SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

When I was a BS we were trying to "fix" things and my XW threw out the idea of me finding someone for a fling if it would make me feel better. IMO She didn't really mean it.

I thought about it for like 1/4 of a second and said no, it takes a certain mind set for someone to cheat or date someone while married. I said that I didn't have that in me, but she did. She had feelings for her AP but I still had feelings for her.

Does your BS have it in him to try to rub your nose in a "fake affair"? Or is he making a point.

An R in which you have to sell yourself out is not an R that should succeed.

Bingo! And this is for BOTH sides of the equation.

From a more pragmatic point of view. He's got two options for having an affair. Either he's going to lie to the other woman about the circumstances and then you have zero reason to trust him about anything else. And now you're both in a relationship where both partners are proven liars and abusive.

Or he finds someone sadistic enough to want to hurt you. In which case you now have a three-way relationship with three abusive people where only one person currently has their head out of their ass - maybe (and I'm not talking about your husband).

Think about separation with clear boundaries for both of you. And definitely therapy for both of you.

Hope things work out...

Nearly all BS consider an RA. It's normal to want to hurt someone who has hurt you in this manner.

Wanting an RA doesn't make him sadistic. It doesn't mean he doesn't love you.

It means he has been lied to for nearly 2 decades,over and over, and he is traumatized,and lashing out. He wants you to feel the pain he is feeling,quite possibly so you won't ever do this again, and you will realize why honesty is so necessary. It means he can not bear being told,again, that he knows everything, only to have the rug ripped out from under him.

No one here has any right to judge your husband. No one here had the right to say whether he shouldn't be hurt over this new info. No one here has the right to determine whether he has been "betrayed enough" by your affairs, and years of lying. Your husband has had, that we know of, 4 ddays. You have said he has been a good,loving husband. I believe that. To stay, after 4 ddays,days, decades of lies, I believe he loves you.

Tell him how you feel about him having an affair. You can also tell him you won't give him your permission, because he doesn't need your permission to cheat..just like you, and every other wayward here. Tell him you are working towards healing,and if he chooses an affair, you can not heal in that environment. And neither will he.

I do find the 6 month affair an odd thing. So,he's going to to find a woman,and use her for his purpose, and then dump her. Gross. But,then,isn't that basically what many waywards have done?

Many waywards also claim to have loved their BS while having an affair. If you subscribe to that notion, there's no reason to believe he is wanting to have this affair because he doesn't love you.

I'm not saying he is right. He's not. But his wanting to have an RA is common. There have been many threads about it,over the years. Many want to, and don't. Many want to,and do. And then you have many BS who would never cheat,regardless of the situation. That may be your husband. He may just be saying this to hurt, because you've hurt him.

You only have control over yourself. Nothing else.

Wanting an RA doesn't make him sadistic. It doesn't mean he doesn't love you.

It means he has been lied to for nearly 2 decades,over and over, and he is traumatized,and lashing out. He wants you to feel the pain he is feeling,quite possibly so you won't ever do this again, and you will realize why honesty is so necessary. It means he can not bear being told,again, that he knows everything, only to have the rug ripped out from under him.

Hellfire - I do agree with you, this man is hurting terribly. And, I do understand many BS contemplate an RA. I do think far fewer actually say this is what I am going to do, for exactly six months, and almost seems as he has someone picked out.

I do not think any of us think he is evil or sadistic. He is at a breaking point for sure.

So, not disagreeing at all, but pointing out most BS's do not take it to this extent. There is something above and beyond happening here. Not saying I know what, but like another poster has said I think it's possible he may have already engaged with someone.

It’s not quite the same thing but in the 1st few months post Dday WGF offered me a ONS to “get over it”

My response was

Would it be okay if I had a 3 month affair to get over it !?!?!?

I had no one in mind and would never do it anyway, I was just trying to see what reaction I got.

I actually think I would be less likely (if that’s possible) to have an affair knowing what it did to me

Perhaps your BH is just trying to let you know how much pain he is in and thinks this is the way to do that ?

There is something above and beyond happening here.

I agree, and others have commented on this as well and have been quickly dismissed. I don't think it should be dismissed though. I can't remember if it was this site or another site that came with a very similar story, and turned out the revenge cheating was already happening. So it's not unheard of.

Not saying that is what is happening, BUT, it doesn't hurt to have all possibilities brought to the table and considered. Sometimes you really do need to step back and look at things with a more neutral, critical lens. That's hard to do when you're one of the parties in the betrayal, but that's why sites like this are good.

I agree, and others have commented on this as well and have been quickly dismissed

It's interesting how we all see this differently. I don't see this perspective being dismissed. I see my perspective, and those who have similar perspectives being dismissed.

I see a man who has been lied to hundreds of times,over nearly 2 decades. I see a WS who has repeatedly told their BS they "now know everything!!" Only to be lying, over and over. I see a WS who offered to give up custody of her children, and a BH being vilified for HER telling him that. I see a BH who has had 4 ddays. I see a BH saying the EXACT same things MANY BS say..that they will have an RA, and people telling OP he doesn't love her, is already cheating, etc. She has said he has been a good,loving husband. Repeatedly. Yet people seem to need to say otherwise.

And, yes,there have been many BS who have said, my WS cheated for a year, so I'm going to cheat for a year. My WS had a ONS, so I'm going to have a ONS. My WS cheated with my best friend,so I'm going to cheat with his best friends. The tit for tat is very common.

But, apparently some of you are seeing things I'm just not seeing. I don't see this WS as a victim of anyone other than herself. I feel for her. But how is she ever going to take responsibility if she keeps being told she's the victim?

[This message edited by HellFire at 1:43 PM, April 29th (Thursday)]

I do agree with you, this man is hurting terribly. And, I do understand many BS contemplate an RA. I do think far fewer actually say this is what I am going to do, for exactly six months, and almost seems as he has someone picked out.

I don't think he has someone picked out. He is mad that she had her affair, she is losing weight, which makes most women feel good. She got to experiment sexually (Giving the BJ) which she felt uncomfortable doing with him first over 15 years.

He feels entirely devalued. He wants to divorce her, but he loves her so he is holding on. He is being specific because he wants some kind of reaction from her. She just recently started IC, which was for her weight loss, not due to her hurting him. She hasn't really taken action to help him. She just cries and waits for him to tell her how to fix herself. She is just waiting. She needs to step up and take action like we tell all WS.

I am shocked at the responses from the BS on the first page of this thread. Go reread your posts.

You should be talking about how to rebuild his self esteem.

I do not think any of us think he is evil or sadistic. He is at a breaking point for sure.

He was called several names and his hate for her was questioned. Someone said they have never hated someone like BH hates 15Years.

That's not love. People who love you don't actively seek to HURT you.

I'm a BS myself, and believe me, I do understand the pain of infidelity. I had been married more than 30 years when my fWH started physically cheating, so I'm no stranger to the pain. But I NEVER tried to injure my WH. I never called him names. I never demeaned him. I never threatened to take his children away from him or to ruin his relationship with them. And you know why???... because even though he had FLAGRANTLY cheated on me behind my back, while we were married, without my knowledge or consent... I actually did still love him.

People who love you don't SEEK to cause you pain. And frankly, I am NEVER going to agree that this guy has the same case as anyone here. He KNEW about the sex before marriage and he KNEW about the EA before marriage. What did he think people do when they're having sex or when they're in an EMOTIONAL affair? Seriously. IMHO, if this is all about the BJ... HE's the one who needs therapy.

I actually did take it to the level that this BS did. I found someone willing to have meaningless sex with me, told my WS, got STD checked (and had person get tested too) and was gonna do it. I was getting advice from “friends” that I have since cut off that this was good and to make sure to drink lots of alcohol before hand....awful, I know. Terrible advice and terrible for my own self-esteem/worth and healing. I was going to do it though. The person was single, my WS knew and even if she didn’t I didn’t care bc I didn’t feel like I owed her any explanation - it’s not like she gave me one in all her affairs. We have been separated since Dday - at the time i wasn’t sure if I would consider R or not.

The only thing that kept me from going thru with it was my IC and my own self reminding me that I didn’t deserve this. It was very challenging to fight the urge to get even but I did it for ME. It was a step toward learning and practicing self-love rather than self-destruction to my pain.

I say this to give potential insight into those that do take it this far.

ETA: I also sought to hurt my WS in my pain. I was abusive physically and verbally after dday and was immensely self-destructive through cutting, drinking and any other thing I could think of. I had flipped my hurt into rage and took it out on her, her AP and myself. I had to learn to stop acting on that and heal myself with the help and support of my IC. I had to learn compassion for my own pain and love myself thru it. I had to learn to stop abandoning myself. At the time I didn’t know any other way to manage that sort of pain but to avoid and destruct. I mimicked behaviors done to me. I gave no fucks for them or myself.

It felt like I was at a crossroads where the pain was winning and I had to choose between destroying myself further to “numb” it, or to sit with it and learn to do it right. I chose the latter because I found that I was losing myself further and none of those behaviors were actually helping. They were temporary “fixes”.

[This message edited by maise at 2:33 PM, April 29th (Thursday)]

It has been said hundreds of times on this site. It isn't the affair itself. It is the lies after dday that kill the marriage.

This is not about a BJ. It's about her lying to him for 16 years. Why do you continue to dismiss that?

You never called your husband a name. Or yelled. Good for you. I did. And guess what? I actually love my husband as well. I would bet I'm far from alone in that.

So what you are saying, is that every BS who lashes out, yells, calls names, after a dday(this man's 4th,BTW), just doesn't love their WS..because that's not how you behaved.

You are not every BS. You are not this BH. You don't really know how you would feel after being lied to for nearly 2 DECADES, and FOUR ddays.

You don't get to decide that he hasn't been traumatized by her actions. You don't get to decide that what she did wasn't that big of a deal. He does.

OP didn't give this man a BJ for the entirety of their relationship, so why would he think she did this with her OM? Seems logical that he wouldn't.

And the fact that this wasn't her only affair is being completely ignored.

BH here: I lived in Amsterdam for a long time after my WW's long term PA. Anonymous sex is as easy ordering takeout. What is significant in this case is what a RA says about your character. You have felt one of the worst types emotional pain possible. You know how it feels ... and you would choose to inflict that on another? On one you say you love or may love again?

My WW was selfish and dismissive, but she has no idea the of the pain she was creating for me. If anyone asks/offers a RA, I will immediately cut them out of my life forever. "You cannot fix stupid" -Ron White

It depends, doesn't it?.. on how you're lashing out. If a WS is beaten, that's not okay. If they're verbally abused, a bit more understandable, sure... but still NOT OKAY. We aren't animals, are we?

We can agree to disagree. I don't think that guy has a leg to stand on. He knew the pertinent facts before he ever proposed. I don't view additional details as new revelations requiring such drastic attempts to injure. Not every lie is equal. Not that I'm defending lies. The OP should have told the truth a long time ago. That way, she might have been able to identify this guy's malfunction early on and saved herself years of aggravation. But for me, this is more like "does my ass look fat in these pants?" than it is "did you commit adultery?" There's no adultery in this entire story.

But, apparently some of you are seeing things I'm just not seeing. I don't see this WS as a victim of anyone other than herself. I feel for her. But how is she ever going to take responsibility if she keeps being told she's the victim?

I do see what you are saying here as well. She is not a victim. I don't think that at all.

What I do think is that she is being asked if he can have a 6 month affair. We are empowering her to say no. She is very clearly on the brink of saying yes. That's why it might feel to you some of the responses are slanted.

It's understandable this is what he is thinking about, and after reading Maise's post I guess it's more common than I would imagine plotting this out and talking about it. However, it's truly a bad idea for her to do this. It will not lead to R.

I feel like this entire thing is a journey about learning to love ourselves properly so that we can love someone else properly too. Both for the BS and for the WS. As BS’s we’ve obviously, or rather I’ll speak for myself instead, I definitely put up with very unhealthy abusive behaviors from people around me and from my romantic relationships. I gave and gave and gave to very transactional love and lost myself in the process. When I didn’t receive the love I was looking for from my WS, I gave more. Thinking and believing I could adjust myself and that would change how she treated me or responded to me. When I saw she betrayed me I was angry, enraged, hurt beyond words. A lot of that hurt was at her treatment of me but also at what I gave and how I’d lost my own self. How I’d abandoned myself. I was resentful. I wanted revenge, I wanted her to hurt like I hurt and I wanted to control or numb my own pain.

I think that if we don’t know how to love our own selves properly or treat our own selves right then we don’t know how to ask that of others, or apply boundaries or remove ourselves from damaging situations. I also think that if we don’t love our own selves right then we don’t know how to love others right either. It’s like that quote everyone always says, “you can’t love others until you know how to love yourself.”

Our parents may love us, but they also pass along a lot of dysfunction or abuse because of their damaged unhealed selves. We then function from what we know and treat ourselves like they treat us, we look for people that are familiar to this too. We are hurt and we hurt others. For me, I was hurt and tried to fill that hurt in dysfunctional relationships that only served to compound my hurt because I was damaged and finding damaged people to fill the parts of me I didn’t know how to fill on my own. I hurt myself that entire relationship and coddled my WS (which didn’t help her). When she did what she did I responded by doing what others had done to me - I didn’t care anymore and had no other coping strategies in my tool box to resort to.

Neither one of us - my WS or myself loved healthily. We didn’t love ourselves in a healthy way and didn’t love one another in a healthy way. How could we? We didn’t know how. Learning to love ourselves right is the only way to know how to not only give it to someone else but to find people that know how to give it to you. If you can’t give it to you - you won’t know how to see it when someone else can or can’t.

Approaching this journey with ourselves and our healing requires compassion, care, and kindness from ourselves. Criticism or judgment won’t help, blame won’t help - and of course, playing victim won’t either. We have to hold ourselves accountable for how we play a role in our own lives and choose differently because we matter to ourselves.

[This message edited by maise at 3:16 PM, April 29th (Thursday)]

We can agree to disagree.

And we do, strongly and fundamentally. I don't condone RAs, but I think his anger and feelings of betrayal are 100% legitimate.

Maise - great post! This is exactly what I think too.

Hellfire/BSR: I am guessing this person's spouse is here too? I don't actually know all the backstory here. My answer is based solely on the question should she allow it. I am guessing we all agree that she should not? Is that a safe assumption?

I am shocked at the responses from the BS on the first page of this thread. Go reread your posts. You should be talking about how to rebuild his self esteem.

I can't speak for others, but I am good with what I said. She is posting about her BH wanting a RA. That is what is on the table here. Wayward or not, she doesn't have to say ok. She needs to start changing herself, and part of that is setting boundaries for herself, and not just saying yes to whatever it is somebody else wants of her.

She just recently started IC, which was for her weight loss, not due to her hurting him.

That is NOT what was said.

She got to experiment sexually (Giving the BJ)

Oh, lord help me. She also gave these to her husband, and he had these before her! In his words, per her, the best BJ he ever had was from a friend of hers. So yeah, no.

You may want to go read the other thread to try and understand where some of these comments are coming from. I mean sure, beat down a wayward if that is what you want, but at least get all the facts first.