and these are consequences of your actions. If you are not prepared to actually divorce her then you have zero leverage to insist she tell you anything.

In fact, her reluctance to do what you have asked, IMO, is a strong indicator that she is not a good candidate for reconciliation (certainly not at this time).

I knew I wanted to R within minutes of finding out about the A, so I switched immediately to 'what do I need to do to R?" What do I need to know?

I think I almost instinctively knew that complete honesty was a true requirement for R. It's not that I had to know about the A, although I thought it was. Rather, I knew in my gut that I had to 'know' that my W would never lie to me again. Of course, one person can't know another totally, but I knew that if I doubted my W's honesty, R would be impossible for me.

My W's answers to my questions (day after day for weeks) provided the evidence which told me she had decided to become and stay honest. I'm sure that's not how everyone works, but it may be how you do.

SIers also say that the BS needs to to know all in order to know what they have to deal with. That's very true. If there's something in your W that makes R impossible, you need to know it ASAP.

*****

In all likelihood, your W is withholding answers in order to protect herself, you. But the motivation for withholding info doesn't matter much, IMO. My W had to come clean to show that she was a good candidate for R.

*****

My reco is to tell your W explicitly that complete honesty is the 1st requirement for R - no honesty, no R.

I know that puts you on the spot, too ... but what kind of marriage can you have without honesty?

[This message edited by SI Staff at 4:02 PM, Wednesday, May 1st]

I am so very sorry this is happening to you. I, too, am in a 20+ year marriage, and never thought this would happen to us. I, too, needed the whole truth - even the nitty gritty details that were always preceded by, "I don't know how this is going to help" by my WH. I didn't know how it was going to help, either, but I knew I needed it. We are 4 months out from the first Dday, and 2 months out from the last one, and it's been a mucky road through gaslighting and trickle truth to now, when I think I have the whole story. I have stopped asking for the minutiae, although at times I do.

My WH wanted to reconcile immediately after being found out, but on his terms. He thought if he told me a smaller piece of the truth that we would have a better chance of reconciling. But once I was on to him, I turned into a fact-finding detective (and was quite good at it, sadly). I followed up on every small outlier to his story and most of them turned out to be the catalyst to more truth. I actually think he was trying to protect me, even though I told him, from the start, that all I wanted was the truth, and that trickle truth was the equivalent of death by a thousand cuts. It didn't matter what I knew I needed - he was full preservation mode.

Thanks to this board and these wonderful people, I took control of the terms of our attempt to R by demanding a full written disclosure in preparation for a polygraph. He went through with it (it took 2x), and in the process all of the remaining lies were busted (I believe - I don't trust him as far as I can throw him, yet).

I am in neutral gear, and will not wear my ring for the 2 years that he was with the OW. I am not going to fully choose to R until those 2 years pass, unless something else precipitates a decision to separate. All of have is my self-respect, and I will not let him tear it down.

In my opinion, If you both want to R, I believe that a full disclosure that you work through together with calendars and a laptop to look up info that is relevant, followed by a polygraph is essential.

This sucks so much, and you deserve whatever you need right now from your wife. Please hold your ground.

[This message edited by Elara at 4:39 PM, Wednesday, May 1st]

You can't forgive what you don't know. The whole truth will certainly be painful. Trickle truth will kill any chance of R.

You deserve to know as much about the affairs as you want to know or need to know.

The cheaters cannot start to censor the facts and details.

It’s not their call to make. But unfortunately when the truth starts to appear they suddenly see themselves for the liar and cheater they are.

I often think they aren’t protecting their betrayed spouse as much as they are avoiding being exposed with all the details and sordid behavior that actually occurred.

In the healing library is a document called ‘Joseph’s letter’ which is worth reading. It is an explanation from a BS about why they feel they need details.