Heartbroken74

Me - 50yo
WH-52
Son - 29
DDay - 25/09/2022
TTOEA - 2003
PA - 2014
DD - April 05/2023
LTA 2011-2018 (virtual), turned physical (2018-2022)
"Hell must break before I am lost"

How do you cope with triggers?

We've been working a lot after discovery (it's been 2 years now since DD1) in IC and MC, but I just can't get over all I know. I have these terrible thoughts on things I know he did, messages he exchanged with the AP and I read (some of highly sexual content), some of the things he said about the affair that are deeply hurtful. I can't have a normal sex life, everything is there whenever he touches me. I know it might seem thinking too much of myself, that I fancy myself, for I am not better than anyone, but his former AP is ugly, deceitful, controlling, she's disgusting as a human being and as a woman and I keep thinking that he would have cheated on me with ANYONE available, it could be the most disgusting and cheap person in the world. I am losing all the hope, I'm becoming a cynical person. There's also everything I think he did and I don't know how to cope with all this. I think and feel my imagination is worse than any truth I would come across.
Has anybody has anything to say on this?

2 comments posted: Tuesday, November 12th, 2024

A New D-Day

Last September I came here and wrote about discovering my husband's affair. After a lot of TT, he admitted he had met her in two different trips in 2021 for sex. He said they had met in an online meeting a few months before the first trip, in October, 2021, and that they met again in the following December.
However, the OW recently contacted me. She wants him to tell her the reasons why he broke up, she wants to meet him for that (and feels entitled to it!). She is also married and her husband already knows. And then she sent me the whole story, with a bunch of files to support her: they'd been talking since 2011 and keeping virtual sex sessions, along with emotional connection. They kept a secret PA between 2018 and 2022, when I found out. He lied and cheated for 12 years and, most importantly, he kept lying to me while we were trying to rebuild something. He can't stop lying, even though we've been dealing with all this and also IC.
I don't feel as terrible as I did when I first discovered, but all the effort we've been through (or that I've been through, since he's been lying all this time) seems to me as a waste. All the trust I was rebuilding is gone. He says he didn't tell me because he thought I'd simply leave him and he seems devastated. But I can't believe it. I look at him when he cries and asks for forgiveness and it seems true, but soon after I think he's still lying. I love him, but it doesn't seem enough for me. We had advanced considerably, but I don't know if I can or want to cope with all this again.

17 comments posted: Wednesday, April 19th, 2023

He cheated on me while I was recovering from a surgery

Thank you so much for being here, I've been reading the articles and posts while waiting moderator's approval and it has helped me a lot in the last few days and the heartbreaking.
I just found out he has cheated on me twice. He had already done that, we had been married for 7 years then (we've been married for 27 years now, one adult son). That first time it hasn't become physical, only messages and pictures on the internet, I know for sure, But I saw the messages, he said he was in love with her and planning to go on. I begged for him to stay, I gave up on dignity and self-respect. Now, after reading some content here, I see that back then I handled it all wrong. I accepted the guilt and the shame and he gave it gladly to me. It was terrible because I didn't ask him to cease contact with her, I went to therapy by myself because I accepted everything he did as if it was my fault and that it was my responsibility to fix. I truly believed I was an awful person, a lousy wife and that I was lucky he had given me the chance to repair what I had done.
This time I found out that he had an affair with OW last December. He was on a trip to release his book and she was on the staff of the event. I was so proud of him, I helped him with the arrangements for the trip, I am such a fool. She is married too.I discovered what happened because I caught him making arrangements to meet her again. He did this while I was recovering from a major surgery. He did this while I was vulnerable, fragile, in bed, unable to do anything by myself, depending on his support for everything. And he was by my side in bed, while I was feeling excruciating pain, talking to her, telling her he wanted to be with her. He cheated in the most vulnerable moment I had ever experienced in my life.
After I confronted him, he finally admitted he had done this before in another situation, some years ago. He was working in another city and a friend of his introduced him to this woman. They exchanged pictures, they did everything. These last two times it was definitely physical.
I cry all the time, I can't work, I don't sleep, I don't eat. I feel like there's a hole on my bosom that nothing could fill, it's overwhelming. I can't think of anything else. I'm feeling like the world is crumbling down and unwanted images come to my mind all the time, I can't help it. It's like a storm that never ends. I don't want to make the same mistakes again, I refuse to be held responsible this time, I didn't do anything wrong. I'm not perfect, but I am a supporting wife and a good person, I don't deserve this. I don't want this. I am taking STD tests this week and I am terrified. I don't know what else to write. I just can't do this anymore.

15 comments posted: Wednesday, October 19th, 2022