SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

My story very briefly. I don’t post often because I have been deemed a "mad hatter" and this makes things difficult on this site in ever possible way.

In 1975 we got married. In 1976, he wanted to try swinging, but arranged it and didn’t let me in on the plan. I rejected the deal as it unfolded. Shortly after this, in my 19-year-old stupidity, I had a ONS (my illogic was that if it was okay to swing, I was choosing the partner, yes I own this, yes it was wrong, yes he knows, yes I immediately confessed). In his illogic, he had a revenge affair almost immediately thereafter. I have NEVER CHEATED AGAIN, NOT ONCE. NEVER.

We worked through this stupidity. Sort of.

In 1977, we were relocating to another state. He went ahead to get an apartment, etc. While there, he slept with another woman twice (he only recently admitted this, full details today but I have pretty much known anyway). In 1978 we briefly separated, but upon getting back together, he slept with two other women - one I knew about that he confessed to at the time, but the other he disclosed last year on DDay 1.

He was faithful (I am told) until 2005 when I caught him with a friend in a 4 month PA, which was a sex-only, no emotional involvement deal. Immediately after I found out, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer and our recovery focus shifted to surgery and cancer treatment. So that wasn’t a proper affair recovery at all.

And so it explains this: he failed to disclose the other affair he also had around the same time as this 2005 PA, that he just disclosed today. It was a one-time attempt at sex, but he says he was very drunk and had ED (likely true, prostate cancer was affecting him at that time) and couldn’t perform. He was also abusing alcohol a LOT at that time, which is a running theme in his affairs.

He recovered somewhat from cancer and we were able to begin sex again, and he tried again with this same person - but tried again while drunk and failed. He hasn’t had the best result post surgery, but with the two of us, I know what works and what doesn’t, and I suspect he’s telling the truth because alcohol doesn’t work for him at all. He also just disclosed this today.

Finally, he had the EA online and over the phone from sometime in 2019 until DDay June 9, 2023 when my iPad updated and all of their texts and emails crossed over onto my device. No, I cannot explain it, but it was the worst day of my life.

Until today, when the rest of the story came out, because he told me that he tried to have sex with a good friend of mine twice, and she’s also a betrayer, and

I am broken.

I have been married to him for 49 years.

Today, I told him I just wanted the truth of my life, I screamed at him that he was killing me, slowly, painfully killing me, by trickling out a piece of truth at a time.

I begged him to stop doing this, to FOR GOD’S SAKE treat me like a human being and tell me the fucking truth of my life so I can make decisions based on real information.

So he sat with it, and told me things he had held back. They hurt. But I think I have what I think is truth now. I’m sure there will be some more details, but at this point I at least know the big picture.

I’m numb. I never expected that one of my best friends would be in the mix, but looking back, she was in a weird place, cheating on her husband with other men at the time anyway, and her husband knew about them, so it’s not altogether shocking she would do this. She’s blocked at my end. I have nothing to say to her. She’s single, her husband left her years ago.

I have no idea what I plan to do. WH wants to reconcile.

I want to heal and figure out what reconciliation would mean.

Well it spans 5 decades, but the best bet against trickle truth is a complete written timeline and a polygraph to confirm there are no intentional omissions.

I think you need to start there if you are going to try to build anything with him. Otherwise you are on a foundation of quicksand.

I’m thinking a polygraph could help me at least know if I’m anywhere near having the full picture. I agree. Last year he agreed to one, and I never followed through. He basically called my bluff, I think. At the time I was mentally exhausted. I’m more so now. I don’t know if it’s even worth it? He’s a skilled liar, I know that.

I mean, let’s say it unearths ten more. Or five more. Or no more. Seven is enough, 17, 12, even one is enough, really.

It’s the damn lies that are killing me. The lies are exhausting me. And if it takes a polygraph to pry the truth out, what the hell am I doing?

I’m broken anyway.

It’s the damn lies that are killing me. The lies are exhausting me. And if it takes a polygraph to pry the truth out, what the hell am I doing?

I’m broken anyway.

I felt the same way, and didn't end up following through on a poly either. However, I recorded a fairly complete drunken confession to her friend that confirmed all of the details to my satisfaction, and later reconfirmed with AP's friend. It's good to have the truth to your satisfaction (you'll never have the full truth since there is simply too much to tell or recall). While you'll never trust your husband completely again, you need some place to start rebuilding trust and knowing he can be safe and change his thoughts and behaviors. Otherwise it's just a secret countdown to your next D-day.

You also don't have to try to R if you don't want to. Or you can change your mind after trying R for any reason or no reason at all. You need to be in charge of what you choose to do regardless. As you said, you need to not be acting out of fear.

Thanks. You’re right, I should not act out of fear. I shouldn’t act out of anger, either, which is what my major emotion is right now.

I keep asking him WTF and why didn’t he just disclose this last year? Why keep this one affair secret for yet another Dday?

He says he just thought that there was way too much to handle last year, all at once, too much pain for me. He couldn’t do one more thing, to add to that pile, it was too much. And it just got to be more time, and then more time, and he had minimized the one affair already, and he knew the lies had just already piled up. And today I told him that I was unable to deal with even one more lie, and that he was killing me, and I was going to have to leave to save myself.

I asked him, "so when I hook up my camper to my truck, how long will I be gone before you call to tell me that ‘one more piece of truth’ you held back?" And that’s when he realized I was actually leaving, actually planning this, and actually knew what he would do once I pulled out onto the highway.

He broke down and confessed to a lot.

It was hard to hear.

I told him that what I have come to understand about him and his sexual needs is that he wants wh#res, not a good woman, that he gets bored with a good woman. Because every person he has had an affair with has been a female who has been very "easy" and not particularly interested in having any emotional attachment whatsoever, just sex - with the exception of the last one, which was long distance EA (but she’s a different story, and a similar type of person in terms of sexual attitude).

He said that was true in many ways, probably due to porn use. And that he didn’t want emotional attachment either, he has that aspect of life with me….

I told him I don’t feel it with him anymore. He’s crushed. I can’t, I don’t feel safe with him. I don’t know if he can truly make me feel loved.

I don’t know if he knows love.

So sorry that you've had another brutal round of confessions. Sending you strength.

My XWH is a diagnosed covert narc, and I hear you about the lies. How do I know XWH is lying? His lips are moving. (Old joke.) I filed for D the week before our 34th anniversary, so I made it about 3.5 decades. I couldn't put up with the lies and emotional abuse that comes from somebody with NPD any longer - and I didn't have to. Thinking about the rest of my life stretching out before me and being treated the same way I had been for years was the tipping point.

Frankly, there are some that consider the continual lying and gaslighting to be emotional abuse. (I do, too. I also consider infidelity as abuse.)

What do you want to do? Would a legal separation be something that is a viable solution for you or are you ready to D? Whatever you decide is right for you is ok with us.

(((5Decades))) this is just awful for you. No one deserves this. Is there a way to live happily detached from him? Do you have a circle of friends you can dedicate more time too. I don't know what I would do in this situation. If I had not left my M this is the future I would have been looking at. I would do everything and anything possible to make yourself happy and be selfish and enjoy it. I would take trips with my friends and travel and do all the things I ever wanted to do. Literally live your best life!

[This message edited by crazyblindsided at 5:34 PM, Friday, June 21st]

leafields,

I am so broken at this point I just don’t know what I want to do.

I’m almost 70. He’s older. How would I even begin my life over? I would have to return to work. I’m really sick right now, and actually am still holding a valuable professional license, and my previous three employers would take me back on any terms I wanted. But I’m sick and I just couldn’t even do it until after I get some treatment done. Maybe in September I could go back to work.

This entire thing would completely blindside my daughters. They’re in their 40’s, but one has mental health issues and I am very concerned about her reaction to this kind of news - just knowing he has done this, let alone if I were to divorce him.

Strangely enough, if I were to announce we were divorcing and that *I* was at fault, everyone would easily believe this and rally around him. However, if I were to state the truth? They would not believe me, and would be on his side, and reason that somehow I was still the cause of his "need" to do all of this.

My daughters would be devastated, but they have him on a pedestal. My family is the same way. And as for my family of origin, it’s very dysfunctional and abusive, I have contact only with one brother, and he would be supportive of both of us (and devastated as well).

Basically I would be very alone in the world. And I would be starting over. The money we have is his, by inheritance.

And the worst part is that I do have love for him. It’s definitely not any kind of love like it was day before yesterday, and the hope I had for reconciliation is at about 1 on a scale of 1-10. Day before yesterday I was at a 9.5 before he confessed that he had lied this entire year.

Thing is, I knew he was lying about the one woman, minimizing that relationship from 1977. But I had absolutely NO idea that he had affair #6. I have to number them now to keep track.

I told him today that my concern is that he has not asked me what I WANT, NOT ONCE, IT IS ALL ABOUT WHAT HE WANTS AND HOW BAD HE FEELS.

I told him this morning that I do not care how bad he feels. I said, "You feel that sadness you have, that pain in your soul?" He said he did.

"That is how I have felt every day since last year. I told you that, every day. I told you that the thing I needed to help alleviate that pain was for you to tell me the complete truth of my life. And every day, you looked at me, ignored that pain, and gave me no value as a human being - you decided, every day, that I wasn’t worth giving the truth to. I wasn’t worth saving.

And the only time the truth became valuable enough to give to me?

Oh, that moment came when YOUR PAIN came into play. YOUR PAIN happened when I told you I was leaving you, because you wouldn’t give me the truth, and you were killing me with the trickle truth. THAT IS WHEN THINGS MATTERED. It wasn’t my pain that had any value to you. IT WAS YOUR PAIN.

And that fact is how I know you do not love me."

He stood there in shock. I’m not wrong. I told him I have no pity for his pain, and he can sit with it,

Because,

Now, I love him EXACTLY AS MUCH AS HE LOVES ME.

He was crushed when I said that. I asked him, very intently, WHY DOES IT HURT YOU WHEN I SAY I LOVE YOU, EXACTLY AS MUCH AS YOU LOVE ME?

He just cried. Because he knows now that he has lost me. Just as I lost him. After five decades.

How did this happen. I hope I can just die.

FML.

crazyblindsided,

I am considering just having a very weird arrangement where we live separate lives, but stay married for financial reasons. I don’t have a large circle of friends nearby because I live in a very rural area. I do go camping and have some friends in that arena, so that will help.

Today I started cleaning out closets. I told him that I’m tossing out bits of myself, along the lines of the same way he tossed me out, piece by piece and lie by lie. That way, when I die (I’m old, so it’s going to happen - with my luck karma will force me to be tortured by dragging this shit out another 40 years) this part of the work will be done. At least the nearest Goodwill will be getting some decent scrubs, jackets, games, and lots of craft supplies. I proceed to do this anyway, we all hold onto too much junk.

I’m just really doing stuff to keep busy, though. I said this to him to hurt him. I want to punch him. I want to set things on fire. I want to scream and cry and throw things.

At the same time I want him to somehow fix this fucking mess and rescue me.

I want to die and have it over.

I want to live a different life and start this one over and not have this happen.

I want my eyes to not feel like there’s sand in them, my chest to stop hurting, and for my soul to find itself again.

I want for whatever gods there are that think my karma is somehow "balanced" by this to please drag my ass to a video screen and show me the exact crime I committed to deserve this because, for real, I do not recall perpetrating it. Also, I repent, from the very depths of every cell of my being for all sins, please, just let this pain be lifted. I can’t breathe.

Like I said, I am broken.

I am so sorry you are going through this. You must be in agony.

I think you should do what you feel you need. Put yourself first.

Hugs

I cut my losses after Dday 2. I cannot imagine doing five decades of rugsweeping. At this point, there doesn't seem to be anything worth saving. Of course I'm on the outside looking in, so maybe take that with a grain of salt. But you have to look at your marriage and recognize that almost the entirety of it he was cheating or planning to cheat. The worst is how much disrespect he showed by cheating with friends and associates of yours.
I get 50 years is a long time, but you still have the rest of your life to experience joy. Does he bring you that joy? Can you see yourself in another decade having more Ddays?

StillLivin,

"Does he bring you that joy?"

After 49 years of marriage, I can say that I know who he is at his core. We have done a great deal of work this past year, and that "joy" you talk about is something inside me, but I’m guarded, yes.

The things we have revealed to each other have gone a long way toward healing me. This last DDay seems different, like it is the last, because HE is different in spirit now.

Through therapy, we have a handle on the whys. The first cluster in the 70’s surrounded one set of "reasons", our separation, and after we got back together we had about 25 years of no cheating. Then he had two PAs at the same timeframe, with a similar thing going on in his life, and the "follow up event" with the one AP from that time a few years later for exactly the same reason.

The one prevailing "reason" has been alcohol abuse. In the 70’s he was a musician and drank nightly, combined with ready availability of females…and cheating was easy. We separated because he thought that "of course he could be a rock star" and have any woman he wanted. He came back because it turned out I was the woman he wanted. The affairs in 2005 were because he had again began drinking too much, and we had neighbors who were coming over to use our pool everyday with their kids. The parties started and continued and then just never ended. One day I tossed them all out, and became the bitch of the block, later discovered the affair.

The most recent affair was an EA, online and phone. This was with a former bandmate from way back in 1976-1980. There was a lot happening in his life when he started this EA, and therapy helped us sort this out. His mother had cancer and we had taken care of her. She had died recently. Our friend (the AP) had a husband who developed dementia. COVID had begun. They were talking a lot on the phone about her health issues, her husband and his impending death, and then he was put in a nursing home. This then started a drinking thing between them like "let’s share a drink while we talk on the phone". The isolator the pandemic, the drinking escalated, the grief of his loss of all of his family when his mom passed, and the new closeness of his old sexy friend who was willing to be his online sex friend - perfect storm.

Anyway.

You asked if I still have joy with him, and the answer is that I do. I know I still love this fool. I know what he has thought in the past about how sex worked for him, but I also know what he now understands about what will happen if there is any breach of boundaries going forward. He knows that our kids and every person in our lives will hear the details of our marriage. And his life will be scorched earth as far as any contact with me is concerned - and this is a huge fear for him. In the past, I have never made that boundary. I’ve always been weak because I was just…weak.

Not anymore. He knows that anything I don’t like from this point forward will result in me leaving, and he will never see or hear from me again. And after five decades, that kind of dead air is deadly. He can’t stand it when I’m gone for one day, let alone the rest of his life.

I do want to save this marriage. There is far more to our relationship than what I can post here. So much more.

I would not claim to have the answers but my WS didn’t come out with the truth until 9 years later. For a year after that I couldn’t stop asking questions and I felt that no matter what he said the facts were swirling around in some confused waves of information lost to memory and time, distortions, my own weird distortions, etc. I couldn’t stabilize under those circumstances. I had heard folks here talking about written timeline and it didn’t seem important because we had discussed all of it. But, due to time and memory and my encouragement to just go with whatever he could remember it felt like nothing in my past history stayed in place, like there were moving parts. I finally insisted on the timeline and I am so glad I did. I don’t really believe in polygraphs so I didn’t do that. Having that timeline has not changed the fact that I feel ambivalent about staying at times. But, it has restored my sense that I know the facts of my past and they are more set in stone. I feel much more stable since its completion. I realize your husband is older and this may not seem like something you want to spend time on. But if he could complete one fairly quickly, maybe working with a counselor, I think it might help you. Just a thought.

Either way I am so sorry you have gone through this. It must be devastating.

Still,

I have a written timeline. The only thing missing was this recently confessed affair and one detail from a previous affair.

I talked about why he held it back on another thread, but briefly, his process of fully confessing coincided with me telling him about some major trauma of sexual and physical abuse as a child. I was in the middle of that trauma plus the affair trauma, and he had jut two details left to reveal when I literally broke down in front of him. His concern was that I couldn’t take any more. Maybe he was right, I don’t know. I do know I was about at the bottom of the bottom, so he could have been right in his concern.

He gave me the two things finally because I knew he was holding back (after 5 decades you know a person’s tells) and I threatened to just leave because I couldn’t take waiting for the other shoe to drop. He knew I was going to leave, I was truly there emotionally.

I have to move forward in my life. I cannot go back, nobody can. There is a foundation of love between us, I cannot deny that. I can’t imagine what my life would be without him in it.

What I fear most is that one of us would die and we won’t have this resolved. Right now, we are on the path of reconciliation. I want that and so does he.

If there’s anything I learned over the life I have lived, it’s that he and I can heal together. Oddly, this time I think I have more of an understanding of the "why" than I did before, and so does he. This makes a huge difference to me.