SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hellfire,
I do not want to thread jack here, so this will be it for me.
Despite your comment about the intent of this thread, in the original post she asked for advice in a fairly general way and specifically mentioned her husband’s "verbal and emotional abuse." So I don’t see how my questions about that topic specifically mentioned by her in her first post diverged from the original purpose of the thread.

[This message edited by BetterNowReally at 10:26 PM, Friday, April 16th]

I appreciate all the responses but I don't want people to fight on my thread. I mentioned it because that was something that happened before that was a problem for me. My husband was taking advantage of me. When I needed his support he wasn't there. When I was hurting he just brushed it off or would laugh at me crying. I felt more of his mom then wife. When I was overwhelmed with anything he wouldn't be there for me. He would call me lazy if I didn't clean or cook in time the way he wanted. He thought he his job was harder then mine cuz I only worked so many hours. At times I didn't feel good enough because he brought me down alot. He was mean when I was trying to reach my goal for a job I went to school for. At times he would call me dumb and that made it hard to come to him for advice. I quit smoking and was making changes to be healthy. He would call me a stoner, druggie ( not sure if that's how u spell it) because I did lie about in the past but he couldn't recognize the improvements. If we went out he would tell me not to embarrass him or I was too loud,that I talked too much. I just felt that he didn't really love me for who I am. If I ate anything bad he would tell me to watch what I eat so I don't gain weight. This was an issue in the past with that. So it triggered me to feel insecure. If I wanted affection it was too much for him. I thought when we got married things would be different. I never have felt equal to my husband. At times my husband wouldn't even respect me in front of our son. It made me feel like crap

Also I will start a new thread if anyone is willing to help me in the right path or at least the tools to reconcile with my husband

Patty, divorce might be what your husband needs to heal. If that is the case, tell him you won’t fight the divorce, but will continue to fight for him and your family. There was a woman here that cheated on her husband, and he filed for divorce. But throughout the divorce process, she worked on herself, he worked on himself, and they tried to see if a relationship could be salvaged.

After the divorce was finalized, she said that she had been demoted from “wife” to “girlfriend”. But they continued as a couple, and I think it was last fall they got remarried.

I believe their usernames her were MrSouthAfrica and MrsSouthAfrica. You might want to see if you can find their threads, especially her threads.

You also talked about your husband telling your son about you cheating. First, your son knew something bad was going on, he just didn’t have the details of what it was, or just how bad it was. As long as your husband told him in an age appropriate manner, and didn’t do it just to hurt you, I believe he did the right thing. I believe that if people are going to recover from cheating, the cheating must not be hidden, family and friends should know what actually happened so that they will be able to provide love and support to you and the family, ESPECIALLY the betrayed spouse and kids

Good luck

I can't support R for someone with an abusive spouse. His abuse isn't an excuse for your cheating because it was up to you to do something productive about it before and instead of cheating. Even if that something was ending the marriage. R'ing with him will put you right back into that unhealthy environment and his abuse will still not be addressed meaning one of the avenues you took to lead to the A will still be there in full effect. It's impossible for you to fully heal and become safe while his abuse continues because it will undo any progress you make.

If he won't commit to creating a healthy marriage free from abuse and infidelity with you, the only healthy choice is D.

1) Given how he's treated you, why do you want to stay M to him?

You punished yourself by staying with him. You cheated. Do you want to continue to punish yourself?

2) I wonder if you want to control things. I wonder if you avoid conflict too much.

You have and should have no control over how people respond to your posts. If others conflict over ideas, that may be a good thing.

3) You write, '...if anyone is willing to help me in the right path or at least the tools to reconcile with my husband.' And yet people have given you a lot of advice. I don't know if you recognize that.

I'm really confused.

*****

Perhaps you've missed the point that R starts with you. You need to change yourself from betrayer to good partner.

It looks like your H has to change from abuser to good partner.

Perhaps you don't want to accept that doing healing work on yourself before is working on R. Accept it - you have to face yourself before you can face your H.

I am taking the steps to R. I am going to therapy. When my husband does want to talk I do and I answer his questions. He gets angry with me and just tells me it's only a matter of time until I cheat again. I do apologize for everything I have done he tells me it's too late or I should have thought about that before. I understand his point, it just feels no matter how hard I work he just shuts me down.i know it's a long road and I am willing to continue to improve myself even if that means being alone.i feel since I hurt my husband in a way that I'm not sure things will workout for us. I am accepting the fact that I might lose everything because of my selfish ways and that I am not a good person. When I do feel I am making small steps my husband is there to remind me that I am a cheater and not a good person. That it doesn't matter what steps I take he will never trust me or ever feel the way he use to about me. I understand I did that to myself and I have to just deal with the pain I caused my husband. It's not a good feeling but I do my best to carry on each day

I'm sure it is very discouraging to a WS to have that constant reminder coming from the BS.

IME as a BS, it's the trauma talking, and that can take a LONG time to learn how to manage. You can't teach him how to manage his trauma. What you can do is learn about trauma, trauma response, how the primal "lizard brain" parts of us are actually doing their JOB to protect from further harm, part of which is to remind us of the hurt.

Like the hand on the stove lesson. When we put our hand and get burned, we instinctively learn "that's effing hot and hurts me" and then our brains wire to remember that FOREVER. When we view that basic, primal, wiring in the context of infidelity, it sucks - for BOTH the WS & BS. I can pretty well guarantee you that your BS wishes he was not CONSTANTLY reminded of his pain, of his trauma, and of the violation of his trust. But logically, the lizard brain is doing exactly what it was designed to do. It kind of overpowers our executive brains to help determine if there is - or is not- safety.

It can take a very long time for the traumatized person to learn to allow their executive brain to come back "online" and convince lizard brain there is no immediate danger. For at least a year (and for me it was more like 2) it was a CONSTANT war between lizard and executive. Try as I might, lizard brain was not having any of the "but he's not cheating today" kind of executive level thinking. It took a TON of work - and I mean hard fucking WORK - to get those two levels to work together well enough to just basically function without completely overwhelming trauma response.

So. Again, you can't control how he responds to or heals his trauma. You can learn to be empathetic about it. You can learn about trauma, as I'd bet that you have your own share of it as well, that also needs to be healed.

And then there is the "work" on yourself, which IMO really comes down to self love and self respect, which is its own winding, twisty, journey ridden with plenty of speedbumps. Your 4/16 post lists the ways in which your BS was abusive. I'm not gonna delve into what is or isn't abuse, etc. That's up to you and not some strangers on the Internet. Here's what sticks out to me:

I just felt that he didn't really love me for who I am.

The thing is, that someone who loves THEMSELF for who they are, would not feel the need to pretzel themselves into being something else in order to be loved OR to put down someone else in order to boost their own self esteem... OR to have an A.

[This message edited by gmc94 at 10:20 AM, April 21st, 2021 (Wednesday)]

Thank you for the last post. I really do get what your saying and it does make sense of what has been going on the past 6 months. I will continue to have empathy for my partner and let them know I am here in any way I can. Then continue to have love and respect for myself.

No one can make you feel inferior without your consent

To someone with high self-esteem, the above is self-evident. To someone who has, perhaps, had the esteem chipped away at bit by bit, or wasn't high to begin with it might seem an impossible mountain to climb. The journey to loving yourslef can start with a single step. A good IC will really help you address and navigate both your past and present.

The person I had an affair with didn't have a wife or gf. I am making steps into finding a new job even though my husband told me to stay. I know that it causes him pain and I definitely don't want to continue that.

You are still returning to the scene of the crime every time you go to work. No wonder your BH is triggering. Does your BH see you actively looking for a new job to spare him further pain? Because the phrase "taking steps" doesn't really give that impression. A BH is encouraged to not trust your words but to look at your actions.

I wish you both well

I want to find a new job and he tells me how he doesn't want to be with me and how I should move back to IL. that's where I use to live before I moved here. He tells me I will never be safe partner the pain that I have caused will never go away. He is only nice to me when he wants to be intimate or needs something from me. He telld just tells me that he will divorce me and he won't tell me when he will do it. He has told me if I work on being a safe partner that it means nothing to him. So i feel that it's only a matter of time until my husband leaves me. So I have accepted the outcome. All I can do is love myself and learn from my bad choices