SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

In my earlier post I pondered qualifying the affair. Physical vs Emotional...

My wife insists that her affair was exclusively emotional. She admits to making out with him once, two "little peck on the lips" kisses, two hugs, and holding hands once.

When I'm not chasing rabbits down a hole, I actually believe her because from the start of her affair, her personality turned on a dime. She was cold, angry with me, etc etc, so I was paying attention to her location. I didn't know why, but I was....I tracked her via phone often. She was always where she was supposed to be. (as far as I know) I look back, and I can honestly believe that she was not sexually active with him because she simply did not have the time. We have a very active family, kids going all over the place with tons of people that we know at sports practices and such. She works with my 3 college friends that I have known for 30 years. One of them would have pointed out that she was disappearing if it was happening at work. (AP did NOT work with my wife) I cannot think of a single time she told me she was going somewhere and her phone was not at that place. She was glued to that phone.... Usually there was a grocery bag, a credit card receipt or some other proof that she had been where she said she was going to be. running errands.

Anyway.... then along come the rabbit holes... and I am certain that she slept with him. This is based ONLY on my own paranoia, what I have read, and my anger fueled by her lies.

So... Do others struggle with this? It can't just be me, right????

The crux of the problem is that if I make her guilty of it no matter what she says, despite the lack of proof.... then I am not being fair. And that is no who I want to be... but so many damn lies... How do I know???

Brain freeze

I'm with you except in the road to D because she's still trying to say it wasn't PA when I have enough proof to say it wasn't.

She made up some ridiculous claim about him having ED despite her underwear choices saying otherwise and the number of times they spent the night together 'cuddling'.

She's not s very good liar and I can see right through her. That's when I decided fuck it I cant live with the uncertainty and her having lied about everything else.

I will not live a lie and if you don't feel comfortable settling for that then the D route really is the best way to go.

I've tried everything but she's not open to discussion. I won't settle for a life of misery especially seeing as she hasnt even hinted that she wants to R.

Good luck to you and sorry.

Hello, I am grateful to have found this website for support. My DDay was end of March this year. WH is in denial. He insisted that she was only a very good friend. I discovered the fake facebook account but he posted his real photos. He usually communicated with a group of women when at work. Somehow he was doing it at home and forgot to logout. I read a lot of sexual contents. He even admitted pressuring one particular woman to send him a photo of her private part. How was it not an emotional affair even though the women are in the Far East? And with this particular woman it lasted for 10 years until he got busted in March. I actually caught him in Jan 2016 on a dating site. He deleted that site but moved the people to facebook.

He said he is sorry for causing me so much pain. He refuses to talk about the affair. He actually never admits that is an affair. He went to MC with me twice but refused to go again. The counsellor failed to make him see the point -- it was an EA not a friendship. The dilemma is that I have an upcoming surgery which requires me to stay home for 3 month after. I need him to help me at least for a few weeks. I can't believe our 29+ years turns out this way. I told him many times that he is a great guy and I felt so lucky to be with him in a loving relationship. Of course that was before DDay. I actually forgave him two years ago and put the whole thing behind me. I just can't this time. I have lost trust in him.

He insisted he never had a plan to leave me. I am the only woman that he loves and he plans our retirement together. I have a hard time believing it when he told the OW "I love you very much". And she would call him "handsome". They discussed sexual stuff. He said he was the one who initiated the sexual content because she told him she is a virgin and never had experience with men. That is why he asked for her photo to prove the virginity. Really???!!! I am so hurt.

Jenna2,

You caught him on a dating site in 2016, and you had another D-day a couple of months ago.

Do you have a plan?

Do you have control of your money?

What are you willing to put up with?

I hope you are thinking about these things.... I would advise you make 2 plans

1) A plan for R... What do you want that to look like? What does he need to do?

2) A plan for D... You can't make him stop. You know that right? So, put together a plan for D. You do not have to execute it, but have the plan ready.

Once you know what you want, I would suggest telling him what your expectations are.... Then detach and see what he does.

Take care of yourself Jenna2

Hi BrainFreeze,

Thank you for your advice and encouragement. I agree with you. Today, WH maintains that he loves me very much and he is willing to work with me and live with me until the end. He just doesn't want to admit his long term affair. He said he screwed up and it will never happen again. If the OW contacts him, he will let me know. And, he wouldn't be surprised that the OW would contact him one day. That's all. He still looks at the OW as a very good friend who doesn't mind to share with him a photo of her private part. He knows all along that she wants him. He said he can have her anytime if he wants to. The poor woman seems to be an innocent party. He keeps saying it is all his fault as he was the one starting the dirty talks/flirtation. She just went along. She knew where she stands as he always told her he is not going to leave me.

If I could sweep everything under the rug there is certainly no issue. Only my mind can't accept that denial and his perception of lightness of a LTA.

I will take your advice and make 2 plans. Thank you again for caring about my situation and your advice. I appreciate that.

[This message edited by Jenna2 at 3:59 PM, September 11th (Tuesday)]

Jenna - Your WS never wants to talk about it again... that is normal for a WS...

It is also wrong.

It's unfair that you have to be the one who pushes for the truth and the discussions... but you do.

You are only 5 months out... that's fairly early. At that point I was starting to get to the point where I thought I might be willing to work on R. The only reason I had stayed that long was because of my kids.

Obviously I am not you, and I don't know the details of your situation... but... When my wife was at her most adamant that she wasn't going to talk about it... she was still in the A.

My D-Day was Feb 1, 2017. My wife told me she went no contact Feb 1. She didn't. It took her until the end of August 2017 to stop talking to him... then she would read his Facebook posts and watch his life from afar until the end of Nov 2017. -- That was the day I headed to the lawyer. That is when she pulled her head out of her ass for good.

I don't have a crystal ball, but be prepared that it might not be over. Better to be prepared, and know what you are going to do, then get blindsided and thrown into the pits again. Know what I mean?

That said here are some questions for you to think about...

Do you want to try to R? Why?

What is he doing to help you?

Do you have full access to his phone & computer?

Do you have tracking software on his phone?

What are his reactions when you ask for these things?

What will you do if it's still going on?

What do you need from a life partner? (This is a tough question...was for me anyways)

Do you believe in yourself?

Can you picture a good life without him? (With or without him, you need to make a good life for yourself)

Do you realize that he left the marriage? That was his choice, you had nothing to do with that.

You do realize that this is no longer about keeping him married to you... it's now about you wanting to take him back. Don't do the pick me dance.

Do you know ITS NOT YOUR FAULT?

Be good to yourself, trust your gut intuition.

Go get some ice cream.

BrainFreeze,

Go get some ice cream? This really warms my heart. I guess we have to be humorous to get passed the ordeal.

WS refused to talk about it because he was caught off guard when I asked him at the earlier days if he had seen her private part. He regretted telling me the truth. After that he wanted me to write down any questions and he would answer them in writing. That way he has the time to think about what to say. The Questions and Answers document had expanded to 12 pages. He just keeps repeating that the OW was a good friend and no more. She is gone now. He demands that I respect his wish to not discuss about it at all. If I have any further questions write them down and he will answer me. I see no point doing it because his perception of the whole thing is very different from mine and everyone else's.

You stay for your kids. I don't have the kid issue. Our son is 21 and he fully supports me. He even encouraged me to end the relationship with his father. He is a good kid, very sensible and mature. I don't want to and cannot leave at this time because of my upcoming surgery and house projects in progress. He is fixing the house in case we separate and have to sell the house.

I have tried R and find it hard because of the different POVs. I feel that he is not remorseful as he sees it not an affair! However he admits that the OW may be having an emotional affair with him. I trust that he has no more contact with the women on facebook as he closed the account closed on DDay.

I do have access to his phone and his real facebook account. I unfriended a couple of his ex girlfriends on his behalf. He didn't seem to mind. Having said that, there is no way to find out if he is still doing it because he was using the computer at work for communication most of the time in the past 10 years. What a stupid thing to do asking for a sexual pic at work!

What do I need a life partner for? This is the million dollar question! Ideally you love each other and will do anything to make your partner satisfied and happy and you live a normal harmonious life. He can do that but he also had the ability to betray me repeatedly and for so long. He promised this will never happen again. He got hooked on feeling wanted and these women gave him the attention and affection he craved for. He also understood their objective was to get out of a poor country and wanted his help. He said he never had the intention of meeting anyone in person that's why they all live far away.

I do believe in myself. I have great friends and a great kid who are very supportive. I am just very saddened by the fact that almost 30 years of good relationship has to go down the drain. I can have a good life without him. Just need time to adjust. That's all. I know it is not my fault. It was his choice, his action. But he doesn't want to own it! His words, he doesn't want to be crucified therefore don't talk about it!

I will be good to myself. I sincerely thank you BrainFreeze for sharing your thoughts with me.

BrainFreeze:

As to your conundrum about PA (yes/no), if you are serious about R, I'd suggest simply telling her outright what you are thinking. "You tell me it was an EA only, but you have lied to me so often, and for so long, that I have difficulty believing you when the circumstances as a whole point to a PA. In my heart and in my gut I believe it was as PA and that you are still lying to me. What can you do to show me you are telling the truth about this, when you have given me so many lies in the past about this?"

Jenna2: A big old double scoop. Moose Tracks is my favorite.

ButForTheGrace: Ironic that you should write this today. Last night I had a bad night, it was a combination of 4 little triggers that culminated in me being awake for a couple of hours thinking about the EA vs PA argument. Yup - a rabbit hole...

She knew that something was up, and asked me to go for a walk tonight so that we can talk about it. We were both heading out to work and didn't have time to talk about it in the AM. She currently doesn't know the topic of conversation, she just knows something is wrong. To her credit, she picked up on it and she said lets talk.

My plan tonight is to walk her through the little triggers that got me to where I was. Then plain out tell her that "I can't prove that you did have sex with him, but you can't prove that you didn't. Furthermore, X, Y, and Z don't make much sense to me...as a guy, it just doesn't pass the smell test."

After talking through the triggers, and telling her about the "PA vs EA" argument that was in my head all night, I planned to shut up and just listen to what she had to say.

My wife has not been perfect in her actions during this R. Neither have I. There are things that she should have done by now that she hasn't, and there are things that I should have pushed harder for that I let slide a little.

Neither of us has been perfect in this R attempt. That said, I do believe that we are headed the right direction. I also know, that there are no guarantees and this could fall apart at any moment. No matter which way I go, I know I'll be Okay!

I'll let you know how the conversation goes tonight... I suspect that we will remain at a loggerhead. The ironic thing is that it's not the sex that twists me up inside...it's the concern that I will find that she is lying, that's the thing I found myself dwelling on last night...

So... I walked my wife through the triggers last night, and the concern about the PA vs EA.

She clued right in on the fact that I wasn't sure if she was telling me the truth or not. She She looked defeated. She was frustrated with the situation. She said she could understand how I could have the doubts. She also wondered out loud why we bothered going through the A timeline if the end result was that I was not going to believe her.

It took a while for her to process the fact that I went "down the rabbit hole" ...

She also queued in on the fact that me sharing what had happened was a good thing, and that I wasn't trying to rip on her, but rather share with her. She thanked me for sharing, and added that "Not sharing our feelings and issues is one of the things we messed up prior to 'This mess'".... she is spot on with that assessment.

By the end of the evening, she basically was saying that she thought we were further ahead in healing than we actually were, but that she wanted to keep working on us. She wants our relationship to work, and recognizes that there is more work to do than she realized.

She decided to re-read the book "Not Just Friends". I bought the book this morning on apple iBooks, and shared it with her. As I type this, she is trying to figure out how to get the book... Honestly I don't know either, it's the first time we have shared stuff on Apple... so... I suggested that we sit next to one another tonight and work on it... She said she would try again at lunch.

Bottom Line -- Sharing helped...

As an FYI - She says I know the whole truth, that there is no more to tell.... I can't prove otherwise, and at some point I have to choose to move forward...

Brainfreeze, I hope you are doing well and have good progress with your wife.

Here is the update of my case. I basically cannot get out of the rabbit hole. His EA is constantly on my mind. He hates it whenever I talk about it and gets very angry. There is no way he will agree to read “Not Just Friends” which I downloaded on the iPad. He keeps denying it was an EA. He insists that she was a good friend who he cared about and he loved her as a good friend but not as a girlfriend. Oh well, there's really no point arguing whose perception is the truth. We are just not on the same page which makes R impossible.

Last night, I asked him how meaningful the relationship with the OW was to him. He said it is a very hard question to answer. If he doesn’t care for her as a friend, he wouldn’t have spent so many years keeping the friendship. For that reason, I don’t think I can stay with him for the rest of my life. I have an upcoming surgery that I need help with. And another one next year hopefully. The plan is to stay together until my health is back to normal and we make a decision then. So sad, we spent almost three decades to build a family, a house and a life together. This will all be destroyed, thanks to his “friend”.

[This message edited by Jenna2 at 4:12 PM, September 12th (Wednesday)]

Hey Jenna,

So, she is just a friend eh? Well then, it isn't a problem for everybody on the planet to know just how much they talk. Is she married? Does her husband know? If they are just friends, then surely her husband would know about it already and be absolutely OK with the situation. Right?

In-fact, since there is nothing to hide, and this is just friends... your entire group of friends, neighbors etc etc should all meet this wonderful woman. Maybe you should throw a party for her! LOL - I'm joking of course

Is there someone else that can take you for your surgeries? Kids, family... staying stuck in that environment must be very tough. It's not good for your health.

Are you getting help for you?

Do you have a financial plan to separate? If not, start putting that in place. You do not have to use it, but be prepared.

I wish the best for you.

Thank you Brainfreeze.

The OW is not married and of course she is looking for a H. She claims that she is a virgin. That’s why H pressured her for a pussy photo to prove it! The OW is a single woman in her 40s living in Asia. They never met but had intimate online, including webcam conversation/flirting for 10 years‼!

I’m gonna be ok. H promised to take care of me after my surgery. I will make a decision when I get better physically. Mentally, I don’t think I will ever heal if I stay with him. I will make good use of my sick time to sort out finances. Either way, I will survive. I wish everyone here good luck dealing with their marital issues. It is tough but it will pass.

I’m hooked on this just friends thing Jenna!

Since he was just friends with her, Then a logical jump would be that he also has Dick Pics of all his male friends.... Is that right? I’d be laughing my ass off at him.... just friends !

And here’s a special unicorn just for him!

Maybe the unicorn will give him pictures of it’s genitalia too!

Ok.... calm down BrainFreeze.... just drink your slurpee

Hey y'all. I haven't seen much movement in this thread in ages, so I thought I'd jump in. :)

Jenna, I'm sorry you are here. It's awful to not have the truth. The first day I came here and posted, I was bombarded with 2 x 4s about being so stupid that the EA wasn't just an EA and the kiss, had to have been more. So I won't do that. But I will say this...that when there is so much time for an EA to progress, when there is sexual talk, when there is one-sided physical actions and photos/phone sex, if there were chances to get fully physical...it probably was.

BrainFreeze, I've seen your posts and didn't realize our stories were so very similar. My WH had an EA with a cOW. I've exhausted pretty much every avenue for investigation and I'm about 99% sure that he's telling me the truth. (There was only the one kiss.) I say 99% because he's no dumbass, and knows that if there was sex, I'd be gone. That is the only reason I don't believe him. I'm fairly certain I will never 100% believe. The cOW could tell me and I'd laugh in her face. (She's a lunatic.) I actually think it would have been fully physical within a few weeks (they had a work trip that would have been just three people at a resort that was entirely made up of "fun" things like horseback rides, sunset drinks, spa visits and pool time. (I'm not even kidding, a retreat for C-level execs entirely social - I saw the agenda.) So I'm fairly certain they would have wound up in bed. I just happened to catch the A a week after the kiss bc he was acting like a crazy person (at least some of his conscience was showing!). All that to say that I think ANY EA if given a chance with get physical. I just got lucky bc I know my stupid WH so well that I knew something weird was up.

The doubt is real. However, it's not even the kiss that kills me, it IS the emotional stuff, so I've given up knowing that I know the "truth" if the truth differs from his story. (And there's no way to really know!)

That realization has been key to my forward movement. Either I'm in, and I trust that he has told me the truth and that he will honor or marriage from here out, or I don't. And if it's the latter, then I am doing neither of us favors by staying.

[This message edited by TX1995 at 6:39 PM, September 13th (Thursday)]

I think ANY EA if given a chance with get physical.

My wife has admitted that it would have gone physical with more time alone together. That seems like an honest answer and is a big reason I believe that maybe she didn't screw him. I know for a fact that they did not see each other much.

Ugh... such a shit storm.

TX1995 and BrainFreeze,

I agree with you both that EA will turn physical given the opportunity. That is the point H was trying to make. He said he had no intention to meet anyone that's why he chose women from overseas - the only defence he has and it's a weak one.

BrainFreeze, H doesn't have friends for many years. He is a homebody and his IC identified his online addiction might be stemmed from his friendless lifestyle. I encouraged him to connect with his old friends but he has not taken any action.

[This message edited by Jenna2 at 7:06 AM, September 24th (Monday)]

Jenna I had been looking for someone that could at least semi-relate to my story. Even though I know for sure medically wh is unable to be intimate what he did do has me constantly done a rabbit hole. I have tried meditation, journals and trigger stopping techniques but my life is a nightmare. I had been going to a therapist but when she had my wh come in alone he came back talking about my anger. I was never angry at him for 35 years until this! I just couldn't keep going every week and that was what she came up with for us. I am sorry because I know this is an international site but those blanking conniving Asian are ruining lives!

My h also only admits to EA. There were plenty of opportunities for pa and I do not believe him. We are only 5 months out from the last dd. How long does it usually take before the wh is completely honest?

Jenna: As an aside, if your WH were a single man looking for a romantic partner, his decision to launch into one with a stranger online who describes herself as a 40-year old virgin, and who will send a pussy picture to "prove" it (as if a photo could prove virginity), that's lunatic stuff. If I was his buddy, I'd tell him: "Dude, you're a fool. All she wants is your financial stability. She'll get here and marry you long enough to get her green card, then it will be nothing but misery until you divorce."