# Need advice: Regaining my spouse's trust after doing everything to lose it



## Nan (Apr 1, 2013)

I'm sure there is a thread somewhere that talks all about ways to revive trust in a relationship but I'm new here and navigating around is proving to be a challenge. 

Here's the short of it and I hope that nowhere in here you think I'm trying to justify or defend myself. That would defeat the purpose for the advice that I seek. Please don't take the brevity of my actions as a sign that I'm trying to sugar coat my deeds. I have messed up, screwed up our marriage, turned my husband's heart inside out, killed his self-esteem, and basically put us through the ringer.

I lost my husband's trust through lies/deceit and crossing marital boundaries; From being cold to him when I felt a distance between us and not listening to his advice, taking on friends who made poor relationship choices themselves, to naively leading on an old school friend by agreeing to hang out with them and chatting (I didn't have feelings for this person as more than a friend but failed to sever the friendship right away when recognizing his flirtatious comments i.e. "I miss you" - I had a hard time telling people who seemingly cared about me to "shove off" even though I should have if it meant it might negatively impact my marriage) to drinking to an excess with people I'd just met putting myself in a vulnerable state and getting spooned on a couch. Then I waited months to tell him. Then I went to Asia for 9 months with a 5 week break to see him in between for a teaching job thinking we'd be fine. Wow do I feel stupid and disgusting.

My husband is the only person I've ever slept with but as he's pointed out and as I agree, you don't have to have intercourse with someone else to betray your spouse. I held off on opening up to him for fear of his reaction for months - he even warned me back when it was all happening (the distance in our relationship) that I should come forward and I didn't until a few months ago. My heart wasn't in the right place and I tried to justify not telling him by saying I'd hurt our relationship enough. Deceit is what hurt it as well as my actions. I've been working on becoming a stronger, less self-absorbed individual - traits that I'd been lacking when our marriage had gotten rocky before. Instead of effectively communicating and acting like a mature adult, I let anger and bitterness well up inside me. I focused on what other people had and not on what I already possessed. I never wanted to be the person I'd turned into. I still feel disgusting and like a slimy creep for what I did to our marriage. I would not want to be friends with someone like myself at that point in my life: selfish, cynical, overbearing, immature, controlling, untrustworthy, and careless with my husband's heart. I thought I knew everything and was above outside advice or warnings. I found out the hard way that I don't. I feel low as dirt.

Let me tell you something about my husband: he is the most gracious, compassionate, strongest, patient, forgiving, and loving, (and on a shallower, but all the same true note) handsome man anyone could possibly dream up. However, I have worn him thin and he's exhausted. He is aware of what I've done and some days are good, others he just can't wrap his dead around "How could my wife do this." I ask myself the same thing. I never want to do those things again or put any doubt or further mistrust in his life. I want a healthy, wholesome, supportive marriage. I want to build him up, make him know he's my knight in shining armor, and prove to him my desire to change through my actions. 

Since being in Asia (only 2 months left thank GOD) I've had a lot of time to reflect on myself and my behavior and who I'd become. I did not like what I saw in myself. I feel sick each time I think of how I made my husband feel and contributed to the distance between us. This has propelled me into a desire for a drastic inner make-over. 

I've been reading books on character development and rebuilding trust, finding ways where I can implement the suggestions into my life. I figured it wouldn't hurt to get some live advice on here either. I am turning every aspect of my life around because I want to, for him, for me, for us. I want to be someone that I feel good about who is honest, trustworthy, humble, a good judge of character, altruistic, and has a drive to not get better and quit but continue to improve as self-improvement is a life long process.

My husband is gold. I want to be the wife that he deserves. He deserves perfection but since it doesn't exist, I want to be the most perfect wife FOR him. We used to put our heads close together and whisper, "You're not perfect, but you're perfect for me." We have had wonderful and close times in our relationship. We let a lot of trivial things that shouldn't have gotten in the way, get in the way.

Okay so even trying to keep this brief and it still turned into a novel. Any pointers for regaining trust/links to an existing thread would be great. What do you think makes a good wife and happy marriage? I'd love to do something meaningful for him to - any romantic suggestions/creative ways to demonstrate my love and devotion to him would be appreciated. Thank you!
P.S. I'm open to constructive criticism but not attacks. I know I deserve a good yelling at and being told how stupid my behavior was. I KNOW. I have had my fair share of tears - my actions hurt me too. I didn't write this so people would warm up to me and tell me it's okay, everyone makes mistakes - I really do want advice but please no trolls.


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## being the best me (Apr 25, 2011)

You should not have left to go to Asia.

Didn't you tell him you were coming home? 

I belived you minimezed the night you were caught spooning the OM and he had to drag it out of you what really happened.

You cannot work on a relationship that is already in the tiolet from another continent and expect it to work.


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## Nan (Apr 1, 2013)

Yes, I've discussed coming home early but we've agreed for now I should honor my commitment/contract/students here and finish it out. You're right. The truth did have to be dragged out because initially I wasn't open about it. Taking on this teaching job was a bad relationship move. I'm coming home soon and am praying I can show him I've changed and continue to work on us. The 5 week break obviously wasn't enough. I'm stuck in a position where I want to come home early but in doing so, it'd show that I can't keep my commitments here and if I stay, it prolongs working on us. It seems like losing either way.


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## being the best me (Apr 25, 2011)

The disision is your to make, but if you really are in love with him and want to spend the rest of your like together than it seams like it is a no brainer. 

People now a days put to much focus on the selfish me and what am i going to do for me now, that they forget the vows they took and don't think of the consiquences of there actions. 

You need to be one unit together growing togther not apart. Relationships don't servive long periods apart especially when they have inapropriet behavior gowing on befrore they even leave.


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## JCD (Sep 2, 2012)

I made almost the exact same mistake but I'm a man. We are fixing things anyway. I think.


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## Stonewall (Jul 5, 2011)

Nan said:


> I'm sure there is a thread somewhere that talks all about ways to revive trust in a relationship but I'm new here and navigating around is proving to be a challenge.
> 
> Here's the short of it and I hope that nowhere in here you think I'm trying to justify or defend myself. That would defeat the purpose for the advice that I seek. Please don't take the brevity of my actions as a sign that I'm trying to sugar coat my deeds. I have messed up, screwed up our marriage, turned my husband's heart inside out, killed his self-esteem, and basically put us through the ringer.
> 
> ...


This story is so close to home for me I swear I thought you were someone else until you mentioned the asia thing. 

If I were your husband the key for me would be why? I need to know why? When I did everything I thought you wanted. I absorbed all your coldness and indifference. All the times you made me feel like I wasn't good enough for you. All the times you were doing those things that I knew about but couldn't prove. All those things that I want to drop the hammer on you over but knew it wouldn't work in the end if it didn't come from the heart rather than me forceing you to it. How could you not care how much you were hurting me? 

And IDK, I was just crazy is not a helpful answer. After you answer that I would tell you if you take the right path I will forgive you but will never forget and it is incombant upon you to always remember that my heart hurts every day, many times a day whenever I remember. I try not to remember but it doesn't work. You took away a piece of my innocence and you killed a part of me that can never be resuscitated. But I still love you so I must forgive. In fact I found a way to blame myself because that makes it easier to let you off the hook. Thats what I would tell you if I was your husband. But I'm not your husband yet I know that of which I speak so please take it to heart.

I don't say these things to attack you and i hope you will not take it as such. Rather, I hope you will gain perspective from these words and remember them. Use them to your advantage. 

I hope the very best for you and him. Building trust will take a very long time but you can do it. Total transparency is key here. Overcompensate, he needs that. Always be emotionally available, he will need that too. And lastly anytime you arent sure what to do come back here and ask. These ppl have more insight and experience than most counsilors you will ever find.


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## Nan (Apr 1, 2013)

Thank you, Stonewall. Your reply was thoughtful and insightful. I will use it to be there for my husband especially on an emotional level. He does blame himself - telling me he feels like there is something wrong with him and he knows that's wrong. I will continue to be completely transparent for him. Your reply is truly helpful.


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## Coffee Amore (Dec 15, 2011)

You're likely to have more responses, and probably more than a few harsh comments too if you can handle it, if you posted this or had it moved by a moderator, to the Coping With Infidelity subforum on this site. The people there have a better handle on how to rebuild trust after trust is broken.

I haven't faced the situation myself, but have read enough and seen enough to know that you have to examine your conduct and figure out what made you do what you did. How did you come to the point where your marriage and your husband meant so little to you? What were you thinking when you were spooning with another man who was not your husband? 

Clearly others are able to breach your marital relationship so you can't have the same boundaries you had before. If your house were burglarized, you're not going to keep the same security measures that failed you, right? You would get a better security system that would thwart more burglars. In much the same way, you have to figure out where YOUR weaknesses are and HOW to shore up those weaknesses so that you don't repeat this again. If you go back to the status quo in your relationship without analyzing and rebuilding your weaknesses, you're not going to make your husband feel safe in the relationship.


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## plasmasunn (Apr 3, 2013)

Wow, that is quite a mess! It's really incredible the things we do to hurt the ones we love, isn't it? Most of the time, we don't even mean to! I.E. spooning with another man...I can completely see how, on one hand, there's the "But we didn't DO anything!" argument, but yes...emotional cheating is very much a REAL thing!

When my husband and I were dating, I was an a**hole, fresh out of college and not sure if I was "up to" a committed relationship. I liked a guy at work, turns out he liked me...we went out in groups, talked, flirted and finally we realized where it was going. I put the kabash on it before anything happened, and I felt good about that, but when my husband (then-boyfriend) found out a year later (I actually just confessed it) he was positively devastated. It took me a loooooong time to understand it (in my mind, if he did that, but ultimately did the right thing, I felt I couldn't get that mad at him). At any rate...

I think there's a LOT you can do to rebuild trust. But because you're so far away, options seem limited for the time being. Do you write your husband letters? Do you speak to him as openly and honestly as you've posted here? You are an eloquent person and you write very thoughtfully...perhaps your husband would appreciate a series of long, frank, exploratory letters that delve into 1) why you did what you did 2) why you will never, ever do it again 3) what you want to/are willing to do to make things right 4)how you can show him you're serious about making your marriage work. And it probably wouldn't hurt to just straight up ask your husband what you can do to help the situation.

Depending on the timing of it, I wouldn't necessarily call your overseas move a bad thing. If you did it to get away from your situation and not deal with it...yeah, that's not a great idea. But, sometimes distance equals perspective and absence can certainly make the heart grow fonder. Though, your hubs could be spending the time apart to realize just how much your actions have hurt him...who knows, the distance could be a bad thing, only time will tell.

You have absolutely screwed up...but guess what? WE ALL DO. Seriously, we're human and we do really dumb things. We hurt people, we think of ourselves and sometimes, we realize our faults too late. I don't think it's too late for you. I think you're already on the path to redemption because you've owned up to your mistakes and are willing to do anything to make it right. Absolutely agree with Stonewall on overcompensating on the openness...total transparency will certainly make him feel at ease.

I wish you the absolute best of luck! And don't get too down on yourself...you have made mistakes, but we all have a PhD in hindsight...the really smart ones apply those lesson to avoid the same mistakes in the future.


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