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How long did it take for you to see your WS in a different light after becoming truly remorseful and doing the work?
I’m almost 6 months out and he’s doing so well but I just want to throat punch him. (I won’t) but you get it.

I know I wont ever look at him through those rose colored glasses but when I do heal, im terrified of what I may see…..

Once we really got on the road train and he was consistently doing the work, we really started to see positive changes and healing.
But when it was consistent behavior change and self improvement from him and him not falling into old bad behaviors when things were stressful or bad that's when I slowly started to have belief we would make it and heal. I would guess it would be around the 8-9 month mark. By the time I hit 18 mos I knew we were going to heal and be good. Yeah there were more good days than bad at that point but I am not saying it was all sunshine and rainbows and never had a disagreement again, that's not real life. But we rarely argue or fight and when we do we discuss it and move on to be better abd happier and stronger.

Oh Groot1988 I could not have written this post better myself. I know my WH is doing everything he can to ‘fix’ his issues and to make himself a safe partner but shit some days I just don’t care. Like WTAF were you thinking, you have destroyed everything for us.

I’m at the same stage as you and have mostly good days but yesterday and today are not those days. I just want to stop feeling like this and get off this shitty roller coaster of emotions. No wonder divorce crosses my mind!!!!

A throat punch might help though, lol.

Webbit, I feel for you because this sucks!
I have more bad days than good days but he lied to me for months trying to minimize what he did. I truly think when that happens it adds so much time on healing… he sees it now but kinda late! I really don’t think I could ask more from him right now. I’m in IC and it’s helping me, we are starting emdr soon.

Thank you tushnurse , I’m so glad things are going well for you!!

I’m almost 6 months out

Please give yourself grace. Six months is so early in the healing journey that any emotions you have are normal for your abnormal situation. It's ok to want to throat punch him, as long as you don't act on it. I've seen too many episodes of Snapped and know that they'll look at you first if anything bad happens.

Are you putting too much pressure on yourself? Why do you think that this early on that you need to be seeing him in a different light so early on? One thing I did was put a 6-month deadline to evaluate where I felt we were as a couple. I had a list of things that I would review to see if I could decide between staying or going. It's ok to take your time to figure it out. Adulting can be hard.

Leafields I love snapped! Can’t promise I won’t be on it one day

I am taking my time on forgiveness and I told my IC tonight I have no timeline on it. It’s a process, I won’t wake up one day and say "you’re forgiven" it will be little steps along the way and one day I’ll realize the pain isn’t so raw and I have a changed husband and marriage.

I just asked the question to get an idea on everyone else’s timeline , trust me , I want to heal, I want to forgive but I know what rushing does. I have a brother who never forgave or healed from my sister in laws affair and 10 years later he randomly asks questions about comparisons in the bedroom and the affair and accuses her of cheating still, they rugswept. I will walk through hell I suppose, there’s no way over it unless I go through it :(

My ic did say that I’m making progress but along the way we noticed I have a lot of childhood trauma that is coming up that is making this way harder to forgive. I watched my parents go through something similar and had a lot of phyicial abuse in the home with a mom that couldn’t leave due to money. I’ve always been independent and had a good paying job to avoid being stuck and now I’m free to go and financially I’ll be ok but it’s just a lot to process. Trauma brings up other trauma ive learned

[This message edited by Groot1988 at 3:01 AM, Wednesday, March 27th]

How long did it take for you to see your WS in a different light after becoming truly remorseful and doing the work?

I’m the one who had to change in order to see them in a different light. Ponder on that. 🙂

I won’t wake up one day and say "you’re forgiven"

My rec is to never even plan to say the words "you’re forgiven". If it happens, he’ll know that you've changed anyway by the obvious dropping of the load you’re currently carrying. No words needed.

[This message edited by HouseOfPlane at 3:22 AM, Wednesday, March 27th]

House of Plane

I’m the one who had to change in order to see them in a different light. Ponder on that. 🙂

I felt this in my soul....

thank you for this.

My rec is to never even plan to say the words "you’re forgiven". If it happens, he’ll know that you've changed anyway by the obvious dropping of the load you’re currently carrying. No words needed.

This IS absolutely how I feel! You said it better than I could have.

[This message edited by Groot1988 at 1:09 PM, Wednesday, March 27th]

As far as forgiveness goes it did not come with bells and trumpets sounding. It snuck in quietly and with a calming peace.
There is so much going on, healing ourselves, holding our partner accountable, them doing their work, keep life going normally, that it really snuck in quietly.
I shared with my H on the 2 year anti-versary that I had reach forgiveness. He was surprised as I took forgiveness off the table to not even discuss as we headed into R.

Tushnurse, I have also took forgiveness off the table, I can forgive him for a lot of things but I don't know if I can for jeopardizing the future of our children and putting me at health risks when I have a special needs child that is disabled.
I mean I hope one day I can come to forgiveness and I hope it hits me as calmly as it did you. If anything I would like to eventually forgive him for my own peace.
Each time we see our MC he asks if I am any closer to forgiveness.... my answer is always "absolutely not".

Even my H understands and said he would never rush it.

It sounds like a boundary is needed with the therapist.
Even a faith based counselor if they are a legit counselor should not be forcing you to reach conclusions you aren't ready for.

It sounds like a boundary is needed with the therapist.

I agree, I told my IC (same company) during my session with her that I felt I was being rushed even if he wasn't necessarily rushing me. When I would tell him that I was not ready to forgive him he would say ok and say that was ok but i still feel pressured. My IC had me sign an ROA so she could share what we are working on in our sessions with him.

I don't know if I ever saw my W in a 'different light'. It took me 3.5-4 years to declare victory in R and recovery. Both take consistent effort over time, and it's easy to fake for 6 months. Or 12. Or maybe even 24.

Forgiveness snuck up on me, too. At one point - the same 3.5-4 years out - it dawned on me that I no longer had any desire for revenge or for seeing my W punished. It was a non-event. A few years later, I posted about it on SI, and my W saw my post. Being forgiven was a big deal for her.

YMMV. R is possible without forgiveness.

Sisoon.

You say you no longer felt like wanting to see her be punished. What did punishment look like on your end?

For the 1st 2 years, I spent some energy trying to figure out how my W should be punished for her A. I concluded that I could find no way to hurt her without adding to my own pain, and I had no desire to add to my own pain.

We are 2 different, autonomous people, but being married means, IMO, that what hurts one of us hurts both of us.

Sisoon, that is wise.
I appreciate that and I agree. I ask my H every day how this is fair to me and his response is "it never will be"

He is right, nothing he says or does will EVER make the playing field even and I have to heal and accept that, me taking the high road will make me feel better about my values and morals as well. Some days I want to make him pay and say mean things to him (and I do) but I NEVER feel better after I do I always feel yucky and not myself, so that has slowed down a lot. Now I am almost numb, maybe stuck? I don't know the right word. I do know I feel exhausted. I haven't skipped a night without nightmares, I am usually up for a few hours a night crying and he wakes up with me each time to comfort me.

Worst club ever.

D-day 1 for me was October 1, 2017. I still do not feel the same about WH as I did before. But see WH in a different light - meaning one not shrouded in the affair? I would say for me that was about 2 years into him really doing some work on himself which started in earnest about 2.5 years after my first d-day. I still do not see him in the way I used to and the A will always be there with him - not all the time - but things will remind me of it (I don't call it a trigger anymore as it does not impact me negatively - just more like a casual reminder *ding* in my brain).

Thisissolonely

I told him last night that even if we heal and reconcile, I think I’ve came to the conclusion I won’t ever look at him like I did before. The blind trust is gone and so is the innocence. I’m sure now I will look at him and see what he’s capable of for the rest of our marriage and I told him that too. He keeps telling me he could never do this again and a huge part of me believes him because this had been hugely traumatic and when I’m in pain he sits and feels it with me. I really don’t think he would have started working on himself so fast if he didn’t. He has seen all of my rage, pain, and depression. He watched me not get or out bed for weeks and being unable to tend to the kids (which he stepped up every single day) all the while having a new physically exhausting job. - I hope all of this will mean more as more time goes on , that it will help me see him in a different light but right now it doesn’t, obviously.

I don’t think there’s been a day I haven’t had a breakdown in the last 6 months , the nightmares he wakes up almost every night with me , I don’t make myself feel these things in silence or in isolation , he did this he will feel it too.
He used to try to tell me to cheer up and watch movies and laugh with him, I told him when I can’t get off the floor he comes and lays with me (I heard that on here and I loved it). And he does.

[This message edited by Groot1988 at 1:43 PM, Friday, March 29th]

It sounds like you are spending a lot of time and energy focused on your WH and your M (which is normal), but at 6 months out, what are you doing to make you feel good? This is a time to learn how to bring joy to our own lives because the M is a place of pain for quite some time. We may not want to ditch it, but that does not mean it can bring us peace or joy either. There is no safety or trust for those things yet. Trust can ONLY be established with consistently positive experiences from someone over time. And how can you rush time?

I found self-care to be incredibly healing during this time. You have four kids, a job, and a broken M; that's quite a lot. What are you doing for you? How are you investing in your own self? Do not minimize the value of self love and care.

For many of us, our WS saw that we invested in the M so thoroughly and to the detriment of our own personal needs that this "signaled" they could take chances, that we needed them too much to leave if they messed up. So for those same many of us, we need to now rebalance the M by learning to invest more in ourselves. We matter. And how do we show our WSs that we matter? With actions, not words. By spending time in any way we want to, by spending more money on ourselves, by finding hobbies and outlets that fill our soul, by nurturing friendships and going for solo walks in nature, by exercising and prepping healthy meals. We take the daily, weekly time to be with ourselves. And honestly, I needed that for a long, long time. It countered the anger and unfairness I felt. Some here call it having an A with yourself. Exactly!

It's time for you to focus on you.