SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Today is 5 years from Dday. 5 years ago I was in such a fog it’s really hard to remember a lot of the details. What I cannot forget is the absolute devastation I felt, like all of the air had been sucked out of me. I have never in my life experienced anxiety or depression. My body’s reaction was terrifying, I could not escape my own head or thoughts. My brain was like a mouse in a maze, I wanted out of it.

At the same time I was desperately trying to get back to where we used to be, let’s just move on, she said she was sorry, so let’s just skip off into R hand in hand happily ever after. It was a terrible idea, she was TT me and confiding in her BFF / A cheerleader that she was going to play nice while working on an exit strategy. When I found the text I was pissed!! I searched Google and found SI. I read everything I could but none of it made sense, it was counter productive, I was trying to get her to "pick me" I did not want to push her further away.

Infidelity is the worst thing to ever happen to me, including my Dad passing away and my MIL taking her life. In life we know certain things are going to happen. We will lose our parents at some point, we never want that day to come but it’s coming. Infidelity on the other hand is a blindside, its your number one person stabbing you in the back. It’s never in the plans, they vowed that it would never happen. There is so much more to infidelity than anyone on the outside would understand, including a WS that hasn't been cheated on.

If you are new to SI I urge you to listen to great advice here, some of it doesn’t make sense, some is very hard to hear, but trust the process. I am as healed as I am going to get, I still think about it daily, I have minor triggers or reminders all the time but they don’t knock me down or send me into a rage like they did years ago. I try to learn from them. Regardless of the path D or R your will heal, face the triggers and feelings head on and don’t rug sweep. Thank you to everyone that contributes here, I wouldn’t be were I am today without SI.

Thank you for the encouraging update, Tanner! Your passion and level headedness come thru in your posting. You’ve helped many survive infidelity, very much me included.

5 years is nothing. Coming up on closer to 20 than 15. As you heal abd your partner has truly done the work the better it gets.

I'm a Grandma now and my kids we still in elementary school when it happened. Luckily the advice I got here allowed me to empower myself to the point of asking for what I needed and not accepting less than. It's been a great life.

Luckily the advice I got here allowed me to empower myself to the point of asking for what I needed and not accepting less than. It's been a great life.

Exactly!! My W deserves a lot of credit but not this post.

InkHulk I am pulling for you Brother

I am as healed as I am going to get, I still think about it daily, I have minor triggers or reminders all the time but they don’t knock me down or send me into a rage like they did years ago.

If that's what you think, let me disabuse you of your notions, just as tush does.

My bet is that healing will progress. Triggers will get less intense and less frequent, though you may get hit with some big ones infrequently. With work and a little luck, you'll be my age and still ... confirming your love regularly, though you may need some chemical help. The work - resolving issues that come up - is often fun, if you continue not to take yourself too seriously.

Five years out is many orders of magnitude better than d-day, but life can continue to get better if you continue what you've been doing for the last 5 years. That's what I wish for you.

duplicate

[This message edited by SI Staff at 4:37 PM, Monday, September 9th]

My bet is that healing will progress.

Thank you for the insight, I only know 5 years and things are good, but thankfully I am no longer knocked down by the triggers. I try to look at them to see what they are telling me.

I have a great sense of humor, I recently had a trigger that did nothing other than make me chuckle. I don't find any humor in infidelity but sometimes triggers can be so coincidental that I just laugh and say "Not today Satan".

My WW's AP has a very common name like "Tom Smith", recently I met with a client that had the same name. It turns out he had a very long career in the same school district I went to. We were talking about the different schools and positions he held and he said "I was the AP (assistant principal) at the middle school". He said many times "I was the AP" or "when I was the AP". It was so bizarre, I couldn't do anything but grin and think "WTAF".

My WW's AP has a very common name like "Tom Smith", recently I met with a client that had the same name. It turns out he had a very long career in the same school district I went to. We were talking about the different schools and positions he held and he said "I was the AP (assistant principal) at the middle school". He said many times "I was the AP" or "when I was the AP". It was so bizarre, I couldn't do anything but grin and think "WTAF".

That's so weird!

I am as healed as I am going to get, I still think about it daily, I have minor triggers or reminders all the time but they don’t knock me down or send me into a rage like they did years ago.

I'm 20 years out and can confirm that the power of the triggers keeps on fading, but the reminders will likely be there forever. Like you said, it's the worst trauma that I've ever experienced, but we survived and we thrived.

Tanner

Do you ever regret staying? Do you think it was the right decision?

Do you ever regret staying? Do you think it was the right decision?

I did at first, I was filled with anger and the injustice of it. I had known my W for 30 years at that time and she had always been one of the most decent and proper people I know. She became someone I didn't recognize for a year or so, she completely went off the rails. I wasn't sure I could ever trust her again. Thankfully, she has done so much work on herself and helped me along the way that I don't regret it today.

A year and a half ago we faced a major health crisis with our minor Son. He went to the ER and hasn't been home since. He spend 9 months in two different hospitals out of town. My W gave up her career to be with him, advocating for him, and was not home in that time period, she was staying in a hotel or Ronald McDonald house all that time. This crisis showed me how blessed we truly are that we did the work. I never doubted her whereabouts or where her heart was, we rallied as team in his care, I spent any minute I wasn't working with them out of town. It was God's will for us and we both take the calling very seriously. He is now in a long term care facility, doing very well and my W is home. I cannot imagine working through this being divorced.

As far as trust, I trust her, I believe she is where she says she is. I believe her sincerity with how much she hates infidelity and what it did to our family. I will never have blind trust again, I can never forget what she was capable of.

Healing is a process just like everything else. Good days and bad days in the beginning. Then it starts to even out (if things are moving in the right direction).

I remember everything as if it was yesterday. Every word. Every lie. Every time he said he wanted a D.

Sadly I didn’t know about SI so I had to rely on my common sense/smarts and good therapist. Something in my gut told me to not broker his lies about R and get an exit plan. A solid exit plan.

It’s a good thing I did b/c I needed it.

I can say I’m healed, happy and we are going well.

However he knows never to play jazz music in front of me. Ever! He asked her (OW) for a date to a jazz club - and thought I would not find out.

That is the one thing I just cannot get past. I don’t get upset by it. I just don’t want to hear it.

I am, unfortunately, also a September 2019 dday baby. I took a much different path than you did, but I feel like I'm in the same spot. In some ways, we are vastly improved as a couple and have a very strong connection. In other ways, I am still stuck.

I wonder what the next five years will bring.

Hi Tanner

Thank you for the reply.

The part that I’ve struggled with is how does a BS come to terms with the injustice of it all? She got to have her fun, nuked you and your family yet got to stay in the marriage. I understand that she has done the work and by your account, is a wonderful partner now. But how do you reconcile the betrayal with who she is now?

Ahhhh Coozann...CONGRATULATIONS on this milestone !! Dday for us was the start of our Mv2.0...and it was our 10th this past July .

That is good news about your precious son doing well in that facility . And that is one FUNNY story about that AP !!

Here's to MORE healing and growing in your M !! Thanks for sharing your story Cuz!!!

Ff4152

She got to have her fun,

Part of successful reconciliation is that the WS really works on their why’s. When they do that there tend to be more regret and remorse about the actions than there are memories of "fun". The actions become what they are/were, and the realization (possibly) that the experience of "fun" was more something to justify the actions, rather than a true or pure emotion.

A short story:
In high-school there was this one guy that was heavily bullied and ostracized by all of us. For no reason other than he was slightly "different". Socially awkward, dressed "funny" and looked a bit weird. He did his BEST to fit in – tried to sit with others at lunch, tried to join clubs and activities... yet he never got accepted. He was the but of all jokes and he was the guy hauled up the flag-pole, taped to the toilet, stripped and made run naked through the halls, beat up every Friday... I’m talking hard-core, serious, soul-damaging bullying...
I often thought of this guy. For years I hid behind the excuse that I was possibly on the verge of the group that bullied him, but not really an active participant. I laughed at him running naked, or at seeing him taped to the toilet, but I neither stripped him nor taped him.

About a decade ago I went to a reunion. There – trying to start conversations with others – was this same guy. All grown up, like we all had. I decided that now was the time to try to make amends, so I went to him and struck up a conversation. I learned that he had a doctorate in chemistry and was a manager at some production plant, married, two kids and all that. We chatted for maybe 15 minutes and then I mentioned the bullying and how I was sorry for how we acted.
I will always remember his response: He said something like Bigger – you are correct that you were never the instigator or actively took part in the worst bullying, BUT you never stepped in to stop it. None of you did. That is the cross you all have to carry.
We sat together through dinner and most of the evening, shared social media connections and have kept in touch. Not "friends" per se, but if he’s in town he might ask if I have time for a coffee (and vise-versa). I admit I am probably doing this to alleviate my conscience, but I can also honestly admit I have had coffee with worse people.

The takeaway – and possible relevance to a "healed" WS – is that now my memories of the "good times" at high-school - the place where I met some of my still-best friends, where I had so many "firsts" and so much "fun" – always have this cloud over them. The cloud is that my experiences are tainted by the pain of others. That while I was doing "fun" I was not necessarily doing "right", and that a strong and persistent emotion from that time is NOT the joy of acing a test or making the team or the first date or kiss or whatever... but rather the emotion that maybe I wasn’t as good a person as I could have been.

I seriously doubt a recovered WS looks back at their affair as "fun" or "good". It’s more remorse and regret.

Hi Bigger

I seriously doubt a recovered WS looks back at their affair as "fun" or "good". It’s more remorse and regret.

I was trying to look at this from the BS perspective. I do not look at my affair as fun or good, quite the opposite. But as been stated many times from others here that it would be natural for a BS to think that way. Through no fault of the BS, the WS gets to have something on the side which completely upends the BS and their family. That’s bad enough. Then to have a reminder of that if R is the chosen path staring at you every day. Even if you have a model WS who does the work, there has to be some lingering bitterness and resentment. I’m wondering how a BS comes to terms with that and make some kind of peace with it.

[This message edited by ff4152 at 6:35 PM, Wednesday, September 11th]

ff4152...I can't speak for anyone else...but for ME...the betrayal DESTROYED my M . My H's A was a dealbreaker...just like EVERY A is. PERIOD.

BUT...there's always a BUT ...we had a foundation that was able to be rebuilt upon . From that foundation...through a LOT of hard work...we rebuilt our Mv2.0 that is so much BETTER than either of us could have ever imagined .

The A happened. There is NOTHING my H nor I can do about it. He would give his right arm and any other body part GLADLY if he could just go back and undo what he did. He does NOT want the "reminders" of the most SELFISH thing he ever did...he is HAUNTED by them...they are not good or fun memories AT ALL. If he would have acted otherwise we may not be in R.

I CHOSE to give my H mercy. He took that as the GIFT it was and he never looked back. He proved to me that he was worthy of this gift .

You might not be a candidate for R if you wouldn't be able to put the A where it belongs...in the PAST. That is perfectly fine...a lot of people can't . There is no right or wrong answer in this scenario after infidelity enters an M. I do want to add though that almost 100% of us probably had the SAME feeling that you are feeling right now...before we became a BS. As most have written on here...we really don't know how it feels and what we would do...unless we have experienced it.

how do you reconcile the betrayal with who she is now?

Nothing either of us can do to erase the betrayal. She is absolutely hates what she did to our family. She is now who she was before the A’s, a kind, decent and proper lady. I am proud of the work she has done and I know she never looks back on it as "fun", it makes her sick. But like I said before I will always trust my gut and never dismiss it again. I am not expecting it to ever happen again, but will never rule it out either.