SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Sorry if I am posting too much, and please inform me if this is the case. I write significantly better than I speak, and find it cathartic to do so.

One of the hardest parts of reconciliation for me to accept is that I can genuinely see her trying now.

I see the effort. I see the transparency. I see her sitting in uncomfortable conversations instead of avoiding them. I see her becoming more emotionally available, more patient, more willing to look at herself honestly than ever before. There are moments where I actually feel proud of her growth, which is such a confusing thing to admit after betrayal.

Because I know change is hard. Real self-examination is hard, I have been there in my youth and it is genuinely hard. Consistency is hard. And she has really started to put in work.

But underneath all of that is a thought I can’t seem to silence.

What if she’s fighting for comfort, not for me?

What if what she truly couldn’t bear losing was the stability? The home. The family structure. The financial security. The familiarity. The identity built over years. The life we created together. What if I am intertwined with those things, but not actually the central reason she stayed?

And honestly, I hate that my mind goes there because part of me feels guilty even thinking it. Especially when I can visibly see her trying. But betrayal changes the way you interpret everything. Once someone has proven they could compartmentalize you while also claiming to love you, it becomes very difficult to trust your own reading of their motives afterward. I have seen her lie while swearing on the children's lives, and saw not an ounce of uncertainty in her eyes.

Before DDay, if she fought for us (and I now look back and can not find even one example of this), I would have automatically believed it was because she deeply loved me. Now my brain pulls everything apart looking for hidden motivations and survival instincts.

Did she come back because she realized my value? I know my value and know what I am worth even still.
Or because the fantasy collapsed? I know at least intellectually that it was a fantasy she was living.
Did she choose me? The real me, the way I always chose the real her.
Or did she choose the safer life? I am safe, almost boringly so.
If the affair had remained exciting, sustainable, consequence-free… would she still be here?

Those questions eat at me because I know there’s no way to fully untangle them.

And to be fair, I understand humans are rarely motivated by only one thing. Love and fear can coexist. Genuine remorse and self-preservation can coexist. Wanting the marriage and wanting stability are not mutually exclusive. Intellectually I understand that, but emotionally the hurt for being second and even third choice hurts.

But emotionally, I struggle with feeling like I may have become the practical choice instead of the deeply desired one. How can she prove real desire when she has strayed for so long?

That’s the part that hurts in ways I don’t know how to articulate. Not the fear that she might leave again someday, but the fear that even now I may not truly know why she stayed. Not truly know or not truly believe.

I think a lot of betrayed spouses quietly wrestle with this.
How do you ever trust that reconciliation is happening for the right reasons when the person already once risked losing you? Already proved capable of the level of compartmentalization previously thought to be impossible to me.

How do you know they are rebuilding because they genuinely cannot imagine life without you specifically, and not simply because they cannot imagine rebuilding an entirely new life from scratch?

And maybe the hardest question of all...........
Even if they never betray you again, how do you ever fully stop wondering whether you were ultimately loved, or chosen for stability?

I don’t have an answer for this other than to say that I am the BS and my FWS is left wondering if I stayed for the same reason. And if I am being honest I would tell him "I absolutely stayed initially for the stability". 🤣🤷‍♀️ that’s one of those things that is a him problem not a me problem. After so many years I don’t really care why he chose to reconcile. I just know we are currently happy and thriving and that’s enough.

Unfortunately you never know people’s true motivations. Sometimes they marry or stay married for a whole slew of reasons.

You can over analyze the entire marriage after the affair. Why did we marry if cheating was going to be a part of their DNA? Why stay together after the hurt & pain? Is he/she staying for kids or $ or some other reason other than love?

It comes down to acceptance of the affair. No answer as to why or anything that is going to make sense to a betrayed spouse or partner. I think we, as betrayeds, have to stop trying to "understand" something so irrational and based on poor judgment and decision making (by the betrayed).

My opinion is - reconcile if you will be happy. If the situation works for you. Have a plan B in case it doesn’t work out.

You are a far better writer than I am because this eloquently sums up a lot of what has kept me up at night for months.

I worked with my therapist on a lot of what you shared, it's a very common thought. But it's just that, a thought, an intrusive one.

I played the "what if" and ulterior motive game in my head for months.

"What if....she didn't get caught by me; would this have continued forever; until they moved in together"
"What if....he lived closer"
"What if....he was more adamant about pursuing a relationship instead of just being an AP"

The reality is you have to see what's in front of you. The reality is she is here now, attempting to improve herself and your marriage. You know she's here, you know she's trying to improve and become as ideal of a wayward as possible. You can wrestle with the self doubt and what if thoughts all day long and you'll never have a concrete answer; because they are more theoretic questions. We'll never truly know someone's motive or how they would have reacted to what if scenarios during the affair.

Whenever I get those self doubts and what if scenarios pop up in my head, I stop whatever it is I'm doing. I pause. I calm down my nervous system and let the thought roll out of my mind as just that, an intrusive thought. And then I go about my day. It sounds easier when you type it our and read it, and it was challenging for awhile, but I'm beginning to truly recognize those thoughts as just being intrusive. It's my nervous system reminding me to stay alert, but I don't need that right now.

So if you find yourself asking a question that contains an "if" or a question you truly know you can't get the answer to. Heck, even she may not have the answer to it; don't let it keep you up at night.

Gemmy,

Sorry if I am posting too much, and please inform me if this is the case. I write significantly better than I speak, and find it cathartic to do so.

I don't think there is such a thing as posting too much.

I had 5.4 billion questions when I got here. Most of them have been answered along the way, but I'll bet if I sit down and try, I could probably come up with a couple more.

Writing and catharsis -- absolutely.

I think I ended up with about 400 pages of notes. Most of my journaling, plus copy and pasting posts here into my notes and articles and all kinds of material related to relationships, good bad and ugly of all of it.

I delated all of it last year, but that was at the end of year nine. Took a while to process it all.

Those questions eat at me because I know there’s no way to fully untangle them.

I've spent most of my life trying to figure ME out -- no chance I can 100 percent fully know my wife or my sons.

I know them really well, but some questions can only be answered over time, and with your wife SHOWING you and not telling you.

The stability question is one you have to know as well.

You're wondering if your wife staying for it, but are you?

I had to KNOW what I wanted first, then I knew what to aim for -- for me and then the M.

What if she’s fighting for comfort, not for me?

If your wife has a conscious how is she possibly comfortable?

She has to wake up every morning and help heal a relationship she burned down to the foundation. That shame and guilt is a thing.

Our R battle was a two front war.

I had to know I wouldn't always see my wife as her worst self, I had to let her back in.

My wife had to let go of the shame enough to be able to fully invest herself back into the M.

Both partners should have one foot out the door on dday.

Getting back to vulnerable is the hard part.

Actions.

Hundreds of consistent actions moving slowly back toward each other.

I honestly feel like walking away in the first three years may have been easier, but seeing the results of not giving up has been far better than I imagined.

[This message edited by Oldwounds at 11:10 PM, Tuesday, May 12th]

Sorry if I am posting too much, and please inform me if this is the case.

Once upon a time, yours truly was one of the most "tread-happy" lunatics on SI. If anyone was ever keeping track, I'd have won an award.

Post as often as you want or need to; it's why the site exists.

Now, on to your question.

What if what she truly couldn’t bear losing was the stability? The home. The family structure. The financial security. The familiarity. The identity built over years. The life we created together. What if I am intertwined with those things, but not actually the central reason she stayed?

Share these fears with her. Don't posit this as a question. Simply share it, word for word, exactly as you've so eloquently worded it here.

Now, ask yourself this exact same question. Have you offered her the opportunity - THE GIFT - of reconciliation for these same things, or is she the central reason?

All of these things you mention - a home, stability, family, identity - are all parts of what forms an extremely powerful bond, one that it not easily broken. They are truly important parts of a life well lived, a life to be cherished, nutured and, yes, vehemently protected (a lesson I hope she's learning to appreciate).

I don't know how, or even if, you will ever have a reassuring answer. This is a big part of why we often encourage a betrayed spouse to carefully watch and observe a WS's actions.

Give it time, Gemmy. You don't have to make any decisions right now. In six months, or a year, or six years you might have the answers you seek.

These are normal feelings and questions.

Logically you have already answered it in there are typically many motivations when it comes to reconciling, growing, etc. and I think it’s probably dead on- it’s many things.

There just simply hasn’t been enough time for you to feel the answer to basis of your question. That is something that eventually you will come to believe after a long period of consistency and seeing the proof.

When we decide to try reconciliation, I had many motivations. Reality is in my case we made similar money and could afford to live separately pretty comfortably. I wanted to see if we could work it out because I regretted what I had done, we had a shared history and family together, and I knew what we once were to each other before the disconnect, the affair, etc.

I loved him, but there were a lot of hard feelings we both had to sift through to reconnect. It wasn’t as if I understood yet my own accountability towards the state of our marriage when it got to the point I would cheat.

I am not blaming him or our marriages for my choices came from my own distorted reality, but what I am trying to to say is that distorted reality still had to be actively worked on to provide a new environment for a new relationship.

I honestly hadn’t expected to hurt him as much as it did. I had projected my own disconnection as the two of us experiencing the same things. So seeing how decimated he was I realized it was me who had been the utter fool.l who had thrown away what we were and any potential of what we could have been.

Of course I am not your wife, nor am I trying to speak for her. I am just saying it’s normal for you to question her love because of her actions. It’s also normal for her to have mixed motivations as long as they are motivating enough to create big lasting change. It’s her job to show you ober a long consistent period that you can trust her and that she undeniably loves you, or the opposite will shine through in time as well.

The truth is, if she does this work on herself she very well can become a person with a greater capacity for love, and if so that will be as clear to you as the work you can clearly see is happening now. You are in a very heightened state, your bs meter is probably set on high right now and will be for years to come. I think you will know.

She has taken the trust out of your relationship and the basis of your question is really can you trust her. The answer is no, not yet, that has to be rebuilt. You can however trust yourself. Lean into that. See that you are getting what you need, know you have your own back. It’s healthy you know you can divorce and be okay, because that makes your motivations be less about fear. Keep track of your motivation, needs, feelings, etc. and as long as you want her there and she is consistently working, she is going to be putting drops into two very big buckets. One is for trust and love, the other for doubt and detachment.At some point one will weigh a lot more than the other and you will have your answer.

[This message edited by hikingout at 6:14 AM, Wednesday, May 13th]

Gemmy, you're not posting too much. If anything, I think most of us appreciate your posts. Even some of the vets here have commented appreciatively on your writing style and ability to articulate your feelings. I've taken snippets and sections from one or two of your posts and read them to my wife because I really relate to what you've said. You describe how I feel better than I can sometimes.

I'm only a year out, so while this isn't as fresh to me as it is you, I'm still struggling with many of the same thoughts and questions you are. Would she still be meeting him every week for a hookup if I hadn't discovered it so soon? Did she "choose" me because I'm what's more familiar and dependable? Does she really love me? That one still keeps me up at night sometimes. She says she does. Her actions seem to back that up, but how can I really know?

My wife's AP groomed her for weeks before she broke down and gave in. Well,"broke down" might be giving her a little too much credit. She loved it. She knew and worked with him for years before he started messaging her over Facebook and showered her with unrealistic levels of empathy, understanding and compliments. Good lord, he laid it on thick, and she soaked it up.

Turns out he's a real piece of work. He did and said some pretty stupid shit about his boss on social media. Got himself fired and trespassed from the company property. I guess he showed up shortly after and threw a fit. Screamed and yelled at some people, flipped them off, then got escorted off the property by the police. My wife had already transferred out so she didn't see it, but word travels fast through the work grapevine and she heard about it.

I was so tempted to send him a message letting him know I still have connections with the company. I wanted to ask him if he was enjoying his permanent vacation and point out that I know and used to work with his boss. The boss he posted some gnarly things about on Facebook that got him fired *wink-wink*, but I resisted the urge. I didn't actually have anything to do with it, but I sure could have led him to believe I did.

I've never confronted or said anything to the pos. I don't stalk his social media at all, and I think I'm probably better off for it. As it is, I can revel in his misery in private. He lost his girlfriend and his job within the space of a couple of months. Sometimes the karma bus does run over the right people.

Well… You yourself chose to remain married for stability.

@Bigger

I suppose to some degree we all marry for stability. I should look at this more through a wider lens and will try moving forward, but it is the hardest thing I have ever done in my life.

I don’t think this question is just another intrusive thought, it gets to the core of it. Most of us think of marriage (and even long term romantic arrangements) as a special relationship, not just another business entity. We pull away with revulsion from the idea that it is just a dressed up sort of prostitution, resources for sex and reproduction. When we are doing it right, we aren’t keeping score.

Infidelity destroys the specialness ethos that covered the relationship. Like stripping the panels off a Corvette, the illusion breaks and what was once was an object of dreams is revealed for the raw machine underneath. I suppose in my metaphor that it can be made whole again. But it’s much easier to break a thing than fix it again.

She has given you the most definitive proof in action one could imagine that she didn’t love you in the way you wanted to be loved. Multiple affairs, spanning the relationship, cruelty during the discovery process. While I think pity is commendable, you feeling bad for doubting her in the face of her recent effort isn’t helpful to your cause. You have every reason in the world to doubt her, you would be a fool not to.

People here say that the specialness can return, so I believe it’s possible. But it does not come easy, and you are very early in your journey. Have patience. Don’t be ashamed of your feelings generated by this immense betrayal, but do act in ways that reflect your best values. If you do that, you will come out of this crucible with your head held high, no matter the outcome.

Gammy, I see your wife as deeply sick throughout her whole adult life. I doubt that she has enough insight into her internal state to really know what drives her. On the other hand the amount of change that you expect her to undergo and that she declares the willingness to make is so large that it is almost irrelevant what goes through her head right now. What's relevant is if she can and will make these changes and that is what I would focus on. Observe and draw conclusions from her actions.

[This message edited by Itiswhatitis000 at 4:25 PM, Wednesday, May 13th]

I've always pondered this question the other way around. How do you know a WS actually wants marriage?

Maybe I'm too simple or think in black and white, but it is hard for me to get my head around why someone would want their marriage AND dating on the side. It seems like you would be complicating your life and making it harder to maintain either one of those lifestyles. And you're not getting the full benefits of either, especially marriage.

I think I could be perfectly happy being married to a different spouse. It's easy for me to think my spouse could too, if being married is what they want. I don't really think about myself as special, and being chosen is an action that is ongoing.

There was a happily married older couple I met about 20 years ago. They had adult children. They lived on a small island off the mainland that he grew up on and was from a prominent large family there. He was a fisherman and owned a shipyard. When he was a certain age, he decided he wanted to marry. He started dating a woman from the mainland. After dating a year or so, she said she didn't want to leave her family and move to the island. The next woman he started dating was his wife. He told her that they would date for x months as a trial period, and then get married and live on the island and raise a family. If she wasn't interested in that proposition, he didn't want to date. That makes sense to me.

I don’t think this question is just another intrusive thought, it gets to the core of it.

Amen.

It took me a while to figure out my core concerns, but they came down to 3 questions:

Do you love me?
Are you in love with me?
Will you be monogamous from now on?

'Are you in love with me' actually meant 'Do you desire me and only me sexually?'

My approach was to ask my questions, especially the ones that had potential answers that scared me. I was willing to work for a marriage in which my W could and would answer 'Yes' to all 3/4 questions. I was not willing to settle for any 'No' answer.

I'm for figuring out your requirements for R and how you'll know if the requirements are being met or not. I'm for laying those requirements out for one's WS, negotiating an agreement, getting buy-in from both parties, monitoring the KPIs (key performance indicators), and adjusting as appropriate.

I don't know if your W can give honest answers yet, because I don't think she knows herself well enough. She did, however, choose you at a couple of important junctures, and you chose her. So 'yeses' are very possible. And she sems to be confronting her life with a desire to change.

No matter what, though, you're asking the right questions, IMO. R takes time. It takes time even to know if R will work, so you have to be willing to spend that time if you want to R. I always knew that one possible outcome for my M to plainsong was for us to find out we, or one of us, didn't really want to spend the rest of our life together. But I figured we'd at least learn a lot of useful things in the process.

*****

In asking my 3 questions, I had to figure out how I'd know if she loved and desired me and how I'd know if she was going to be monogamous. The answer I came up with was 'consistent behavior over time' and 'meeting small commitments was the best indicator that she'd meet big ones.'

Gemmy,

I know exactly how you feel as I heard my wife tell her lover that she could not take a chance on breaking up the family and losing her kids and grandkids. Not once was my name brought up. That had sat in my mind for a couple years. I truly believe if I would not have discovered the infidelity it would have continued till one of us had died. My wife lacked the courage and the strength to end it and as the years went by she fell out of love with me and fell in love with him. I do believe on Dday that she had no emotional connection to me and went for family and stability. I do believe over time as she cleared the fog and the affair attachment that she, in some way came to her senses. We cannot control how our spouses think and feel and right now after infidelity we both wish we had that superpower. I slowly realized there is so much in life that we can't control and that we rely heavily on trust, honesty, communication and action in our relationships and marriage. The more you analyze and look back at infidelity the more you miss of living life in the present. Like your wife, my wife is doing the work and shows her love and appreciation for me. We may never know how our wives truly feel but we can see it more clearly now in their actions and work. Actions speak louder than words. Over time you need to let go of the past and don't let it ruin the future. Infidelity never goes away completely as it is a traumatic event but it can fade over time if you keep moving forward. Gemmy, this is not how either of us expected our marriage to go but we can choose how to proceed in the present.

Lost1313

I would also tell you how appreciative of your writing I am. You have a knack for being able to examine an issue deeply but also not conflate it with psychobabble! Post 9000 times a day if you want.

I don’t think anyone could give you a real answer to your question. I don’t think most can answer that question for themselves even.

I can make suggestions that may give you some ideas.
If I put myself in your situation, with an eye towards giving her a chance I’d probably think about and do the following.

I’d ask to Grant me a favorable divorce, you’re now downgraded to gf and I will TRY to work towards
A new marriage contingent on you getting yourself straightened out. That doesn’t just mean counseling to deal with your behavior issues. It also means a psychiatrist (as I’m sure you’ve thought theres more going on in her brain than just a run of the mill serial cheater)
Whether you stay residing together or separate should be your call.
Think about what other consequences you can apply that would convince you that’s she’s there for you and not because you’re the safest choice.
Very easy to say, much much harder to determine what those consequences should be. Almost everytime there is a cheating situation and the WS faces no or barely any consequences of their actions, they give themselves permission to do it again. Why not? They’ve determined worse case their spouse will put them in the dog house for just a short while.

I've always pondered this question the other way around. How do you know a WS actually wants marriage?

I think that is valid too. I had come to believe marriage was a place where I gave a lot more than I got. I couldn’t see that was primarily my own fault for not asking for what I want, or hell, not even knowing what I want. I just wanted him to know what I wanted and needed and give it to me naturally I wasnt interested in marriage based on that experience.

However, for me the affair was not about dating, it was about escapism and distraction because I was too cowardly to face the situation head on. It was about seeing if someone could love me for me. I cringe writing that because the stupidest place anyone can look for that is in an affair. And I do mean the stupidest. I was looking for validation in an extremely skewed and deceptive place.

I do not think real dating is always to find marriage though. Should something ever happen to my husband, I know I do not have a desire to get married again (which is why I think your question is so astute). I have found a way to make space enough for myself in relationships, and my marriage is harmonious and I truly enjoy spending time with him. But after that, I would be one to find another person who also wasn’t interested in marriage or cohabitation even, just someone to spend time with and have a steady monogamous sexual relationship mostly because I believe in the health benefits. That also sounds cringe, but being honest sometimes lands that way.

I hope this wasn’t a thread jack but I was very intrigued by KD’s post and thought those black and white thoughts were not so far off.

[This message edited by hikingout at 7:08 PM, Wednesday, May 13th]

I do not think real dating is always to find marriage though. Should something ever happen to my husband, I know I do not have a desire to get married again (which is why I think your question is so astute). I have found a way to make space enough for myself in relationships, and my marriage is harmonious and I truly enjoy spending time with him. But after that, I would be one to find another person who also wasn’t interested in marriage or cohabitation even

Absolutely. I agree with this. That was partly my point with the story. That man knew he was interested in marriage and pursued it. He didn't want dating. I personally would also not marry again at my age. It's hard to picture cohabitation too.

I still had a hard time understanding wanting both with marriage and dating. I asked questions every which way about why not divorce if you want to pursue dating for any reason. My WS insists he didn't think of leaving the marriage. Still, I don't think like he does, and it's confusing for me.

I imagine your age and your children's ages factor into this, as well as your financial situation. Yet, my WS seemed genuinely unconcerned about our teenage children experiencing divorce, and it harming their life in any manner. I cried many tears over that.

[This message edited by KitchenDepth5551 at 7:54 PM, Wednesday, May 13th]

I think that it’s because you think of it as dating maybe. When I see that I don’t relate to it at all. Dating to me is you have choices, you are interviewing them for likely a relationship or you casually just would like more sexual partners.

The drive for an affair doesn’t come from the motivations that dating does exactly.

Generally speaking, this is a closeted situation with someone who is convenient rather than selected. Either chosen because of proximity and inappropriate boundaries (the opportunity fell in their lap and probably hit at a time where there was more vulnerability towards it- such as a midlife thing or a death close to them or something that has caused them to wrestle with their own mortality/desirability) or it’s even more random than that (hiring prostitutes, using web sites to find people who do not mind being with married people because of wanting more and different sexual experiences) I suppose there is a third kind in which the ap is someone they dated or wanted to date in the past and they have some narrative in their head about that person that was based in fantasy due to the unrequited aspect of the relationship, but I think that is still just a subtype of number one.

In my case it was the first. Proximity, opportunity, and riding escapism. There never was a moment where I was like I am going to start dating. Generally, it’s just a selfish decision to get more of something—-sex, attention, validation, the ability to be someone you are not. It’s a very instable feeling of you don’t really know what you are doing past the minute you are in. I never thought the ap was going to be my real life relationship. I did get addicted to the affair feelings, but I wasn’t interested in having a real life relationship with him, I was using him and he was using me.

Had I been an unmarried woman interested in dating, I would have met different people and found someone I enjoyed being around. This was more about getting attention and self adulation. It’s transactional and not based in maturity or realism. The motivations are so much darker, and not at all like dating.

Your husband wanted stability with you and to get these unhealthy needs met with her.There were times I told myself this outlet was good for me, or it might improve my marriage—-in other words affairs are not rooted in logic at all, they are rooted in quite a lot of unconscious issues and thoughts. You can not find logic in it because it doesn’t exist. It’s all selfishness, avoidance, hidden, and being rewarded with predictable brain chemistry.

[This message edited by hikingout at 8:13 PM, Wednesday, May 13th]

@Ohitsyou

Almost everytime there is a cheating situation and the WS faces no or barely any consequences of their actions, they give themselves permission to do it again. Why not? They’ve determined worse case their spouse will put them in the dog house for just a short while.

This right here is what I fear is going to happen, my only reprise is that it was her first time getting caught.