SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I believe she "has the makings of a serial cheater" that need to be explored.

There was the first incident when they were an exclusive couple in high school. The second incident at the 5-year mark of their marriage and the third incident at the 10-year mark. And then:

As I look back through our 26 years of marriage I can remember other times when something didn't seem right

I wouldn’t define this as Serial Cheating, but it would cause me to dig deeper to ensure I have a proper assessment of the actual scope of the problem and required remediation.

There were comments you made about her dating and sexual perceptions (sex used as a device vs love making), choice of partners, multiple short term relationships, that MIGHT indicate a bigger problem. A good therapist can provide good analysis of that.

I agree with Bigger and CT, your 26 year marriage seems salvageable and definitely shouldn’t have the Serial Cheater Doom Stamp on it. I think a good IC/MC can make a big difference here. From what you’ve described, your wife has the high potential for many unresolved FOO issues that can lay dormant and predispose her to current cheating and even serial cheating behaviors when life stressors come into alignment.

I would definitely do your due diligence and make sure you’ve got your arms around the actual scope of problem.

Serial Cheater label or not, there was a physical affair at the 10 year marriage mark. Add that to her prior, pre-marriage issues, and debates can be made on both sides.

Bottom line, your wife definitely needs to have her issues addressed, or she will continue to address many situations in an unhealthy way. There is still the possibility of something going on today, but you will need to investigate this further. I can assure you, unfortunately, that theses flooding moments will NOT go away following the status quo. Both of you need to make changes to have the best possible future outcome.

My experience is that people who want to change and do the necessary work most definitely do change.

I agree with Bigger, CT, RB that your W isn't a serial cheater, but even if she were, she can change from cheater to good partner. I also agree that R is possible for you if you both want R and do the necessary work.

I'm concerned about your fairy-tale view of yourself in your M. Maybe you are soulmates, maybe you're not, maybe you're soulmates who can't be in a good M together. But no matter what, I don't think anyone can be close to the best partner they can be without being an individual whether in a relationship or not.

I'm not sure if you experience yourself as an individual with your own wants and needs. If you don't, you'll have a hard time with D or R or life in general. So who are you? What do you want? What are you willing to do to get what you want? (You're under no obligation to answer publicly, and it's probably impossible to answer in full in writing anyway, but you owe it to yourself to answer these questions for yourself.)

Whether you R or not, you can heal, survive, and thrive - you just may have to give up your M to do so.

Dude, I'm so sorry you are here. You've received some awesome words of wisdom from everyone.

Let me ask you this, what are your boundaries?

What could she do that you would absolutely say was too much?

On another note, we've all been in your shoes.

How are you taking care of yourself?

This stuff is killer! Whatever you do and whatever you decide, please remember to take care of yourself.

I'll end with this...

When the other dude stated that they had masterbated each other to orgasm, personally, I'd consider that a sexual act.

I have no other proof than experience, but I'd dig deeper with that.

Most people don't just stop at masterbation.

Whatever you decide bro, we're in your corner.

Just want to thank everyone who has given advice and asking of my well-being.
It has been rough seeing some of the responses but I was ready for anything that anyone would have to say that may help me get through this horrible situation that I am in. Tough advice or not.
I have been through a lot with this and it is still cutting me to the bone.
I am beginning to believe that that what some has suggested my marriage as being a fairy tale marriage is just that.
I guess what has bothered me the most is the affair in which my wife was involved in when the both masterbated each other to orgasm is more than what it seems. I guess the reason I believed them is because of the threats I made to him when I met him in a parking lot seemed to be honest.
I told him if he told me the truth that I would not expose him for what a piece of trash he was to his wife. He would have probably lost his wife as well as his wife.
But when I got home my wife only admitted to what he told me after I said we had met and told her what he said.
I even tried to trick her by telling her he had told me they had sex but she would not admit to anything else happening..I have even pressed her through the years telling her my gut keeps telling me that there was much more than what they had admitted to but she has always stood her ground saying that I knew everything.
He has since moved halfway across the country with his wife.
The problem I have is I know my wife lied to me about a first.
Just a friend, we hugged, he kissed me but I told him it was wrong, we made out a couple of times, then we made out and master bated each other to orgasm twice.
He said they had told each other they loved each other as well.
With the amount of texts and calls I found my gut has always told me they were more than they admitted to but she has never admitted to anything else.
The most recent thing that has happened is I found one red rose that someone had gave to her that she had thrown in the trash to me hauled off. She doesn't know I found it.
God help me and my Family

There seems to be real evidence that teenagers, particularly those in high school, imprint on each other and that’s why it’s so hard to look at your spouse with clear eyes. You have viewed her with rose colored glasses through every kind of behavior on her part and continue to love her. It is not up to me, nor anyone on this forum, to tell you whether to stay or go but it is up to us to be as honest with you as we can be and we all know there’s something wrong we just don’t know what.

Right now you need to just relax and try getting some sleep and look after your health. That’s the most important thing because stress like you have will start affecting your health.

You have lived with this info a long time so giving yourself a breather should help slow down the panic you feel. One day at the time until you can take a deep breath. Then begin to look at your life realistically. Don’t forget….you have as much control as you want. Use it wisely.

Sometimes its terrifying to have to rip the blinders off and see the reality of something we thought was so very different than what it truly was.
Its also not easy to face it, our brains will want to default to "Nope it can't be THAT bad" or "Its just my imagination".
I know its hard to realize the person we love and believe loves us in return can be the way your wife has been, cheating, lying and minimizing. It sucks to find out that that is who they truly are. She never faced any consequences and that will almost always say to them "Im free to do it again" or however it is their minds process that.
And nothing you did was wrong, many people really do what you do, just take their word and move on with life. We may sound harsh, and it isn't that anyone is being nasty but sometimes hard truths need harsh words. We all just wish the best for you, and that you can be happy. Obviously somewhere down deep you question more than what you admit to yourself about your wife.
Take as much time as you need to process this, but don't let her control the narrative, cheaters will blame shift, deny, deny, deny, minimize, lie, lie, lie gaslight....the list goes on and on, until you accept their, well, BS.

Welcome and I'm so sorry for what happened to you. But to be honest, I don't think you truly love her. You've conditioned yourself from an early age to love an image of her, an idea, you don't even really know her. You've centered your whole being and your whole universe on her, you're co-dependent. What you did from being a child on, you've given her the knowledge that she can whatever she wants and you'll be there for her no matter what. All you "know" is her. You've never given yourself the chance to get to know other girls/women. You have to take off those rainbowy glasses.

It’s interesting how many posters are commenting on the reality of this marriage. Being HS sweethearts and all is the start of the foundation of this marriage. And it started young. And it was the basis for the marriage today. I view this as a KISA syndrome (knight in shining armor).

I had a friend who married a local small town girl he knew from HS. Funny how this wife’s family life mirrored the cheating wife in this thread. Similar issues. Similar challenges.

Sadly the wife passed away after 30 years of marriage. My friend was a young widow.

It’s been 10 years since the wife passed and my friend has a new woman in his life for 4 years. Night and day difference in the relationship compared to the marriage.

He looks back and sees the marriage in a whole new light. Things he never noticed before about his marriage suddenly are so obvious he wonders how he didn’t see it. His wife’s FOO played a very heavy role in their marriage plus the drinking drinking drinking. Everything in their married life involved a bar and/or alcohol.

Point is we are all hoping the Original Poster will see what we all have noticed. We are hoping he can see his wife from a different perspective. And he can stand up and protect himself and demand his wife gets counseling.

Hopefully the wife will step up and go get professional counseling before it destroys the marriage and her wonderful husband.

[This message edited by The1stWife at 1:39 PM, Wednesday, December 7th]

Going to have to talk some more.
At this juncture I am now fighting myself. I have reawaken the two people that sit on each of my shoulders. One telling me to leave my wife, the love of basically my entire life. And the other telling me that I still love her and she is worth fighting for even with the baggage she has.
In my heart, deep in my heart I do love my wife. As I said she is the sweetest person you could ever meet, she is very caring for everyone, she a beautiful lady that has a beautiful smile that will make anyone who comes in contact with her attracted to her, she has a high profile job and is well loved by her coworkers, she is loved by all my family and friends, I could go on and on with comments about my wife and her standing with others that know her. However. All of these people do not know my other wife. She has proven to me more than once that she has another personality. As I said in the initial post she has done things to me that myself or no one else that knows her would believe she is capable of doing. Yet I still love her deeply in a way that seems like I have been put under a spell with her beautiful smile and hypnotizing eyes. I have struggled with this for so long I think she has a demon in her capable of fooling everyone and capable of making me love her no matter what she does. I don't really mean that frankly but that is what it is like. It is like she has a love spell on me. I love her and would give my life for her to this day even knowing what I know. Brought her out of a family full of trash and vile people, I was the first person that showed her true love, I was the first person that didn't use her for pleasure and throw her out like a piece of trash, I showed her what a functioning family full of love was like, I more than likely saved her life. She has several cousins and other close relatives that are addicted to drugs, prostitutes, in prison, and dead due to alcohol and drugs. She was going that direction and I showed her love and showed her she could do better and have a better life. My family took her in, my parents treated her like their own daughter. She truly has such beauty and charm comes from her.
The voice on my other shoulder will speak in the next message I post because I don't want to loose this message. Stay tuned because I have much more to say later.

Now for the voice on my other shoulder.
This voice is what is yelling at me now.
It bringing up all the horrible memories of what she has done to me throughout basically my life.
This voice screams to me to open my eyes, expose my wife's other personality and what true hell she has at times brought into my life and the horrific thoughts that I have embedded so deep in my mind that I struggle with daily.
I don't ever look at myself as a person that would brag on myself and what I am about to tell everyone is not intended to do so but the voice I am speaking of right now is telling me to do so.
You see I am 49 years old. I am a very handsome man who is clean cut and very well fit. I am polite,well mannered and show respect to others. I well loved and respected by many. I have been good looking all my life with numerous beautiful girlfriends that I mentioned having in school while my wife and I were broke up. I worked my ass off in a high end automotive parts factory for 27 years working extremely long hours and weekends equivalent to a full time job and a part time job while my wife worked a good job but not the hours she got to see my precious daughter grow up doing fun things with her in the evenings and weekends while I worked the weekends and 60 70 hours a week. I am now retired and have two homes paid for a plan on doing some farming, something of which I haven't gotten to do in 27 years do to work and something I have missed doing dearly. During this time in my place at work I had numerous opportunities to have affairs with beautiful women some of which were half my age. I to have always gotten looks from the ladies and girls in a way that would make some people blush. I will tell everyone here this. The temptation was hard to resist from the advances of beautiful girls and ladies but I never once had an affair on my wife. Never. It is not something I desired to ever do and not something I could do and definitely not something I could do and go home to my wife and act like everything was just fine I home. People that do this are definitely wired different and I truly don't see how they do it. I saw it frequently my entire career. Which brings me to where I am today. I recently found one red rose that someone gave her she had thrown in the trash and it started the voices in my head that once again something is going on. And as I said before I have never accepted that when she had the affair at year ten in our marriage that I got the full truth out of either of them when they said they never actually had sex.
Thank you all for sharing your experiences that are or were like mine and thank you for everyones help in trying to help me find my way through this horrible situation.

Now for the voice on my other shoulder.
This voice is what is yelling at me now.
It bringing up all the horrible memories of what she has done to me throughout basically my life.
This voice screams to me to open my eyes, expose my wife's other personality and what true hell she has at times brought into my life and the horrific thoughts that I have embedded so deep in my mind that I struggle with daily.
I don't ever look at myself as a person that would brag on myself and what I am about to tell everyone is not intended to do so but the voice I am speaking of right now is telling me to do so.
You see I am 49 years old. I am a very handsome man who is clean cut and very well fit. I am polite,well mannered and show respect to others. I well loved and respected by many. I have been good looking all my life with numerous beautiful girlfriends that I mentioned having in school while my wife and I were broke up. I worked my ass off in a high end automotive parts factory for 27 years working extremely long hours and weekends equivalent to a full time job and a part time job while my wife worked a good job but not the hours she got to see my precious daughter grow up doing fun things with her in the evenings and weekends while I worked the weekends and 60 70 hours a week. I am now retired and have two homes paid for a plan on doing some farming, something of which I haven't gotten to do in 27 years do to work and something I have missed doing dearly. During this time in my place at work I had numerous opportunities to have affairs with beautiful women some of which were half my age. I to have always gotten looks from the ladies and girls in a way that would make some people blush. I will tell everyone here this. The temptation was hard to resist from the advances of beautiful girls and ladies but I never once had an affair on my wife. Never. It is not something I desired to ever do and not something I could do and definitely not something I could do and go home to my wife and act like everything was just fine I home. People that do this are definitely wired different and I truly don't see how they do it. I saw it frequently my entire career. Which brings me to where I am today. I recently found one red rose that someone gave her she had thrown in the trash and it started the voices in my head that once again something is going on. And as I said before I have never accepted that when she had the affair at year ten in our marriage that I got the full truth out of either of them when they said they never actually had sex.
Thank you all for sharing your experiences that are or were like mine and thank you for everyones help in trying to help me find my way through this horrible situation.

Sorry for the last post being put in twice

As long as you are seeing the marriage with your eyes wide open, that is a great step for you. You are not entering into R blind or not knowing some/most of the truth.

I think with counseling your wife can change and stop her cheating. Like you said, you really don’t know everything — most betrayed spouses don’t. Some get 90% of the truth, some get less.

However once your blinders are off, you start connecting the dots to those "off" or "odd" instances from the past. I learned my H was a serial flirt and had more minor EAs than I knew about. Because at the time I assumed he was respectful and that most of these women were friends.

How stupid I was. I remember the first woman that got too flirty with him after his last affair, he shut it down immediately. Before his affair he would have encouraged it.

So can your wife change? Yes. But only if she wants to. And plans to make a long term commitment to therapy and your marriage.

I hope for the best for you.

In the past 13 years, particularly more recently, when you have discussed the affair with your wife, what was her disposition?

--Has she been caring of your pain, and helpful in trying to give you peace of mind?

--Has she been defensive, or argumentative?

--Does she shut down emotionally during these discussions?

--In a nutshell, has she tried, in your opinion, to better herself---or has she simply tried to 'move on' from her errors?

Its good to see you be so introspective. Sadly, I do believe you have a boatload of a certain type of sandwich coming down the pike. If you open yourself to accepting a reality you've long ignored, you won't like the taste of it.
Usually what a BS finds is often just the tip of the iceberg.
I do wish you luck but I have to add that for as long as you've known her, she has been lying, gaslighting and cheating on you. This has gone on for so long, I honestly hope you dont get your hopes up that she will change now. Its who she is, and after this long its almost a DNA level thing.
She'll most likely promise change, but at this point her words will most likely be hollow, and to you they should ring empty all day long. Unless she seeks professional help, she can't or won't do. You love her, and she loves having you there, but her actions in no way show her as someone who truly loves you the way you do her. I'm not trying to crush your hopes or build them up one way or the other, but as a realist, you're the only thing that held that house of cards up and together. You worked for your family, built a life, while she went and had her fun, what ever and how much it was.

Your wife receiving red roses would indicate some type of romantic relationship weather emotional or physical. I just can't think of any other reasons she would be receiving red roses from someone other than you.

I think this is certainly a red flag and definitely needs to be investigated especially given her history of cheating.

And I still say she’s a serial cheater. Emotional affairs, flirty inappropriate behavior, crossing the line etc.

Doesn’t necessarily have to be a physical affair to be cheating. Something most cheaters will not acknowledge or agree with.

@ jb3199
I have tried to discuss with my wife about my insecurities on trusting her because I never believed she was honest with me and she always says that she has told me everything they did. Recently I have tried to talk to her and she just says she wants to put it in the past and says that I am dwelling on the past instead of working on the future. She still doesn't know I know about the one red rose which is what brought the gut wrenching thoughts back about what she hasn't told me about her past affair and wondering what is going on with her and someone else now. What the hell is wrong with people who do this. I have given her unconditional love and it now seems she still doesn't appreciate all the things I have done for her. It is driving me crazy and I just don't understand. I just can not imagine how someone could be so cruel and heartless to someone who has been so good to them. How can people do this. There have to be women who would appreciate someone like me but I can not understand why my wife doesn't. It is driving me crazy because she is the love of my life.

FallingApart

I feel so badly for you that you are in this position. I cannot understand why your wife refuses to be honest, refuses to discuss the past openly and honestly, refuses to see your pain, etc.

But only you can change this.

First you need to accept your wife’s shortcomings.

She’s not going to change. So it is better for you to accept that.

Then you need to stop torturing yourself. You know what you know (and more) about your wife. You can tell her everything you know or you can keep things to yourself. But you need to make a choice.

You are at the proverbial fork in the road.

You see your cheating wife only cares about herself. Her actions certainly validate that. You can remain stuck where you are or choose to make YOUR life happier or better by not focusing on her and the pain and devastation she caused you.

Nothing will change by you remaining miserable and devastated.

But you can change by choosing not to stay miserable and devastated. And once you do, you will start to re-evaluate your wife and your marriage with a new perspective.

You may decide to stay married despite your wife’s lack of honesty. Or you may decide the marriage no longer works for you.

Just know no matter what you choose, your wife isn’t going to change and magically become honest and focused on you and your pain.