# Betrayed by my Spouse and Best Friend



## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

My wife and I met thirty-two years ago. We were teenagers, she was a rising senior in high school and I had just graduated. Her father died when she was twelve and I met her when she was seventeen and have been with her since. It really was love at first sight. We dated long distance for several years with our relationship becoming more serious over time. We married in 1992, six years after we met. 
We had our first child in 1996 and our second in 1999. My career was going well and we lived comfortably. I changed things up with my job so I could spend more time with my family, and we lived the prototypical suburban life: two kids, two jobs, two dogs, a mortgage, and so on. 
About fifteen years into the marriage, we were living parallel lives. We attended to the kids' needs, but we spent more time parenting than being good spouses. We were living in the same house, but our lives were disconnected. Over time, our intimacy faded to the point we were not particularly close emotionally and our sex life suffered. 
In 2010, eighteen years into our marriage, I had a sudden health emergency that left me dead for five minutes. It was traumatic emotionally for everyone. Physically I recovered very quickly, and fully, but the brush with my mortality exposed all the weaknesses in our marriage. I wanted to be happy, right now, and anyone who wasn't with me on that was not on "my team." My wife struggled to fit in, because she wanted to nurture me and protect me and I wanted to live on a high wire. 
Quite by accident, I reconnected platonically with a woman for whom I had long had a "married crush." She confided in me her plan to divorce and I shared with her my marital struggles. We talked too much, about too many things, for about a month before we realized it was not a good idea. We broke contact, but not before my wife suspected an affair. I never had physical contact with my friend, not of any kind, but my wife absolutely believed that this relationship had become a full blown affair. It wasn't, but she believed it was. 
By this time, my wife had sought comfort with my best friend. He lived out of town, but they texted often. The three of us had been close since college, so twenty years of friendship between us. He was in our wedding. He was my children's godfather, and "uncle." I trusted him with my wife without reservation. Unfortunately, my trust in him was misplaced. 
My wife's relationship with him escalated to an emotional (electronic) affair shortly after my medical issue and moved quickly. Under cover of a long planned trip, my wife began a physical affair with him in October 2010. Shortly thereafter, I discovered inappropriate emails that betrayed at least an emotional affair, and my wife's statement that she wanted to divorce me and that she "loved him with all her heart." I confronted them both about it, they conceded the inappropriate emotional connection but adamantly denied a physical affair. 
I resolved that a physical affair was likely but that even if it had happened, I would forgive them both. After all, I had likewise become emotionally entangled with another woman and I wanted to move forward with my wife to be happy together. I believed that we mutually forgave one another for our contemporaneous wrongs to one another, and committed to our marriage. 
I did. She didn't. She carried on her long distance affair, emotionally and physically, for the next year until my friend moved to our neighborhood with a job change. They continued their affair for another year after that, into 2013. I was unaware of it. I was well aware my wife and I were on the verge of divorce, but I thought we were just having ongoing disconnection between us. Foolishly, it never occurred to me to think perhaps my wife was ****ing my friend and that might be part of the problem. 
It seems to me that it was a limerent affair, in which they operated in an alternate fantasy land where I was the bad guy and they were destined to be together, soulmates denied connection until midlife. Until, they got to spend a lot of time together and my wife realized he had so many issues that made him insufferable that she came out of the fog. He demanded they continue the affair, but she broke it off. He moved away and severed all ties with our family. Good riddance, by then, I thought, because he had become a real jerk to everyone. 
My marriage improved markedly over the next five years, all the while I was unaware of my wife's long term affair. She became the wife every man would want. She took interest in my hobbies, she fed me well, she turned up the sex to fulfill every want I could imagine. We returned to truly enjoying one another in every sense of the word. 
And then I had a dream. In the dream, my friend and my wife had resumed the affair I thought they had had many years ago. I woke up and told my wife, "in my dream, you were ****ing X again." Now keep in mind, I had only confronted her about it once, in 2010, and she had denied it. This dream is in 2018. For eight years, after her denial, I never accused her again. When I said, "in my dream, you were ****ing X again," the look on her face, and her failure to quickly deny ever ****ing him, told me everything I needed to know. She had ****ed him. We both knew we were going to have to have a discussion that included her confession. 
It lingered for a month or so before the time was right for that conversation. Ironically, that conversation occurred at our anniversary dinner to celebrate 26 years of marriage. She confessed that night to the affair, and gave up most of the details. 
However, partly because of the passage of time and partly because she began to trickle truth me, it was not until six months later, and my efforts to reconstruct the timeline independently with occasional questions to her, that she finally put it all out there. In the mean time, the nagging feeling that even in 2018 my wife was lying to me about ****ing my friend was deeply troubling to me. I finally told her that if she wanted to stay married, she had to sit down with me and go through it all until I was confident she had admitted everything. We did that in November 2018. 
It's been agony to know that my wife ****ed my best friend for over two years, did it under my nose, concealed it for five years, and then slow walked the truth for six months. She's remorseful, she's finally admitted everything as best I can tell, and we are going to try to reconcile. Still, I have moments where I want to find X and make him regret what he did or pack my wife's stuff and put her on the street. I love my wife, and I think we are going to live happily ever after, but it won't be without great effort.


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## Talk2Me (Mar 22, 2019)

Wow, that's awful. How do you ever trust her again? You're a better man than I am because I would have kicked her out immediately.


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## Andy1001 (Jun 29, 2016)

Is your self esteem is in the gutter? 
Do you enjoy life as plan B?
If your former friend hadn’t developed “issues” your wife would still be ****ing him under your nose. She never admitted to anything until you caught her unawares the night you had the dream. 
She is a good prospect to have another affair if she’s not already cheating, because let’s face it,your observancy skills aren’t the best. 
I would like to know your definition of happy ever after because it appears your wife got to screw around for a few years while you were tricked into thinking her affair was over. So at least one of you is happy. 
One thing I would like to know.If you had had your health episode again while your wife was the only person around do you think she would help you?
I wish you luck,you’re going to need it.


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## StillSearching (Feb 8, 2013)

" I think we are going to live happily ever after,".....really?
How would you define that??


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## Yeswecan (Jul 25, 2014)

There is no remorse. Only sorry she was caught.


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## BioFury (Jul 9, 2015)

I'm very sorry you've gone through this. I hope everything works out for the best.


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## Ragnar Ragnasson (Mar 4, 2018)

StillSearching said:


> " I think we are going to live happily ever after,".....really?
> How would you define that??


This is the real question. 

How would you define that?


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

Talk2Me said:


> Wow, that's awful. How do you ever trust her again? You're a better man than I am because I would have kicked her out immediately.


If I had discovered the affair closer to the end of it, I might very well have moved to divorce quickly. 

I trust her because, while I didn’t know the real motive, she has behaved impeccably since 2012.


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## Oldtimer (May 25, 2018)

I like the thought usually of reconciliation, but your situation begs the question.... WHY?


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## StillSearching (Feb 8, 2013)

Rocinante67 said:


> *If I had discovered the affair closer to the end of it*, I might very well have moved to divorce quickly.
> 
> I trust her because, while I didn’t know the real motive, she has behaved impeccably since 2012.


This is funny brother.
You have no idea when in the time frame of the affair you found out.

"while I DON"T STILL know the real motive" fixed that for you.
"she has behaved impeccably since 2012"...now speaking from my experience, I'd like you to break this down and tell us and yourself exactly what this means?

You are trying to convince yourself that the ghost you live with, is the ideal woman in your dreams.
I know I did that for 20 years.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

Andy1001 said:


> Is your self esteem is in the gutter?
> Do you enjoy life as plan B?
> If your former friend hadn’t developed “issues” your wife would still be ****ing him under your nose. She never admitted to anything until you caught her unawares the night you had the dream.
> She is a good prospect to have another affair if she’s not already cheating, because let’s face it,your observancy skills aren’t the best.
> ...



I’m a resilient guy. For sure there have been bouts of doubt but in general I’m winning at life. 

The “plan B” thing is tough. No getting around the fact that for a while I was certainly not her priority. That’s clearly not the case now, and hasn’t been since 2013. 

The affair collapsed under its own weight. When he moved to our community, all illusions permitted by distance vanished. She could compare me to him in the same context. He was never going to “win” that fight. 

I don’t believe she could or would do it again. The situation that permitted this to happen was a perfect storm of history, opportunity and circumstance. 

My wife has, in fact, stood by me through subsequent health issues. 

I’m happy because I have a wife who has made amends and who is highly motivated to be a great wife.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

Oldtimer said:


> I like the thought usually of reconciliation, but your situation begs the question.... WHY?


Because we have spent thirty three years together, only some of which were marred by her misconduct. We have thoroughly intertwined families. Our shared history outweighs her sin. I am optimistic that we will be happy. I’ve done the math, my life is better with her than without.


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## StillSearching (Feb 8, 2013)

Rocinante67 said:


> Because we have spent thirty three years together, only some of which were marred by her misconduct. We have thoroughly intertwined families. Our shared history outweighs her sin. I am optimistic that we will be happy. I’ve done the math, my life is better with her than without.


I get your idealism.
I was married 25 years.
So tell us....Why are you here then??

"my life is better with her than without"....this you cannot know, can you?


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

Rocinante67 said:


> I’ve done the math, my life is better with her than without.


In all honesty, Sir, that's the bottom line. Only you can say this, and all of life's circumstance sets present us with "tradeoffs"..... you seem to have found a complete reconciliation with your wife.

These are stories that I love to hear.... mine failed, but I know that if the cheater is repentant, there's a good chance for reconciliation.....and I'm really happy for you and your wife.



Rocinante67 said:


> Our shared history outweighs her sin.


That, Sir, is the biblical model of God's love for us. Your wife is a very fortunate woman to have you for her husband. May He bless every remaining moment of your lives together.


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## Satisfied Mind (Jan 29, 2019)

Rocinante67 said:


> I trust her because, while I didn’t know the real motive, she has behaved impeccably since 2012.


If this was anyone but your wife, would you describe someone who lied by omission for years about repeatedly banging and carrying on a relationship with their spouse's best friend as "behaving impeccably"? 



Rocinante67 said:


> My marriage improved markedly over the next five years, all the while I was unaware of my wife's long term affair. She became the wife every man would want. She took interest in my hobbies, she fed me well, she turned up the sex to fulfill every want I could imagine. We returned to truly enjoying one another in every sense of the word.


Have you acknowledged that her actions during these five years was due at least in large part to the guilt she felt for her affair and her attempt to make up for it? That those 5 years of your life were a lie?



Rocinante67 said:


> I don’t believe she could or would do it again.


Look, I'm not trying to point these things out (there are others as well) to dump on your wife. I'm pointing them out because we have seen what happens when someone rugsweeps their spouse's affair, and I would like to spare you that pain. The chances of recidivism are extremely high in cases of rugsweeping. Everyone is capable of cheating in the right circumstances (which I say as a 100% faithful spouse), and the fact that you aren't acknowledging that about your wife, even after she has proved to you that she's capable of cheating, is concerning. 

I'm not saying that you should hold her cheating over her head, but you need to be honest with yourself about the realities of your situation. You are married to a woman who didn't just have an affair, she did it for YEARS with your best friend. That is a particularly blatant betrayal. Then, she lied to you about it for five years, regardless of how much sex she was throwing your way at the time. Then, even when confronted, she took 6 months to come completely clean. Those are HUGE red flags when it comes to her character.

What has the reconciliation looked like for her? For you?


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

StillSearching said:


> This is funny brother.
> You have no idea when in the time frame of the affair you found out.”


Yes I do. Without doubt the affair began in 2010 and ended in 2013. Without doubt I learned of it in 2018.


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## syhoybenden (Feb 21, 2013)

Rocinante67 said:


> Without doubt the affair began in 2010 and ended in 2013. Without doubt I learned of it in 2018.


Please enlighten us. Exactly why and how "without doubt".


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## drifting on (Nov 22, 2013)

Rocinante67

You learned of the affair in 2018, she lied to say it was only an emotional affair, came clean after your dream, which took six months, but has remorse? Tell me, how do you describe this remorse?


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## drifting on (Nov 22, 2013)

What I’m trying to show you from my last post is this, she was content with that lie never seeing the light of day. She never came to you to confess. Had you not had this dream, would she have told you it was a physical affair? Ask her and put the answer here, I can tell you it was no, I can also tell you the guilt was eating her alive, think about that.


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## skerzoid (Feb 7, 2017)

Polygraph.


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## alte Dame (Aug 7, 2012)

Are you here just to tell your story? Or do you really want the wisdom of the collective to help guide you in some way?

You sound to me like someone who is captured by the sunk cost fallacy. The affair was long ago, you have so many years invested, etc.

It's very hard when you find out years later. It sounds like you always knew, though, given your dream. At the very least, you should talk about concrete consequences for her lying for so many years. If you're determined to stay, you should do what you can to affair-proof your marriage (to the degree that that can be done....)

I do think that she needs some consequences other than, "Hey, Honey, I love you even though I know you did a terrible thing some years ago and have lied about it ever since."

I would also be tempted to find a way to exact some consequences for the fake friend. That's just me.


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## BruceBanner (May 6, 2018)

Rocinante67 said:


> My wife and I met thirty-two years ago. We were teenagers, she was a rising senior in high school and I had just graduated. Her father died when she was twelve and I met her when she was seventeen and have been with her since. It really was love at first sight. We dated long distance for several years with our relationship becoming more serious over time. We married in 1992, six years after we met.
> We had our first child in 1996 and our second in 1999. My career was going well and we lived comfortably. I changed things up with my job so I could spend more time with my family, and we lived the prototypical suburban life: two kids, two jobs, two dogs, a mortgage, and so on.
> About fifteen years into the marriage, we were living parallel lives. We attended to the kids' needs, but we spent more time parenting than being good spouses. We were living in the same house, but our lives were disconnected. Over time, our intimacy faded to the point we were not particularly close emotionally and our sex life suffered.
> In 2010, eighteen years into our marriage, I had a sudden health emergency that left me dead for five minutes. It was traumatic emotionally for everyone. Physically I recovered very quickly, and fully, but the brush with my mortality exposed all the weaknesses in our marriage. I wanted to be happy, right now, and anyone who wasn't with me on that was not on "my team." My wife struggled to fit in, because she wanted to nurture me and protect me and I wanted to live on a high wire.
> ...


Why are you here; What type of advice are you seeking from this site? This sounds like more of a blog post than you really seeking any particular advice. You don't sound resolute enough to be willing to go through a divorce either.


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## Diana7 (Apr 19, 2016)

Rocinante67 said:


> Yes I do. Without doubt the affair began in 2010 and ended in 2013. Without doubt I learned of it in 2018.


The thing is that if you hadn't had that dream she would never have told you. That is not repentance.


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## PM1 (Aug 9, 2011)

I think all we can really ever do is try to put ourselves in your situation and describe how we would react. I think for me, aside from the mind-movies, the part that would eat at me over and over is never truly knowing whether I know everything. I think in your shoes, I'd have to have a polygraph, and even then...


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

Satisfied Mind said:


> If this was anyone but your wife, would you describe someone who lied by omission for years about repeatedly banging and carrying on a relationship with their spouse's best friend as "behaving impeccably"?
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I would be very skeptical if it were told to me. But I’ve lived it and seen it 24/7/365 for six years. 

Yes, I know her guilt drove a lot of her efforts. I have wondered if her guilt were exhausted will she make the effort just because a good spouse does that. I guess we will see. 

Yeah, the five years of lying by omission has been difficult for me. She denied me the opportunity to decide if I wanted to be in the same marriage that she knew she was in. Again, I weight the past six years of her actions far more heavily than her deceit. 

Sure, she could cheat again. But we aren’t now where we were then. We communicate better and our intimacy is much better. 

I have a better wife now than I did before the affair. I’ll take it.


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## MaiChi (Jun 20, 2018)

Rocinante67 said:


> My wife and I met thirty-two years ago. We were teenagers, she was a rising senior in high school and I had just graduated. Her father died when she was twelve and I met her when she was seventeen and have been with her since. It really was love at first sight. We dated long distance for several years with our relationship becoming more serious over time. We married in 1992, six years after we met.
> We had our first child in 1996 and our second in 1999. My career was going well and we lived comfortably. I changed things up with my job so I could spend more time with my family, and we lived the prototypical suburban life: two kids, two jobs, two dogs, a mortgage, and so on.
> About fifteen years into the marriage, we were living parallel lives. We attended to the kids' needs, but we spent more time parenting than being good spouses. We were living in the same house, but our lives were disconnected. Over time, our intimacy faded to the point we were not particularly close emotionally and our sex life suffered.
> In 2010, eighteen years into our marriage, I had a sudden health emergency that left me dead for five minutes. It was traumatic emotionally for everyone. Physically I recovered very quickly, and fully, but the brush with my mortality exposed all the weaknesses in our marriage. I wanted to be happy, right now, and anyone who wasn't with me on that was not on "my team." My wife struggled to fit in, because she wanted to nurture me and protect me and I wanted to live on a high wire.
> ...


What if she did what she did because she genuinely believed that you were doing the same elsewhere? When people confide in outsiders, things happen. You both had emotional affairs which means you were not faithful to each other. The fact that yours did not develop into sex is pure chance. The fact is you both were cheating. It is then unfair to say she cheated more. 

That is how I see it whatever the causes of the affairs.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

Your story has a lot of parallels to mine, and we are still together nearly 30 years later, and the happiest we have been. So it can be done, though it’s not easy and there is an element of luck involved.

A few suggestions. 

1. Make sure you are happy with the level of detail you have on what happened, and the level of verification you have done. Don’t leave things open for doubt.

2. It looks like you have already see there are positives and negatives about the relationship. I personally see that as mature, and seeking perfection as a fools errand (particularly since our ideas of perfect love are often shaped by illogical Hollywood nonsense.) But your heart matters. Don’t bury your feelings. Deal with them. 

3. The relationship as a whole needs work. In the past you didn’t always put the work in, don’t make that mistake again. 

4. Don’t be scared of divorce. Consider it, plan in a hard headed way what it would look like. This is for two reasons. Firstly, because it makes sure you are not scared of divorce if it becomes necessary. But secondly, it can make you appreciate what you have, provided you don’t get sucked into the fallacy that the grass is always greener in the other side of the fence. I see that in your posts, recognising good things as well as bad. My situation is the same, but if it happens again (not that I expect it to, but you can never totally rule it out) I would walk.

5. I think you are already doing this, but see what your wife did through the mirror of what you did in your emotional affair. That in no way excuses her, but it can help you understand the internal conflicts that led her to cheat. That becomes important in helping her deal with any issues that might lead to a repetition. Everyone has baggage. You can’t let that excuse repeated bad behaviour, but a life partnership in part means getting beside your partner and helping them overcome their baggage, as they help you with yours. Finding that place is one of the things that makes my marriage strong.


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## lifeistooshort (Mar 17, 2013)

I believe that true remorse here is complicated by the fact that your wife believes you had a physical affair. That's why you won't get true remorse from her.....a small part of her thinks you deserve it.

This must be addressed. While what she did was no doubt much worse, it wouldn't surprise me if deep down she resents you because of her belief that you had one. You know that phrase about the appearance of impropriety? You had a life altering medical event that your wife tried to help you through and then another woman shows up.

Consider what this looks like to her......it damaged her bond with you.

If you wanted to divorce her none of this would matter. Since you don't it's worth addressing.

How did your wife find out about the other woman? Did you tell her, or did she find out? Were you completely open? Did you deal with the damage that caused or did you rugsweep?

None of this justifies what she did, but if you want to really move forward in your marriage it should be addressed.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Talk2Me said:


> Wow, that's awful. How do you ever trust her again? You're a better man than I am because I would have kicked her out immediately.


There is nothing better about that.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Let me ask you this. If instead of emotionally abusing you like she did, lets say she hit you with a baseball bat, and say she said she did it because she was feeling lonely and unhappy with you, wanting to divorce or even that you cheated, would you stay with her? How about it she ran over you with her car? If you did would you say you are healthy and thinking correctly about it?

What's the difference?

"limerenance" just means "I am entitled to be an *******"



> She became the wife every man would want.


There is no healthy man in the world who would want a wife like yours. You need to be honest about who you wife really was during this time and who she is. She was cooking and having sex, but hiding and lying to you about ****ing your best friend. THAT and only THAT is who she was, you can't have one with out the other. So in that context is she the wife everyone would want? Seriously are you really saying that her ****ing your friend is worth her being nice to you know? Do you understand that many of us have wives like that who never ****ed our friends? 

That is part of your problem you are separating how your wife acted with you from who she is in private, but that is foolish. She is all of it and a terrible wife, she didn't just pay you back for your affair but had one with your best friend and did it for years. She should have just divorced you or at least divorced you when she decided to stay in the affair when you found out. If she was here then I would be telling her as much. She had a right to be angry but this is too much. Plus I don't buy the, "It was revenge" stuff. People don't have revenge for 3 years like that, show such a severe breakdown of boundaries. This is about her nature. 

What happened to the friend? Was he married did you at least go punch him in the face?

Again if she just shot you in the leg (IMHO less painful in the long run) would it make sense to stay with her? How about to trust her again? Why would you want to. 

Toxic people make toxic lives. How could you be happy staying with someone who does that to you? What is different about this situation?


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Rocinante67 said:


> Because we have spent thirty three years together, only some of which were marred by her misconduct. We have thoroughly intertwined families. Our shared history outweighs her sin. I am optimistic that we will be happy. I’ve done the math, my life is better with her than without.


Which is why you are posting on this board right? Seems to be a rash of these types of posts here. It may be easy to lie to yourself but it's hard to convince others that what you are saying is the truth.

Dude until you are truthful at the very least with yourself you are going to be unhappy.


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## Diana7 (Apr 19, 2016)

I think that for me the years of lies and deception would destroy the trust. If someone could do that for so long, I would not be able to trust them again or believe anything they said.

How can you possibly believe anything she says?


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## snerg (Apr 10, 2013)

Rocinante67 said:


> It's been agony to know that my wife ****ed my best friend for over two years, did it under my nose, concealed it for five years, and then slow walked the truth for six months. She's remorseful, she's finally admitted everything as best I can tell, and we are going to try to reconcile. Still, I have moments where I want to find X and make him regret what he did or pack my wife's stuff and put her on the street. *I love my wife, and I think we are going to live happily ever after,* *I'm so codependent that I'm going to rug sweep this so I have the fantasy of living happily ever after*, but it won't be without great effort.


You had a grammatical error. I fixed that for you.


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## No Longer Lonely Husband (Nov 3, 2015)

Rocinante67 said:


> My wife and I met thirty-two years ago. We were teenagers, she was a rising senior in high school and I had just graduated. Her father died when she was twelve and I met her when she was seventeen and have been with her since. It really was love at first sight. We dated long distance for several years with our relationship becoming more serious over time. We married in 1992, six years after we met.
> We had our first child in 1996 and our second in 1999. My career was going well and we lived comfortably. I changed things up with my job so I could spend more time with my family, and we lived the prototypical suburban life: two kids, two jobs, two dogs, a mortgage, and so on.
> About fifteen years into the marriage, we were living parallel lives. We attended to the kids' needs, but we spent more time parenting than being good spouses. We were living in the same house, but our lives were disconnected. Over time, our intimacy faded to the point we were not particularly close emotionally and our sex life suffered.
> In 2010, eighteen years into our marriage, I had a sudden health emergency that left me dead for five minutes. It was traumatic emotionally for everyone. Physically I recovered very quickly, and fully, but the brush with my mortality exposed all the weaknesses in our marriage. I wanted to be happy, right now, and anyone who wasn't with me on that was not on "my team." My wife struggled to fit in, because she wanted to nurture me and protect me and I wanted to live on a high wire.
> ...


You have a dilemma sir. She thinks you had an affair, and likely used this to justify her having an affair. You very likely do not have the full truth of the relationship. She has trickle truthed you and you in my opinion are rugsweeping somewhat.
This **** is hard to get through no doubt about it. I would be reluctant to R until I was apprised of the entire affair. How many encounters, where did they occur, why did they occur and why did she think it was okay to **** around on you.

I would encourage you to have her sit for a polygraph. You need to come up with 6-7 pressing questions and put her on the hot seat. Conversely, given the fact she thinks your emotional affair went physical, you should allow her to have you take a polygraph also.

Three years....I would have a hard time reconciling. My wife’s fling went on for nine months, long story, but I had her take a polygraph and told her one lie I am out of here and we are divorcing. Thankfully we are in the third year of R. Let me tell you, it was not easy to do. Triggers will haunt you sporadically, and they will decline in frequency with the passage of time.
However, you will never forget and if you are like me I think of the affair frequently. When I get worked up I go to my farm and shoot my guns. Something about the sound of a high powered rifle and the smell of gunpowder makes everything all right. My therapist referred to me doing this as displaced agression. It works.

You need to consider making a list of questions to ask her why she wants to stay married to you and sit down and review the questions with her. I think you are plan B right now.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

One more thing people cheat especially the type of affair your wife had because of lack of character. That's it, and that doesn't change. I wouldn't be surprised that your friend wasn't the only one or that it wasn't going on long before you know. How do I know? Think about how you would feel having an affair with your friends wife, or your wife's best friend? I know for one even if she was Sophia Loren I couldn't do that. 

That is not your wife. I bet if you did a poly you would find this is not a one off. You don't just jump into bed with your husband's best friend there has to be some severe lack of boundaries already to go THAT far. That is generally not going to be your first affair. It probably won't be the last either, because again it's their nature. 

Read this.


DNA test your kids. Better yet, just try this. Tell her you know you are both still suffering from the affairs and are tired of having it hang over both your heads. Tell her you want you both to get polys, so there are no lingering doubts. Then have a number ready and have 3 questions, one being has there ever been anyone else besides the one affair you know of. Show her the questions and offer to go first. Her reaction will tell you all you need to know.


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## honcho (Oct 5, 2013)

Rocinante67 said:


> Because we have spent thirty three years together, only some of which were marred by her misconduct. We have thoroughly intertwined families. Our shared history outweighs her sin. I am optimistic that we will be happy. *I’ve done the math*, my life is better with her than without.


so in other words you get hammered in a divorce financially?


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

sokillme said:


> There is no healthy man in the world who would want a wife like yours. You need to be honest about who you wife really was during this time and who she is. She was cooking and having sex, but hiding and lying to you about ****ing your best friend. THAT and only THAT is who she was, you can't have one with out the other. So in that context is she the wife everyone would want?
> (Snip)
> Toxic people make toxic lives. How could you be happy staying with someone who does that to you? What is different about this situation?


Let’s start by acknowledging that there is emotion and logic. I am only going to comment about the logic. While the emotion does matter it’s harder to quantify, and personal.

Yes she did as you say, so she was capable of it. How do you find someone who is guaranteed not to be? How many of us picked our partners knowing they would cheat?

Ok, so now OP knows wha his wife did, at least to some extent. He also has his own near miss, and if he has any empathy as a person that can help him see both sides. That aspect is one that OP and I have in common. I am not naturally a cheat, but I can screw up, so I need to think about boundaries. I’d rather have someone who knows that about themselves. Because if you don’t, you might not be vigilant and you might fall.

In my case, it’s taken years to form an understanding of why my wife did what at she did. It was necessary in order to really get past he affair, and to have reasonable confidence that it won’t happen again. At the same time, I look at her good qualities. I weigh them and find on balance she is worth it.

To be honest, your “no healthy man” comment applies to me as much as OP. And that’s ok, but I disagree. From where I sit, your perspective is at least as unhealthy, in that it can be informed by a mixture of hurt, fear at getting hurt again, and unrealistic expectations. I don’t know if that is true in your case, but I’ve seen cases where it definitely is. It would have been in my case.

“I will find a perfect soul mate who is not capable of cheating” is like saying “Santa Claus is out there, I just have to find them.” It’s a nice dream, but I’d rather live in the real world, where I have decades of data on the good my wife brings as well as the bad. Shared history. Shared experiences. Deep deep friendship. Times we we have let each other down but worked through it (and therefore know that we both choose to be that sort of person). Shared values on so many important aspects of life, and a lot of skill at finding common ways forward where we disagree. 

That is a more complex equation.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

No Longer Lonely Husband said:


> You have a dilemma sir. She thinks you had an affair, and likely used this to justify her having an affair. You very likely do not have the full truth of the relationship. She has trickle truthed you and you in my opinion are rugsweeping somewhat.
> This **** is hard to get through no doubt about it. I would be reluctant to R until I was apprised of the entire affair. How many encounters, where did they occur, why did they occur and why did she think it was okay to **** around on you.
> 
> I would encourage you to have her sit for a polygraph. You need to come up with 6-7 pressing questions and put her on the hot seat. Conversely, given the fact she thinks your emotional affair went physical, you should allow her to have you take a polygraph also.
> ...


I don’t agree with everything NoMore writes here, but I recommend his story as one to read. That’s one of the things you can get from this place - see what others did and maybe steal some ideas that would work in your circumstances.

He’s doing better than I was in year 3.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

honcho said:


> so in other words you get hammered in a divorce financially?


Worth considering this practical stuff. I arranged my affairs in part so that if I had to leave I would be financially able to do so. I am financially better off married, but if that was all we had I wouldn’t stay.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

snerg said:


> You had a grammatical error. I fixed that for you.


Wanting to work on it is automatically major codependency? I’d be more scared of having to constantly prove I wasn’t codependent. That could get like Marty McFly running round Hill Valley being goaded into dumb things whenever someone calls him a chicken.

Relationships by their very nature are teamwork. You need to make sure that this is not unhealthy, but there’s nothing wrong with valuing and even needing each other. That is entirely human. I don’t view my wife as my one true soul mate, but she is a great life partner.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Wazza said:


> Let’s start by acknowledging that there is emotion and logic. I am only going to comment about the logic. While the emotion does matter it’s harder to quantify, and personal.
> 
> Yes she did as you say, so she was capable of it. How do you find someone who is guaranteed not to be? How many of us picked our partners knowing they would cheat?
> 
> ...


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

Thanks for a detailed reply. My comments below.

OP, hope you get some ideas from this to apply to your situation. None of us know you or your spouse.



sokillme said:


> There is a very big difference between fearing they will cheat and KNOWING they did cheat. Saying they are the same thing is just denial and not true.


I'm not saying they are the same. 

When you evaluate the risk of something, you ask yourself how likely it is to happen, and how big a deal it would be if it did happen. The fact that an affair has happened once is of course significant. But I think for some people it indicates a character flaw they can't or won't fix (and I would leave such a person), and for others it is something they never thought they would do and have learned from. OP has learned from his EA, and he now has a better idea about boundaries. He needs to look carefully at his wife, and satisfy himself that she has learned. If she hasn't and won't I would advise him to plan his exit.

Diana's point about not having come clean willingly is relevant here. My wife didn't either, but that's because she was afraid rather than coldly manipulative. We work on the fear, which causes problems in different areas. That's part of the life partner thing I wrote about.

And I did say I was being logical. If an affair is an absolute deal breaker for you, that is perfectly valid and reasonable. 



sokillme said:


> This was not a one night stand it was a 3 year affair with his best friend and then 5 years of lying about that. To see this the same thing as say a work affair is once again being dishonest. I will again contend that a middle aged women doesn't start a 3 year affair with the best friend unless there is already a very strong moral deficit and he would be wise to guard himself.
> 
> Your comment about rather having a person who has failed but knows better now only makes sense if there is not at least the possibility of having someone not cheat at all. Once you accept that there are plenty of people who don't cheat then it just seems like settling. I mean "look I love her and can't help it" makes more sense to me.


I think those who don't cheat are a combination of a strong moral compass (which my wife has in abundance) and good boundaries (which both of us lacked in our own ways). I think she has learned from her mistake. But I also think everyone has a breaking point. If you really think there are people who won't cheat no matter what, we must agree to disagree. I'm looking for someone who is a comparatively good risk. I don't expect certainty. If you want to condemn my wife, or OP's wife, let the person who is without sin throw the first stone.

I agree three years is a long time and that complicates it. I can't advise on that. My wife's affair was about eight months that I know of, but she was in contact with her affair partner for about 5 years after that (he was on staff where she was studying) so who knows? I got over that.



sokillme said:


> When you are married to someone who cheats you have to convince yourself that expecting more then that is unhealthy.


And when you have divorced you have to convince yourself those who don't are weak or deluded? I don't think either of those is a healthy response. I think it is healthy to recognise the situation for what it is and make realistic choices. 

One valid response is to say "I don't expect you to, but cheating is a dealbreaker. You do that once, you are out!" It's not the response I choose, but it acknowledges the risk and addresses it in a realistic manner, and if I felt that way I would have divorced. My choice is similar in that I have weighed the risks, know my walk away point, and have set things up so I can leave if I choose to. If you simply say "I'll find someone who won't cheat" that is when I think you are in Santa Claus territory. 



sokillme said:


> Again you seem to be saying here expecting the person you marry won't have sex with someone else is akin to believing in "Santa Claus"? I am saying having these kind of low expectations are necessarily to stay with someone who cheats.


Requiring they won't cheat is fine. Being selective and cautious about their character is not only fine, but advisable. But being convinced that there is zero risk of infidelity no matter what is unrealistic.



sokillme said:


> Actually from an outside perspective it's pretty simple. Staying married to someone who cheats on you is probably going to be very hard. The chances of you completely getting over it, or having the type of marriage you once thought you had are slim, and this is especially true if they are not totally honest and contrite about what they did. If they don't see what the did for the evil it is. Better to be realistic about it and accept that this is the life you choose.


If your rule is infidelity leads automatically to divorce, then the decision is indeed pretty simple. The fallout of divorce might not be, but that is another discussion.

But start from a point where you have decided you are going to consider reconciliation. That is where it can get complex.And you are absolutely right it's better to be realistic, and not stay our of fear. 

Completely getting over it? I'm not. But friends who had the same situation and divorced are often not over the divorce. Some went on to better things, some went on to bitterness and loneliness. Sometimes life sucks and then you die. Deal with it. Play the hand you are dealt. Own the consequences.

Having the type of marriage I thought I have? The type of marriage that got us to that point? I don't want it. My idea of marriage is very different today to what it was then. We have learned from experience. If we had divorced, we would have taken that learning into new relationships. Instead we brought it into this one. That applies both to changing the way we approach marriage, but also working on who we are as people. You are never too old to learn. 

Total honesty. My wife was not totally honest, and you are right, it matters. That's why in my first post I advised that OP satisfy himself that he has the truth he needs, and if he doesn't have it, consider walking. I found out the details of my wife's affair from other sources. When I weigh the good and bad that is bad, and it was a problem right through the relationship. Not just the affair. But it wasn't a sign of lack of contrition. She recognised the problem, had counselling, and the progress is visible. I have more of a basis for trust, she is actually happier (long story about childhood issues) and its a win.

I think the hardest part is assessing another person's character. I don't have an easy way to do that quickly, and we have all seen people who tried to rugsweep the problems in their marriages, which I think is dangerous. I think it just takes time to be sure you have judged the other person correctly. Decades for me, but if I had had something like TAM at the time of the affair I might have made much quicker progress.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

drifting on said:


> What I’m trying to show you from my last post is this, she was content with that lie never seeing the light of day. She never came to you to confess. Had you not had this dream, would she have told you it was a physical affair? Ask her and put the answer here, I can tell you it was no, I can also tell you the guilt was eating her alive, think about that.


I have asked that question previously. She would not have told me had I not asked. She had, however, resigned herself to tell me the truth if I asked. Yes, she did withhold some of that truth for months. That did not help. What she told me immediately was worse than what she continued to lie about. That continued deceit has been a sticking point.


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## Spicy (Jun 18, 2016)

Welcome to TAM.

I guess you don’t really have a question for us, but seem to want to discuss.

A few questions first. Not asked in a snotty tone, just trying to understand you.

Why were you silent for so long while you were suspicious?
Did you confront your worthless BF?
If he had a spouse or GF during this time, did you expose to them?
Does anyone else friends/family know your wife had a long term affair and that you have been through all of this?
Who do you have for support?
Do your children know?
Would you say in general you are a rug sweeping type of person when difficult situations arise?


Ultimately, there are people that can forgive and move on and have a happy relationship. You have chosen to forgive. You are forgiving years of adultry and also years of deceit. That’s a whole lot of forgiveness. That is your choice and your right. She is a very, very lucky woman. 

Since you are sure you want to stay, I wish you the best, and hope that she can be a faithful and honest wife from this time forward.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

drifting on said:


> Rocinante67
> 
> You learned of the affair in 2018, she lied to say it was only an emotional affair, came clean after your dream, which took six months, but has remorse? Tell me, how do you describe this remorse?


Well, I think I learned of the affair in 2010 but was lied to about the fact it was by then physical, too. I was also lied to again by both of them in a deliberate, affirmative denial of the past affair while they were still having the affair. 

I don't know that I really know the difference between regret and remorse, or what others think that difference is. I know what kind of wife she has been since he removed himself from our lives. Whether she's been motivated by guilt, remorse, regret, love, or a combination of some or all of that I cannot know for sure.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

PM1 said:


> I think all we can really ever do is try to put ourselves in your situation and describe how we would react. I think for me, aside from the mind-movies, the part that would eat at me over and over is never truly knowing whether I know everything. I think in your shoes, I'd have to have a polygraph, and even then...


I struggle with exactly this. I won't ever know everything. I know there was constant electronic contact that pervaded our lives and excluded me for many, many months. I know there was sex in 2010, 2011, 2012 and maybe 2013. I know that there were at least a dozen sexual encounters. I suspect there were more.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

alte Dame said:


> Are you here just to tell your story? Or do you really want the wisdom of the collective to help guide you in some way?
> 
> You sound to me like someone who is captured by the sunk cost fallacy. The affair was long ago, you have so many years invested, etc.
> 
> ...


The temptation to exact revenge on him is strong. Very strong. I have debated contacting his present girlfriend and filling her in on the kind of man she's exposing herself and her children to, what he is capable of. 

If I could put my finger on a "consequence" for her that is proportionate, fair and would make me feel better, I'd probably implement it. Nothing seems to be adequate that would allow us to actually reconcile. For now, I choose to forego vengeance.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

Diana7 said:


> The thing is that if you hadn't had that dream she would never have told you. That is not repentance.



She probably wouldn't have. She probably regrets confessing under questioning, given what she's seen it do to me.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

BruceBanner said:


> Why are you here; What type of advice are you seeking from this site? This sounds like more of a blog post than you really seeking any particular advice. You don't sound resolute enough to be willing to go through a divorce either.



Well, sometimes it is just helpful to me to "shout at clouds" rather than rehash it with her. I hope there are people here who can say, "been there, made it, we are happy, here's what I suggest...."


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

Diana7 said:


> I think that for me the years of lies and deception would destroy the trust. If someone could do that for so long, I would not be able to trust them again or believe anything they said.
> 
> How can you possibly believe anything she says?


Well, I verify what she tells me. I have the standard protocol of passwords, access, location services, etc. 

I believe only what I can confirm. I have not had any reason to doubt her after the affair ended. She has been consistent and conscientious in her conduct, save the lies she maintained after the initial disclosure and until November. I hold that against her.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

honcho said:


> so in other words you get hammered in a divorce financially?


Yes, but that is an incomplete equation. It would cost me financially to divorce. 

But then I would be out there in the world looking for the least damaged MILF and hoping she would treat me at least as well as my wife has treated me for 30 out of 33 years together, and in particular the last six years. The past six years, even this first year post DDay, she's been great as far as companionship and "wifely duties." No complaints there whatsoever. 

For reasons that have nothing to do with me being a philanderer (I'm not), I'm quite familiar with the pool of available women in my community who are age appropriate. 

Sure, it would be fun to run through a bunch of them until that got old. But then what? Start all over? Take on some "new" girlfriend's problems/preferences/kids and navigate/negotiate all that? 

Like I said, I've done the math.


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## MattMatt (May 19, 2012)

Andy1001 said:


> Is your self esteem is in the gutter?
> Do you enjoy life as plan B?
> If your former friend hadn’t developed “issues” your wife would still be ****ing him under your nose. She never admitted to anything until you caught her unawares the night you had the dream.
> She is a good prospect to have another affair if she’s not already cheating, because let’s face it,your observancy skills aren’t the best.
> ...


That was so smoooth, @Andy1001.


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## GusPolinski (Jan 21, 2014)

Rocinante67 said:


> My wife and I met thirty-two years ago. We were teenagers, she was a rising senior in high school and I had just graduated. Her father died when she was twelve and I met her when she was seventeen and have been with her since. It really was love at first sight. We dated long distance for several years with our relationship becoming more serious over time. We married in 1992, six years after we met.
> We had our first child in 1996 and our second in 1999. My career was going well and we lived comfortably. I changed things up with my job so I could spend more time with my family, and we lived the prototypical suburban life: two kids, two jobs, two dogs, a mortgage, and so on.
> About fifteen years into the marriage, we were living parallel lives. We attended to the kids' needs, but we spent more time parenting than being good spouses. We were living in the same house, but our lives were disconnected. Over time, our intimacy faded to the point we were not particularly close emotionally and our sex life suffered.
> In 2010, eighteen years into our marriage, I had a sudden health emergency that left me dead for five minutes. It was traumatic emotionally for everyone. Physically I recovered very quickly, and fully, but the brush with my mortality exposed all the weaknesses in our marriage. I wanted to be happy, right now, and anyone who wasn't with me on that was not on "my team." My wife struggled to fit in, because she wanted to nurture me and protect me and I wanted to live on a high wire.
> ...


There’s this cool thing called divorce.

You should do that.

Twice, if you can.


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## OutofRetirement (Nov 27, 2017)

Cheating and its aftermath is extremely predictable. I'm watching a baseball game. A pitcher is pitching, a batter is at bat. What will happen next is extremely predictable. The pitch will be either a strike or a ball. The batter is either going to swing or not. The ball is going to get hit or not. If hit, the ball will fall somewhere inside the stadium. 

What won't happen. An elephant or giraffe isn't going to walk by and step on the pitcher or the batter. The fielders are not going to start strumming a guitar. There is no reason any of those things can't happen - any of them can happen - it's not impossible. But we all know they won't happen.

Your wife's affair is like that. Except you know baseball, or some other game, and you don't know affair behaviors. Including your own behavior. But you and your wife both are acting within a very predictable range of behaviors after an affair. If someone punches you in the mouth, you might punch him back, or you might move away. You may do a few other things. But punch back or run away are the most common behaviors.

You are posting here about a year after you found out your wife had a three-year affair. It took you six months to ask her deeply about it and figuratively put your foot down for "the truth." Those two things alone tells a lot about your wife, you, and your affair, for those who read of these things all the time. Look at some of these people, there are thousands of posts. Do you think they might know a little something more than you, even if you think they are bitter or hurt or whatever? At least listen to what they have to say.

My suggestion: (1) Your wife is not what those in the infidelity hobbyists (i.e., they've been betrayed, too, and read a lot more than you have so far) "remorseful." Your wife is "regretful." I'm too lazy to look up their real definitions, but there is a difference, a huge difference, in infidelity terminology. Regret means your wife is focused on herself (even if she is doing things for you to assuage her guilt) as opposed to remorseful (focused on you). The difference is that she has been doing all those things for you, but didn't confess, and continued to lie when you pushed her and she confessed a little. So now six months later, is she "remorseful"? It's theoretically possible, a zoo truck may break down overnight and you'll wake up to see an elephant or a giraffe wandering down your street.

(2) I question that she never told you how she was wanting more romance but cheated. My doubt is that this is her first rodeo. Others have said similar. I give it a 50-50 chance. Polygraph. Paternity tests. If nothing else, they are tangible actions, tangible consequences, that your wife can understand.

(3) I seriously doubt that your wife has had no contact with the guy. Again, polygraph.

None of this is that important. Happily ever after, I don't discount that some people get cheated on like that and later feel they've had the happily ever after. In the United States alone, there are how many hundreds of millions of people. Even if 1% believe in something, that is going to be thousands of people.

Why am I here? If I feel the need to read and post, do you think I feel I have "happily ever after"? On an infidelity forum? When I got married, and thought I would have a "happily every after," did I think I'd be cheated on, then read and post about it? For what, fun? Yeah, if you think that, my other hobbies are I hang out in funeral parlors and hospital emergency rooms. Everyone posting here is here. You're here. Why are you here? To figure out how to reach the happily ever after with great effort?

Step 1 - Get the full truth. Which I agree you may have right now. But you are naive if you can be so sure. About the one affair you know about. And possible other affairs she could have had before or after. Polygraph.

Step 2 - Time. And deal with "triggers" as they come (e.g., when you wake up from a nightmare about her having sex with your friend). Don't force it. 

How much time and effort did she put into the affair? Did she lose weight, exercise, dress up, groom, etc., how much time did she spend in affairs? Did she make sure she contacted him first thing every morning, last thing every night? 

She ended the affair because she found out he was insufferable. What would have happened if he was a great guy? Would she have told you the truth, divorced you, and give you a fair settlement? Or would she lie that she wanted divorce because you were a horrible husband, she would have let it believe that she only ran into him after you were separated, etc.? 

Point being, understand that every successful reconciliation is based on pure luck. Every successful reconciliation involves a certain amount of mental gymnastics. You have to hang your hat on something to make it livable, as to why you are happy even though she cheated and betrayed you so easily, so long, so cruelly. You seem to are hanging onto the "she's treated you so well for six years." If you look too deeply at the Faustian bargain, - well, just don't look too deeply into that.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

Spicy said:


> Welcome to TAM.
> 
> I guess you don’t really have a question for us, but seem to want to discuss.
> 
> ...


Why were you silent for so long while you were suspicious?
I confronted them, they denied it. I assumed the worst, and forgave them. I was not suspicious again. I believed that having been caught, she could not possibly commit that crime again. I was wrong about that.

Did you confront your worthless BF?
I asked him at the time I suspected a physical affair. He lied. I did not believe either of them could do what they did next. I was wrong.

If he had a spouse or GF during this time, did you expose to them?
He did not have a spouse. His girlfriend was my wife. He has a girlfriend now. I have debated telling her.

Does anyone else friends/family know your wife had a long term affair and that you have been through all of this?
No.

Who do you have for support?
I'm in therapy. I read a lot. I participate in forums. 

Do your children know?
No, and they will never know.

Would you say in general you are a rug sweeping type of person when difficult situations arise?
I clearly did rugsweep in 2010. I do not believe I am rugsweeping now.


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## MattMatt (May 19, 2012)

snerg said:


> You had a grammatical error. I fixed that for you.


Whenever someone says: "I fixed that for you" and then totally changes what the person wrote so that it is so twisted that it utterly changes the meaning, I always wonder why it is that the person "fixing" that other person's life experiences and opinions, never grasps or realises how condescending, smug and priggish that looks?


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## GusPolinski (Jan 21, 2014)

MattMatt said:


> That was so smoooth, @Andy1001.


And 100% correct.


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## [email protected] (Dec 23, 2017)

Rocinanter67, you are here for a reason. You are still triggering. Worse, you are responding to those minute, sub-verbal cues that lead you to mistrust your WW. Listen to those, because your gut (among other things) is telling you something. Some waywards will confess to partial betrayal in the hops that something worse won't be found out. If I were to bet, I'd place good odds on something going on with your W.


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## MattMatt (May 19, 2012)

Rocinante67 said:


> Why were you silent for so long while you were suspicious?
> I confronted them, they denied it. I assumed the worst, and forgave them. I was not suspicious again. I believed that having been caught, she could not possibly commit that crime again. I was wrong about that.
> 
> Did you confront your worthless BF?
> ...


I have been in a very slightly similar situation to you, @Rocinante67, so do see where you are coming from.

As you had an EA, and your wife had an EA and a PA, would joint polygraph sessions and joint couple's counselling be of potential benefit to you both?


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## MattMatt (May 19, 2012)

GusPolinski said:


> And 100% correct.


But not helpful. Never kick someone when they are down.


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## Rocky Mountain Yeti (Apr 23, 2017)

MattMatt said:


> Whenever someone says: "I fixed that for you" and then totally changes what the person wrote so that it is so twisted that it utterly changes the meaning, I always wonder why it is that the person "fixing" that other person's life experiences and opinions, never grasps or realises how condescending, smug and priggish that looks?


Usually, I think they do grasp how condescending it is.... that's actually at the core of their intent.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

sokillme said:


> Let me ask you this. If instead of emotionally abusing you like she did, lets say she hit you with a baseball bat, and say she said she did it because she was feeling lonely and unhappy with you, wanting to divorce or even that you cheated, would you stay with her? How about it she ran over you with her car? If you did would you say you are healthy and thinking correctly about it?
> 
> What's the difference?
> 
> ...


My former best friend has been completely absent from our life since 2013. We are all better off for that. He was toxic as hell. Yes, I want to go hurt him. But to hurt him, I have to bring him back into my life. And I cannot hurt him without collaterally damaging my wife. He was divorced long before the affair. I used to wonder why he never had a girlfriend towards the end of our friendship. Now I know he did have a girlfriend: my wife. I disagree with you that people are nothing except the worst thing they ever did. People are more complex than that. If I didn't have thirty years to compare to the three, I might see it differently. She started the affair believing I was in an affair and leaving her. That I kind of understand. But she knew before long that I had never had an affair and she continued hers. That really complicates her contrition. Yes, what she did was extraordinarily cruel, selfish, and destructive. I struggle with it every day. I choose to be hopeful, and her conduct in the present reinforces my hope.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

OK there is SO MUCH HERE. 



Wazza said:


> Thanks for a detailed reply. My comments below.
> 
> OP, hope you get some ideas from this to apply to your situation. None of us know you or your spouse.
> 
> ...


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

@Rocinante67

Thanks for sharing. Would not be for me but I just don't put up with **** like that.

Thanks for sharing your tale.

I just can't comprehend the ****tyness it takes to do what she and your "friend" did.

I only hope you are healthy. Make sure you are making healthy choices for yourself. Your wife has been at the very least self serving.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Rocinante67 said:


> My former best friend has been completely absent from our life since 2013. We are all better off for that. He was toxic as hell. Yes, I want to go hurt him. But to hurt him, I have to bring him back into my life. And I cannot hurt him without collaterally damaging my wife. He was divorced long before the affair. I used to wonder why he never had a girlfriend towards the end of our friendship. Now I know he did have a girlfriend: my wife. I disagree with you that people are nothing except the worst thing they ever did. People are more complex than that. If I didn't have thirty years to compare to the three, I might see it differently. She started the affair believing I was in an affair and leaving her. That I kind of understand. But she knew before long that I had never had an affair and she continued hers. That really complicates her contrition. Yes, what she did was extraordinarily cruel, selfish, and destructive. I struggle with it every day. I choose to be hopeful, and her conduct in the present reinforces my hope.


Better to accept you are probably going to struggle with this. Anyone in your situation would. 

My question is why do you think you would be able to get over this when you have decided to live the rest of your life with the person who did this to you? If you had to live with this "best friend" do you think you would be happy or have a happy life or do you think you would be struggling? Why do you think living with your wife (whom by the way, had more responsibility to you since she pledged her fidelity) isn't going to cause you the same pain, if not more.

Something would be wrong if you could GET OVER this. This is the life you have chosen, better to accept it and get on with it, or change it. 

I stand by my contention that a person who has lived an exemplary moral life doesn't have a first affair with the best friend of their spouse, that is just a bridge too far. A one time twist out of anger and revenge, yeah it happens. A 3 year affair with the best friend. I don't buy it. You either have to build up, or down your morals enough to do that, or you never had them to begin with. You should do what I said and mention the poly and see what her reaction is.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

sokillme said:


> Better to accept you are probably going to struggle with this. Anyone in your situation would.
> 
> My question is why do you think you would be able to get over this when you have decided to live the rest of your life with the person who did this to you? If you had to live with this "best friend" do you think you would be happy or have a happy life or do you think you would be struggling? Why do you think living with your wife (whom by the way, had more responsibility to you since she pledged her fidelity) isn't going to cause you the same pain, if not more.
> 
> ...


Yes, I know I am going to struggle with this in varying degrees forever. I've told my wife that if divorcing her meant I would be free from this suffering, I'd divorce her. But divorcing her won't alleviate my suffering. So, I soldier on working to make the best life I can.


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## TDSC60 (Dec 8, 2011)

I see where you admit that you were wrong at almost every step in her affair. She intentionally cheated on you for a minimum of 3 years.

You have a track record of not being right or misinterpreting her actions at every turn since things went south.

How in the world can you really think that you are "right" now.


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## CDR No Longer Lost (Apr 28, 2019)

"I know he did have a girlfriend: my wife."


For years, Sir. YEARS. Very likely physical infidelity numbering in the hundreds of times... Why someone would willingly eat that **** sandwich is incomprehensible to me.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

sokillme said:


> TI think we can infer a lot from her actions though. Do the poly thing and see if I am right.


Can certainly infer from actions, and a poly is a consideration. If you do that make sure you research their limitations first. It’s often discussed round here so no need to rehash that unless OP would find a summary helpful.

But infer from her actions? Yes. ALL her actions. OP gets this having read post #51.



sokillme said:


> Even I think people have the ability to change, they can but they are like drug addicts in the sense that it is a life long struggle and they are always a greater risk then those who don't have that character flaw. Even still, this is only a requirement not the primary focus on if you stay married or not. The most important thing you need to think about is what will the quality of your life will be if you stay with this person.


Agree they have to make lifelong change (boundaries). Don’t agree you can find anyone who does not have the potential to cheat. 

Would also say that it's really hard to figure out who your spouse really is after this. We see lots of people here wanting to deny that their spouse is flawed and did this. It takes a while to get past that point. You have to accept they really did what they did, and it is part of them, before you can really make sense of it. That's a point where its really tempting to walk, and I would not blame anyone who did. For me it was worth getting past it, but there was no guarantee it would all be ok.



sokillme said:


> Man am I tired of this. What Jesus did there was prevent her from being stoned to death. That is the context and the context was exactly what we are talking about here adultery. If we were living in the old testament God himself commanded those who committed adultery to be killed. There was NO CHOICE for the one wronged, NOPE. Dead. So in that vain I completely agree we should not stone adulterers to death. I am not advocating for that. However I personally believe if the husband was there Jesus very well might have told him to leave his adulterous wife. One only needs to read the old testament to understand that the bible calls and adulterous wife "death". What Jesus was NOT doing was saying because you sin that means you have to allow yourself to be abused by someone else's sin. Given there was never a choice given to R and only death to the adulterer I am going to assume the bibles default position is to divorce.


I was simply using a famous quote to make the point that we are not perfect, and cutting each other a little slack at times help us all. Was not trying to get theological. 



sokillme said:


> Better to be alone then with someone who cheated on you. Here is the thing if you guys who decide to R would come on here and say it's hard but you can do it, then I wouldn't challenge you so much, but you all come on here and make it seem like you have these great marriages. You do it under the guise that others can too. But then in the next breath you all talk about the YEARS you spent getting over it, your STILL getting over it. All the struggles you have and still have. That is NOT a great marriage, that is a person trying to hold onto a very difficult marriage, and that is a realistic picture of what OP is setting himself up to if he stays. OK say that at least it's honest.
> 
> I am sorry to be so blunt but please don't tell us how great your marriage is or how you recovered. You didn't, your not. A great marriage doesn't have years of going over and over adultery and trying to figure out why, waiting for the next shoe to drop, learning to LIVE with it. Most of the time the primary focus of the marriage from the time the adultery has happened is just that, adultery. Calling that great or even good THAT is Santa Claus. Let's be real great marriages don't have a history of Adultery in them. They just don't.
> 
> People come on here and is clearly very unhappy. The reality is, OF COURSE he is unhappy his wife is a snake who slept with his best friend at the very least because she was pissed on him but probably because she has serous character issues. It's ALWAYS going to suck being married to someone like that. Telling him he can get over it if he just works hard and just settles for a wife like this and if he is lucky maybe after years she will GET it is some very ****ty advice in my opinion. All that does is set him up to assume the fact he is not over it is somehow a sign he is not working hard enough, when the truth is almost NO ONE SHOULD be able to really and truthfully get over that. That is one of the most ****ed up one human being can do to another, and one you pledged your life too? HELL NO you shouldn't get over that, something is wrong if you do. I mean who are we trying to convince here? **** that, there is much better out there, again in my opinion. My advice is yeah you can live with your crappy wife, but this is probably how your life is going to be. However if you take a chance maybe you don't have to. Life is short and you are already unhappy enough to come post on here.


If being here is evidence of being unhappy, does that not say the same about you as me? On that basis neither of us has an answer. But to be honest, I know me, I know what I think. Whether you believe me or not is irrelevant. 

I wonder which of us is happier, SoKillMe. Hard to compare. 

"Beyond that, better to be alone than with someone who cheated" is entirelyreasonable. Lonely, but logical. The only way I can see to avoid risk. I still think relationships are worth the risk but I understand if someone doesn't.

As to why I am here - at the time of the affair I stayed for the kids. As they got older I had to make the decision whether to stay or not, and I hadn't dealt with everything around the affair. This was one of my sources of information on how to do so. It was a different place then, more balanced in my view. More couples involved where you got the betrayed and wayward sides. It helped.I stay around TAM because I am learning in other areas of my marriage. I post in the infidelity section to try and provide an alternate viewpoint, to give back some of what was given to me.



sokillme said:


> Given your history what reason do you have to believe her, she could have just as easily be telling you this because it's was finally an answer you would accept. When it comes down to it, all of these folks they do it because they want to, more then they care about their partner at the moment. That's really it. Occam razor.


I certainly don’t take her word alone. Independent verification. That was the first piece of advice I gave OP. My wife lied, your wife lied. You need to find a way to know the truth you need. You won't rest until you have that. But it means the details that are important to you. No more, no less.

And of course my wife put her affair ahead of me for a time. So did OP’s wife, and maybe he was leaning that way with his “friendship”. If you can't deal with that, then I don't know if you can reconcile.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

If you'll all pardon me until tomorrow, I'm going to go have great sex with my wife. Thanks for your comments so far.....some of them are very helpful to me.


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## alte Dame (Aug 7, 2012)

My prediction is that you will gradually, inexorably lose respect for your WW. I will assume that this process has already begun. As the respect drains away, the attachment starts to fade. At this point, you tell yourself that you can try to 'fall in love again.'

I think that this is how these things go. A double betrayal is horrendous. They both knew that they were aiming two guns at your heart. They both knew it. And now you have to eat this **** sandwich for the rest of your married life or face the uncertainty of life after divorce.

I am not a person who has to be together with someone. In a situation like this, the prospect of being alone wouldn't be the element that might stop me from deciding to divorce. People are different, though. I certainly get that.

Perhaps you mentioned this, but is she in IC? Her getting into therapy to try to determine how she could betray you so fundamentally would be a measurable consequence for her.


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## GusPolinski (Jan 21, 2014)

MattMatt said:


> But not helpful. Never kick someone when they are down.


The truth is rarely unhelpful.


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## SecondWind (May 10, 2019)

You both had affairs. Yours is already a long marriage. If you want to stay married and be happy you're going to have to forgive each other.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Rocinante67 said:


> Yes, I know I am going to struggle with this in varying degrees forever. *(This you know for sure and now have years to confirm it) * I've told my wife that if divorcing her meant I would be free from this suffering, I'd divorce her. But divorcing her won't alleviate my suffering. So, I soldier on working to make the best life I can. *(This you don't have any idea about. Plenty of people divorce an wish they had done it sooner.)*


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## Zodiac (Dec 7, 2018)

I would start by reading the book Co-Dependent no more. This will just keep doing more and more damage. I ignored the signs but never got confirmation, but they where some red flags. I chose to try and make her happy. I was just hurting myself.


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## ABHale (Jan 3, 2016)

You are definitely a glutton for punishment. 

Why are you staying with a lying cheating ******?

You have been about to divorce all this time, so why are you staying with her? 

It sure isn’t for the great times the two of you have shared.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

@Rocinante67

So what's changed, other than the passage of time, since you posted the exact same post on SI in 11/2018?

https://www.survivinginfidelity.com/forums.asp?tid=632945&AP=21

On this one, look further down the page where posts by DomesticTourist start.

https://www.survivinginfidelity.com/forums.asp?tid=626947&AP=401


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## Spicy (Jun 18, 2016)

Rocinante67 said:


> Did you confront your worthless BF?
> I asked him at the time I suspected a physical affair. He lied. I did not believe either of them could do what they did next. I was wrong.
> 
> If he had a spouse or GF during this time, did you expose to them?
> ...


In an attempt to save face to everyone, you have given her no consequences other than dealing with you. We know she doesn’t really care about hurting you, she has proved that with years of infidelity and deceit. So this isn’t much of a consequence at all. She would have been perfectly happy keeping this to her grave. IMO, not telling your family is a huge mistake. If she had faced repercussions from her family and had to answer to them some, I think you would have a better chance of success long term. As it is now, she has no real life consequences other than you being hurt. Plus you got no support or human advice from parents etc when you clearly need it.

If all of this wasn’t enough to make you divorce her, have you ever asked yourself what it _would_ take?


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## SecondWind (May 10, 2019)

Although you had an EA, she had a sexual affair that went on for a while. Most men can't block that out in order to reconcile. Can you trust her? Can you forgive her?


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## [email protected] (Dec 23, 2017)

I think she's still cheating, and I think he thinks so too. Moreover, I don't think he really wants the whole story.


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## MattMatt (May 19, 2012)

EleGirl said:


> @Rocinante67
> 
> So what's changed, other than the passage of time, since you posted the exact same post on SI in 11/2018?
> 
> ...


Because circling round an airfield time and again in a holding pattern only works until your fuel runs out. Then you have to come down.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

Thank you all for your comments.


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## BruceBanner (May 6, 2018)

Rocinante67 said:


> Yes, but that is an incomplete equation. It would cost me financially to divorce.
> 
> But then I would be out there in the world looking for the least damaged MILF and hoping she would treat me at least as well as my wife has treated me for 30 out of 33 years together, and in particular the last six years. The past six years, even this first year post DDay, she's been great as far as companionship and "wifely duties." No complaints there whatsoever.
> 
> ...


What makes you think you can't get a younger woman?


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

I wish that I could tell you that my WW and I reconciled, and lived happily thereafter. But, that would be a complete falsehood.

I also think that it's hard to find people who can say this. They are in the miniscule minority, the vast majority is comprised of those whose marriage ended.

And, there are also those like you and me, who did the math, chose between bad and worse.


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## Diana7 (Apr 19, 2016)

Cheating is bad enough, cheating with your spouses best friend is appalling. Then lying about it and deceiving your spouse for so long is despicable behaviour. 
I have no idea how anyone could possibly think that their spouse is telling the truth after that. Or not cheating again. After all they had no consequences did they. They got away with it.


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## Lostinthought61 (Nov 5, 2013)

look its your life, and your headache being married to her, but from my perspective you should have dumped both fo them...you are playing form a weak hand and you have only demonstrated that you are willing to be plan b...if you are going to stay with her i would demand a couple things...number one this guys is out of both of your lives...number two she sign a post nup that you get the house if she does it again...and you get how many hall passes you want...that or you open your marriage...but you are playing fro a lose lose position. you are married to a freaking liar that you can never trust.


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## snerg (Apr 10, 2013)

Wazza said:


> Wanting to work on it is automatically major codependency? .


Sorry, I failed in my attempt to state my thoughts.

Codependent in the fact that he didn't give her the boot a long time ago for her actions.



Rocinante67 said:


> Under cover of a long planned trip, my wife began a physical affair with him in October 2010.
> Shortly thereafter, I discovered inappropriate emails that betrayed at least an emotional affair, and my wife's statement that she wanted to divorce me and that she "loved him with all her heart."
> I confronted them both about it, they conceded the inappropriate emotional connection but adamantly denied a physical affair.
> I resolved that a physical affair was likely but that even if it had happened, I would forgive them both





Rocinante67 said:


> Now keep in mind, I had only confronted her about it once, in 2010, and she had denied it. This dream is in 2018.
> For eight years, after her denial, I never accused her again.





Rocinante67 said:


> Ironically, that conversation occurred at our anniversary dinner to celebrate 26 years of marriage.
> She confessed that night to the affair, and gave up most of the details.
> However, partly because of the passage of time and partly because she began to trickle truth me, it was not until six months later, and my efforts to reconstruct the timeline independently with occasional questions to her, that she finally put it all out there.
> In the mean time, the nagging feeling that even in 2018 my wife was lying to me about ****ing my friend was deeply troubling to me.
> I finally told her that if she wanted to stay married, she had to sit down with me and go through it all until I was confident she had admitted everything. We did that in November 2018.


There are many more examples of what looks like codependency.

How many more chances does she get?

How can you stay with someone knowing all the the lies, deceits, deceptions, and the willful harm they caused unless there is some codependency?


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

BruceBanner said:


> What makes you think you can't get a younger woman?


I’m certain I could. But the women with whom i would be compatible are going to be old enough to have plenty of baggage.


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## Chaparral (Jul 17, 2011)

Most people divorce over cheating. Some studies claim two thirds do. However, at least one study claimed a very high percentage wish they had stayed and worked it out rather than divorce. I have never seen a stat that indicated how many that stayed were happy with that call. 

Why do you think they only had sex 12 times in 36 months? I am doubtful about that. More importantly, how ofte were you having sex during that period and what kind of partner was she. The answer to this is indicative to her real feelings toward you. 

Why does she say she did not leave you for him when their affair was strong? Not sure about her reasons for stopping the affair since that is about the average lifespan of affairs.

Why haven’t you talked to him? It would be risky. The chance you got a different story is high. He might tell the truth, play it down or exaggerate simply to hurt you. 

You and your wife definitely need to get STD tested because of some diseases that are around now that didn’t used to be and can be fatal years later. Another consequence you need to give her is to DNA test your kids. Unfortunately, when a person is caught in a significant lie, everything they ever say will always be taken with a grain of salt. 

I agree you need to do the polys. If she could cheat with one person she could cheat with another. Plus, it is another consequence. 

Has she told you where her trysts took place and when? Does that explain how you never caught on? Do not feel bad about that, 80% of cheaters are never caught.

Have you looked through any old phones or computers for evidence?

Good luck, I hope you succeed in your quest. Your wife has to suffer consequences and not just forgiveness. Freebies result in entitlement and contempt.


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

Rocinante67 said:


> I’m certain I could. But the women with whom i would be compatible are going to be old enough to have plenty of baggage.


Yep. That was where I was at, too. I was 34 already, had been single until 33. Had very little success with women, only 1 long term GF, and thank God I didn't marry her. Talking about baggage.....Jerry Springer (if he were around then) would have cast her on an upcoming episode....

The available women were not much different than my WW. There was a reason they weren't married. The good ones were. These women had been dumped by other men. I had one chasing me for her 5th marriage.....


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## sunsetmist (Jul 12, 2018)

Having read this thread all at once--the suggestions, the debates, the judgments, it seems to me to be obvious: OP finds it easiER to stay with his wife, is protective of her, and he WANTS to stay and live the life they are now living--his decision.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

BruceBanner said:


> What makes you think you can't get a younger woman?


How about he works on getting a faithful woman. His wife didn't have an affair because she is old, she had one because she lacks character. That should be what he is looking for if he decides to move forward.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

TJW said:


> Yep. That was where I was at, too. I was 34 already, had been single until 33. Had very little success with women, only 1 long term GF, and thank God I didn't marry her. Talking about baggage.....Jerry Springer (if he were around then) would have cast her on an upcoming episode....
> 
> The available women were not much different than my WW. There was a reason they weren't married. The good ones were. These women had been dumped by other men. I had one chasing me for her 5th marriage.....


The best place you want to be is to get to a place where you are comfortable being alone anyway. That gives you a position of strength to make a decision.


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## Satisfied Mind (Jan 29, 2019)

Rocinante67 said:


> I would be very skeptical if it were told to me. But I’ve lived it and seen it 24/7/365 for six years.
> 
> Yes, I know her guilt drove a lot of her efforts. I have wondered if her guilt were exhausted will she make the effort just because a good spouse does that. I guess we will see.
> 
> ...


Rocinante, a few here are being overly harsh in their comments, but most here are coming across strong because they really don't want to see you make the same mistakes that we've seen made by other betrayed spouses attempting reconciliation with very predictable consequences.

I asked you before what reconciliation has looked like for both you and your wife, and you didn't really answer my question. Reconciliation is going to be damn hard regardless, but it's doomed to failure (maybe not tomorrow or even next year, but eventually) if you both aren't taking the hard steps, and I'm not talking about her stepping up her game in the kitchen and bedroom. Here are a few questions to get you started:

1. You won't be able to recover from this without being reasonably confident that you have all the *truth*, and you clearly don't feel that way or you wouldn't be posting what you have. You also only know about a dozen instances of sex over a three-year period. We all know how sex works between adults who have the hots for each other, and that's probably short by a factor of at least 10. So if you don't even have a reasonable ballpark of the number of times they had sex, you're still being snowed. Has your wife written out a timeline of her affair (just as much for her as for you)? Have you verified the facts of that timeline, either with third parties or with a polygraph?

2. Has your wife given you a satisfactory and plausible *explanation* for why she carried on a relationship with and banged your best friend for 3 years under your nose? The revenge theory doesn't fly. That might partially explain a one-night stand, but not what she did. Until she understands her motivation and her character flaws that caused this, she can't work on that aspect of herself or even truly apologize for what she did to you. Has your wife gone to IC to address this?

3. What *consequences* has your wife faced for her actions? Clearly, there was no exposure - to anyone - which is often the most effective consequence for a variety of reasons. You think you're protecting yourself by avoiding disclosure, but that's short-term thinking based on pride. Exposure shows a true willingness to own what she did and express remorse for it and it also builds in accountability. If you rugsweep this, I can almost guarantee you won't be happy with the long-term outcome.

4. Has your wife shown *remorse*, not merely regret? Regret is a selfish emotion motivated by fear and avoiding negative consequences, which seems to be what's happening here. Remorse is based in empathy and sadness for hurting someone else. Hallmarks of remorse are complete and total honesty, no matter how painful or what the consequences (your wife fails there), true sorriness for her actions (not that she was caught or had to confess), a willingness to admit, completely own and take responsibility for her actions to the family she betrayed (your wife fails there too, and you're enabling it), expression of empathy for what you're going through right now, and affirmative and selfless actions designed to avoid even the appearance of a repeat, to improve herself, and to help you heal. 

5. What are you doing to address your *co-dependency* issues and become a better, stronger man? Your wife carried on a full-fledged relationship with your best friend under your nose for years, and at some level you knew it was going on. You made a weak attempt to confront it and then essentially stuck your head back in the sand. After D-day, it then took you six months to get some version of the truth (and I don't even think you've gotten it all yet), and now you just want to rugsweep this whole thing, but your inner lizard won't let you. This screams co-dependency and clearly factored into your analysis of whether to stay or leave. As heinous as your wife's actions were, it's okay to want to stay, but that decision has to come from a place of strength and confidence in yourself. If not, you'll ignore all the warning signs we're seeing just because you want to make it work.

6. Do you have any sort of *support system* beyond online forums? I suspect not given that it doesn't appear that you've told anyone about what your wife did, and you're back online 6 months later posting the same story here and other online forums. You need someone other than your wife who you can be real with and bounce this stuff off of and who you can expect to call you out with a dose of reality as needed or be there for you when you need support.


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## Stormguy2018 (Jul 11, 2018)

I couldn't stay with her. But that's just me.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

sunsetmist said:


> Having read this thread all at once--the suggestions, the debates, the judgments, it seems to me to be obvious: OP finds it easiER to stay with his wife, is protective of her, and he WANTS to stay and live the life they are now living--his decision.


Then why has he been posting about his suffering on different sites for years?

He reminds me of river-rat or WaitedtoLong on SI. 

OP here is some light reading, you should read river-rats story and see if it speaks to you. When he got here he was like you talking about how happy he was, yet posting on here consistently. You can see in his early post history how much he desperately wanted not to have to confront what he emotionally already knew. Eventually when he was ready he basically had enough. He doesn't sound unhappy in his latest posts, just tremendously relieved. 

I believe this is where you are headed. Right now the question is are you going to be able to play out the clock or not. But do you want to live your life like that?


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## SecondWind (May 10, 2019)

What's SI?


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## red oak (Oct 26, 2018)

Rocinante67 said:


> Well, sometimes it is just helpful to me to "shout at clouds" rather than rehash it with her. I hope there are people here who can say, "been there, made it, we are happy, here's what I suggest...."


Read Sex at Dawn.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

SecondWind said:


> What's SI?


SurvivingInfidelity.com

OP is on there as well. See links.


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## lifeistooshort (Mar 17, 2013)

Rocinante67 said:


> I’m certain I could. But the women with whom i would be compatible are going to be old enough to have plenty of baggage.


I've never understood this idea that wronged men must seek out younger women.....I figure it's either to soothe his ego to stick it to his ex (assuming she even cares).

Why would the priority not be a compatible partner with honor and integrity? I mean, you have to prioritize what matters, so if your only goal is younger then you really can't complain if her character turns out to be ****ty.

And what's the issue with some baggage? You have baggage.....pretty much everyone does.

I hope you can work things out with your wife if that's what you want, but if not please prioritize the qualities that matter to you. Otherwise you could be right back here on TAM complaining that you found a younger woman but she cheated too.


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## sa58 (Feb 26, 2018)

From reading your entire thread and your
posting on SI this is still an issue for you.

Your trust in her is gone and you do not
know everything. Right now you are just
trying to deal with this on your own. That is 
not going to work, you and her both need counseling.

This is eating you alive and all of the questions
that you have. Can you trust her, is she going to
cheat again. I think a big question is why did she 
break it off with him ? Where you the best option
since he is an a-hole. 

The time you and her have together is a lot and I
understand not wanting to walk away. Family, friends,
kids and divorce cost and everything else. Going through 
the motions and pretending everything is better will not work.
Just confessing to you partially at best is the only thing she 
has done. This will implode and end eventually.

I agree with Satisfied Minds post above.

Trying to force this to work will not work.
Thing for you and her will build up over time.
You wondering about things and her wondering
if divorce is coming. Both of you may even cheat.

When my son found out his wife of 6 years
cheated, he wanted to stay. After a long 
struggle he knew it would not work His concern 
was his daughter, and the cost of divorce. She 
is a lawyer!! but I guess guilt and everything got 
to her. They share joint custody and he pays her
nothing!! He is happy and she is miserable. 

This is your life and you live it as you want to.
But I hope you at least admit this is an unresolved
issue and start dealing with it before it is to late.

Take care of yourself, to many people forget
that part.


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## Diana7 (Apr 19, 2016)

lifeistooshort said:


> I've never understood this idea that wronged men must seek out younger women.....I figure it's either to soothe his ego to stick it to his ex (assuming she even cares).
> 
> Why would the priority not be a compatible partner with honor and integrity? I mean, you have to prioritize what matters, so if your only goal is younger then you really can't complain if her character turns out to be ****ty.
> 
> ...


I so agree. I am SO glad that my now husband didn't do the usual 'cheated on man thing' and run after some young bimbo. We met and clicked and I am actually a year older than him. We also both had lots of baggage, both in our late 40's by then, but so what? Most importantly, neither of us would cheat, lie or deceive our spouse, we just aren't made that way.


----------



## Stormguy2018 (Jul 11, 2018)

SecondWind said:


> What's SI?



Surviving Infidelity. It's a website.


----------



## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

I feel sorry for all the hot young women out there just waiting for the betrayed, middle aged men to have sex with.

There they are, waiting with panties dangling in expectation of being taken by middle aged dad bods only to be disappointed when they stay with their cheating wives....

Sorry all you hot young ladies. No takers from this thread!:grin2:


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## lifeistooshort (Mar 17, 2013)

ConanHub said:


> I feel sorry for all the hot young women out there just waiting for the betrayed, middle aged men to have sex with.
> 
> There they are, waiting with panties dangling in expectation of being taken by middle aged dad bods only to be disappointed when they stay with their cheating wives....
> 
> Sorry all you hot young ladies. No takers from this thread!:grin2:


Well, when you put it like thar.....>


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## Chaparral (Jul 17, 2011)

If it hasn’t been mentioned,’it takes three to five years to recover from adultery if both are f you are working hard at it.

What has your wife done to help you? Individual counseling? Reading reconciliation books. 

Did she use your affair as an excuse or blame you? Ironically, women in a long term affair blame their husband for not knowing them well enough to catch them immediately and put a stop to it.

I wonder if he gave her an ultimatum and she would not dump you. Maybe he wouldn’t marry her and she dumped him. Polygraph.

Marriage counseling is not a good idea at this early stage. You both should be in counseling though. You should not be telling her you have forgiven her yet either.

You have been married a long time. You do not need to rush into any decisions. A lot of times the decision will simply become obvious. Love can turn to disgust at a later date. I gave it a shot and then baled.


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## VladDracul (Jun 17, 2016)

Satisfied Mind said:


> 2. Has your wife given you a satisfactory and plausible *explanation* for why she carried on a relationship with and banged your best friend for 3 years under your nose? The revenge theory doesn't fly. That might partially explain a one-night stand, but not what she did. Until she understands her motivation and her character flaws that caused this, she can't work on that aspect of herself or even truly apologize for what she did to you. Has your wife gone to IC to address this?


Im willing to provide that explanation on her behalf. She simply had low romantic interest in him.


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## Chaparral (Jul 17, 2011)

If it hasn’t been mentioned,’it takes three to five years to recover from adultery if both are f you are working hard at it.

What has your wife done to help you? Individual counseling? Reading reconciliation books. 

Did she use your affair as an excuse or blame you? Ironically, women in a long term affair blame their husband for not knowing them well enough to catch them immediately and put a stop to it.

I wonder if he gave her an ultimatum and she would not dump you. Maybe he wouldn’t marry her and she dumped him. Polygraph.

Marriage counseling is not a good idea at this early stage. You both should be in counseling though. You should not be telling her you have forgiven her yet either.

You have been married a long time. You do not need to rush into any decisions. A lot of times the decision will simply become obvious. Love can turn to disgust at a later date. I gave it a shot and then baled.


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## [email protected] (Dec 23, 2017)

Chaparral is right. It doesn't look like the WW has done much of anything for R. This doesn't look good, and it seems that Rocinante67 is rug sweeping a bit.


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## Malaise (Aug 8, 2012)

Rocinante67 said:


> I’m certain I could. But the women with whom i would be compatible are going to be old enough to have plenty of baggage.


And your wife doesn't?


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

He's only saying that another choice will not result in much improvement.


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## Malaise (Aug 8, 2012)

TJW said:


> He's only saying that another choice will not result in much improvement.


Yes it will. He'll be with someone who hasn't betrayed him.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

lifeistooshort said:


> I've never understood this idea that wronged men must seek out younger women.....I figure it's either to soothe his ego to stick it to his ex (assuming she even cares).
> 
> Why would the priority not be a compatible partner with honor and integrity? I mean, you have to prioritize what matters, so if your only goal is younger then you really can't complain if her character turns out to be ****ty.
> 
> ...


It wasn't me that suggested the balm of a younger woman. I'm just saying I'm sure I could seduce a younger woman. Yes, we all have baggage. I prefer known baggage that I helped pack to whatever is in Mystery Bag #1, 2, and 3.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

Satisfied Mind said:


> Rocinante, a few here are being overly harsh in their comments, but most here are coming across strong because they really don't want to see you make the same mistakes that we've seen made by other betrayed spouses attempting reconciliation with very predictable consequences.
> 
> I asked you before what reconciliation has looked like for both you and your wife, and you didn't really answer my question. Reconciliation is going to be damn hard regardless, but it's doomed to failure (maybe not tomorrow or even next year, but eventually) if you both aren't taking the hard steps, and I'm not talking about her stepping up her game in the kitchen and bedroom. Here are a few questions to get you started:
> 
> ...


1. I am reasonably confident I have all the facts I will ever get. Some are lost to time - the affair was between 2010-2013. I think there may be facts that she has not surrendered for fear they would be "the last straw." Honestly, at this point, what worse fact could she reveal? The distance between never ****ed my best friend and ****ed him once is a lot further than ****ed him once and ****ed him a hundred times. 

2. My wife wrongly believed I had an ongoing exit affair. My wife was traumatized by my brief death, because of her own family of origin trauma (loss of father at a young age). She was lonely in our parallel lives universe. It wasn't a revenge affair, it was an affair she justified on the false belief I had cheated first and it took on a life of its own after that. Typical "addiction" affair, I guess. The duration bothers me, a lot. 

3. Her consequences have been her own guilt and watching me suffer. Many have said and will say that is inadequate. I don't think more suffering on her part is a gain for us. I don't think exposing her to our adult children or my parents or her family increases our affair resistance or advances my healing. I am certainly not going to shame her just for the sake of stitching a scarlet letter on her. I would never cause her to suffer, ever. 

4. My wife has been extremely empathetic. She listens, she struggles with me, she is responsive to my requests. She's been truthful (except for withholding a couple of facts in trickle truth fashion) since the revelation. She has been accountable and scrupulous with her behavior since the affair ended, even if I didn't know fully why. There has been no contact with the AP, of this I am sure. She is sickened by him and by what she did with him. I go to counseling and she sits with me and discusses whatever I want to discuss, even when it is hard for her to see my pain. She feeds me like a king and ****s me like a porn star. Superficially and substantively she has stepped up to work through this with me. It's not easy for her to confront her shame or my pain, but she is getting better at it.

5. All I can say to this is two things. If you met me, you'd know that weak I am not, in any sense of the word. I can't say much more without being a braggart, so I'll just ask you to trust me. Not a single person who knows me in real life suspects I suffer like this, or would believe it, and I operate from a position of power as a professional who mingles with money, power and fame. I know without doubt that were I to choose to divorce her, I would never want for companionship of desirable mates. As to the "co-dependency" issue, well, maybe. My wife and I have been together since we were kids, in some sense we grew up together. I love her. I love her more than the pain she inflicted. 

6. I am in therapy. I will begin EMDR soon. I train very hard physically almost every day. I read good books. I have a couple of confidants I reach out to periodically. I visit online forums and read and post. My wife and I are getting better at having difficult conversations. We don't fight, our emotional intimacy is better now than ever. 

I appreciate your advice and questions.


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## lifeistooshort (Mar 17, 2013)

Rocinante67 said:


> It wasn't me that suggested the balm of a younger woman. I'm just saying I'm sure I could seduce a younger woman. Yes, we all have baggage. I prefer known baggage that I helped pack to whatever is in Mystery Bag #1, 2, and 3.


Of course....I didn't mean to imply you did. I only wanted to address the idea.

I'm sure you could seduce a younger woman.....I'm 45 and in really good shape so I'm sure I could easily seduce a 25 year old stud.

It's just that there's a long line between seduce and have an actual successful relationship. The latter is unlikely with that big of an age difference. I have insight into this.....I left my 19 years older husband last fall. Big age differences have their own unique issues and the people who get involved in them usually have a lot of issues. I know I did.....2 1/2 years is counseling helped me a lot.

I get wanting the baggage you have shared history with and as I said I hope that works out for you. But if doesn't lots of baggage can be dealt with.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

lifeistooshort said:


> Of course....I didn't mean to imply you did. I only wanted to address the idea.
> 
> I'm sure you could seduce a younger woman.....I'm 45 and in really good shape so I'm sure I could easily seduce a 25 year old stud.
> 
> ...


I agree. I think my litmus test would be if you can’t quote Seinfeld, you’re too young for me.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

Sounds like you are taking care of your health very well.

That is usually my only concern when bull **** like this goes down.

Sounds like you are comfortable with your choice and your straying wife is very uncomfortable with hers.

At least she pulled her head out of her ass eventually.

I would suggest she has earned some spankings but that is just me.>


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## ABHale (Jan 3, 2016)

Rocinante67 said:


> 1. I am reasonably confident I have all the facts I will ever get. Some are lost to time - the affair was between 2010-2013. I think there may be facts that she has not surrendered for fear they would be "the last straw." Honestly, at this point, what worse fact could she reveal? The distance between never ****ed my best friend and ****ed him once is a lot further than ****ed him once and ****ed him a hundred times.
> 
> 2. My wife wrongly believed I had an ongoing exit affair. My wife was traumatized by my brief death, because of her own family of origin trauma (loss of father at a young age). She was lonely in our parallel lives universe. It wasn't a revenge affair, it was an affair she justified on the false belief I had cheated first and it took on a life of its own after that. Typical "addiction" affair, I guess. The duration bothers me, a lot.
> 
> ...


Just like a few others on here, you blame yourself for her actions. 

Well best of luck.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

She loves a good spanking.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

I absolutely do not blame myself for her affair. I had a part in making the marriage what it was. I was in the same marriage as she was and I didn't **** someone else. That's on her.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Rocinante67 said:


> 1. I am reasonably confident I have all the facts I will ever get. Some are lost to time - the affair was between 2010-2013. I think there may be facts that she has not surrendered for fear they would be "the last straw." Honestly, at this point, what worse fact could she reveal? The distance between never ****ed my best friend and ****ed him once is a lot further than ****ed him once and ****ed him a hundred times.
> 
> 2. My wife wrongly believed I had an ongoing exit affair. My wife was traumatized by my brief death, because of her own family of origin trauma (loss of father at a young age). She was lonely in our parallel lives universe. It wasn't a revenge affair, it was an affair she justified on the false belief I had cheated first and it took on a life of its own after that. Typical "addiction" affair, I guess. The duration bothers me, a lot.
> 
> ...


All if this is the least she can do. She had a 3 year affair with your best friend and lied about it for 5 years. That is basically the worst wife possible. She could have had an affair with anyone else but she picked your friend. 

You are doing what all people who R do, you are making the mistake of projecting the way you think on your wife. That is unwise. Would you have and affair with her best friend, for 3 years? They don't think like you and I do. 

Do what I said and suggest the poly look at the reaction in her face. 

Even in your post you do what most men who R do you hold your friend more responsible. Yet he didn't make vows to you. She is not any less "sick" then he was. It was 3 years even after she knew you found out. 

You give her a pass because of your affair, and I get it but 3 years and 5 years of lying? Never truly being honest with you? So if she is allowed to do that now why aren't you allowed to have a revenge affair? By the same logic you should get a pass too. 

It's just as likely she knows she is past her prime and you are the best choice for her now.

Is there some statue of limitations where you decide you have felt like this long enough?


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Rocinante67 said:


> I absolutely do not blame myself for her affair. I had a pet in making the marriage what it was. I was in the same marriage as she was and I didn’t **** someone else. That’s on her.


And yet here YOU are suffering years out.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

Rocinante67 said:


> She loves a good spanking.


One of the healthiest damn betrayed men I've come across.

Conan stamp of approval.:toast:


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## Lostinthought61 (Nov 5, 2013)

Lets be honest, in the end you are rug sweeping this whole mess not your wife...you have rationalized everything into a nice neat box with a bow....it is your life. Just turn in your man card at the door.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

This is a tough crowd and I feel the **** she put him through and his response might seem a little milk toast but read everything he is saying.

This might not be the lopsided marriage it appears to be.

There might be more equity than is at first evident.

Maybe ask some pertinent questions instead of hitting him with 2x4's.


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## VladDracul (Jun 17, 2016)

Rocinante67 said:


> Go **** yourself anonymous internet coward. You would never, ever say this **** to my face.


Dawg, if you want to forgive her, simply stay with her for old time sake, or keep her around for occasional booty call, just do it. If its better for you not to throw the baby out with the bath water, stick with your plan and ignore criticism. Besides, its like my son in laws brother said, "It'll wash off". Just bear in mind your buddy was hitting it, (could/would have be somebody else. And if you got three buddies, two of um will screw your old lady) because her interest and respect for you and the marriage was in the toilet. If she does it again, I'd cut her loose. Ain't no need to pay for poon tang somebody else is getting. In the mean time, her action warrants you a hall pass. If you ever decide to cash it in, keep your mouth shut about it.


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## Justno1 (May 11, 2019)

Firstly I have to applaud you on having the courage to work through your marriage. Not many of us could/ would do the same. 

If you feel your wife is truly remorseful and is making an effort to work through the marriage and won’t do this again, then I’m sure you’re fighting for something worth fighting for. Everyone will give you a advice based on their life experience (definitely with your best interest at heart) but at the end of the day you have to live with her so if she’s worth the fight then she is. I don’t believe in throwing a marriage away without a fight but at the same time you have to do what’s best for yourself. If you’re healthy and happy with her then good. Just remember to take care of yourself too. Wish you all the best


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## BetrayedDad (Aug 8, 2013)

ConanHub said:


> This is a tough crowd and I feel the **** she put him through and his response might seem a little milk toast but read everything he is saying.
> 
> This might not be the lopsided marriage it appears to be.
> 
> ...


You think so? My ex spent a lot of time blame shifting her affair into me.

Took every flaw I had and multiplied it by 1,000 in her mind. It’s how they cope.

Like some how not being the perfect man is carte blanche to let another man f*** you.

Obviously he’s not perfect but what I see a lot of in his posts is “I may have deserved it”.

The faster he accepts his wife is just a disloyal hypergamous POS, the better off he’ll be.

Some people are just selfish to the core. I’ve yet to read any REAL remorse from her.

You don’t really feel bad about taking the cookie, when you know there’s no real consequences.


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

Rocinante67 said:


> I was in the same marriage as she was and I didn't **** someone else. That's on her.


Yes, Sir, that's exactly right. You could have, but you chose not to, and to honor your vows to your wife, even though your marriage was problematic.

You obviously do operate from a position of strength, even now, you would have every right to end your marriage, and you've chosen to honor your vows to your wife.

Doing this requires more strength than divorcing does. I wish and pray for the very best outcome possible for you and your wife.

I'm absolutely appalled at some of the responses here. Your response is tempered with reason, humility, and forgiveness. Congratulations on your excellent character.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

BetrayedDad said:


> You think so? My ex spent a lot of time blame shifting her affair into me.
> 
> Took every flaw I had and multiplied it by 1,000 in her mind. It’s how they cope.
> 
> ...


You and I are reading slightly different versions of the same poster.

You are definitely seeing through the lense of your own wife's actions.

I don't see him taking blame for her cheating and I do see her owning her ****.

He also does know he has options but, in his books (the only ones that matter in his marriage), keeping her has more merit than not.

OP's wife is not behaving like yours did.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

Rob_1 said:


> You want to take a bet, but typical of men like you, all macho, with men , but with women, we can see here where you stand.


If you want sparring partners, you should start your own thread and ask nicely.

I'll be first in line.

This guy is sharing his experience and it is valuable for everyone to read about and ask questions.

You are simply picking fights.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

He will be divorced in 5 years.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

BetrayedDad said:


> You think so? My ex spent a lot of time blame shifting her affair into me.
> 
> Took every flaw I had and multiplied it by 1,000 in her mind. It’s how they cope.
> 
> ...


My WW rewrote the marriage to justify her affair, too. She vilified me to herself and to our marriage counselors. My blood boils sometimes when I think of sitting in marriage counseling with her, raking me over the coals for the exit affair I did not have/was not having, for the effort she said I was not making, and so on, all the while she was fully embroiled in a full on EA/PA.

I did not deserve what she did. There are moments when my pride and my ego and my pain tell me to kick her the **** out of my life and tell everyone what she did. And doing that would be chaos for a while. I might get some superficial vindication out of that. It would definitely damage my wife, our sons, our families, and me.

I have visualized the outcome of the reflexive "divorce her" that so many advocate. On the back side of that divorce, I don't have a wife that loves and honors me in the present, that has spent six years doing everything a man wants his wife to do (again, leaving out the part about not disclosing the affair, which I understand), and that really is in love with me today. I would not have the woman who has stood with me for over three decades, only a few of which she tainted with her affair. I would not have the only woman I have ever loved.

Sometimes I wonder if the most virulently vengeful men on this thread - the ones calling me weak and my wife a ***** - are merely justifying their own decision because they are ego-invested in it. Who is weak? The person offering grace to someone who doesn't necessarily "deserve" it for the sake of everyone he loves or the man who shouts at strangers on the internet, who choose a different path, calling them weak?

And sometimes I am just certain that some of these strutting peacocks are sitting alone and lonely with a bag of Cheetos in one hand and an orange penis in the other, congratulating themselves for being the ringleader of a digital circlejerk (looking primarily at you, Rob_1, but you get a glance, too, BetrayedDad).


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

Rocinante67 said:


> My WW rewrote the marriage to justify her affair, too. She vilified me to herself and to our marriage counselors. My blood boils sometimes when I think of sitting in marriage counseling with her, raking me over the coals for the exit affair I did not have/was not having, for the effort she said I was not making, and so on, all the while she was fully embroiled in a full on EA/PA.
> 
> I did not deserve what she did. There are moments when my pride and my ego and my pain tell me to kick her the **** out of my life and tell everyone what she did. And doing that would be chaos for a while. I might get some superficial vindication out of that. It would definitely damage my wife, our sons, our families, and me.
> 
> ...


Has she fully owned her **** to date?

Do you feel and can you point to facts that indicate she fully gets that she is the ****head that tried to destroy her family and polluted what sounds like a dream marriage?

I may have missed it but does she finally realize that she is the only faithless liar in your relationship?

I'm using some rough language to accurately portray what she became and what she did.

Is she owning it?

If you already answered these questions, I apologise.

I'm actually a little taken back by the attacks towards you. Hard questions are fair but some of the **** being slung your way just seems combative.


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## TDSC60 (Dec 8, 2011)

She kept the affair going for 2-3 years happily.
She ended it because he became insufferable. 
Not because she could not live with the guilt. 
Not because she realized she loved you. 
Not because she could not continue to lie and deceive you. 
She ended it because of something HE did. 
She was not remorseful enough to tell you the truth. Did not respect you enough to let you make your own informed decision about continuing the marriage.
She probably thought that if she confessed at that time she would loose the comfortable live you provided.
Classic cake eater.
How does it make you feel to know that you were not her first choice. That the affair ended, not due to you, but because of him?
And when it ended, she just returned to her clueless husband and continued the lie.

Edit: Sorry. Posted this before I read your last post. Forget it.

Are you sure you are OK with not knowing the entire truth? Most men want to know exactly what they are forgiving before deciding to R.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

ConanHub said:


> Has she fully owned her **** to date?
> 
> Do you feel and can you point to facts that indicate she fully gets that she is the ****head that tried to destroy her family and polluted what sounds like a dream marriage?
> 
> ...


Cowards shrink in the presence of courage.

Oh yes, she is well aware that she distorted reality to do an incredibly selfish thing. She has fully accepted that. We've had a lot of conversations about the difference between what was in her head at the time and how she now sees how messed up her thinking was then. She knows if I had been as weak and as selfish as her, our sons would have divorced parents. 

She struggles with her shame. She struggles with seeing my pain. We have spent a year breaking bad patterns of communication between us. Circumstances that nine years ago would have precipitated a cold war between us are resolved in fifteen minutes now. We can sit together in intimacy and talk about things we never talked about. Our sex life, which was always "good" is now off the charts, and we are well past the hysterical bonding phase. This is the marriage I wanted. I don't think I'd have volunteered to walk this path to get here, but I do like where we are now. There is still much work to be done, but we are willing to do it together.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

TDSC60 said:


> She kept the affair going for 2-3 years happily.
> She ended it because he became insufferable.
> Not because she could not live with the guilt.
> Not because she realized she loved you.
> ...


You overstate the bad and understate the good. The affair ended for many reasons. Some of them had to do with seeing him for what he really was, but she also saw me for what I was, too. Her cognitive dissonance collapsed around her. She did grow weary of the deception and the guilt. I was not her "first choice" during the affair. That sucks. It hurts. That is common to everyone who has been betrayed. 

It is correct that she did not give me the chance to recommit to the marriage she knew she was recommitting to, and that bothers me a great deal. I thought we had struggled together through a tough time and that we had organically reconnected. She knew if she confessed then I likely would have divorced her. It was selfish of her to deny me that choice. But, we are now where we are now. I am not petty enough to make a decision now just because I would have made it then. I have to make the decision now based on the circumstances as they now exist. 

I have interrogated her endlessly because, as you say, I had to know what I would be forgiving. What little "truth" may have escaped detection at this point doesn't change the analysis here, and more importantly doesn't change my feelings about where we are and where we are going.


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## TDSC60 (Dec 8, 2011)

Has she accepted that her stated reason for her affair (the affair she thought you were in) was just smoke and mirrors to make her less guilty about what she has doing?

Does she still think you cheated?


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## MyRevelation (Apr 12, 2016)

Then why are you here?

You asked for advice, but are too whipped to acknowledge anything other than what you’ve accepted.

Well, if you’ve accepted it ... own it and quit whining. However, if you’re man enough to objectively look at the situation, then do something to change it.

Whining to a bunch of experienced cyber strangers who see through your self deception gets you neither validation nor peace.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

TDSC60 said:


> Has she accepted that her stated reason for her affair (the affair she thought you were in) was just smoke and mirrors to make her less guilty about what she has doing?
> 
> Does she still think you cheated?


A bit of nuance here, she did not claim that she cheated because of her belief that I was having an affair. In point of fact, her EA had probably begun before she became of aware of the facts upon which she rested her accusation that I was having an EA. I think she did turn her EA into a PA more quickly and more easily because she justified it on the basis of my alleged affair. Her belief that I was having an affair definitely played into the acceleration of her actual affair. 

No, she does today not believe I cheated.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

There might be an ugly truth here.

You can carry on a long term affair with the worst person possible, for example a friend or relative, and as long as you don't get caught and then commit to being the best and most loving spouse you can be for years, you can pretty much get away with it.

OP's wife didn't exactly get away undetected and is having to deal with the pain and accountability for her behavior but she did succeed at having her cake and eat it too.

She successfully denied her husband any decision or consent regarding their ruptured marriage and her manipulations worked in this case.

Life is pretty ****ing messy and it is often filled with ugly truths.

Despite the bad taste her behavior has left in everyone's proverbial mouths, this marriage has apparently survived her faithlessness and partially due to her manipulations and one sided recommitment to her marriage.

Cold and ugly truths should be faced. She was able to put enough distance between her skankery and her discovery while filling the gap with an abundance of love and hard work that she effectively healed enough of her damage before the repercussions of discovery could cause more.

She effectively shot her marriage in the head, placed the patient in a medically induced coma for years and worked tirelessly on the patient's recovery until the patient woke up.

The wound would not have been survivable if the patient had been awake.

The would be murderer is also the savior and healer.

Not saying that OP didn't have anything to do with the healing. He sounds like he was the best part of the marriage for a long time even if he wasn't aware of it, now he is and she has known for a while that she is the ****ty partner and he the more solid of the two.

I am sad and horrified when I hear about such bull**** coming into a relationship that started as children.

How does someone who knows you that long lose sight of who you are and starts ****ing your friend???

People suck. Fortunately people can change for the better as well as the worse.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

> Then why are you here?
> 
> You asked for advice, but are too whipped to acknowledge anything other than what you’ve accepted.
> 
> ...


For the opportunity to be heard and understood, like this:



ConanHub said:


> There might be an ugly truth here.
> 
> You can carry on a long term affair with the worst person possible, for example a friend or relative, and as long as you don't get caught and then commit to being the best and most loving spouse you can be for years, you can pretty much get away with it.
> 
> ...





MyRevelation said:


> Then why are you here?
> 
> You asked for advice, but are too whipped to acknowledge anything other than what you’ve accepted.
> 
> ...


I'm not resistant to advice, but knowing that someone else can hear the pain and the grief without being a ********* makes the world a better place.


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## TDSC60 (Dec 8, 2011)

You are a stronger man than I am.

If I found out my wife had done what your's has, we would be done. I don't think I could get over a betrayal of that magnitude. Not the physical aspect, but all the lies and deception would be my undoing. I could never trust her again.

Good luck. I really hope you make this present marriage into one you are happy in.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

TDSC60 said:


> You are a stronger man than I am.
> 
> If I found out my wife had done what your's has, we would be done. I don't think I could get over a betrayal of that magnitude. Not the physical aspect, but all the lies and deception would be my undoing. I could never trust her again.
> 
> Good luck. I really hope you make this present marriage into one you are happy in.


It is strange to me what bothers me. It probably should bother me more than it does that she believed that she was in love with another man for several years. I think that doesn't bother me as much as it might because I believe that love was ersatz, not real. What bothers me most is that she ****ed him. That happened, for sure, nothing fake about that. I know she traded access to sex for access to affection and attention. He lavished affection and attention upon her, and she granted him sex. That bothers me.

The only reason I can trust her is because of the way she has lived her life for the past six years (AGAIN - acknowledging that she kept a big secret the whole time). She has been meticulously honest and reliable, so much so there were times that it felt as if she were passive aggressively suggesting that I was not being honest with her. Does that make sense, that she was living so clean that I felt it was an underhanded indictment of my own conduct? In any event, I know for certain she has had no contact with AP, that she has not exposed herself to even the possibility of any other misconduct, that she has been where she says with whom she says doing what she says, and so on. It's boring to a fault, really. 

If I had discovered the affair during the affair, or shortly after it, I would feel exactly as you describe, incapable of trusting her. It would have been over. 

Timing matters, rehabilitation of one's character, conduct and trustworthiness is possible.


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

Rocinante67 said:


> Timing matters, rehabilitation of one's character, conduct and trustworthiness is possible.


Yes, when people repent of their sin, and turn toward re-established good moral values and integrity, it is not only possible, it happens....and, it can become complete.

It's unfortunate that you are here in the midst of many people whose WSs were not repentant at all. They self-justified, and continued to hold on to the "rewritten history" they conjured for themselves. This renders the marriage unsalvageable. Mine was one of these.

I think, with all sincerity, that if my wife had come to a place of repentance, instead of blaming me, we could have had a healed and functional marriage again, in time.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

TJW said:


> Yes, when people repent of their sin, and turn toward re-established good moral values and integrity, it is not only possible, it happens....and, it can become complete.
> 
> It's unfortunate that you are here in the midst of many people whose WSs were not repentant at all. They self-justified, and continued to hold on to the "rewritten history" they conjured for themselves. This renders the marriage unsalvageable. Mine was one of these.
> 
> I think, with all sincerity, that if my wife had come to a place of repentance, instead of blaming me, we could have had a healed and functional marriage again, in time.


I'm sorry for your loss and your pain. It sucks. As bad as my "story" is, I am grateful that I don't have to suffer the additional pain of having an unrepentant WW.


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## bigfoot (Jan 22, 2014)

So, the bottom line is this: they lied and deceived you for years and you knew all was good. They had sex for years and you knew all was good. She supposedly ended it and has been impeccable for years and you know all is good. She trickle truthed you for a while, and all was pretty good. Now, based on that history, all will be good.

Dude, enjoy your life. You are bothered by the fact that she cheated, but it's not a deal breaker and in fact, nothing she did, could do, has done, or will do is going to make you leave or do anything different. As a result, enjoy your life. It works for you. Sometimes rugsweeping works until it doesn't. When it stops working, this is a good place to figure out your next steps.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

bigfoot said:


> So, the bottom line is this: they lied and deceived you for years and you knew all was good. They had sex for years and you knew all was good. She supposedly ended it and has been impeccable for years and you know all is good. She trickle truthed you for a while, and all was pretty good. Now, based on that history, all will be good.
> 
> Dude, enjoy your life. You are bothered by the fact that she cheated, but it's not a deal breaker and in fact, nothing she did, could do, has done, or will do is going to make you leave or do anything different. As a result, enjoy your life. It works for you. Sometimes rugsweeping works until it doesn't. When it stops working, this is a good place to figure out your next steps.


I am enjoying my life. And you’re wrong about what I would do or could do.


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## Taxman (Dec 21, 2016)

What consequences, other than mental anguish has she suffered for this? Was she asked to leave the home? Has she confessed to family and friends? Has she considered what she would feel if you betrayed her? I know she entered this as a revenge affair, too bad she revenged herself on an innocent man. Ask her if turn about is fair play. Not suggesting you need revenge, but she really needs to walk a good number of miles in your shoes, she needs to be outcast to appreciate the nature of this crime. Right now she is just embarrassed at breaking the marriage and your trust.


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## drifting on (Nov 22, 2013)

Rocinante67

I’m hoping that peace and happiness come to you in aspects of your marriage. You are going to struggle over many issues, deception, that she gave herself away for compliments and attention, trickle truth, deflecting her issues to you, and so on. You will need to work on yourself in therapy to become emotionally strong and healthy, I just hope your mind is swayed against therapy as she dragged you over the coals before in therapy. Your wife’s thoughts about couples therapy and justifying her affair do interest me, but if your wife is repenting as you say, this will be very hard for her. To destroy one person in therapy while having an affair is very cruel, but she can change and repent. I’m not against you here, I’m in my own reconciliation as well, and if we had to compare my wife’s actions I think would have your wife’s best hands down. Doesn’t mean that person can’t change, doesn’t mean your wife can’t be healthy again, extending grace for such a difficult sin isn’t easy. Best of luck to you.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

Rocinante67 said:


> It is strange to me what bothers me. It probably should bother me more than it does that she believed that she was in love with another man for several years. I think that doesn't bother me as much as it might because I believe that love was ersatz, not real. What bothers me most is that she ****ed him. That happened, for sure, nothing fake about that. I know she traded access to sex for access to affection and attention. He lavished affection and attention upon her, and she granted him sex. That bothers me.
> 
> The only reason I can trust her is because of the way she has lived her life for the past six years (AGAIN - acknowledging that she kept a big secret the whole time). She has been meticulously honest and reliable, so much so there were times that it felt as if she were passive aggressively suggesting that I was not being honest with her. Does that make sense, that she was living so clean that I felt it was an underhanded indictment of my own conduct? In any event, I know for certain she has had no contact with AP, that she has not exposed herself to even the possibility of any other misconduct, that she has been where she says with whom she says doing what she says, and so on. It's boring to a fault, really.
> 
> ...


Timing might be key.

My version of the same truth is that I decided to stay for the kids, and things were not great for a while but they got better. When I joined TAM and worked through the unfinished business, there was a whole lot of positive history to balance against the negatives. I was contemplating divorce at that time, but it was complex. 

Maybe in one sense my wife is like a favourite old t shirt that I wear even though it’s faded, got a few holes and I should really buy a new one. Imperfect, but worth it.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

Taxman said:


> What consequences, other than mental anguish has she suffered for this? Was she asked to leave the home? Has she confessed to family and friends? Has she considered what she would feel if you betrayed her? I know she entered this as a revenge affair, too bad she revenged herself on an innocent man. Ask her if turn about is fair play. Not suggesting you need revenge, but she really needs to walk a good number of miles in your shoes, she needs to be outcast to appreciate the nature of this crime. Right now she is just embarrassed at breaking the marriage and your trust.


Consequences occur on many levels, but genuine mental anguish is not trivial. The key word being genuine.

I’m certain that my wife feels genuine anguish. I’m also certain that she doesn’t fully get what she did, because it’s not been done to her. But I don’t think finding ways to hurt her would change that. I’m not even sure what consequence would be commensurate with what she did. There’s just not much to be gained from perpetuating the cycle. You eventually have to let it go, or leave.


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## Rocinante67 (May 9, 2019)

wazza said:


> consequences occur on many levels, but genuine mental anguish is not trivial. The key word being genuine.
> 
> I’m certain that my wife feels genuine anguish. I’m also certain that she doesn’t fully get what she did, because it’s not been done to her. But i don’t think finding ways to hurt her would change that. I’m not even sure what consequence would be commensurate with what she did. There’s just not much to be gained from perpetuating the cycle. You eventually have to let it go, or leave.


^^^^this^^^^


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## CDR No Longer Lost (Apr 28, 2019)

It's actually fortunate the OP can so readily accept what many other men cannot, since he's staying with his cheating wife. We're each wired how we're wired. I'm wired to completely blow up my XW's life and come down like the Hammer of God on her AP, of which I did both with absolute ruthlessness. Mr. Rocinante apparently is wired differently. I wish him well in his pursuits.


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## SecondWind (May 10, 2019)

It appears that Mr. Rocinante is confident about his manhood, his love for his wife, and her remorse. He doesn't see the need to cut off both their noses to spite their faces. I wish you all the best.


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## bigfoot (Jan 22, 2014)

Staying or leaving have NOTHING to do with confidence about one's manhood. Obviously, that theory would leave out betrayed wives.


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## BetrayedDad (Aug 8, 2013)

ConanHub said:


> You and I are reading slightly different versions of the same poster.
> 
> You are definitely seeing through the lense of your own wife's actions.
> 
> I don't see him taking blame for her cheating and I do see her owning her ****.


Everyone views life through their own experiences and biases, even you.

We’ll have to agree to disagree on whether she’s sorry or sorry she got caught.



ConanHub said:


> He also does know he has options but, in his books (the only ones that matter in his marriage), keeping her has more merit than not.


I agree, as I said his misery is self inflicted. He thinks he’s too old to do better than a cheat.

What he doesn’t understand is if he’s too scared to be alone then he’s the broken one not her.



ConanHub said:


> OP's wife is not behaving like yours did.


She’s running the cheater’s playbook almost page by page. You're getting soft in your old age friend. :wink2:


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## CantBelieveThis (Feb 25, 2014)

Rocinante67 said:


> It is strange to me what bothers me. It probably should bother me more than it does that she believed that she was in love with another man for several years. I think that doesn't bother me as much as it might because I believe that love was ersatz, not real. What bothers me most is that she ****ed him. That happened, for sure, nothing fake about that. I know she traded access to sex for access to affection and attention. He lavished affection and attention upon her, and she granted him sex. That bothers me.


it's common for the sex part to bother us men, but in reality it should be the betrayal and deceit...would u feel differently if instead of sex she was giving him a crapload of money from your retirement fund??

look am in R too, it's hard and I think you still have a lot to process ahead but dont fool yourself into thinking that you won't have times where you want to end it.

as far as your wife, careful about trusting her like you are, unless she has had some serious therapy and hit rock bottom on understanding what drove her behavior then is fairly likely she could fall for it again. 

is ok to forgive and reconcile, but you do have to fully accept in your mind what has happened, how you will never forget and finally knowing she is demonstrated being capable of betraying you....you gotta go into this full wide open eyes....wish you best of luck


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

BetrayedDad said:


> Everyone views life through their own experiences and biases, even you.
> 
> We’ll have to agree to disagree on whether she’s sorry or sorry she got caught.
> 
> ...


Does yours let you spank her?:grin2:


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## BetrayedDad (Aug 8, 2013)

Wazza said:


> I’m certain that my wife feels genuine anguish. I’m also certain that she doesn’t fully get what she did, because it’s not been done to her. But I don’t think finding ways to hurt her would change that. I’m not even sure what consequence would be commensurate with what she did. There’s just not much to be gained from perpetuating the cycle. You eventually have to let it go, or leave.


A rational man leaves a remorseful spouse like this. His situation is actually cut and dry.

His wife is not remorseful. A remorseful person would not need to have a confession extracted and tricked from her like OP did. The end. A remorseful person would of had the guilt become so unbearable they would of done so voluntarily. Instead, she kept her mouth shut in order to save her ass and make OP an unwitting ****. Her selfishness was more important to her than his self respect and letting him make the choice willingly to forgive. Nothing OP will do will ever make his spouse but him first. NOTHING.

So now he unwillingly forgives her because he fears being alone. 

Such is the behavior of an irrational man. Staying is giving up your self respect. Alone is better than that.

You’re right, any option at this point involving staying is not commensurate. No one is advocating revenge. That would be pointless if he stays. She fed him a **** sandwich and OPs pain is his subconscious acknowledgement of digesting it. It can’t be unfed. She won, he lost. Time will ease the sting but he still has to wake up to the mind movies. Much like a constant burp reminding you of what you ate. 

Frankly, I’d swallow the whole bottle of blue pills and pretend it never happened. Why pick the scab if you plan to leave the knife in your back? It’s masochistic continuing to talk about it and the 2x4s are pointless. I’m starting to remember these kind of posters droving me away from TAM.


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## BetrayedDad (Aug 8, 2013)

ConanHub said:


> Does yours let you spank her?:grin2:


I remember going to the strip club for the first time when I was 18. Stripper put her boob on my mouth. I thought it was the greatest thing ever till my buddy leaned in after she left and said, “so how many dudes tonight you think she let suck on her tits?” 

Reality is a cruel b***h sometimes.


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## CantBelieveThis (Feb 25, 2014)

Rocinante67 said:


> A bit of nuance here, she did not claim that she cheated because of her belief that I was having an affair. In point of fact, her EA had probably begun before she became of aware of the facts upon which she rested her accusation that I was having an EA. I think she did turn her EA into a PA more quickly and more easily because she justified it on the basis of my alleged affair. Her belief that I was having an affair definitely played into the acceleration of her actual affair.
> 
> 
> 
> No, she does today not believe I cheated.


when people start the process of initial deception they tell themselves all kinds of made up crap, whatever it might be, to justify their course of actions. 
I think your wife cheated in the pretty traditional sense, they all do the same thing literally, and you know part of it is human nature, to protect ourselves from impending doom. she trickle truth, etc because she was scared ****less, and while that's very wrong is quite the norm for cheaters....
I insist that the key here is for you to see that she gets the help she needs to dig down to places most people dont dare want to look into themselves, and make the moral behavior corrections necessary to avoid it ever again. being a good wife, feeding you and great sex isnt going to fix her


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## BetrayedDad (Aug 8, 2013)

CantBelieveThis said:


> when people start the process of initial deception they tell themselves all kinds of made up crap, whatever it might be, to justify their course of actions.
> I think your wife cheated in the pretty traditional sense, they all do the same thing literally, and you know part of it is human nature, to protect ourselves from impending doom. she trickle truth, etc because she was scared ****less, and while that's very wrong is quite the norm for cheaters....


This. She was protecting her mental psyche.

She didn’t want to feel “bad” about being a cheating ***** so she decided she was going to make OP a “cheater” too in her mind to justify the getting screwed by OM. Part of her mental gymnastics to rationalize her horrible but absolutely complicit and eagerly willing behavior. She wanted to have sex, she just needed a reason. Even a fictional one is good enough.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

BetrayedDad said:


> I remember going to the strip club for the first time when I was 18. Stripper put her boob on my mouth. I thought it was the greatest thing ever till my buddy leaned in after she left and said, “so how many dudes tonight you think she let suck on her tits?”
> 
> Reality is a cruel b***h sometimes.


I wouldn't put up with cheating. The gal in this tale would have been burnt toast if she did it to me.

But as to previous partners, I had a hell of a lot more women put mileage on me than my wife had men doing the same.

I get what you're saying but it is the cheating and, yes, sharing my bed with a third that would compel me to make a cheating wife an ex. 

In the end, I pay attention to the health of the betrayed. This guy doesn't seem unhealthy.


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## drifting on (Nov 22, 2013)

ConanHub said:


> I wouldn't put up with cheating. The gal in this tale would have been burnt toast if she did it to me.
> 
> But as to previous partners, I had a hell of a lot more women put mileage on me than my wife had men doing the same.
> 
> ...





From what I see in his posts he is on track to being more and more healthy, which in turn will bring Rocinante67 some serious issues. How he navigates himself to a healthier point is key, and yes, he will think of divorce more seriously. It’s during therapy that you go where you’ve never gone before go to get to better health. In this process he will find his peace, his happiness come more each day. This is the point where you realize you are just fine with or without her by your side. At that point money becomes no object, kids no longer figure into the equation, it’s just a healthier you who knows he is fine. When I got to this point my wife became the most scared, it’s when she dug the deepest into herself, as she knew she better get to this point to. Her health was as much as important as my own, with us both healthier now, we began to build slowly, and as you build trust returns. Blind trust that she had is gone, it was my fault solely for giving blind trust, which won’t happen again. 

Rocinante67, as I said earlier, you have issues coming down the road to you, your wife has her own as well, you both get through these and you have a chance. It’s hard work, it can be unbearable at times, but if you navigate successfully, you can reconcile.


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## [email protected] (Dec 23, 2017)

Rocinante67 reminds me of One Eighty in The Charade. One Eighty did this for four years!


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

BetrayedDad said:


> A rational man leaves a remorseful spouse like this. His situation is actually cut and dry.
> 
> His wife is not remorseful. A remorseful person would not need to have a confession extracted and tricked from her like OP did. The end. A remorseful person would of had the guilt become so unbearable they would of done so voluntarily. Instead, she kept her mouth shut in order to save her ass and make OP an unwitting ****. Her selfishness was more important to her than his self respect and letting him make the choice willingly to forgive. Nothing OP will do will ever make his spouse but him first. NOTHING.
> 
> ...


Your post is a bit weird and I am not sure exactly what you are trying to say. But talking about leaving “talk about marriage” because some people rescue their marriages is mildly amusing.

I assume your ex was unrepentant, and I’m sorry. Mine is definitely remorseful. Of course, there was no way I could guarantee it in advance, but after decades I know and my self respect is better than ever. Honestly, would you really respect someone who threw away their marriage to prove they were tough to a bunch of strangers on the internet?


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## MyRevelation (Apr 12, 2016)

BH’s don’t come on internet infidelity forums to tell how great their WW is unless they’re trying to convince THEMSELVES of that fact.


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## dpoohclock (Apr 30, 2019)

I have to say it's amazing to see the variety of situations and events that people have been a part of and/or worked through. 

One person can want divorce from just seeing their spouse look at another person, and someone else can see their spouse have sex for years and still stay married. 

Just goes to show the differences in tolerances and ability to handle issues, also the differences in how much people will accept. 


Opinions about a lot of this can change over time too. 

Like this poster mentions the thing that bothers him the most is that his wife was screwing the other guy. Not the emotional aspect or any other part, but the physical aspect. 
And then I go back to my own experience, and I was bothered far more by the continual lying than I was about the physical. The physical, in my case, was hardly a concern at all in relation to the rest of it. 


Anyway, if the decision was already made to stay, and even said, the wife lacks remorse, that just means you have chosen to accept that sort of history and move along for whatever benefits you think the rest of the time together will offer. Depending on your own mindset, that may be good or bad, none of us can really say since it applies only to you. Most people wouldn't want to continue under those circumstances, but everyone is different.


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## OutofRetirement (Nov 27, 2017)

There is no way you can be sure she hasn't contacted him or vice versa since then unless one of them is dead. Saying things like that is what I question about rugsweeping, like you don't quite get it. You would be more convincing that your wife was truly remorseful if you demonstrated that you were aware you can't possibly know every thing she has done or not done in the past six years, then say that the things you are aware of are all positive except her lack of confession and six months at least of lying. Even saying you know you have the full truth - there's no way you can know that.


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## BetrayedDad (Aug 8, 2013)

ConanHub said:


> I get what you're saying but it is the cheating and, yes, sharing my bed with a third that would compel me to make a cheating wife an ex.
> 
> In the end, I pay attention to the health of the betrayed. This guy doesn't seem unhealthy.


You're making my point. You'd ex her because you have self respect and don't derive your happiness from others. 

I agree, he's weighed his perceived options carefully and made a firm decision. It's just based on rationale I couldn't disagree with more.


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## BetrayedDad (Aug 8, 2013)

Wazza said:


> Your post is a bit weird and I am not sure exactly what you are trying to say. But talking about leaving “talk about marriage” because some people rescue their marriages is mildly amusing.
> 
> I assume your ex was unrepentant, and I’m sorry. Mine is definitely remorseful. Of course, there was no way I could guarantee it in advance, but after decades I know and my self respect is better than ever. Honestly, would you really respect someone who threw away their marriage to prove they were tough to a bunch of strangers on the internet?


My ex was very repentant at the end with her words not her actions. I could of chosen to stay with her. She begged me to work it out. Too many people stay married for the wrong reasons.

Do I advocate every cheating scenario to end in divorce? No.

But TRUE remorse is a requirement to salvage a relationship and that happens with 1% of affairs. Why so low? 

Because if you're the type of person to be capable of being truly remorseful then your conscience probably would of stopped you LONG before the sex happened.

The amount of logistical planning and mental gymnastics required to get to intercourse virtually requires permanent check out of a relationship.

Yeah, I get it affairs burn out and spouses move on and stay married. They got to have a good time and the other person lets is go out of fear of losing them. 

Happens all the time. Doesn't mean it's okay. It means modern society has a serious self esteem problem. (Obviously, see: social media).


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## BetrayedDad (Aug 8, 2013)

MyRevelation said:


> BH’s don’t come on internet infidelity forums to tell how great their WW is unless they’re trying to convince THEMSELVES of that fact.


This whole thread is an attempt to alleviate his perceived humiliation of being cucked. He's fishing for sympathizers so he can lessen the emasculation.

I'm sympathetic to his plight but he predicament is completely self inflicted.


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## CantBelieveThis (Feb 25, 2014)

BetrayedDad said:


> This whole thread is an attempt to alleviate his perceived humiliation of being cucked. He's fishing for sympathizers so he can lessen the emasculation.
> 
> 
> 
> I'm sympathetic to his plight but he predicament is completely self inflicted.


I kinda agree....even thou Im a BH that stayed and in pretty good shape after 6y. it does suck knowing one was cheated on, the **** sandwich is real, but I have grown a lot from that experience and I no longer have emasculation feelings or stuff like that....
I most certainly didn't stay because I was afraid of being alone....hell I enjoy being left alone and tinkering with my hobbies and stuff. I stayed for a combination of factors which was better than D "for me"....
I am baffled if any BS looks for outside reasons or opinions to make a choice other than one solely based on their best interests...
I stayed, we have a good M and enjoy each other, we have both gone thru other significant life events together since her A and as a result there is a different "bond" of sorts now, and we are both more "hardened " individuals. 
But, R is reversible by the BS anytime, I can wake up one day and tell her am done and walk away.....we both know this and know very well that promises fail and dont work, so we dont promise each other anything, we simply work on the marriage every day.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

MyRevelation said:


> BH’s don’t come on internet infidelity forums to tell how great their WW is unless they’re trying to convince THEMSELVES of that fact.


Or unless they are already here, someone else asks and they judge it relevant.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

CantBelieveThis said:


> But, R is reversible by the BS anytime, I can wake up one day and tell her am done and walk away.....we both know this and know very well that promises fail and dont work, so we dont promise each other anything, we simply work on the marriage every day.


Either person on a relationship can walk, and ultimately the other person can’t stop them. Working on things every day is wise.


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## Wazza (Jul 23, 2012)

BetrayedDad said:


> My ex was very repentant at the end with her words not her actions. I could of chosen to stay with her. She begged me to work it out. Too many people stay married for the wrong reasons.
> 
> Do I advocate every cheating scenario to end in divorce? No.
> 
> ...


Choosing to leave was totally your right. 

I chose to stay but it’s a different marriage. The affair killed what we had before. And even the decision to stay for the kids would have eventually become a delayed divorce if I had not felt there was something there that I chose to be part of.

There are some clear differences in yours and my perspectives, but I think also some similarities.


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

CantBelieveThis said:


> I am baffled if any BS looks for outside reasons or opinions to make a choice other than one solely based on their best interests...


Immediately following D-Day, I wish I had this kind of anonymous "sounding board" to get opinions and viewpoints from others, without exposure. My friends tried to help, but honestly, they weren't much help. Problem was, they knew us both. I needed someone to concentrate on me. 



CantBelieveThis said:


> I stayed for a combination of factors which was better than D "for me"....


Bottom line..... that's exactly what I did. I got an inventory of all the "factors" and made my decisions based upon my specific set of circumstances. There were some who disagreed, some who pontificated to me about marriage being "for life", some whose own anger and pain ruled what they said. 

However, every person I was able to talk to about it provided a useful and considerable viewpoint which helped my decision.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

TJW said:


> Immediately following D-Day, I wish I had this kind of anonymous "sounding board" to get opinions and viewpoints from others, without exposure. My friends tried to help, but honestly, they weren't much help. Problem was, they knew us both. I needed someone to concentrate on me.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Are you married to the wife who cheated on you? From earlier posts, she doesn't sound like a very good wife even without being a cheater?


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## Satisfied Mind (Jan 29, 2019)

Rocinante67 said:


> 1. I am reasonably confident I have all the facts I will ever get. Some are lost to time - the affair was between 2010-2013. I think there may be facts that she has not surrendered for fear they would be "the last straw." Honestly, at this point, what worse fact could she reveal? *The distance between never ****ed my best friend and ****ed him once is a lot further than ****ed him once and ****ed him a hundred times.*


I agree with the bolded language, but that doesn't mean there isn't still a significant difference between sex with him 12 times and 100 times. And while it may be less important in terms of weighing your wife's actions in the past, it may make it harder for you to move on if you don't feel like you've been given the full truth now. This is a question only you can answer for yourself, and better to be honest with yourself and your wife about that now than to wait until resentment builds to the breaking point years from now.



Rocinante67 said:


> 2. My wife wrongly believed I had an ongoing exit affair. My wife was traumatized by my brief death, because of her own family of origin trauma (loss of father at a young age). She was lonely in our parallel lives universe. It wasn't a revenge affair, it was an affair she justified on the false belief I had cheated first and it took on a life of its own after that. Typical "addiction" affair, I guess. The duration bothers me, a lot.


Every single one of us has a past with negative experiences that has shaped us in some way, and we all are dealing with or will deal with grief and trauma in our present lives, but those things aren't what cause an affair or any other choices we make. It would be easy for me to blame being emotionally distant from my wife on the child abuse I endured, but I don't because one doesn't justify the other. I've gotten the help and done (still doing) the work to become a better man notwithstanding what happened to me. Ultimately, the decisions we make come down to our character. Your answer here is concerning because you're putting your wife's actions on external stimuli rather than on her, which is simply a form of rugsweeping. What insecurities or character flaws led her to do what she did? Is she going to a counselor to figure that out and make the changes she needs to make inside? 



Rocinante67 said:


> 3. Her consequences have been her own guilt and watching me suffer. Many have said and will say that is inadequate. I don't think more suffering on her part is a gain for us. I don't think exposing her to our adult children or my parents or her family increases our affair resistance or advances my healing. I am certainly not going to shame her just for the sake of stitching a scarlet letter on her. I would never cause her to suffer, ever.


I posted in another thread recently and fully agree that the pain of and guilt from hurting someone one loves is a heavy consequence, and I don't advocate exposure as a form of retribution. There simply is no leveling the scales in a situation like this. In your case, exposure is less critical given that the affair has been over for year, so not necessary to end the affair. On the other hand, voluntary exposure by the cheating spouse is also a strong sign of remorse (as opposed to regret). And exposure is not the only potential consequence for an affair.

Have you historically been your wife's knight in shining armor? If so, do you think that protecting her as much as you can from the consequences of her affair is healthy for either her or your relationship?



Rocinante67 said:


> 4. My wife has been extremely empathetic. She listens, she struggles with me, she is responsive to my requests. She's been truthful (except for withholding a couple of facts in trickle truth fashion) since the revelation. She has been accountable and scrupulous with her behavior since the affair ended, even if I didn't know fully why. There has been no contact with the AP, of this I am sure. She is sickened by him and by what she did with him. I go to counseling and she sits with me and discusses whatever I want to discuss, even when it is hard for her to see my pain. She feeds me like a king and ****s me like a porn star. Superficially and substantively she has stepped up to work through this with me. It's not easy for her to confront her shame or my pain, but she is getting better at it.


Look, only you are in a position to judge this. I asked this question because of your repeated emphasis on the good food and freaky sex. While great things, they have little to do with remorse. And despite the food and sex, you still seem "stuck," for lack of a better word, based on the very similar posts you've made 6 months apart. A lot of speculation has been made about why that is. Why do you think that is?



Rocinante67 said:


> 5. All I can say to this is two things. If you met me, you'd know that weak I am not, in any sense of the word. I can't say much more without being a braggart, so I'll just ask you to trust me. Not a single person who knows me in real life suspects I suffer like this, or would believe it, and I operate from a position of power as a professional who mingles with money, power and fame. I know without doubt that were I to choose to divorce her, I would never want for companionship of desirable mates. As to the "co-dependency" issue, well, maybe. My wife and I have been together since we were kids, in some sense we grew up together. I love her. I love her more than the pain she inflicted.


First, let me say that I hope you did not take anything I said as a personal attack on your manhood because that was not what was intended (and I've been disappointed to see others make such attacks). My point was that I have known a couple of physically and mentally imposing and successful men who were absolutely doormats for their wives. They constantly had women throwing themselves at them, and I wouldn't have believed how they let their wives treat them if I hadn't seen it for myself for years. My point is that there are many different types of strength, and regardless of how strong you may be professionally, the one that counts right now is the one that you live and show toward your wife. There were two things that waved HUGE red flags to me in your case:


1. This affair was happening under your nose for years, and based on how you've described it, your attempt to confront it was extremely weak. You knew that she was engaged in an intense emotional affair, and you also knew that it was "likely" physical as well. And the affair continued for three more years after you confronted her. I'm a successful lawyer as well, so I get the demands your work probably presents, but there's no way I could have seen the emails you saw and been blissfully ignorant of an ongoing affair between my wife and my best friend for three years. I can't accept that you didn't really know what was going on, which suggests that fear was to blame for your inaction. Regardless of the reason, that is NOT a strong response to your wife's actions.​
2. When your wife finally confessed to the affair, by your own admission, you didn't get the facts you have now for 6 months, and you let that slide. Again, not a strong response. I would not expect to get the complete truth right up front (although that would be a good sign of remorse), but at some point very early on in the trickle truth process, I would have sat my wife down and explained to her that if she had any hope of reconciliation, she had one last chance to give me the complete truth and any future discovery of a material lie or significant omission to a direct question would be a deal breaker. And I would have stood firm on that point. I can't imagine suffering through 6 months of trying to get at the truth like you went through. That had to be excruciating.​
There are a couple of other red flags for co-dependency, but these two really stood out to me. 



Rocinante67 said:


> 6. I am in therapy. I will begin EMDR soon. I train very hard physically almost every day. I read good books. I have a couple of confidants I reach out to periodically. I visit online forums and read and post. My wife and I are getting better at having difficult conversations. We don't fight, our emotional intimacy is better now than ever.


These are all good things. These forums can be an important sounding board, but it's good you have other outlets as you go through this. Since reconciliation is the path you have chosen, I hope that you and your wife are blessed with a long and healthy relationship.


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

ConanHub said:


> Are you married to the wife who cheated on you? From earlier posts, she doesn't sound like a very good wife even without being a cheater?


She was a good wife and good mother, if you can call a cheater either of those (which you can't), but I'm just saying that her other wifely things and motherly things were done well.
And, no, she tragically died of liver failure 4-1/2 years after D-Day. When the boys grew up and left home, I would have gone then, too.


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## ConanHub (Aug 9, 2013)

TJW said:


> She was a good wife and good mother, if you can call a cheater either of those (which you can't), but I'm just saying that her other wifely things and motherly things were done well.
> And, no, she tragically died of liver failure 4-1/2 years after D-Day. When the boys grew up and left home, I would have gone then, too.


Thanks. That clears it up. I remember a post of yours, unless I got mixed up, that didn't paint a very attractive picture of your current wife.

I couldn't see putting up with cheating and poor treatment on top of it at all.


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