SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Sparky762: I feel the same.. He´s been living a double life almost our entire relationship (since 2010 - we got together in 2007)

And I also feel that there are no good memories left from our years together, like mentioned here about photographs. All I can think of is what he was doing the same time we went on a holiday and so on.

In may this year we also took a trip to a place we have been several times before, kind of like "our place". And just a couple of weeks when we came back I found out about his multiple affairs. And his last partner was a long term thing, and the last week on our trip he spent a lot of time e-mailing her. So now "our place" is just a bad memory as well.. So sad..

He´s been doing really well, going to IC and I see change. But I HATE the mind movies and the thought of him doing all of this for all these years behind my back. I really feel that he has been wasting my time and emotions. He has emotional problems related to his childhood, so that explains a lot of his behavior - but there is no excuse.. He also says that he never thought of his affair partners as pretty or good looking (except from one) and he never had feelings for anyone. It´s good to know, but hard to believe since two of them were long term affairs (about a year each) and to think of how much time, energy and putting me and his family at risk for several people you don´t find attractive or have feelings for. It´s been all about the attention he got from them.

[This message edited by Northenlight at 5:23 AM, September 20th (Wednesday)]

Me again... The timeline changes and suddenly he can't remember who he cheated with first (it's been 6 people)

Come on!! Even though the first is about 7 years ago, you should remember who! Or am I the only one who think that's a no brainer?!?

Me again... The timeline changes and suddenly he can't remember who he cheated with first (it's been 6 people)

Come on!! Even though the first is about 7 years ago, you should remember who! Or am I the only one who think that's a no brainer?!?

I struggled with the same thing. For me, I wasn’t as worried about whether she could tell me the right order, I was more worried about whether she left anyone out. As I get older, the timeline of things from years ago start to blend into eras. However, I also remember significant events with a much higher resolution and 7 years ago wasn’t that long ago.

From my own perspective, I think cheating on my wife would be a significant event. I think that would be especially true with the first one if there were multiple. But I also placed a much higher value on my M and fidelity too which I think is frequently similar to other BS’s. I get that not everyone is the same, but if the value of a M (not to be confused with the value of an individual spouse), and the value of fidelity are low, it becomes more like running to town for a good cup of coffee. I don’t really understand casual sex because my fww is my only. For me, who I would be having sex with would be much more important than just if I were having memorable sex. I think that ratio is different for everyone.

Once I understood my fww’s value system, it made it much easier for me to accept some things and helped me to dig into other things that I felt were more important.

I wish you peace in your journey to sort this all out.

I haven't posted in a very long time. Having trouble sleeping lately.

So sad to see so many of us struggling with the result of someone else's wrong decisions!

It's been 6 1/2 years since my first DD. I am here, I love my fwh but in a totally different way. Our son is 23 and just got married 6 months ago, what example does it make to get divorced now? Our son knows dad did things in the past but also has watched him be a good husband and father since he was a child.

I get up, put a smile on my face and get on with the day. I was a stay at home mom for 18 years. Since DD, I went back to work, I make my own money, I enjoy my profession.It's the place where I forget about the past and be myself.

Fwh is remorseful and says he has to live with the pain he caused everyday. I find myself knowing the only reason I am there is not to break up the family, even if my kids are adults.

Holidays and special times would never be the same.

I guess I find myself lost right now. I am 51 years old and don't want to continue to look through the rear view mirror.

This is how I feel, at my age, whom ever I meet, because I don't want to spend the rest of my life alone, will have a past.

Will their past be worse then my fwh? Will I ever truly trust another man? Am I just broken?

Sometime you need to play mind tricks on yourself to go forward?

When I discovered my wonderful spouse's A's there was a lot of anger & frustration etc etc.

Considering I found out many years later, long after the deed (like must of us here in the FTWFOYL thread have found out) it was really a bit of a mind-fuck to make sense of it all & get on with life.

How do you get rid of all those feelings, especially when your spouse went on to be a good & loving mother/father husband/wife?

Especially when you have lived a life together for years afterwards?

I find that there is a lot of sadness in this particular thread. Probably because most of us feel so helpless.

I sometimes feel like I am a loaded gun shooting off anger & frustration bullets in any direction.

And yet there are happy and positive people on SI.

People that are in a good space and have survived.

I also noticed that those that divorce seem to be able to adjust quicker & be happy faster.

My lightbulb moment was realizing that my 16 year old sweetheart was NOT the person I thought she was.

No, she was Not that magical apparition as I had always thought, just another screwed up individual.

The way I think about living my life these days is that it is like getting divorced and marrying your best friend that you have known all your life.

You get to keep the memories and laugh about the good times.

You get to keep the children, houses etc.

You get to have sex, no longer with that childhood sweetheart you still had the hots for (until DDay) but now with a 'new' person.

So maybe I will never love her the same as I did before, but I still have my life.

I am able to move on and enjoy that life.

I still get to have my dreams & grow old together with an old friend.

I belong to another infidelity site. A man wrote in and asked if he should tell his wife about an affair he had, ended and regretted. The affair happened a year ago, and his wife had no idea, and he had no intention of having another one. He had no idea what keeping this secret from his wife would do to his marriage. This is the post that I responded to him with:

Oh wow... I am glad to know I am not alone, but yet so sad to see so many folks with common issues. My WH A occurred 10 years before D-day. I have posted the story elsewhere. The condensed version is that there is OC. Yup found out about OC on D-day because OW contacted my 18 yr old DD and asked if she would like to meet OC. OW proceeded to harass my DD and nagged by telling her to ask her dad about the A and OC. She even sent pics of them together. My DD does not want anything to do with OC at this time and stopped contact with OW.

I had suddenly lost my mother 2-1/2 months before D-day and i had also been dealing with issues with my oldest DD. Oldest DD is not bio DD for my husband, but he did adopt her. I say this because my WH KNOWS what problems oldest DD had due to her questions about her bio father and her half siblings from other mothers. Yet he chose to take up a request for stud services and father OC for OW.

D-day was 20 months ago. OC will be 11 in approx 4 months. My WH does not have contact and does not pay child support as that was per OW request. She just wanted a baby, nothing else. Obviously OW has some issues going on to contact my DD and I know she will come out of the woodwork again at some point.

WH and I are working every day toward continuing our relationship. We just had a very long talk this morning after I found a great post in the wayward forum. It hit every point and he was able to better understand my side and how to help me and help us. A week of severe anxiety melted away once we opened that door.

Has anyone else been hit with the double whammy on D-day (A and OC)?

Wow. This is me. Didn't think that there were so many of us. Comforting in a sense to know I'm not alone but it saddens me that this is so common.

I found out 5 years after it ended and 8 years after it began. We had children during and after. I was never given the chance to know who my FWW truely was before I went down a path of family that leaves me feeling guilty for wanting to leave at times. I was truely manipulated and mind f*cked for years and made to believe I was not a good husband. It is hard to think about how it all happened and so many memories have been tarnished. It is hard to believe that I can ever see her in the same light again. That type of manipulation and selfishness does not easily leave a person because they seem to do it unconsciously.

FWW seems to want brownie points for telling me now. In what world would a person get credit for that!? Now we are in MC and she wants to talk about all of "our" past marriage issues (basically her issues with me). We spent YEARS working on "our" issues and now I know she was gaslighting me. I guess she is trying to explain why and put her A in context but the way I see it, she had a ONS, realized she liked it and wanted something extra on the side with the guy and is now trying to justify it.

I want to let all my BS family out there know I won't let her rug sweep or blame shift. I will stay strong

I am glad to find this thread. I recently found out about my wife's affair from 20 years ago.

Finding out years later is truly awful. Not only did he have the A, he lied to my face for years. Lied and manipulated me into staying.

For me, the worst part is, he stayed in contact with his AP/cousin. "Only as a cousin". Um, you lied to me for years. Why the hell should I believe that?

[This message edited by Northenlight at 3:16 PM, October 16th (Monday)]

Of all the forums, and all the posts I can relate to, this is perhaps the one I hate being a member of the most. The empathy I feel for all of you in this club runs deep.

I'm not really sure why, but as of late I am having a really tough time. It really doesn't make sense since my business is booming and by all outward appearences, anyone would think I was happy. It's actually quite the contrary, I am tortured. Questions and thoughts in my head are relentless. The found out years later club is a special kind of hell.

We are so many years out, that it puts me in a difficult place. If I want to discuss any of the things I think about, it will undoubtedly end in anger and tears from my WW. DD was 27 years ago and A was 9 years prior to that. My WW, as most WS's do, made choices that impacted our marriage and my life. By the time I found out we had 3 children. There are no good choices at that point in one's life. The children are first and foremost, at least in my eyes they are. All my choices revolved around what would be best for them.

In my case it meant putting on the facade that we were happily married. It was sucessful, all 3 boys have grown into good men. One of my sons not long ago told me he wants to emulate the marriage his mother and I have. Talk about a double edge sword. It was a rewarding statement, but at the same time has left me feeling more trapped than ever. Now I feel as though I have perpetuated a lie that I didn't create. I feel like a horrible person, what have I done?

Lately it's all those choices I made that I reflect on. Did I do the right thing. Was I blinded by my own struggle to do the honorable thing for my family? These are hard questions to face. As a BS we are handed a huge burden to carry in some cases.

I spend so much time thinking back and trying to remember so many events and it's a struggle. Looking for things I may have missed. Wondering if all the children are mine. At what point was I loved and at what point was I not. What holidays were real and which weren't. When I thought we were happy, apparently we were not. So what about other times. When we had sex, was it always about us or was there others in her mind. There is so much more, but I'm just rambling now. Guess none of it really matters. My fate was sealed long ago.

There's an old saying. The truth will set you free.

Would you like for any of your sons to live the life you've lived/are living?

Sparky762

I spend so much time thinking back and trying to remember so many events and it's a struggle. Looking for things I may have missed.

all 3 boys have grown into good men. One of my sons not long ago told me he wants to emulate the marriage his mother and I have. Talk about a double edge sword. It was a rewarding statement,

Ditto. I know that feeling. Exactly!

Marz

Would you like for any of your sons to live the life you've lived/are living?

No, I would not. But my WS'es A's happened prior to them. And the example they have to follow is a good & loving household. These days things happen a lot quicker and more instantly. They have the tools to judge in their own lives.

Don't be mistaken, I have gained much knowledge. My eye will be there. I will be watching.

I haven't been on this thread for a while so just catching up. What a powerful post Lefty. I'm 40 years married. The lies started before marriage. After the first lie each one gets easier. The problem with lies is that there's often something not quite right about them and often they are inconsistent.

I guess once you've cheated and not got caught it's probably easier to do it again if you think it's acceptable behavior for yourself. WW would not have been happy or accepting if I cheated by her own admission but she was positive I wouldn't cheat.

My WW was involved with the church and held in high regard by most people. She served on a Joint Needs Assessment Committee for 4 charges and on the Ministerial Selection Committee for the same charges. Aura of respectability, integrity, commitment and faith.

Have any of you got over the though that there must be more to find out? My husband has only admitted to the one, but the more I look back the more I am confident that was not the only one.....but as you all know there is no way to prove things now.

Just wondering how you overcame worrying about more and believed what was being said.

My WH never stopped talking to his cousin/AP, so I don't believe for a millisecond I know everything. There is no way for me to find out. I just know I can't live like this anymore. The continuous doubt. It's killing my soul. I'm nothing like the person I used to be.

I can relate to this too. Almost nobody ever came clean to me about their cheating. Everyone strung me along, including mutual friends and our families. When one of my girl friend's bf cheated on her, one of HIS friends snitched to her, spilling everything and details of his two-timing. Nobody has ever given me that courtesy, not even this particular betrayed friend. Before I became a WW/MH but while I held suspicions, WH invited this friend and her boyfriend to bars without me. Inviting others but not me technically isn't infidelity, just insulting and outcasting to me, but what irritates me is that he'd invited them to the bars where I later found out he'd met girls who gave him favors. These were the same bars he always evaded taking me, for obvious reasons. My girl friend didn't tell me about the bar invites until I griped to her months later about him always going places without me (GPS showed). So this wasn't directly cheating related and I found out months later not years later, but it's still somewhat relevant to this topic.

But more directly relevant: it took nearly 15 yrs for an ex to admit he'd cheated on me at the end of our relationship. I'd asked him multiple times before that over the years, back when we were "friends". Always said no. It wasn't until I was a real bitch, confronting him about an unrelated issue, that I used that opportunity to grill him about other stuff including past cheating. I guess he felt like he had nothing to lose telling me at that point since it was now so far into the past, so irrelevant, and I already made it obvious I hated him.

[This message edited by madhattermarilyn at 4:28 PM, November 9th (Thursday)]

QUESTION: Has anyone ever been given a fake confession at a later date? Or told one? (Maybe in high school?)

My one friend was loyal to a cheater but done dirty by the end. Worse, the hypocritical deadbeat had the nerve to tell everyone he knew that he doubted their child was really his. Years later when people told her this, she claimed that there was no question about paternity years later because she didn't cheat on him until 6mis after the birth, only after finding out he cheated on her first. In reality she had been good as gold to him, never even so much as flirted or touched another man until after she clearly broke up with him. I guess she felt foolish being loyal. This was many years ago, but is this something that happens a lot? I also wonder because my WH/MH didn't open up about all of the physical cheating until after I had a full-on sex PA (I hadn't told him about that but he may have suspected, esp since I mellowed out big time after my PA, no longer bitter about what he'd done). I think it's more likely WHs will lie to minimize their cheating, not exaggerate, esp mine. No doubts we're MHs. But anyone get told a false confession like my former friend told?

[This message edited by madhattermarilyn at 4:36 PM, November 9th (Thursday)]

Impacted

Have any of you got over the thought that there must be more to find out?

There is ALWAYS so much MORE to find out.

But I think your question is more about "were there any other affairs/AP's?" other than the one/those you were told.

I too have often wondered.......

DDay my spouse owned up to 4 AP's.

However,a friend's wife left him abruptly. He would visit us for support. These visits got longer and longer, sometimes ending late into the night. I would leave them talking and go to bed, needing to get up early for work.

This dude was not one of those 4AP's.

Years later he married again and we became close house friends, until they emigrated.

A year AFTER DDay my spouse mentioned that in one of those consoling sessions, he tried to kiss her/they kissed.

This was around the time just before her 3rd & 4th affairs.

Do I believe her?

How far did it go?

Do I even bother - as in bring it up for discussion?

Or

Do I accept that she was what she was.

That IT probably did happen.

That I can now stop wondering.

That she eventually stop effing around and changed for the better.

That now ALL of that is in our past.

And try to get on with my life with a smile .