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Feelingeveylow,

You have done the right thing, don’t forget that. However, the road forward will be long and painful.

I know that for me, as a betrayed husband, I wanted and needed to know everything. And yet, I live with the fact that I do not and never will know "everything". You may find that your wife, no matter what your efforts at full transparency, might come to the same conclusion that I have about my wife's disclosure.

I don’t know if this fits your disclosure, for my wife’s disclosure was not nearly as well thought out as yours, but for me, every "I don’t remember" and "I don’t know", true or not, was and is fertile ground for the weed of disbelieve to take root and mature, bloom and seed.

This is my experience, not necessarily yours or your wife’s, but I share it so you might choose your words in authenticity and then accept that that honesty may very well be smothered by distrust. The hope is that the suffocating will be temporary and not the death of your marriage. But either way, you are no longer in control and will have to accept the future choices of your betrayed spouse, as she is now having to accept the past choices of her betraying spouse.

Hang in there, we are here for you and are crossing our fingers for the outcome of your disclosure, whether that be reconciliation or divorce.

Asterisk

My wife still wants to try and reconcile. I worry the anger phase has not even started and that decision is constantly in flux.

Years. That's what you've signed up for. It's going to take years to recover, heal, reconcile (if that happens).

So, hold on to your hat. The shit storm is only just begun.

Years, yes, but life starts to get better at some point (maybe 6-12 months from d-day). The improvement, if it happens, starts very slowly but eventually accelerates.

My bet is that your W will feel a lot of anger, grief, fear, and shame. If she won't share her feelings with you, R is unlikely.

IMO, it's better to know what she's feeling than not to know, if not knowing leads to believing the worst.

Asterisk - your comments have been so helpful. Thank you.

We are in such early days and the shock is still so fresh and raw that I am trying to avoid drawing any inferences on what issues will be more difficult or how the healing journey will progress.

We have had more real talks in the last seven days than in our 31 years of marriage. I am definitely worried that a large portion of our talks revolve around me and my history / trauma vs what would help her heal. I think the context is important and helps explain my actions as being totally unrelated to her or our marriage. We covered my sexually history from age 11 until we met. Those were things we had never discussed, but when I went through them as part of the disclosure prep and in therapy I can see some of the root causes for why I was able to make the terrible choices I did. Not an excuse as what I have done is inexcusable, but important to show that I was broken long before we were married and long before the infidelity.

We are going to therapy tomorrow and my primary goal is to identify how I can support her healing and avoid always focusing on me. I have always been a voracious reader so I am through the books the therapists recommended in addition to others, but my wife has read only a couple chapters (shock is limiting day to day activities like sleeping and eating so reading is not a priority) so I am hopeful that will help her identify ideas that could be part of her healing.

Sisoon and unhinged - very grateful for your engagement on this.

Totally on board with the years and will appreciate every minute I have to reconcile for as long as she is willing. She mentioned last night that she wonders if she is being weak by even entertaining reconciliation and that she feels like people will judge. She has told only one friend and likely will keep the groupv who know pretty small so the concern seemed to me to be her perception of herself and wondering if she is betraying herself by reconciling.

Totally agree she will need to talk about all her thoughts and feelings if we are going to reconcile. That does not come naturally so very hopeful therapy will help her become more comfortable doing this.

[This message edited by feelingverylow at 7:02 PM, Sunday, September 14th]

My goodness Feelingverylow,

I’m truly impressed with your understanding of what you and your wife are in for. There was nothing like this my D-day, 32 years ago, My wife and I just did the trial and error approach and held onto hope and each other tight. Uggg. It worked out fine, however it extended our recover process for decades instead of years. Keep reading, listening and writing. All this said, the end result has not been written yet. Sigh.

I read in your response that your wife is questioning if she is being "weak" by trying to reconcile. This query, more than likely will rear its ugly head many times over the next few years. She will hear this in own head and even more so from others who may think they are being supportive. It makes sense because your affair has stolen from her, her agency. Now, if she is going through anything like I experienced, there will be a huge tug of war within herself attempting to regain some sense of balance and self-empowerment. And one of the most expedient ways of regaining what was ripped away from her is – divorce.

Hang in there, you are doing an amazing job of attempting to rectify what you destroyed.

Asterisk