I wrote this on another forum in 2011:
This is long but these stories usually are. I have been a fairly active poster over the past couple months as I continue to recover from my wife's cheating. We married very young (she was 17, I was 18) although each of us had sexual relationships in high school. We had been dating a few months when she got pregnant and we both decided we wanted the child and that we should get married. It was a great decision to keep the child, but a very bad decision to marry.
After 6 years of fighting & stress, we decided to separate. I blamed the marriage for problems I was having with anxiety and panic attacks and wanted to change my life. After about 3 months living apart we decided to give our marriage another try and I moved back home. I hadn't dated or had sex with anyone during our separation. She went out with an old flame a few times but told me that nothing happened because the old feelings were gone. I believed her because there was no reason to lie and I wouldn't have thought of it as cheating since our intentions at that time were to divorce.
Over the next couple of months things were better and I thought we had made the right decision to give our marriage another try. She had a vacation planned with her parents & family that was booked while we were separated so I stayed with our son for the week that she was gone. I picked her up at the airport when she returned and I immediately felt something was wrong. I asked her and she told me that she had met someone and that our marriage was over. She wanted me to move out right away since that person was driving to move in with her in our apartment. I was stunned. Shocked. I was able to drive her home & drop her off and I told her I'd pick up my things some other time. I then parked the car and cried. I'm a really tough guy but this was a real punch in the gut. I called my brother for a place to stay and he welcomed me - no questions asked - for as long as I needed.
I was a zombie for a few days and then I decided I wasn't going to just roll over and die so I called my wife and told her I wanted to see my son and pick up my things. My heart was broken and I felt so betrayed but I refused to let this crush my spirit and believed that time would pass and I would heal. I vowed to hate her forever and I told her I never wanted to see or talk to her again other than to exchange logistical stuff about our son. We agreed to every weekend and I would pick him up Friday and drop him off Sunday evening. All exchanges would consist of me pulling up and honking the horn and him walking out with his little overnight bag. No contact with the cheating *****.
Two or three weeks later I was dropping my son off after our weekend together and my wife told me I had me to come in for some reason. I didn't see the OM's car around so I obliged her. I should point out that I was an ex-boxer and all-around tough guy and the temptation to beat the sh!t out of the OM was strong, but I truly didn't blame him at that point in time. This was all on my wife and I didn't want to beat up some guy just because he wanted to get laid. Anyway, when I came in she acted very different and wanted to hug me. I stiffened but she held on to me. She told me she had sent the guy packing and that she now knew that she loved me and only me and that she wanted me to move back home right now. More shock on my part. I had been through hell for the past 3 weeks and was determined to tough it out and put this cheating **** out of my mind forever. But now she was crying and telling me she loved me and wanted only me and please, please come home. I caved. I was so sick and tired of hurting and it just felt good to have her love me and want me. I thought about how good it would be to wake with my son every day. She was all over me and we were in the bedroom within a few minutes having sex.
When we were finished she told me that she had been with two guys. One was a ONS and the other the guy she "fell" for and allowed to move in with her. She told me that the experiences were great for her in that she learned a lot about herself and sex with other people and how lucky she was to have me. Absolutely zero remorse because in her mind we were still separated so she had license to screw around as much as she wanted to. The fact was we were living together again working to reconcile our marriage and I thought we were making good progress. I didn't know what to do or how to feel. I was really confused because it felt like she cheated. The whoring around she did on vacation knowing that I was dutifully taking care of our child and household was wrong. When I told her how I felt she would have none of it and told me that it was an important "awakening" for her and that it was my problem if I couldn't understand that. I told her I wasn't sure I could live with what she had done but that I would try to see it from her perspective. I reminded her that I had not dated or screwed anyone since the day we met and that what she did seemed wrong to me. She finally did apologize for hurting me, but didn't see it as cheating and believed it was a positive learning experience for her.
Over the years that followed this became more and more of a problem for me. I tried to keep it bottled up in the back of my mind and we had two more kids together. Every time I brought this up she went into pure gaslighting mode. She stuck to her view of the story for many years and basically told me to "get over it" countless times. So I would keep my feelings under wraps as long as I could and then something would trigger them and we would have the same fight over and over again. I became more and more ashamed of myself for not leaving her once I got over the shock of it all and realized what she had done. I was angry that I cared for this woman enough to swallow the hurt, anger and outrage and considered suicide many times. The fact that she was true to me (as far as I know - she would never admit it) from then on and has been a good mother to our children only complicates the situation. All facts point to her truly believing she did nothing wrong screwing these guys because it was a valuable "learning experience". Her half-hearted apologies for "hurting me" never meant a thing to me because she simply was not sorry for what she had done and didn't see it as wrong.
Now it's been thirty years and this wound has not healed. I've been in therapy for years and recently began seeing a new psychologist and finally began to talk about this. I still feel a tremendous amount of shame along with the anger and hurt. My Dr. has assured me that in her practice she has seen many people who struggle with their partner’s infidelity for many, many years. That "surviving" infidelity is a process with many ups and downs over a very long period of time. That the BS may believe they have dealt with the situation and forgiven the WS and years later something can trigger all the emotions again and the pain, anger and shame wash over the person in waves.
I now am quite direct with my wife and have told her that she was selfish, uncaring, and callous when she decided to experience sex with other men while we were married. It has been a difficult issue because it is not what I would call "typical" infidelity and that has made it more difficult for both of us to work on. We have now cut through the bull**** and she claims she realizes that what she did was selfish, hurtful and, most importantly, wrong. She admits that she fought the idea that it was cheating because she thinks of herself as a good person who would never do anything so horrible. She tells me it is hard for her to admit the truth, but that she knows it was wrong and is now sorry for what she did. The problem for me remains believing her. I think that now she would say anything to keep me from divorcing her. I have decided that if I am not able to find some inner resolution to this within the next year or so that I am going to either leave her.
UPDATE as of summer 2016: The past 5 years have only complicated things more. I was making some progress toward acceptance and understanding the whole situation back then for what it was. It was still very hard for me and my triggers increased during that time as I finally faced my emotions but I did think I was making progress toward healing whether that meant staying with her or leaving. Then my daughter started using heroin and we had to rescue our 3 year-old grandson. That became a legal battle that we finally won in court in fall of 2014. He’s been with us ever since. He’s been through a lot and I would die before I would risk harming his feeling of love & security.
So I’m staying and trying to make the best out of those areas of our life that do not cause me pain. I see a counselor weekly and that helps – but my shame for the horrible decision I made after d-day is worse than ever. I will always advocate that a BH divorce his WW because I don’t believe true reconciliation is possible for most men. They will survive but cannot thrive. Be strong and start a new life without the horrible burden of infidelity dragging you down.
A final note: if my story is not clear about this let me say that I told exactly one person about this when it happened. It was the pastor of our church whom I had become to respect a great deal - and that's saying a lot for an atheist. I've had probably a dozen counselors since that time and I never revealed it to any of them until my current counselor. That's the depth of my shame - I couldn't even tell my therapist what I had been through. I strongly believe that if I could have opened up to a therapist things would be a lot different now. If this forum had existed back then things would be a lot different now.
This is long but these stories usually are. I have been a fairly active poster over the past couple months as I continue to recover from my wife's cheating. We married very young (she was 17, I was 18) although each of us had sexual relationships in high school. We had been dating a few months when she got pregnant and we both decided we wanted the child and that we should get married. It was a great decision to keep the child, but a very bad decision to marry.
After 6 years of fighting & stress, we decided to separate. I blamed the marriage for problems I was having with anxiety and panic attacks and wanted to change my life. After about 3 months living apart we decided to give our marriage another try and I moved back home. I hadn't dated or had sex with anyone during our separation. She went out with an old flame a few times but told me that nothing happened because the old feelings were gone. I believed her because there was no reason to lie and I wouldn't have thought of it as cheating since our intentions at that time were to divorce.
Over the next couple of months things were better and I thought we had made the right decision to give our marriage another try. She had a vacation planned with her parents & family that was booked while we were separated so I stayed with our son for the week that she was gone. I picked her up at the airport when she returned and I immediately felt something was wrong. I asked her and she told me that she had met someone and that our marriage was over. She wanted me to move out right away since that person was driving to move in with her in our apartment. I was stunned. Shocked. I was able to drive her home & drop her off and I told her I'd pick up my things some other time. I then parked the car and cried. I'm a really tough guy but this was a real punch in the gut. I called my brother for a place to stay and he welcomed me - no questions asked - for as long as I needed.
I was a zombie for a few days and then I decided I wasn't going to just roll over and die so I called my wife and told her I wanted to see my son and pick up my things. My heart was broken and I felt so betrayed but I refused to let this crush my spirit and believed that time would pass and I would heal. I vowed to hate her forever and I told her I never wanted to see or talk to her again other than to exchange logistical stuff about our son. We agreed to every weekend and I would pick him up Friday and drop him off Sunday evening. All exchanges would consist of me pulling up and honking the horn and him walking out with his little overnight bag. No contact with the cheating *****.
Two or three weeks later I was dropping my son off after our weekend together and my wife told me I had me to come in for some reason. I didn't see the OM's car around so I obliged her. I should point out that I was an ex-boxer and all-around tough guy and the temptation to beat the sh!t out of the OM was strong, but I truly didn't blame him at that point in time. This was all on my wife and I didn't want to beat up some guy just because he wanted to get laid. Anyway, when I came in she acted very different and wanted to hug me. I stiffened but she held on to me. She told me she had sent the guy packing and that she now knew that she loved me and only me and that she wanted me to move back home right now. More shock on my part. I had been through hell for the past 3 weeks and was determined to tough it out and put this cheating **** out of my mind forever. But now she was crying and telling me she loved me and wanted only me and please, please come home. I caved. I was so sick and tired of hurting and it just felt good to have her love me and want me. I thought about how good it would be to wake with my son every day. She was all over me and we were in the bedroom within a few minutes having sex.
When we were finished she told me that she had been with two guys. One was a ONS and the other the guy she "fell" for and allowed to move in with her. She told me that the experiences were great for her in that she learned a lot about herself and sex with other people and how lucky she was to have me. Absolutely zero remorse because in her mind we were still separated so she had license to screw around as much as she wanted to. The fact was we were living together again working to reconcile our marriage and I thought we were making good progress. I didn't know what to do or how to feel. I was really confused because it felt like she cheated. The whoring around she did on vacation knowing that I was dutifully taking care of our child and household was wrong. When I told her how I felt she would have none of it and told me that it was an important "awakening" for her and that it was my problem if I couldn't understand that. I told her I wasn't sure I could live with what she had done but that I would try to see it from her perspective. I reminded her that I had not dated or screwed anyone since the day we met and that what she did seemed wrong to me. She finally did apologize for hurting me, but didn't see it as cheating and believed it was a positive learning experience for her.
Over the years that followed this became more and more of a problem for me. I tried to keep it bottled up in the back of my mind and we had two more kids together. Every time I brought this up she went into pure gaslighting mode. She stuck to her view of the story for many years and basically told me to "get over it" countless times. So I would keep my feelings under wraps as long as I could and then something would trigger them and we would have the same fight over and over again. I became more and more ashamed of myself for not leaving her once I got over the shock of it all and realized what she had done. I was angry that I cared for this woman enough to swallow the hurt, anger and outrage and considered suicide many times. The fact that she was true to me (as far as I know - she would never admit it) from then on and has been a good mother to our children only complicates the situation. All facts point to her truly believing she did nothing wrong screwing these guys because it was a valuable "learning experience". Her half-hearted apologies for "hurting me" never meant a thing to me because she simply was not sorry for what she had done and didn't see it as wrong.
Now it's been thirty years and this wound has not healed. I've been in therapy for years and recently began seeing a new psychologist and finally began to talk about this. I still feel a tremendous amount of shame along with the anger and hurt. My Dr. has assured me that in her practice she has seen many people who struggle with their partner’s infidelity for many, many years. That "surviving" infidelity is a process with many ups and downs over a very long period of time. That the BS may believe they have dealt with the situation and forgiven the WS and years later something can trigger all the emotions again and the pain, anger and shame wash over the person in waves.
I now am quite direct with my wife and have told her that she was selfish, uncaring, and callous when she decided to experience sex with other men while we were married. It has been a difficult issue because it is not what I would call "typical" infidelity and that has made it more difficult for both of us to work on. We have now cut through the bull**** and she claims she realizes that what she did was selfish, hurtful and, most importantly, wrong. She admits that she fought the idea that it was cheating because she thinks of herself as a good person who would never do anything so horrible. She tells me it is hard for her to admit the truth, but that she knows it was wrong and is now sorry for what she did. The problem for me remains believing her. I think that now she would say anything to keep me from divorcing her. I have decided that if I am not able to find some inner resolution to this within the next year or so that I am going to either leave her.
UPDATE as of summer 2016: The past 5 years have only complicated things more. I was making some progress toward acceptance and understanding the whole situation back then for what it was. It was still very hard for me and my triggers increased during that time as I finally faced my emotions but I did think I was making progress toward healing whether that meant staying with her or leaving. Then my daughter started using heroin and we had to rescue our 3 year-old grandson. That became a legal battle that we finally won in court in fall of 2014. He’s been with us ever since. He’s been through a lot and I would die before I would risk harming his feeling of love & security.
So I’m staying and trying to make the best out of those areas of our life that do not cause me pain. I see a counselor weekly and that helps – but my shame for the horrible decision I made after d-day is worse than ever. I will always advocate that a BH divorce his WW because I don’t believe true reconciliation is possible for most men. They will survive but cannot thrive. Be strong and start a new life without the horrible burden of infidelity dragging you down.
A final note: if my story is not clear about this let me say that I told exactly one person about this when it happened. It was the pastor of our church whom I had become to respect a great deal - and that's saying a lot for an atheist. I've had probably a dozen counselors since that time and I never revealed it to any of them until my current counselor. That's the depth of my shame - I couldn't even tell my therapist what I had been through. I strongly believe that if I could have opened up to a therapist things would be a lot different now. If this forum had existed back then things would be a lot different now.