SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

You ask:

Am I crazy, or do I still deserve to have a way to privately converse with WH about our marriage? Is there any point to it? It feels like I still deserve to have private conversations about what happened, like only discussing parenting/finances/house is punishing me somehow. Like it's me giving up the right to hear any more information about what happened to our marriage, or any hope of ever getting any more questions answered. Like it's letting WH off the hook. Giving him his ideal scenario in which he never has to account for himself or his actions. Was he doing this before I restricted our conversations? No he wasn't. But I always felt like there was a chance he would. That lightning would strike one night and he'd tell me something - anything - to fill in the missing pieces.

You are of course entitled to proceed as you wish. It's worth pointing out that the advice here is not the required course of action. I, for one, continued to engage with my WH when I felt like it, on my terms. I learned not to expect anything out of him though. I think I initially backed off and then came back to the table but only when I felt like it and without any expectations. I treated conversing with him almost like a reminder of what bullshit he was capable of spewing at that time. Almost of a reminder of his manipulations when/if I felt my resolve against him softening.

Only you know if there is more harm than good for you. I recall when my WH was still engaging in his A post d-day 2 when I pretty much knew about it but became more interested in seeing him lie to my face about its existence - while I was getting my ducks in a row. I would ask loaded questions and watch him squirm. His angry fits and attempts at manipulation only pushed me further away (which I tell him now - as i know he would really like to R after he's been on his own and been in therapy for 3+ years - that time period where his ugliness was so clear and obvious to me was just more nails in the coffin containing "us"). Just typing that makes me sound crappy and manipulative myself, but I think what happened was that realized I stopped protecting him in my mind, so my conversations with him were all about my agenda - his agenda just rolled off my back.

So, I say do what you think is best, and try something else if it's not working.

EDIT: I will add that if you already know the "why" that he did all of this: Because he wanted to. The problem is now that you won't let him continue to do what he wants, and he likely has no desire to change. It really is that simple.

[This message edited by ThisIsSoLonely at 6:52 PM, Tuesday, May 23rd]

Just typing that makes me sound crappy and manipulative myself, but I think what happened was that realized I stopped protecting him in my mind, so my conversations with him were all about my agenda - his agenda just rolled off my back.

No, you don't! I totally get this! I was imagining it in my mind as I was reading your post, and if I imagine doing that to my WH while he lied it would absolutely be about verifying to myself that he is indeed exactly that level of liar, is currently lying, is currently choosing to lie to my face. There's such a sense of disbelief that comes with infidelity that there is some relief in having absolute verification that this awful side of the person you love IS real. As you said, no longer making excuses for them, even in your own mind. "He couldn't possibly..." becomes "He IS, and right this minute." Also when you're arguing and struggling with the details and being manipulated you are really IN it. It's hard to be involved in the emotional roller coaster while also evaluating the emotions, which takes some emotional distance. I also have a lot of information from WH's OW (pictures, screengrabs and texts) that I confronted him with and that he denied. Having the evidence right there and seeing him lie was in some ways a gift to me, but I was still too head-spinny to benefit from it entirely. But I bet when I look back it will have gone a long way towards helping convince me that what I knew to be true was indeed true, and that he wasn't even close to the person he was presenting himself to be. The way you described it, you had information as your anchor and he still had every chance to just be honest and chose not to. Using an anchor to anchor ourselves isn't in my opinion manipulation, it's just safety.

He is controlling himself. You know how he's all mean, accusatory, rewriting history to you on the emails but is nice on the family chat? That is all control and manipulation. He turns it off & on as he sees fit.

It's so very doubtful that there will be a lightning strike and he'll say something to help with the missing pieces. Unfortunately, you can't really trust what comes out of his mouth.

ETA: For part of my processing, I went through memory after memory. What was I thinking/feeling at the time? Was I happy, sad, mad. Was I being authentic? What about XWH, I what were huts thoughts and feelings? Is what he told me true, a lie or I have no idea. If I had no idea, was I being authentic according to the truth I knew. If I was being authentic according to the truth I knew, then I am ok with it.

I got to a point where I realized that I wouldn't be able to apply logic to the A situation and all of his lies because it is an illogical situation.

[This message edited by leafields at 12:55 AM, Wednesday, May 24th]

There's such a sense of disbelief that comes with infidelity that there is some relief in having absolute verification that this awful side of the person you love IS real.

It's such a double edged sword, isn't it? One one hand, this person you loved more than anything else in life has debased themselves and lied to you on so many varying levels that the sheer weight of their long-term blatancy and sense of misguided apathetic invulnerabilty just aboslutely destroys you; while at the same time those same lies and multiple disgraces make it easier for you to let them go in the long run.

I saw my ex-WW tonight at drop off and she just looks haggard. I miss who I THOUGHT SHE WAS dearly, but I don't miss the new version; a walking Dorian Grey painting let loose from the attic, her hedonism and poor decisions worn on her face like the burden they are, not the 'exciting new life' she thought it would be.

You have to admit, once the indifference sets in fully, it will be interesting watching your ex-WH's spiral into the possible self-realisation that he is indeed a woeful human being.

Sigyn - I’m sure it’s been discussed on the thread but if so and to reiterate, I think it would be helpful for you to look into the concept of trauma bonding (Stockholm Syndrome is a good and well-studied example of this). It also explains why no/minimum contact (though I know it’s hard with where you currently are and that you have a young child together) is so effective in gaining clarity. I also understand why it’s concerning with how much you share with your family - though I do think the "he was unfaithful" only paints a very limited picture of your actual situation. The additional aspects that it was prolific, perverted, and that he continues to lie in the face of hard evidence is the real tell that trumps any notion of he knows he made a "mistake".

Engaging with him in any way just opens you to further manipulation. There’s a world of difference between knowing he is manipulating…and weeding out how that manipulation is still having an affect. The deeper affect is still wishing to understand, trying to find a key to his door, and, more important and insidious, all the internal questions and doubts you wrestle with - the internal conflict. This is the trauma bond aspect - that deep down you know who and what he is, you just can’t fully reconcile it. (All of this is completely normal, btw, and part of the process.). A better understanding of the trauma bond and all that happens in the reptilian brain just helped me "disassociate" from the events and interactions themselves and to instead become more an observer to my own emotional reactions. It helped to separate the human-experience part of me (instinctual survival) from the higher soul experience (deeper truth). Once I could see those two aspects with distinction then the cognitive dissonance was calmed because I was no longer trying to reconcile those two parts into one absolute…I was able to accept that both this and that can be true.

It's so very doubtful that there will be a lightning strike and he'll say something to help with the missing pieces. Unfortunately, you can't really trust what comes out of his mouth.

Especially now when there's nothing left for him to gain from it. I know enough that I don't need any more details about the what, I'm just back to wondering about the why and how of it all, and I don't think he really even knows that about himself. Black box forever.

Well, one bonus find: I unearthed more of his comments in the cheater's group after finding a second account of his (same user name with a number after it, also definitely his writing) in which he pondered whether he should send his favorite sexworker money during early Covid when businesses were shut down. I looked back at our banking and there were no cash withdrawals then, nor did he Venmo anyone I didn't know. I guess he chose not to generously support that small local business in the absence of receiving the service.

...her hedonism and poor decisions worn on her face like the burden they are, not the 'exciting new life' she thought it would be.

Same with WH! He looks awful, hollow eyed and pale and he has developed this weird tic where he rakes his hands repeatedly through his hair until it's standing on end and then he rakes it all down and starts over again, it's just so distracting and weird and for someone who cares a LOT about his appearance it's definitely a sign of emotional unwellness. Like your exWW, somehow now that he's free to live his life loud and proud, it doesn't seem like there's a lot of celebration or enjoyment happening. Your exWW should by her own account be having an objectively better life now - I wonder if it will ever occur to her to wonder why she's not.

Quick update and sincere thanks to everyone who walked me through the last year of JFingO about the real state of my husband and marriage.

Divorce update, stbxWH is awful and vindictive despite being 100% in the wrong, and he's still holding himself up as a tragically misunderstood victim, somehow, in all of this.

He was always the kind of man who had to be the smartest guy in the room, his thoughts, feelings, priorities and ideas the most important, his voice louder, his audience bigger, his experiences more valid than mine. I've always suspected that it came from deep insecurity. He would often cut me off while I was talking so he could insert his own thoughts about whatever the subject at hand was and if I never hear the words "let me stop you right there..." cutting off one of my sentences again, it will still be too soon.

However.

It turns out that after nearly two decades of dismissing his wife's thoughts, feelings, priorities and ideas, he has absolutely no idea what I really value in life, and as a result my attorney has been able to get so much of what I want by doing that Judo move of using WH's force against himself. He honestly seems to think that I value the same things he does - mostly material possessions that I have zero interest in - and so using those things as a bartering chip, it looks like we're going to be able to finish the divorce sooner than expected with a much better outcome than I could have hoped for. It keeps flooring me how little WH ever really knew me. How can he think I would ever want the things he covets? How can he not know how little those things mean to me? How can he think I would ever want, let alone fight for the flotsam of our fake marriage?

Another thing. I was listening to the podcast Betrayal and it's so familiar and so hard to stomach. In it, a woman discovers her husband has been living a second life and cheating for their entire marriage, including the same cast of characters my own WH was sleeping with (long term 'girlfriends', one night stands, sex workers, various fetishists, all at the same time) but in the podcaster's case her exWH was also preying on underage girls and went to jail. One of the things I've always sensed about my WH's affairs is that there are much deeper things he's done that I don't know about, and this podcast really made me wish I had more access to his online world so I would know the totality of what he'd been doing all these years. I sometimes wondered if he had another family out there, because I sense there's something large that is happening beyond the incredibly complicated sex life I now know about. And after listening to the podcast I do wonder about the age of some of his partners. I'll never know. In the podcast, the woman was able to interview some of the women her xWH victimized, and she asked them how they got involved with her husband, what they were thinking, what their motives were. Listening to the women was awful and also in some ways satisfied my own need to ask some of my WH's partners the same questions. I have to accept that I'll never know. It's still very hard to have so many unanswered questions and this pit in my stomach that tells me there's more, worse, that I might never know about.

In other news we also hired a forensic accountant to get an estimate of the money that was spent on his second life as far back as we can track and it's much, much larger a number than I could have ever anticipated.

As for me, I've been in a much better place lately. Peaceful for the most part, reflective, putting pieces together, telling myself, family and my therapist the real narrative of my marriage often enough that I'm starting to live in the actual reality more these days than retreating back into seeing my husband and marriage in the fantasy way I used to see things. I'm still struck by disbelief at times, but I'm no longer shocked. It's like the fantasy husband image was torched so hard that it couldn't stay in my mind anymore. I've seen him so clearly I can't ever get that old vision back again. And it's a relief. I feel almost like I don't love him anymore. Is that even possible? I can't attach the feeling of love to this new, more accurate vision of him. I don't know if this is a phase and I'll relapse, or if it's real. I want it to be real but the rollercoaster doesn't feel like it's quite over yet.

I want to thank everyone for all of the wisdom you gave me. I think this site and everyone who contributed to helping me on this thread and privately did more to change my vision of my husband than therapy did. I don't want others to have their lives blown up this way, but I'm so grateful for everyone who had similar experiences and who shared them so openly with me. It helped me to feel like I wasn't crazy. It also helped me through the excruciatingly painful phase of feeling like I was trapped with my arm under a rock and having to amputate it and be armless, or stay there forever trapped and in pain. In my heart I always knew I would cut off the arm, and reading back over the things people wrote to me back then I can tell that was obvious and everyone was so tactful but also in some ways cheering for me to get it over with and free myself. Invaluable. To have people who understand that exact feeling. I'm grateful for all of you, tough-lovers included.

Sigyn,

I am in awe of how strong you have been through all the mess that your WH has put you through. He comes across as a petty insecure fool after all of this. He’s not capable of knowing how classy you truly are. There has to be something deeply wrong with him to not even realize the magnitude of his actions.

I hope your son is doing well. The precious little kid did not sign up for this but I can tell he will be ok with thoughtful mother like you.

Your life from now on will only be better, hopefully you can leave this nightmare behind and have many more positive experiences and people surrounding you in the future.

Take care.

Thanks for the update, Sigyn.

Your STBXWH only retains information about you that he can use to manipulate you. In his weird way, he can't understand why you don't want the things he wants because his stuff is the best. Yes, it's possible that you don't love him any longer. You may not even like him.

My XWH used to talk over the top of me and cut me off. It's a form of abuse, according to Dr. Ramani. The funny thing is he'd start talking over the top of me. Sometimes, I didn't have anything to say, but I'd open my mouth like I was going to say something and he'd start right back up.

I'm glad the D is progressing and I hope it doesn't take too long to finish. Good call on hiring a forensic accountant. What they find will be interesting

The emotional rollercoaster can still take you on a ride, but hopefully without the corkscrew turns this time. Antiversary dates can be tough for awhile. I cried when we filed the D paperwork, and again when I got the call it was final. Just acknowledge that it's a phase and you can get through it. Plus, you can post here for virtual hugs.

Next stop, peace and contentment.

Sigyn you sound great. It’s shocking how these WS people think they’re the smartest guys around and once they’ve been revealed as otherwise, the mental gymnastics they need to continue the charade of being the good guy and the "victim" are literally Olympic level. Sheesh.

I fully understand and relate to your anxiety about more information materialising that further damns and implicates your Ex. I think it’s pretty understandable after you’ve had your reality so upended that you would feel that way. IT’s unfortunately part and parcel of the trauma of all of this and can be difficult to resolve. You may never know. But you’ve acted on the information that you do have and made your decisions based on that. That’s not nothing. I hope that anxiety will fade for you over time as you move further out from this trauma. Keep talking about it in ic and have some compassion for yourself. You’ve been through an extraordinarily terrible ordeal. There’s no getting around that.

I also used the arm in a rock metaphor to describe the end of my marriage and the divorce process. I couldn’t get out and away fast enough once I had irrefutable proof of who my Ex really is. But your kid will not have the same opportunity to fully extricate himself and that can be painful to watch. Just keep doing what you’re doing and with time and continuity of your parenting he’ll be okay.

You’re going to be okay. You already are.

Fabulous update of your amazing strength and resilience! You will be so much better off without him. Your rainbow awaits you and your son. You have paid your dues and then some. He truly sounds like a full blown narcissist (i am not one to throw that label around lightly). He has all the signs.

I agree this board of survivors is a lifesaver for many especially those just discovering the tip of the iceberg. If only we could all follow the sound advice here everytime. But we all must go our own paths and people here understand that as well.

Come join us on divorce/separation boards. Best of luck to you always.

Hi Sigyn
I don't come on SI anymore but saw your post and wanted to wish you happiness and joy for the future. You helped a lot of us through some dark times as well.
Kind regards
VezfromTaz

Good to hear your update Sigyn. I'm glad to hear you are doing better and that the divorce moves on at a good pace.

I wanted to answer YES, it is possible to fall out of love with someone. Especially when the version of him that you loved either didn't exist, or doesn't anymore.

We talk about betrayed trust a lot around here, naturally. It's a beast to overcome. But I feel like losing respect for our partners is just as damaging. I am of the opinion that without respect, there is no love.

As your respect for him continues to plummet, so does your love. To me, that's perfectly normal.

(And a relief!)

Take care.

Great update!!!

I think it takes time to unhinge the marriage you lived from the fraud he forced upon you without your knowledge.

Your experience came from authenticity, and I wonder if that benchmark makes it that much harder to wrap your brain around a partner who thinks they deserve second, third, etc… lives.

The road from disbelief to distain IMO is right on point. He deserves little respect as he demands pity, help and understanding as a heinous perpetrator of decades.

You have mentioned about how he and his non monogamous web friends bragged about how they were living lives true to who they are. He has the opportunity to live it and spread the word on it! Not so much in reality I guess.

You’ve navigated this terrible journey with so much grace, contemplation, and consideration for all parties.

I wish you and your son peace as you find a new normal as a family.

Thanks so much for sharing your story and providing a straight-up bad ass road map for others who arrive here in pain!!

Great update Sigyn.

It sounds like you are leaning in towards the 'cold anger, gusting indifference' phase. We started our journeys merely a few weeks apart, and with a lot of similarities (ala, prolific serial cheaters), and I have highly valued your insights. It has made me realise that I wasn't going crazy myself either.

In other news we also hired a forensic accountant to get an estimate of the money that was spent on his second life as far back as we can track and it's much, much larger a number than I could have ever anticipated. barf

The financial reality is just the cherry on the cake isn't it? I realise now that in over 10 years of marriage, and despite having a joint account, I could count on one hand how many times she contributed to it. To be fair, the last few years saw most of her pay get wiped out by childcare costs (having twins in childcare in Australia is akin to losing a six figure salary after tax per year, insane), but I get very angry when I realise how much was being spent on AirBNBs/winery 'weekend get-aways' while she was on work courses and I was left paying every other bill and managing the kids. One of her more hilarious re-inventions was post D-Day, and realising she hadn't been paying the childcare bills for 6 weeks - some $5000. When I realised this, she actually said to me, 'no remember we talked about this, noting we were going to be breaking up you agreed that I could start putting some money away so that I could move out etc?'.......how we had this conversation 6 weeks prior to me finding out she was having an affair and that we were 'apparently breaking up' is still one of science's great unsolved mysteries regarding breaks in the space/time continuum! Of course they lie. They lie so much that they forget what they've lied about. But I digress.

Today was a pretty hard day for me; the divorce paperwork (we have to wait 1 year from separation here) got signed this morning in the presence of a Justice of the Peace. She tried to keep it light-hearted, and I wasn't down with it. I find nothing light-hearted nor funny about a family being torn in two by the actions of one. But for all intents and purposes, I'm free. I am sure her fellow cheater of an AP will have a great not-at-all-suspicious-of-each-other great romantic love going forward!

Amusingly, I ran into my wife's long-distant ex-bf from well before we were married (he works in my industry and is a really good guy) at the school gate the other day, and our city being as small as it is, he said he'd heard what happened. We were having a laugh about it and he said, 'well I suppose she'll have fun with her fellow cheater spinster divorce squad.' He knows her too well!

Stories aside, in all seriousness, I am glad you are starting to heal Sigyn. You have been an inspiration, and I hope you keep posting updates; I have no doubt your life will be magnificent!

Sigyn, thanks for the amazing update. You may not see this as clearly as we do through your words, but you are truly a remarkable person. I know its been hell, but you are still standing and coming to terms with it all. Says a lot about your fortitude and character. Your communication skills are way above par imo btw.

This really struck me:

As for me, I've been in a much better place lately. Peaceful for the most part, reflective, putting pieces together, telling myself, family and my therapist the real narrative of my marriage often enough that I'm starting to live in the actual reality more these days than retreating back into seeing my husband and marriage in the fantasy way I used to see things. I'm still struck by disbelief at times, but I'm no longer shocked. It's like the fantasy husband image was torched so hard that it couldn't stay in my mind anymore. I've seen him so clearly I can't ever get that old vision back again. And it's a relief. I feel almost like I don't love him anymore. Is that even possible? I can't attach the feeling of love to this new, more accurate vision of him. I don't know if this is a phase and I'll relapse, or if it's real. I want it to be real but the rollercoaster doesn't feel like it's quite over yet.

Im not sure that I've read a better, more gritty description of battling to the point of "acceptance" on this site, or any other for that matter. I hope this trend continues to the point of achieving what I and other Betrayeds call the "Zen Of Meh" concerning your stbxh.

I hope you will continue to post here with updates and as a contributor on other forums as you have a powerful voice and great insight into dealing with betrayal trauma.

Thanks again and continued healing, peace and clarity to you.

I'm starting to live in the actual reality more these days than retreating back into seeing my husband and marriage in the fantasy way I used to see things. I'm still struck by disbelief at times, but I'm no longer shocked. It's like the fantasy husband image was torched so hard that it couldn't stay in my mind anymore. I've seen him so clearly I can't ever get that old vision back again. And it's a relief. I feel almost like I don't love him anymore. Is that even possible? I can't attach the feeling of love to this new, more accurate vision of him. I don't know if this is a phase and I'll relapse, or if it's real. I want it to be real but the rollercoaster doesn't feel like it's quite over yet.

What happened with the moment you found was like a "death" to your marriage. The shock, the betrayal, the lies, etc... and that feeling of nausea, wanting to throw up each second it scrolls thru your brain, no one will know how you feel except for the people on this site who are brave enough to all talk about it just like you have. What a BS goes thru in finding that their partner in life, father or mother of their children, twined together lives you have lived that you thought were all OK....until that moment.....is like a car crash where a police man comes to your door and tells you that someone has died. It is at that moment it all stops. And with a death comes the mourning period. You are mourning the marriage you thought you had, in a weird way (not that you want your WS back) you are mourning the person you thought your WS was. You are mourning what your child had to go thru, what your family had to find out, what all you had to swallow, the way you had to go out and find an attorney, find a therapist, just the whole damn awful change to your life.... you don't love him anymore, but you are still in some ways a bit in shock and probably have a bit of PTSD after all of this, we all do in some shape or form. There is just not a physical dead body to bury, but it was a death all the same that you have had to go thru.

You are right in that you will still be on the roller coaster, it just won't take so many crazy dips at all times, they will come fewer and farther between. But give yourself some time to mourn, however that looks for you or feels for you. The first days and months are so awful then the first year seems so odd, still picking up the pieces around you, the whole time so focused on getting OUT of infidelity, the craziness of it all, that it just takes awhile to get over the initial shock of what all just happened.

I still think the one of the many hard parts for me which I still think about, is how in the heck did I not see it? Meaning how could I live with someone and feel happy while the other person was living a separate life and plotting behind my back? Still a tough one for me, mostly having to do with me wanting peace and happiness in my life, calmness, no drama.... that I have the one main person in my life to CAUSE all of my drama and I did not see it? That one I am still working on.

But I digress.... you are doing great, glad to hear your update. Keep taking care of yourself, you deserve some peace and happiness in your life. It will come.

Hope all is going well Sigyn.

Just wanted to share that I've spent the last two hours reading this saga, and I have gleaned so much wisdom and insight. Thank you for being vulnerable and generous with your thoughts, experience, and process, Sigyn.

Bump per request