SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I’m sorry you’re having such a crappy time Abcd. Do you feel like life is getting any easier at all?

I’m with you there, especially the repeated mantra.

His mum used to leave the family home without warning, sometimes he’d get home from school to find she’d moved out. Again. He never felt loved by her and still believes this. I have spent years convincing him that I am not like his mother and in reality he knows that. Sadly, in this instance, probably because of his declining mental health at the time, he really believed it which led him to make selfish, destructive choices. Once his affair started he began to seriously destroy our relationship and went completely off the rails.

ABC, I’ve only just spotted your earlier message about the drinking. He was drinking with colleagues while he was away but drinking secretly at home.
One of my conditions for him to stay was that the secret drinking stopped, in fact pretty much all drinking for the time being.
I’ve said if he fancies a drink he should say. We’ve since had the odd shandy together whilst out on long walks.
When asked about the drinking he says it just helps turn his mind off. He knows now that he needs to stop.
The smoking and vaping while away is incredibly sad, he is normally pretty fit and athletic. He’s definitely had some kind of midlife crisis and was trying to get back to his youth.
I’ve mentioned up thread that for the first few weeks after D day I had to support him because of his poor mental health. One thing he kept going on about was that he wanted us to be young again and live like we did in the early days. He has finally accepted that we won’t be young again but that we can do our best to make the best of the lives we have.

The midlife also resonates. Our stories are remarkably similar.

Life is easier but flat. I’ve recognised and accepted his flaws and I’m struggling with loss.
Some days I’m okay, I think that what we have now and how we could be, is amazing. Like we were for years (until small kids, busy lives and sleep deprivation took its toll). I didn’t want to get married, I really wasn’t bothered. I didn’t settle I tried to be really careful. Yet here I am.

Loss plus The lies, deceit and how callous he has been are the stumbling blocks. He isn’t the person I thought I’d married. He could be him, I have faith he will be him. I hope he succeeds and makes himself proud. But I’m not sure where I figure in it. Funnily I’m now not sure what I want in life. I was prepared to work hard, do Day to day stuff and grumble but get on it with. Now I’m not keen on settling. I may be having a mid life myself

I’ve said I’m not sure I have the skills (or desire?). Self esteem is fine. I’m financially independent. But cognitive dissonance and loss are my current issues.

How are you getting on?

We’ve gone over and over the cause of the affair and why he confided in random people.

Basically he had a massive midlife crisis. Pressures of work and finances, heading towards a milestone age that he couldn’t see beyond, obsessing with the past. I knew he wasn’t great but I hadn’t realised how bad it was. He was withdrawn and depressed

The details of the trigger point and the whys are different, but the broad strokes are much the same between your H's betrayal and my H's betrayal.

The stages of coming to grips with betrayal are much the same as the stages of grief.

I felt like hysterical bonding was a form of denial for me. It was partially reclaiming the relationship and intimacy, but with a heavy dose of denial (let's pretend for these minutes that it's all okay and we a super committed to each other)

My H fed me months of trickle truth (earnestly telling me straight to my face that "now you do really know it all; there's nothing else"...only for me to discover more that he would then admit to...and then swear, again, that now I know it all).

So, it took quite a while for us to really start true R and even then I still struggled to fully accept that this all happened. I spent several weeks wishing it all away and wishing I could magically turn back time and change it somehow--head it off, catch it sooner, stop it somehow.

So, part of the journey is moving past that stage and into true acceptance: This happened. It can't be changed.

So, can I really live with that?

There is no wrong answer to that question. It's just important to be honest with yourself.

For me, the answer to that question was "Yes, if..."

Yes, if he's being really transparent and truthful.

Yes, if he overcomes his avoidance issues.

Yes, if he learns to consistently show more empathy and self sacrifice.

Yes, if he does the work willingly.

There are more, but these are the main elements for me.

He has shown me, very devastatingly, that when the going gets tough he can be very self-centered and destructive in his choices. I need to see that he is fixing this, because the going will get tough again, because, well, that's life.

So can I count on him to respond much, much better when life has those tough spots? Can I count on him to communicate with me and to maintain his integrity?

Hello @InACloud I'm so sorry you're having to deal with this painful situation in your marriage. I think it's important that you both consider IC to help you both process what has happened and also MC as you progress further. From what you've said about your H's situation even makes it more important for him to seek counseling to address these issues and not hope that it will just resolve itself. Do be careful that you don't rush to return to normality and rug sweep what has happened in order to move away from the pain of dealing with the situation. It's like a wound that has to be tendered too even if it's painful so that it can eventually heal.
You need as much support too and I hope you continue to get that through trusted friends and family.
The reality is you will go through a roller coaster of emotions but I'm praying for healing and strength for your emotions and wisdom for the days ahead.

Hello, just checking in to say hi and that I am still reading, I just haven’t got around to replying.
We’ve had friends visiting for a few days which has been lovely.
They are my husband’s best friends and they are the ones I turned to in my hour of need.
It has been so nice to have people around that know all about our situation, no pretences needed and they are so supportive of both of us. They have made such an effort to travel to see us.
Husband started CBT yesterday, it’s actually to do with work but it should be helpful.
Thanks for all your support.

InACloud, your husband needs EMDR. Children who are abandoned, and he was every time she left, cannot mature emotionally. Their entire childhoods are ruled by fear. Please push this therapy. He will find he has so many hidden memories that are running his life. For him to fall apart like this says these memories are trying to come out but they are too painful so his subconscious shuts them down. With an expert in EMDR all those memories come out into the sunshine and their stings are gone.
Children do the best they can but instability is one of the worse things to happen to them. He brought a lot of baggage with him into adulthood even tho he might not know it.

Thank you Cooley. We talked about EMDR even before his infidelity but didn’t do anything about it.
We know he has the trauma, it’s amazing how many times it raises its ugly head. Part of his crisis was obsessing with his past and his childhood, more than he ever has done before. Unfortunately, the AP was from his youth so her reappearance was spectacular timing. To be clear, he didn’t go looking for her, she approached him. She handed herself to him on a plate and he stupidly and selfishly took it.
We will definitely look at the EMDR but he has recently started CBT (a condition of his employment) and I’m assuming he probably couldn’t do the two side by side?
I’m feeling really crap today. I’m going back to work tonight after a week off and I’m a little worried about it. I’ve also been eating really unhealthily for a few weeks (we both have oddly), I’ve started binging and I’m putting on weight. My energy levels are through the floor.

Just to add, the CBT won’t address his childhood trauma or his recent stresses, it’s purely to do with work related anxiety.