# Recovery



## want2recover (Jul 27, 2011)

I wish there were cliff notes on how to recover from my husband cheating on me. Many years ago, I warned him of a woman at work that I thought he was getting too close to. He assured me I was wrong. I had just had our first child. I trusted him. Then we had our second child. Something made me suspicious of their relationship again. I asked if I needed to be concerned, he assured me it was a "work relationship". I was tired all the time with 2 little ones to care for at all hours. I had given up my career to have a family with my best friend and husband. I was sure I was just making it up in my head. 

After years, I found emails, phone records, text messages that confirmed they had crossed the line including calls to her as soon as I would leave the house. I didn't catch them in the act however. 

He denies a sexual relationship, but admits an "unhealthy" relationship. He claims he cut off all connection to her as of that day. We moved states immediately thereafter due to a job change, built a house, got ourselves settled again. Its been 18 months since my discovery. He's been very accommodating, he provides for us, treats me wonderfully, claims he loves me more every day. "I'm his soul mate" etc etc. He's doing all the right things.

At first, I was too numb to feel anything, shock, too many changes, need to get the kids settled. Then came the anger, devastation, humiliation....and punishing him every day in my head. I think about her constantly, compare myself to her, mourn my former self who was more like "her". Career, expensive suits, nice car. I'm suspicious of every call, text he gets. I feel depressed. Today, I've decided ignoring and trying to "move on" isn't working. I need help. 

I love my husband. He loves me. We have a wonderful life and beautiful children who deserve healthy parents. I wouldn't do anything differently. I think he had a hard time with my attention shifting to the kids. They were demanding. I should have paid more attention to him. I really did put him last. 

A year before I found out, the kids were getting easier, I trained and ran a duathalon, lost 20lbs, started paying more attention to him, improved our sex life....so I was feeling better than I had in a long time. I thought we were good...then WHAM! Having a hard time getting motivated to work so hard at the gym when it did me no good when I was in the best shape of my life!

How do I "get over it". How do I "forget about it". How do I put the obsessive thoughts of her out of my mind? How do I stop punishing him in my head? I feel the ball is in my court to "let this go", but I don't know how to do that. None of the online "surviving infidelity" tips seem helpful. He is doing everything he should according to them. I just can't get past it. This marriage CAN be saved. But how?


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## 8yearscheating (Oct 14, 2010)

18 months and your still questioning yourself. The first thing you need to believe is it was not you or your physical condition and she was NOT better than you. You need to heal yourself, he can't do it for you. Can i suggest BOTH you and your husband go to beyondaffairs.com. They are directed at the betrayed spouse (BS) they also have tons of info for the wayward spouse (WS). The two of you could really benefit from one of their weekends on healing from an affair. To get a feel for their perspective, both of you should go to the seminars tab then click on the words teleseminars and listen to as many as you can. There are also articles and BAN meetings in most cities that are free. If you register, there are free teleseminars they will invite you to. YOu both need to heal. 8 years says you have not done that yet, at least not to the point of moving forward and healing from it. Stay on here no matter how nasty it gets. There are a lot of bitter people who will rsuggest you leave him. But there are those like me who have compassion and will try to help. Good luck.


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## lordmayhem (Feb 7, 2011)

want2recover said:


> I wish there were cliff notes on how to recover from my husband cheating on me. Many years ago, I warned him of a woman at work that I thought he was getting too close to. He assured me I was wrong. I had just had our first child. I trusted him. Then we had our second child. Something made me suspicious of their relationship again. I asked if I needed to be concerned, he assured me it was a "work relationship". I was tired all the time with 2 little ones to care for at all hours. I had given up my career to have a family with my best friend and husband. I was sure I was just making it up in my head.
> 
> After years, I found emails, phone records, text messages that confirmed they had crossed the line including calls to her as soon as I would leave the house. I didn't catch them in the act however.
> 
> He denies a sexual relationship, but admits an "unhealthy" relationship.


What you're describing is so very common here, it's called an Emotional Affair (EA), which can be as damaging as a Physical Affair (PA). 

What is An Emotional Affair? - Oprah.com

And this was with a coworker. Many affairs begin in the workplace, and an EA is basically just a prelude to a PA. Because after a while, the sexual tension, the texting, the phone calls, are not enough and they end up going PA. I'm not saying without a doubt that your H went PA with the coworker, but in most cases it does, especially if they are working together or working in close proximity to each other. If you've read some of the threads here, its usually the case. Did you do any investigating back then? Probably not, like most, you took his word for it. And now it's eating at you that there was probably more. Your gut is usually right.



want2recover said:


> He claims he cut off all connection to her as of that day. We moved states immediately thereafter due to a job change, built a house, got ourselves settled again.


Moving to another state or across the country is no guarantee that an EA is over, not by a long shot, especially in this day and age. If they are still in contact in any way, the EA is still on. Your uncertainty stems from the fact that you aren't really sure.



want2recover said:


> Its been 18 months since my discovery. He's been very accommodating, he provides for us, treats me wonderfully, claims he loves me more every day. "I'm his soul mate" etc etc. He's doing all the right things.
> 
> At first, I was too numb to feel anything, shock, too many changes, need to get the kids settled. Then came the anger, devastation, humiliation....and punishing him every day in my head. I think about her constantly, compare myself to her, mourn my former self who was more like "her". Career, expensive suits, nice car. I'm suspicious of every call, text he gets. I feel depressed. Today, I've decided ignoring and trying to "move on" isn't working. I need help.


What you did was you swept it under the rug, which is what he was hoping for. Now you know that sweeping it under the rug resolves nothing for you. Of course you're suspicious of every call and text, because *TRUST HAS BEEN BROKEN*. Because trust has been broken, you don't know if he's doing it again or not.



want2recover said:


> I love my husband. He loves me. We have a wonderful life and beautiful children who deserve healthy parents. I wouldn't do anything differently. I think he had a hard time with my attention shifting to the kids. They were demanding. I should have paid more attention to him. I really did put him last.


Every married couple goes through the process of getting on with life, with kids, careers, and bills to manage. Whatever you did, did not give him the excuse to cheat, and yes, definitely, an EA is cheating. Instead of communicating with you, he CHOSE to have an EA with his coworker. And you don't know if it went full PA or not.



want2recover said:


> How do I "get over it". How do I "forget about it". How do I put the obsessive thoughts of her out of my mind? How do I stop punishing him in my head? I feel the ball is in my court to "let this go", but I don't know how to do that. None of the online "surviving infidelity" tips seem helpful. He is doing everything he should according to them. I just can't get past it. This marriage CAN be saved. But how?


You can't simply get over it. It doesn't work that way. At the very least this is an EA, and it constitutes betrayal. It takes 2-5 years to heal from a betrayal of this magnitude. Trust has to be rebuilt. That means you have to sit him down and he has to give you full disclosure about what happened. You also have to investigate him on your own and monitor him without him knowing about it. This means installing a keylogger on the computer, cell phone, possibly a VAR. 

He also has to become fully transparent. This means willingly handing any and all passwords to all accounts, and being physically accountable for his whereabouts. If he is as invested in this marriage as he says he is and he wants you to heal, he will GLADLY be transparent for you.

What this transparency and monitoring does is rebuilds your trust in him. As the days go by and you find nothing going on, and he continues to be transparent, you will find yourself checking on him less and less. Trust is slowly rebuilt. You begin to feel safe and you begin to heal.


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## want2recover (Jul 27, 2011)

To all who posted or will post, thank you for taking time to help me! I appreciate it so much! You've given me a lot to think about. I am committed to making this work. I believe he is too.


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