SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hi Perdital Welcome to SI and the EI group. So sorry that you qualify for membership here but you've come to a really good place.

Good that you are in therapy and working toward healing. I know what you mean by it "feeling dirty." I've been post D-day for three years now. When I learned what my H had been doing for the last 10 plus years of our more than 30 years together at the time I learned I felt more disgusted than hurt. The feelings are far less intense now but so much time on working to heal from the trauma. It can be exhausting but we do heal; we do start to feel Ok and sometimes even better than ok. It just takes lots of time and lots of work. So keep the focus on yourself and know that you will survive and come to a good place again.

Welcome new people although I’m truly sorry you’re here. I’m reading a common theme- working hard to get some happy moments back but lots of time still doesn’t make it go away. It gets much easier with time but like you’ll I don’t think the purely safe feeling and pure love can ever return. There is something to be said for achieving functionality.

I had a trigger after I’ve been doing pretty darn good. The DDay night I found out my h texted that his friend he was visiting, he’s wife was going to cook for them so he’d be late. Well my h is driving back from an out of state thing right now and he stopped to visit a friend. Then he texted me his wife was cooking for them. Made me want to throw up. I talked to him and asked him if he was telling the truth. He sent me a pic which made me feel so much better cause the guys kids were home and in the pic. Anyway just crazy how out of the blue moments can turn you upset down. I know it’ll pass.

Marji- do u still get triggers?

O Reb, yes, of course, yes. And totally get how that one made you feel like throwing up. Wow. Hey, I still get triggers all over the place because where I live there are signs all over the place for "massage."

And yes, makes me nauseous. But also yes on the improvement with time. And yes too on something to be said for decently functioning.

We're set for going away this winter for four months and my H will be going for a medical procedures that until now he received at home. It will mean his traveling every other week for two days and being away for maybe 5 hours each day. I am very uncomfortable with that-just the thought of it reminds me of his going away each day to work and how we lead such different lives, I just didn't know until D-day how different. So the thought of this new way of life is a huge trigger; it's not really about his repeating the disgusting double life ; to be sure there are places for that but I doubt he'd partake again--or be able even if he wanted to; it's just that it's a horrible reminder --ironically enough a reminder of what I didn't know about.

But Reb--Im so glad he sent you the photo and all was as it was supposed to be and hope you're back to the better place. It sounded as though things were really getting to a finer place with you and your H as a couple. We are survivors, Reb. And I'd like to think, we're good ones

Rebplay,

I completely get your trigger surrounding D day. I threw out the sweater I was wearing when I confronted my husband with what I knew. The meeting took place in a restaurant which I will never return to. I won't go back to any hotel or resort we have ever stayed at while we were supposedly in a committed marriage, I will never visit any Asian country, I can't look at family pictures...

My list is quite extensive.

Last Friday my H told me he'd be home at 2:00 because of a impending snowstorm. He arrived at 4:30 and I was beside myself.

I let him know and he was surprised I would be upset. When I explained why, he tried to minimize but caught himself and said Fair enough, I will be more accountable to you, as I was right after D day. He just assumed I was over that stage.

Ummmm, no!

Oh beautiful and pure trust, I miss you.

Marji- yes survivors. Well said. Gosh I’m sorry about the life change coming up that’s a reminder for you. It’s so hard. They don’t understand how something similar (even if they’re innocent) makes the resurgence of traumatic feelings. I was actually doing ok after he got home this afternoon. Of all things tonight, he slipped and said he really liked the motel 6 (he stayed at a hotel driving home last night). I just looked at him horrified and asked why he said that. He said it was a slip, he meant to say comfort inn. I told him that’s where you cheated on me the day I caught you. We never stay in those so I was disgusted. What the hell. It’s like horrible reminder weekend. Honestly, I wish he’d go back so I could have some peace for awhile.

Shocked- oh I miss the pure true trust too. I don’t blame you for being triggered for the time gap. Even when it’s innocent it’s just a cruel, heart wrenching reminder. The anxiety that comes with reminders just sucks. Not as bad as early on like the poor new arrivals,but tough.

Marji said it well- we are survivors.

Kaygem- If you read sometimes still, I wonder how you are

Hey Friends,

Sorry I've been away from the group for a while. I have a reason for that, albeit a strange one. When I first came to SI, this group was my safe place, I rarely posted or read anywhere else. And then, suddenly, I found myself unable to read stories similar to my own without triggering?? EI stories were too hard to process. So I moved over to the main forum boards for a while. I cannot explain this at all. I am weird.

I am actually doing much, much better. I still ride the roller coaster but it's a calmer ride and has a different view.

I realized just the other day, as I picked up one of my H's shirts for the wash, that I missed him. That I loved him again and that my M was being rebuilt into something good and better.

He continues to treat me like a queen, sometimes to an almost embarrassing degree. I don't treat him nearly as well as he treats me but he says he doesn't mind, he just wants a chance to show me his love and that he is grateful I am still around.

And even with all of this, my pain has not gone away completely. It certainly has dissipated, but not disappeared. I still trigger, I still have mini meltdowns (but no more breaking of mugs or smashing of helmets with hammers, thank God.).

One trigger occurred the other day when we had to stop by his work place to pick something up. A woman that he had been recently hired (he told me about) came out of the building. I had expected her to be an old hag the way he described her earlier...but she was not! She was around his age and decent looking. I WAY triggered on this as I have a "type" in my head from his descriptions of the whores he was with and well....she fit that type. I flipped. I was SO angry that he wasn't totally honest about her appearance. He said he WAS honest and thought she was not attractive. Whatever... I got over it but I felt he was minimizing things, which he has always done. I do not believe there is any danger of him working with her so I let it go.

So, even with a truly remorseful spouse, it still takes a loooooong time to heal and overcome triggers and pain.

But I am very thankful that I AM healing. I thought I never would...you ladies here got me through those horrible, awful months that were like being in hell itself. When trauma is that severe, you can't really see a way out. You need friends (like SI) to point you to a place and time that it WILL get better. And it did!

Longsigh, I was glad to see you back but so sad to read your last post. If you want to PM me, I'm here to chat. Sending you hugs.

Thanks for asking about me reb, marj and supresse! I love you all!

Perdita1, Welcome, and I’m sorry you’re here. I’m 6 months out from D-day and I’ve (We’ve) been in therapy ever since too. Glad you found SI.

kaygem, I really related to your post as I could've written a lot of it. My story of trauma and not being able to get out of the hell and the anger was similar. I also feel like my WH is very remorseful, and we are now in a much better place. I also feel like I'm always on edge with things, like what you wrote about the woman you saw at work. My WH took his department on our boat for a day for some department bonding time and most of the people are guys and then when I saw the pictures, there was one girl that was beautiful that wore a string bikini, which was a HUGE trigger for me. I felt like he wasn't honest about it, because he knew it would set me off. I'm only 6 months out so I still have a lot of ups and downs, but feel like there are more ups than downs. Thanks God.

We live in Northern CA and we came to my parents house for the week, who live on the east coast. It was the first time that WH has seen my dad, who was devastated by this whole thing. WH apologized for everything he did and what he put me and my family through (they were literally by my side through a lot of the first month). He was crying when he talked to him. I was very emotional too. I'm hoping my family will still accept him and support us in our marriage, despite all the pain that WH put me through.

Kaygem- good to hear from you. I understand needing a change during the healing process. Sometimes I won’t think about SI for a bit and I think that’s part of the healing process. I’m glad you’re doing so well and your h is still trying so hard. I

Wish you the best sweetie.

Veryhurt- wow that must have been tough for your h to face your family. It says a lot he was willing to do that. Your journey at six months is still very new so just know that it’s normal to take steps forward and then unexpected steps back. Be good to yourself.

Something has been bothering me. My H provided me with a little more TT.

It appears that he has been a client of two “massage therapist” for at least 5 years each. They were his go to people in addition to others for variety and excitement.

This is also in addition to parlours and Gentlemen’s clubs I’m Asia for 7 years prior to his regulars.

Marjo has helped me understand that chances are there was. I real connection with his two regulars but I wonder...

Is his also considered an LTA?

Is here such a thing as an LTA in EI?

Sometimes I write on these forums and can’t believe this is my life. Ever feel that way?

Shocked I don't think LTA and EI are mutually exclusive categories unless we define "Affair" as an old fashioned, traditonal "love affair" kind of thing.

I know of at least two SI situations where the H was involved for years, many years, with the same person--enough to qualify the spouse for the LTA group--but where the men were not at all emotionally involved with the betrayal person, and readily dropped the her when the "affair" was discovered. They consistently said they had felt no affection, no emotion; that they had just liked the sex. So the betrayed spouses qualified for the EI group as well.

In those situations the wives pretty much believed that there was no emotional attachment; no love; nothing more than sexual entertainment though that fact didn't lesson their trauma. In fact in one of those cases, the betrayed spouse felt even more estranged, more horrified to learn how cold and exploitative her H could be. The kind of attitude her husband showed, that ability to engage so often, and for so many years with the same person and have no feeling, no emotional involvement , created its own level of horror.

I've felt that way. So yes, I do feel that some of these men entitle us to be in both the LTA and EI group. When I first came to SI there was not EI group so I hung out in General, LTA and SA. I thought of my H as having a LTA with the parlors and his years of regular activity as similar to an addiction even if he didn't meet all the criteria of SA according to Patrick Carnes.

I am so sorry you are living with this. And TTs add to the trauma though maybe the trickle down is better than no truth at all.

This stuff is hard on the brain as well as the emotions. We all deserve a certificate of some kind testifying to the amazing endurance and creativity we show in dealing with it all.

Well, really cannot believe it, but here we are - one day away from another Thanksgiving Holiday (USA)...

I am hoping, for each of you here, that you have been busy finding new ways to make meaning out of what is left of our lives....

And I am grateful for this particular forum on SI.

Wishing everyone a blessed and peace-filled Day of Thanksgiving.

I am trying to heal by looking outward, seeing other people in all their difficulties of life, and becoming attuned to things other than my own day-to-day misery. We can always find someone, somewhere, who has it worse....right?

The EI group is kind of a different place, I too felt like it was so hard to find a landing spot at first.

Here is how I see it. My H had a LTA affair with adult fuck finder (sorry, I just can't call it anything else). He was in the fog, he gave his time and energy to "it" and he even spent money on it. It was his mistress that provided him with random, meaningless whore encounters. He was in this LTA for four years. Right or wrong, that is how I see it. He had a group of whores that he went fishing for, and AFF provided that.

Would you believe I found a voice text that he sent to a whore once in that he said, "What?! I've never had to pay for sex in my life!"

So, he was fished by a prostitute and he was indignant that she wasn't a ONS whore that wanted him. Yeah, you didn't have to "pay for sex" because I was your wife (insert swear word @#$ ).

Shocked,

I am sorry about your recent TT discovery. Is he willing to tell you what their relationship was like? How did the relationship end? Does he know about their private lives? I really wish I can grab a hold of each WS and tell him/her that it’s better for everyone if they just rip off the bandaid.

Shocked- I’m sorry you have to process more traumatic truths. I don’t think we ever know everything. Im at a point where I

Don’t want to know anything else. I still wonder but don’t think I can handle any “new” info at this point from the past.

Super- I try to think about how “easy” my life is compared to a lot of others too. I’m still wrapped up in myself a lot of the time but try to remember there’s lots of people going through so much more of all kinds of trauma.

Thank you for the welcomes. Sometimes I can’t believe that I am here. Happy Thanksgiving to those who celebrate it. Sorry to hear about the triggers and TT.

I’m sitting here waiting for WH to come home from drinks with ex-colleagues. Have watched some tv and now just staring at the clock willing myself not to go off the deep end. ‘I won’t be late’ he said, and it’s not late, but it’s not early either. I’m tired - I have three young children - and want to go to sleep but I can’t until he’s back. How ridiculous is that?

It makes me so sad to write that I have three young children. He’d been doing this for 5 years. Why expand your family if you’re betraying them?

Bestthing,

My H visited the same two "massage therapists" in their home, one for each of his work routes, for convenience.

There were hundreds of other massage parlour encounters over 12 years, but I am focusing on these two simply because he returned to them on a regular basis. Stupidly, I am actually jealous of that. It's as though these particular two had some sort of hold on him, as opposed to random walk in parlours or business trips in Asia where he was treated to these activities by the suppliers he had meetigns with there.

He did say he was looking for other people to see because he had seen those two for so long that he felt people started to know him. Probably people in the buildings etc.

Maybe he felt they were getting too close, who knows.

I have a picture of one of them because she has a website. I have called the other ones' number so many time I know her voice. I obsess regularly over these two women, even after all these months. I know they are just desperate people doing a job but I hate them nonetheless. It's easier to hate them than to hate my H.

Perdita,

Sorry to hear you are at home with 3 young children. I know that feeling. Mine were 5,5, and 7 when my H admits to starting his habit. That was close to 13 years ago so basically they grew up with a cheating dad. Nice eh?

What was your husband involved in, if you care to share?

Happy Thanksgiving to my American SI friends.

Shocked A website??? you can call them???? Aren't these businesses illegal? Or are they listed as "Spa" or "Massage . . "

Have you or your H considered calling the authorities about their business to have the place closed? If your laws are similar to ours then what they're doing is illegal. The police rarely make raids of such places here but now and then a business is closed. Maybe these women could be put out of business?

The Times just ran a large article about brothels in regular residences. The places my H went were in apartment houses and they were advertised in a weekly paper. There are signs all over the city for "Massage" "Chinese . . blah, blah, blah." Probably similar to where you are.

Sometimes the police are paid off to turn the other way; sometimes they just feel it's pointless since another will pop up right after. Sometimes they just don't want to bother. But maybe it's worth a try? Or is that something you understandably don't want to risk losing anonymity over?

Perhaps the police would take action without you giving your personal information? I just wonder if your learning that they were no longer doing business where your H went would somehow help you.

As far as your H repeating his visit to them, that may just have been because it was easy and he felt it was safe. Again, don't know how things are where you live but here there are sometimes raids and some degree of risk these men are taking; my H said he didn't feel afraid because nothing ever happened--I think they just get into the habit and normal thinking stops; but your H might have just found it the safest way to go; nothing to do with the women being special or having any special meaning for your H other than the familiarity of it all; kind of like people going every morning to the same place for breakfast. Creepy, I know. But I think for some of these guys what they were doing was in a sense just a routine; a dirty, nasty habit but one they figured caused no harm. Sooo stupid; so sad. So wrong.

Kaygem,

So good to see your update. I’m really happy for you, that you’re feeling as if you have your husband back. Know that I think of you. I don’t want to reach out and drag you back down with me though. I’m not doing so hot, at least not in terms of finding any peace with all of this. He tries, but... I dunno.

Super, always insightful. Yes, I think a lot of what’s going on with me is that I’m closing one chapter and about to open another. More than that though, I’ve been slammed with so many realizations lately. The extent to which he used me. How little he gave me of himself. The fool he made of me. The extent of the disrespect. The risks he took with my health and life. One line he crossed that I can’t ignore or justify. Then I consider that long period of TT on top of all of that. After all of that, he thought so little of me that he lied over and over, about every fact and detail. I’m just thinking that we didn’t have any good to counterbalance the bad. We never really had anything at all. He started cheating within 2 months of getting married and didn’t stop until he popped the lid 6 years later. We had no marriage.

Every memory I have is tainted. He emailed another woman the night I gave birth to our son, the day after I gave birth to our daughter two years later, had sex with a hooker on another son’s birthday, sex with a whore in mine, and so on so forth.

Ahhh!!. Edit and update ladies. So I just realized that today marks the eight year anniversary of my former partners death. Perhaps this is why I’ve been so unbalanced lately. Gonna take a break and see where I am in a few weeks.

Hope you’re all having Good Turkey days!

[This message edited by LongSigh at 11:12 AM, November 22nd (Thursday)]

Shocked - I'm sorry to hear your story. My WH had a ONS with someone from a club while he was in on a business trip in Asia (he thinks probably a hostess), then indulged with strippers and prostitutes. Marji - my WH used a website for the prostitutes too. It's all absolutely disgusting in my book. My oldest child was only 1 year old when this started. LongSigh, I get where you're coming from on the tainted memories - at least twice these incidences happened while we were on family holidays. The level of betrayal, and the sickness of the betrayal, is unreal.

Writing it out makes me question why I'm trying to R. I mean, he's hardly a catch is he? Why am I even bothering? And yet, even as I write this question, I know that the only reason I'm bothering to try is because of the kids. If I didn't have the kids, I wouldn't put myself through the pain of trying to R, I would have walked away months ago and just cut him out of my life. Does that make any kind of sense?

[This message edited by Perdita1 at 6:27 AM, November 23rd (Friday)]