SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

All good over here except for your typical "fuck 2020" stuff.

#worstyearever

Dang. I did, BSR! Sorry!

HIKINGOUT, I am sorry to hear your news. 😪

Hi Mickie.

If he asks I will tell him the conversations were of a very sexual nature and that when we entered that aspect of the affair he was not mentioned.

What if he asks for details? Will you give it to him?

You can tell me til you’re blue in the face that I should tell him ...I’m okay with not telling him. If I am being asked to move on without those details then he won’t have them either.

I understand those feelings. I think they need to be ironed out between you two. It's a tit for tat adversarial type of thinking. Did thinking that way lead you to you find yourself in now? And maybe that's how you're feeling, but if you want to stay together, don't you need to work together to figure out what you each need to heal?

I KNOW that now that I see with my own eyes that the words weren’t even about “HIM” I don’t see the point in knowing what he said to her nor him knowing what I said to him.

What if he offered to share all the details with you. Would you still not share with him? Isn't it about what the BS needs to heal? Aren't you looking at it from a WS point of view, which is sort of biased towards self preservation?

I understand why you're okay with path you've chosen. But I would hope that by being here you've seen and learned so much that you recognize why it's not really a healthy one.

Mickie, you have not once been bullied or maligned in this thread. Some advice has been blunt, but it’s all been fair.

If you feel ashamed, maybe it’s because you’re doing something shameful... not because others are shaming you.

If you feel attacked, maybe it’s because you’re uncomfortable with other people's observations about your behavior and the likely consequences that will result.

If you’re angry at a bunch of strangers on an Internet forum, maybe it’s because you feel safer being angry at us than the person who betrayed you and you made you feel like you had to get to even... your husband.

[This message edited by BluerThanBlue at 2:58 PM, December 10th (Thursday)]

Bravesirrobin I will confess but not share the text messages.

This is a well moderated forum. It is,IMO, the MOST protected forum here on SI. The WS aren't allowed to be attacked. BS aren't allowed to swing 2x4's. The mods are always very quick to step in when that happens. It sounds like some of you don't think they are doing their jobs.

The responses have been blunt. Some full of the harsh truth. Not everyone sugarcoats, and pats people on the head when they are doing awful things. That doesn't equal an attack.

Mickie, I'm glad you are going to tell him.

What happened when the OM called the other day?

Bravesirrobin I will confess but not share the text messages.

Well, that's an important start. Once he knows about the infidelity, he at least has agency to decide whether he's willing to accept your restrictions.

As far as why people tell you that you're wrong when you already know it, I have a few answers.

1. When you started this thread, you gave every indication of escalating the A rather than ending it. I will wager that as of a week ago, you knew the exact price of plane tickets between Chicago and New York. To use a metaphor, when your kid is running out in the street, you scream at them. You don't calmly remind them that a speeding car is headed their way.

2. On the BS forums, with very rare exceptions, the BS is the only concern. You arrive bleeding out, and all attention is on giving support to you. For obvious reasons, no one gives a fuck about what the WS might read. They pulled the trigger, and you're the gunshot victim.

Over here in Wayward, it's more complicated. We often write for a mixed audience. With almost 40 posts in "BS Questions," I'm sure you understand the compulsion of betrayed spouses to read here and try to figure out WTF their spouse was thinking. I'm not sure that BS know how often some of us think about that when we're crafting responses to other WS. My advice isn't dishonest, but it acknowledges that the truth is hard for our most vulnerable members to read, and I want them to know that I see the other side of your circumstances. Sometimes you might feel like a target, even if the language is restrained, because your own psyche is so raw, and no one seems to appreciate how close you are to jumping out of your own skin. I said once (it may even have been to you) that pain doesn't hurt less for being self-inflicted. However, your deliberate choices reduce the amount of sympathy you receive.

Imagine how you would have felt, when you first arrived, watching us tell a WS that we understand how addicted they are to the affair and what a struggle it is to give it up. Remember how you felt about WS who argued they were protecting their BS by refusing to tell them the full truth. How did you feel about someone whose first priority was sheltering themselves from the fallout? It's triggering, and you removed the stop sign from your thread.

You have new insight as a WS. There are many suffering BS who do not. Don't lose sight of that.

[This message edited by BraveSirRobin at 6:41 PM, December 10th (Thursday)]

RE: this side of it is horrible.

I'm sorry, I just don't "buy" that statement.

If THIS SIDE was so horrible, we wouldn't have so many people on THIS SIDE.

In the moment, most of THIS SIDE is pleasurable. Most of THIS SIDE seemed worth it at the time it was happening... at least while we were getting away with it.

BSR writes:

You have new insight as a WS. There are many suffering BS who do not. Don't lose sight of that.

^^^ This.

I do NOT recommend having an RA to develop insight and empathy, no more than I recommend touching that hot burner to convince yourself that you'll get burned.

However- now you have some empathy and insight as a WS.

Does it help you to understand that your wayward husband didn't so much 'get one over on you' as he 'crapped the bed?'

Yeah, you are *both* in the bed, that sucks- but the person who crapped the bed gets the blame and the shame.

Very few waywards on SI would step up and declare that whatever 'fun' was had in the affair is worth the blame and shame of the crapped bed, never mind the discomfort to all parties therein.

Elsewhere on the interwebs, well, there are those dark corners. =/

I don't perceive those dark corners as places where people are going to find healing, resolution and a healthier way forward, either together or alone.

I actually do have a LOT of empathy for you, Mickie. One of the hardest things I've ever done in my life, and certainly in this marriage, was to *just. sit. still.* (or still enough)(never mind the screaming and the bleeding) after finding out what *really* happened long ago with Husband. I too wanted to scorch the earth and salt it.

At my age and level of experience and amount of financial exposure, etc. (older, fewer years with which to 'recover' from a self induced wound) I was not seriously considering an RA of any sort.

Any of my male friends of my equivalent age or close enough, would first ask me if I'd lost my mind. We all know the score.

But a whole helluva lot of the steam coming out of my ears was composed of the searing memories of all the times this Good Girl *did* say no-

including one time when my husband pushed my good will and my fortitude damned near to madness with abject tone deafness about what it actually meant to be 'married.'

So I get it.

For the record, even though I did not 'step over the line' in that moment, at that opportunity, I got close enough (I allowed the opportunity to sit in my lap long enough) that I felt it demanded a full confession/accounting to my husband- and he got one, in complete technicolor detail, all in one conversation, no trickle truth.

Which made me all the more livid when I had to deal with his trickle truth years later, and when I realized how hard he and we had rug swept years before.

Ergo I'm sure, Mickie, that at this moment, you feel like you are being held to a completely different and higher practical standard than your husband held himself, and than you received at his hands. Part of you is screaming, "THIS IS NOT FAIR!" and it's not.

And part of you is attempting to rug sweep by saying, "Not telling him will protect him." And, I'll go one step further, I'm sure some part of you is also saying, "I'm sure he hasn't told me the complete truth either."

I get all of that.

But what you are *really* doing here is setting your own standard for the type of relationship and the level of honesty at which you wish to live.

You don't have to be so honest as to be cruel.

You don't have to force details on him that he's not ready to hear.

But you have an opportunity to model bravery and courage and integrity to him.

I do recommend that you consult a therapist who is experienced in infidelity and that you conduct whatever disclosure you decide to do with professional help and guidance for both of you.

You are both in the emotional/relationship ER, trying to staunch a wound, and another bleeder just happened.

"First, do no harm."

<3

All good over here except for your typical "fuck 2020" stuff.

LOL, ditto.

Fortunately, weirdly, who could have seen *this* coming, 2020 appears to be the year in which we/I am coming out of the pit.

Although, there is some logic to it.

After decades of 'hair on fire' life, we are not only in the first years of much reduced employment, but we are also in quarantine/semi-lockdown.

We have time.

We have time together.

We have time alone.

We have enough sleep.

We have time to talk. Really talk.

2020 has been a weird blessing...

LOL.

I've read your past posts. You used to insist on honesty, you needed the truth, and now that you are the cheater, you are fine with lying,hiding, and don't feel betrayed spouses deserve to know what has happened in their marriage.

Can you remember how you felt after dday? Can you find the empathy to give your husband what you didn't get? Simply because it's the right thing to do..