SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

In terms of having a successful reconciliation, does it matter how the affair ended? Meaning if the WS ended it vs being dumped by the AP?

Personally, I don't think it matters as much as some believe. What it really comes down to, is if your partner is a good candidate for reconciliation.

I checked your prior posts, and you believed that he was stuck in a shame cycle. Is that still the case?

--Has he started answering your questions?
--Has he stopped with the 'let's move on' mindset?
--Has he started reading any infidelity books?
--Has he started to acknowledge your pain instead of his own?

Recovery from infidelity is deeply personal and highly subjective. For some betrayed spouses, this does matter. I've seen many posters express some version of the concept that an affair only ending because the WS is dumped by the AP is essentially a statement by the WS that the BS is the WS's "Plan B".

I think it does,to some degree.

I think if a WS is the one who ended the affair,because they don't want to be a person who cheats(as opposed to ending it because they're mad at the AP,or scared they might get caught), and then they confess everything to their BS..and they want to become a better, safe person, who is actually willing to do the work ..the chances of a successful reconciliation are better than a ws who gets caught,or left by the AP.

[This message edited by HellFire at 4:52 PM, Monday, March 6th]

Jb3199
Yes my WH finally got his head out of the sand. He still struggles with shame but has been very open to discussing whatever I need to talk about. I got a full timeline of the affair and now have full transparency to bank accounts, credit card statements, devices, etc. But I know there are ways to still hide things so I am vigilant and observe his behavior very carefully.
But so far his actions have been very positive. Only time will tell.

For me, it is what my wife did with the time while I was trying to figure out what to do next.

Did she own her choices or blame the M?

Did she eventually figure out TT was more harmful than helpful?

How fast does a WS get from regret to real remorse?

Is the WS working on being a safer, better partner?

For the record my wife was dumped by AP. The AP asked to start things back up two years after that and for the first time, my wife finally refused the AP. She eventually confessed, but owned every horrific choice she made.

I mean, I think it MATTERS because it's part of the story and it will likely be an indicator of where the WS is at the moment (someone who decided to break up with their AP months prior is less likely to CURRENTLY be caught up in the affair fog for example). But I don't think it matters in the sense that it's necessarily a clear predictor for long-term outcomes.

I agree with Oldwounds that what happens NEXT is a better indicator for success in R.

As a BH, it matters to me.

If my WW had wanted to continue the affair, pined for him after it was over, harbored some "soulmate" fantasy past the end of it, I think it would impact my willingness to work on reconciling.

As it happens, the evidence that does not depend upon her version of events supports her claim that she ended it for the right reasons. That helps me.

Circumstances mattered to me, and they have certainly shaped the trajectory of our reconciliation. My husband had an excellent opportunity to come clean about a month before Dday when I found suspicious phone records and asked him about it. I was not hysterical, and I made it very, very clear multiple times that truth was what I wanted and needed, even if it hurt. He chose the route of lying and gaslighting, and that month of him doing that did serious psychological damage to me that I’m still recovering from. It harmed our relationship as much or more than the affair itself.

When I found conclusive proof of their affair he did an abrupt about-face and immediately broke it off with her. There was very little trickle truth after that. That also mattered a great deal.

I don’t know how it would have altered things if his AP had broken it off instead of him, but I think it would have mattered at least some. It certainly mattered that I felt like he only broke it off when he was forced to make a choice.

I might be fooling myself, because all I have to go on are the particular set of circumstances I’ve experienced, but I do think the circumstances and type of affair are important to a lot of people. The specifics of an affair would make a difference to me, no matter how remorseful and committed to recovery my spouse was.

The AP breaking it off vs. my spouse breaking it off doesn’t feel like an insurmountable difference, though. I think a long term affair or a pattern of affairs over the course of the marriage would be much harder for me—I don’t think I’d be a good candidate for reconciling under those circumstances, even if my spouse were all in.

I think it's a deeply personal feeling. For me it does matter because if I had to force him to end it or give an ultimatum, I think that that would be much harder for me to overcome. I also think if there was love involved or a continued pining for the affair partner, I would not be willing to reconcile. In my case, my husband had ended the affair a year prior. Despite that, he never came clean with the truth and straight up denied it to my face and I ended up finding out from the OW husband. Even then I got trickle-truth for a month and all of that was deeply traumatizing to me. So I also think how you find out greatly matters.

I am very cynical here.

Yes...and no.

Yes - I'm a detail person and need all the i's dotted and t's crossed.

No - because over the years worth of photos and messages and such, I saw WH "break up" with LTAP many times. Yet he kept getting sucked back in. So much so that a Cease and Desist had to be sent to her a few years later for creating fake profiles to follow him/reach out to him with.

At this state in my recovery - I'm more concerned that she stays gone.

IDK if my W confessed or not. During a sleepless night, My W decided to end the A and stop lying. I aksed a question, and her response was to reveal her A.

I think the important part is that she decided to stop lying. It doesn't matter much if the WS starts telling whole truth after being found out or after confessing.

There is a lot of good feedback in the posts above.

Personally, I do not think it matters how it ended the further you go into stages of reconciliation.

Because what really needs to happen is that the wayward ultimately needs to "break up" with the affair partner in their mind. THEN they need to "break-up" with their affair brain. Much like a person who quits a chemical substance - like smoking, for example - they need to break up with the romanticization of what is not good for them.

And you need to take care of you first and foremost...because you really have no control over what they do to heal their own mind. But if you care for yourself, you will be better prepared and stronger no matter if you are healing together or apart.