After 12 years I still have demons of doubt and mistrust please help

Hello
This is my first post ever on any site talking about this. I am truly in despair and need advice and help.
This will be a long post so please bare with me. Me 49 and my wife 48 have a long history. We have been married for 26 years with one precious daughter who is 16. We first met in grade school when we moved and I switched schools. I was in 5th grade and she was in 4th. That is when or connection/chemistry started when I gave her a note with a simple question. Will you go with me? Check one yes or no. She accepted. We were apart for transition from grade school to middle school for a year and when she arrived to middle school we were again boyfriend/girlfriend off and on with other relationships in between until the transition from middle school to high school when we were then apart for another year. When she arrived in high school her freshman year and me a sophomore it was love at first sight for me and I knew in my heart then I wanted her to be my wife. I even told my cousin that I would merry her someday and he said I was crazy. I wound up in her gym class at the start of the year because they messed up my schedule and we got to talk and again boyfriend girlfriend again. We broke up and got back together a few times with short relationships with others. A little more about us now. I was raised in a very loving Christian family with the security of a functional family and morals. She was raised in a broken nonfunctional family that was total chaos and atmosphere of anything can happen at any moment. Adopted by her grandparents who did their best to raise her. She was from a very poor and rough area. Her older brother was both wild and truly crazy and partying all the time with friends who were a wild as he was. Her family would literally fight with guns and knives at any moment. Half cocked all the time. My junior and her sophomore year we were again boyfriend girlfriend. She was partying with her brother and his friends which I didn't know she was doing and had sex with one of the thug friends of her brother. I was truly devastated and in shock at the same time. I could not believe she had done this with such a piece of trash. I was deeply in love with her. We broke up and she was with him for a while all the time I would see her in school thinking about what she was doing with him with me still loving her deep in my heart. My senior and her junior year she broke up with him and again we were drawn back to each other and again boyfriend girlfriend. We had sex and I lost my virginity to her. She asked me after we had sex for the first time if I was going to break up with her thinking that all I wanted was sex and was going to dump her after I got what I wanted. I looked her in the eyes and told her that was not what I wanted at all and told her I loved her and we had not just had sex but made love. She cried and hugged because that was the first time she made love and had been truly loved instead of used for pleasure. We talked and I told her that she was the first person I ever had sex with and I was shocked to learn she had had multiple partners with some just being one night stands. I was also shocked that some of these people were pure lowlife trash. How could she have allowed these thugs to do this to her is what was going through my mind. We continued to be boyfriend girlfriend and I graduated. She had to go to summer school while I had started working my first job after graduating. Some friends told me she had been hanging around with a guy going to summer school as well. He was from a different school but was going to summer school there. They told me they had seen them very flirty and seen them walking out after school and kissing each other. I confronted her about it and she denied all the accusations. One day I drove to the school to watch her when she got out. I was in shock to see her walking out with this dude all smiles. I confronted both of them and they both denied anything was going on. I gave in. Her senior year I was working and she would miss school alot. She wound up quitting school and I broke up with her. About a year passed and some friends of ours set up a double date with them and us. She said she still loved me and in my heart I never stopped loving her since my sophomore year when she arrived at high school. We had both went out with other people during this break and I asked her if she had had sex with any of them and she said that she had made out with things getting close to sex but said that she had not went that far and I didn't have sex with anyone I dated during this time. She was still the only person I had ever had sex with. We got back together and she got her GED. A year passed and I asked her to merry me on Christmas Eve.
We were married 4 months later with a clap of thunder outside when the preacher announced us husband and wife.
My wife was truly a a beautiful girl in school and a beautiful lady when we got married. When I say beautiful I am not saying this because she is my wife I am saying this because she is truly drop dead gorgeous. They have always been guys looking and approaching her.
About 5 years in our marriage I sat down at our computer and found she had left a message ap open on it. I read to see who she was talking to and it was a guy. I didn't find anything that mentioned sex but did see he had told her he missed her and could not wait to see her again and she had said the same. I confronted her about it and she said that nothing was going on and it was just someone she had met at work. She worked at a tourist stop and she said it was just someone from out of town and they had became friends. I later dug and found his number. He was from out of town. I called him and he was in complete denial about even knowing her. I let it pass even though I had a gut feeling that they were more to what she was telling me. Our 10th year in marriage our precious daughter arrived. When she was about 3 years old I was working long hours and off shifts. My mom and dad would watch her during the day while my wife was at work and I was sleeping for a while because I worked long hours on night shift. There was another lady that babysitter as well. There were times when she would arrived home late and had a lot of unexplained time. My dad was dieing of cancer at this time and I was working long hours so it never really hit me that anything was going on. My dad passed away and it was a terrible time for me. One day by mistake I found she had been talking and texting a number alot. When I say alot I mean hundreds of messages. Hundreds. I called her at work and asked her whose number it was. She was silent and didn't say a word. She would not answer. She said that we would talk about it when she got home. She arrived and we talked. She said it was only a guy friend that she talked to. I told her that she was lieing and didn't believe her due to the number of texts. We argued and said admitted that they had met after work a few times but nothing had ever happened. Still didn't believe her. She admitted that they had hugged. Still didn't believe her. I threatened to call the guy and talk to him and she said he had kissed her but she told him that was wrong and didn't do anything else. She swore on her dad and our daughter's name that that was the only thing that had ever happened. This was the day before valentines day and I act like I believed her. Valentines day we went out and had a nice dinner and made love. Little did she know that I had called the guy and threatened to tell his wife if he didn't meet with me the next day. He agreed to meet. I told my wife that I was running to town when I got up and I met with him. I told him that I knew what had happened between him and my wife because she had told me everything trying to make him think I knew more than I did. I told him as long as he told me the truth I would not kick his ass or get his wife involved. He admitted that they had met a lot after work and said they never had sex. I asked them what they did all the times they met. He admitted they had made out on several occasions and admitted that she jacked him off and he had feel her boobs and fingered her while she jacked him off and that they both orgasmed two of the times they had made out. He also said that they had told each other they loved each other. I grabbed him and rattled him and told him he better never speak to my wife again and he agreed. Went home and confronted my wife and told her he had told me everything using same strategy as I did with him. She started with a hug then kiss that should not have happened then a hug then mutual kiss then making out a couple of times promising and swaring that was it then admitted to what he said about her jerking him off and him fingering her until they both orgasmed 2 times but only admitting to that after she asked me what he had told her and I told her what he had told me. She again swore that that is all that happened between them. I eventually said I forgave her but I have never believed in my heart that that is the only thing that happened between them with a strong feeling in my gut that they were both lieing about the extent of the affair. She also denied ever telling him she loved him. As I look back through our 26 years of marriage I can remember other times when something didn't seem right but at the time never dreamed that my wife could be messing around with another man. Which brings me to present day. Our daughter is now 16 and for a few years now there have been things happening that brings that gut feeling that something isn't right. I still feel like my wife has a lot of skeletons in her closet that she has lied about. I still feel like the affair I caught her in 13 years ago went a lot farther than they both admitted to. I feel like I am going crazy sometimes but my gut keeps telling me more. We have both discussed this over the years many many times a she told me the same thing every time a still swares that is all that happened and there has never been any other affairs. Am I crazy? Going crazy? Or is there more she isn't telling me? One thing I want to add is that my wife is well known and loved in our community and she is the sweetest lady you would ever meet. No one would ever suspect her of the things she has done and would be in total shock if they knew. I however know my wife better than anyone and know that my wife can be 2 different people and fool you easily. I experienced it first hand.
Sorry for the long post.
Please help me

185 comments posted: Tuesday, December 27th, 2022