# Anyone who was cheated on and divorced here are 5 questions.



## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

How long after the affair did you decided to end it?
Did your life get better after you did?
Do you think you made the right choice?
How often do you think about the affair?
How much pain does that cause you?


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## Personal (Jan 16, 2014)

1. Within hours of first learning about it through her confession. Although there was an extremely brief attempt at reconciliation for a few days, following a few weeks at her pleading. Yet given that I no longer liked holding her hand anymore and hate ****ed her once, I told her we were done immediately after that ****.

2. Not immediately, yet from 6 months into our 12 month legal separation, pending being able to divorce it did get better from then on.

3. Absolutely.

4. Not often.

5. None at all.


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## Openminded (Feb 21, 2013)

1. There was DD1 and then (much later) DD2. I reconciled after DD1 and tried to reconcile after DD2 but at that point I knew I had to get out. Implementing that took a little time.

2. Immediately.

3. Totally.

4. Very rarely.

5. Zero.


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## Hopeful Cynic (Apr 27, 2014)

sokillme said:


> How long after the affair did you decided to end it?
> Did your life get better after you did?
> Do you think you made the right choice?
> How often do you think about the affair?
> How much pain does that cause you?


It was about six months of limbo. I was in shock after D-day and not thinking clearly, and it took me that long, and a compassionate therapist, for me to finally pull off the rose-coloured glasses. I didn't have the terminology then, but I'd been expecting the 'fog to lift' and for my ex to magically turn back into the spouse I thought I had. And my ex spent those six months lying to me, and secretly trying to force me to accept an open relationship in which I was by far the secondary partner.

Life got immensely better. No longer being stabbed in the back by the person who swore to have my back? Priceless. Single parenting, financial woes, any of the other sequelae of divorce are worth not trying to rely on someone unreliable.

For me there was no other choice but divorce. My ex would not end the affair, and didn't seem to care how much it hurt me. I could not stay married to that kind of cruelty.

We share children and do exchanges in person, so I can't help but be reminded now and then. Sometimes questions like this come up, too. So it's several times a week, I guess. Once the kids are launched, I expect that to decrease.

It doesn't hurt anymore. It's just an awful part of my life that's behind me. Occasionally, something will happen that could be considered a trigger, but all that I feel is a minor tinge of melancholy, I guess, that my life isn't where I had once envisioned it. I suspect if I ever remarried, that would stop too.


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## Casual Observer (Sep 13, 2012)

So one (ok, I) wonders if kids make a difference in terms of how often one thinks about the affair? As @Hopeful Cynic points out the sharing of children makes it difficult to put the affair out of one's mind and completely move on.


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

1) 1-1/2 years of trying to reconcile with someone who doesn't want reconciliation, who instead just wanted to continue her "open marriage".
2) slowly, but definitely
3) yes, and my choice was irregular, to have an "emotional divorce" while still living there
4) I didn't think about "the affair" a lot, I thought a lot more about things she said in the aftermath, her unfavorable comparisons to the POS
5) the pain was unbearable at first, but, over time, less and less


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## Mr loyal (Apr 29, 2020)

1) about 4 weeks, though during that time I was laying the ground work to move on. 
2) it really doesn't feel like it, kinda like a roller coaster. 
3) yes 
4) unfortunately daily... (sometimes I even have nightmares about it)although we are only 6 months in to our separation and it is a legal mess.
5) lots of pain.... for many reasons.


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## MJJEAN (Jun 26, 2015)

sokillme said:


> How long after the affair did you decided to end it?
> Did your life get better after you did?
> Do you think you made the right choice?
> How often do you think about the affair?
> How much pain does that cause you?


1. It's complicated. He cheated, so I cheated, and I stayed married "for the kids". Which is the whole reason I got married in the first place...accidental pregnancy. I talked about the future divorce on the wedding day, so it was always going to end. It just wasn't supposed to end until the kid was older. I knew for sure I wanted to end it soon just before I found out a condom failed and I'd conceived #2. It took 6 years married, the last year spent "trying", before I finally ended it.

2. Oh, yeah. No question.

3. Absolutely.

4. Only when it's relevant to the conversation. Often in humor.

The first was on Valentine's Day, the first one since we started dating, and 3...count 'em 3....of his friends showed up at my house during a party we were having to snitch on him. _His_ friends, who'd only recently met me, mind you.

The second was when I was pregnant and he tried to deny, deny, deny while I was on the speaker phone with the woman and she was telling me everything. Like, dude, I got months of phone bills in my hand, a couple friends who have admitted they knew, and the AP is on the phone, right now, singing like a canary and you're _still _trying to claim it never happened???!!!??? 

5. None.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Mr loyal said:


> 1) about 4 weeks, though during that time I was laying the ground work to move on.
> 2) it really doesn't feel like it, kinda like a roller coaster.
> 3) yes
> 4) unfortunately daily... (sometimes I even have nightmares about it)although we are only 6 months in to our separation and it is a legal mess.
> 5) lots of pain.... for many reasons.



How far out are you?


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## Mr loyal (Apr 29, 2020)

sokillme said:


> How far out are you?


Stbx lives on her own and sees my son (12) 50/50 and doesn't see my daughter (15) at all. We are stuck on the value of our home, I had it appraised and she doesn't agree with the value. She thinks its worth 200,000 more. And her lawyer is taking her for a ride.


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## Rowan (Apr 3, 2012)

1. How long after the affair did you decided to end it?
DD1 was an emotional affair (supposedly), so I decided to try to R. That lasted nearly 3 years. On the advice of our MC, he agreed to a poly to clear any lingering doubts about whether it had only been an EA. The night before the poly, I got the classic "parking lot confession". Turns out he'd been a serial cheater for the entirety of our 21 years together. Everything from EAs, to ONSs, to FWBs he met up with periodically for years, all overlapping and in no particular order. To the extent that he couldn't say how many times or with how many other women - from the earliest days of our dating and continuing throughout our marriage.

I was at an attorney's office the next day. Our divorce was final exactly 10 weeks later.

2. Did your life get better after you did?
My life is immeasurably better for no longer being married to my ex-husband. It's hard to convey how soul-eating it is to be married to someone who has a vested interest in making sure you feel bad about yourself every single day. I no longer have depression, anxiety, migraines, or dangerously high blood pressure. It also turns out, I'm not crazy, lazy, incompetent, dumb, useless, or unlovable. I wasn't defective, and he wasn't doing me a favor by putting up with my "issues".

3. Do you think you made the right choice?
Absolutely.

4. How often do you think about the affair?
I've been divorced 7 years, so not often. In fact, it's been years since I thought of it at all unless infidelity was the topic of conversation of I was reading/posting here.

5. How much pain does that cause you?
No pain. His damage is no longer mine.


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## Red Sonja (Sep 8, 2012)

1. How long after the affair did you decided to end it?

I ended it the very day I discovered it ... the affair was the last straw in a bale of other betrayals (not multiple affairs, AFAIK at the time).

2. Did your life get better after you did?

Yes, I was an emotional mess for approximately 6 months, grieving a long marriage will do that to you, however it felt like immediate relief the day I ended it. Now, life is grand and I am content.

3. Do you think you made the right choice?

Yes absolutely, the last 25 years (or so) of the marriage were like slowly increasing torture mixed with brief periods of relief ... I was a boiling frog trying to swim and, didn't realize it.

4. How often do you think about the affair?

Never, until you asked, I think because the affair was not the worst thing he did.

5. How much pain does that cause you?

The affair doesn't cause pain at all. I rarely think of exH now, however I do still have recurring nightmares about him but they have decreased over time. I have one every 2 months (or so) now and, wake up from trying to scream.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Mr loyal said:


> Stbx lives on her own and sees my son (12) 50/50 and doesn't see my daughter (15) at all. We are stuck on the value of our home, I had it appraised and she doesn't agree with the value. She thinks its worth 200,000 more. And her lawyer is taking her for a ride.


OK so for you this is very new. Have hope my friend. Look at everyone else posting on here. You will get there one day.


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## Mr loyal (Apr 29, 2020)

sokillme said:


> OK so for you this is very new. Have hope my friend. Look at everyone else posting on here. You will get there one day.


Thank you, I know things will get better but I still have a bad taste in my mouth from the sandwich she served me.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Mr loyal said:


> Thank you, I know things will get better but I still have a bad taste in my mouth from the sandwich she served me.


Yeah it takes time. There will be a point where you will separate her actions from your own self evaluation. It's hard now at first but in the end you will get there. And listen, almost everyone gets cheated on at least once in their life. Unfortunately it happened to you after so much invested. But obviously you are not the only one. 

Cheating is not a product of your marriage but a product or the cheaters character. That doesn't mean that at an appropriate time you might not want to evaluate your role in the marriage, you should be doing that all the time anyway, just to make sure you are giving your best. But if you read on here and other places you find that very often the kind of people who cheat are not really good at marriage to begin with, and they attribute the problems in their marriage to everyone else but themselves and their selfish nature.

It happens, things end. That is life, your marriage would have ended one day eventually she just ended it early. Your life is not over, you can still have great joy. Allow yourself to grieve for a while, but also find the courage to have some hope that you will have a happy future. Because you will.


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## Mr loyal (Apr 29, 2020)

sokillme said:


> Yeah it takes time. There will be a point where you will separate her actions from your own self evaluation. It's hard now at first but in the end you will get there. And listen, almost everyone gets cheated on at least once in their life. Unfortunately it happened to you after so much invested. But obviously you are not the only one.
> 
> Cheating is not a product of your marriage but a product or the cheaters character. That doesn't mean that an appropriate time you might want to evaluate your role in the marriage, you should be doing that all the time anyway, just to make sure you are giving your best. But if you read on here and other places you find that very often the kind of people who cheat are not really good at marriage to begin with, and they attribute the problems in their marriage to everyone else but themselves and their selfish nature.
> 
> It happens, things end. That is life, your marriage would have ended one day eventually she just ended it early. Your life is not over, you can still have great joy. Allow yourself to grieve for a while, but also find the courage to have some hope that you will have a happy future. Because you will.


I really needed to hear that today I have been on a low lately, THANK YOU!


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## Hoosier (May 17, 2011)

Married 30 years age 51 when I discovered her affair, we were divorced in 102 days.in 2011:

1. Hard question off the start. Basically from the get go she was not interested in R even tho I was. so I guess the answer is immediately.

2. My counselor said my divorce saved my life. Yes it improved a lot!

3. Most definitely! I have maintained my relationship with my three girls, if that would not of happened different answer. 

4. Affair? What affair? Seriously almost not at all, and when I do its usually a random thought caused by some memory and never unpleasent.

5. Honestly, I am pain less about the affair.....now.

My xw affair was totally out of the blue to me, I had NO idea. Because of that I had tons of pain. I literally did not function at work for over two years. Thank god for great employees. My PTSD symptoms were problamatic for those two years and probably took another two years before my symptoms were "normal" in occurance and longevity. I had a very tough road. But I had great friends and family, my brother and I were close, now we are even closer, with all their help I came out alive and BETTER than I would of been. Time, Time is the answer.


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## Numb26 (Sep 11, 2019)

sokillme said:


> How long after the affair did you decided to end it?
> Did your life get better after you did?
> Do you think you made the right choice?
> How often do you think about the affair?
> How much pain does that cause you?



1. As soon as I found out.
2. Very much! Lost over 60 pounds, bought a new place and moved. Live a quiet life with my kids now. 
3. Absolutely 
4. A lot at first but now I never think of it and when someone brings it up I only think of it as a disinterested party
5. None


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## lifeistooshort (Mar 17, 2013)

1. I knew in my gut as soon as I saw the communications with his ex that I'd never trust him again and it was over, even though he never admitted beyond what I could prove. He changed his story a lot though so that was enough to trash his credibility. I made the decision to leave about 8 months later.

2. Yes.....immensely.

3. Without a doubt.

4. Seldom.

5. None. I see him as a pathetic old man I'm glad to be rid of.

Ironically I think finding out about his ex was the push i needed to leave so in that sense it did me a favor. I think that dampens my anger. I also see it as a symptom of his extreme insecurity and understand that he would likely do it to anyone, so it's not me.


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## notmyjamie (Feb 5, 2019)

My exH didn't really have an "affair" he was trying to have meaningless hookups with men on the down low. I stayed for a lot of years "for the kids" and because I let myself believe it wasn't real. Stupid, I know. 10 years later I got more proof that he just couldn't explain away and I left him right after that.

My life is immeasurably better now. My soul was being damaged every day by staying in that marriage that wasn't a real marriage. It's soul crushing when the person who is supposed to love you the most in this world just doesn't and it's WAY more lonely standing next to that person than standing alone.

Eventually I made the right choice, but I should have made it years before. That's my only regret.

I rarely think about it. I still have no idea if he actually accomplished his goal of sleeping with men during our marriage and honestly, I don't care. I got tested, everything was negative so it doesn't matter to me. He broke a vow he had NO business making so I really don't care anymore.

I was in a lot of pain during the last few years of my marriage. I mourned the loss of who I thought he was during that time. It doesn't cause me pain now. I've moved on and life is good. I pray he learns to accept himself and finds someone so he can be happy too.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Mr loyal said:


> I really needed to hear that today I have been on a low lately, THANK YOU!


Man I made this thread for you, for everyone out there suffering like you are. I remember thinking that the pain was never going to go away. I didn't just believe it, I knew it like the sky is blue.

You know what ----


I



WAS


WRONG.



Every other post in this thread shows that. The whole point of this thread is to crowd source, to show you that YOU ARE GOING TO BE FINE.

ANYONE OUT THERE READING THIS DOUBTING IT CAN GET BETTER - You are going to be fine.

It's like chemo. You cut the cancer out, then you do 12 weeks of chemo, and you puke a lot and you generally feel like crap. But every day you heal and before you know it your hair grows back, and you get stronger. One day you are the person you used to be but healed and healthy.

Right now you are in the early stages of treatment, but you are healing even if you can't see it. You are.

One other thing. Don't learn the wrong lesson. The lesson is not that you should be afraid that you can get hurt, no it's that someone could hurt you worse then you ever believed possible and yet you are fine. I my opinion (since I don't have kids so there is no risk of them dying) this is the worst pain I will ever go through. I think dying would have been easier. But like my Mom told me. If you can get through this you can get through anything. Anything bad happens to me I remember that lesson, so I think, well I got through that so how hard can this be.

And you WILL get through this. Have hope, just takes time.


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## Hopeful Cynic (Apr 27, 2014)

sokillme said:


> I my opinion (since I don't have kids so there is no risk of them dying) this is the worst pain I will ever go through. I think dying would have been easier. But like my Mom told me. If you can get through this you can get through anything. Anything bad happens to me I remember that lesson, so I think, well I got through that so how hard can this be.


Not long after my D-Day, one of my colleagues at work was diagnosed with leukemia. I remember being jealous, thinking that I would have preferred having cancer, or one of my kids having cancer, to being cheated on. I still do. 

Going through something awful is, well, awful enough when you have your support network at your side. Being cheated on ripped that support network away from me, and I went through it ALONE.


Cancer:

You might die.
You feel sick. You can't sleep, you lose weight and your hair falls out.
Your loving partner is there for you.
Family and friends rally around to support you.
You get paid time off work.
People stop by with meals, offers of babysitting, housecleaning, care packages, etc.

Cheated on:

You wish you were dead.
You feel sick. You can't sleep, you lose weight.
Not only do you suddenly no longer have a loving partner, they're the one that did this.
Friends and family avoid you like infidelity is contagious.
You are expected to show up to work as normal and take care of the kids as normal.
You have to give half your stuff to the person who hurt you and share your kids' time.


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## Cromer (Nov 25, 2016)

sokillme said:


> How long after the affair did you decided to end it? I didn't find out until years later, long story but I couldn't stay once I found out.
> Did your life get better after you did? Hell yes. I have an amazing woman in my life now.
> Do you think you made the right choice? Yes.
> How often do you think about the affair? I haven't in a while but recently my XWW needed some help and I helped her out. I know this is weird but she wanted to talk but I wouldn't without my wife there. She knows that's my big rule in our interactions, I don't talk about anything personal unless my wife is there too, so we don't have personal conversations. Basically I don't want to talk about the past with her, and she has no interest in having my wife around her.
> How much pain does that cause you? It is painful at times but then I wouldn't have this amazing person in my life today.


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## Kamstel2 (Feb 24, 2020)

1) within 5 minutes of discovering she was cheating, I was online researching divorce lawyers.

2). Shocking how much of an improvement!

3). Without question!

4). Only when someone comes to me for advice about marriage/divorce

5). Now I laugh or just smirk at just how much she lost and how much I have gained


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## UpsideDownWorld11 (Feb 14, 2018)

Officially maybe a month? Maybe a week, I think I was truly over the moment I found out.

It got way better, but of course I fell off a ****ing cliff and hit every sharp rock on the way down, so not that surprising.

I don't know how much of a choice it was since it was mutual...she was checked out so she cheated, I was checked out once I found out she was cheating... The marriage was over after that, there was only one choice.

Hardly ever.

Absolutely none, especially once I quit visiting that ****show forum SI.

I really don't know how someone can move past infidelity with a partner, especially men. I felt like she ripped my balls off and put them through a dicer. I don't know how you get rid of that feeling, no matter how many hours of counselling (and why should I be forced into counseling because she ****ed up?).I don't know what would be worse, other knowing I stayed or myself living with it. No * is worth that mind ****.


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## joannacroc (Dec 17, 2014)

sokillme said:


> How long after the affair did you decided to end it?
> Did your life get better after you did?
> Do you think you made the right choice?
> How often do you think about the affair?
> How much pain does that cause you?


1. Within days of the last instance of infidelity.
2. MUCH. There is a lot of anxiety in general that comes with the uncertainty at least for me of "is he or isn't he out cheating on me" and now I know he isn't because I honestly don't have feelings for him like that anymore.
3. YES
4. I don't anymore. Sometimes when I think about my partner being unfaithful because of what happens.
5. Zero. I wasn't a perfect person but I was always faithful. If he couldn't see that I was worthy of loyalty then that was his loss.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Posted here as a contrast.

Whoever says staying and leaving really doesn't change your recovery is just completely misinformed. If you want to R so be it, but you need to know what you are signing up for.

One more for good mesure. 

On any given day there will be one or two of these "it's still not better after years" posts. I suspect as much a part of the issue as the affair is the fact that the person now realizes this bill of goods they have been sold that it will be better in 2-5 years is just not true for most. And now they have wasted years.


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## Casual Observer (Sep 13, 2012)

sokillme said:


> Posted here as a contrast.
> 
> Whoever says staying and leaving really doesn't change your recovery is just completely misinformed. If you want to R so be it, but you need to know what you are signing up for.
> 
> ...


I wouldn't be quite so hard on those who you believe "wasted" that 2-5 years. I get the idea that those are 2-5 years you'll never get back. At the same time, it may be something that someone just has to do. It's in their mindframe to handle things a certain way. They had to try, even though likely to fail. Even if they were virtually assured it would fail, they still had to try. For whatever reason, they had to give their partner more opportunity than deserved to show their POS mentality as being permanent, not changeable. Had they not given their partner that chance, they may have always wondered if they should have.

The easy comeback to that is obvious. You can't fix stupid. Some of us are just stupid.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Casual Observer said:


> I wouldn't be quite so hard on those who you believe "wasted" that 2-5 years. I get the idea that those are 2-5 years you'll never get back. At the same time, it may be something that someone just has to do. It's in their mindframe to handle things a certain way. They had to try, even though likely to fail. Even if they were virtually assured it would fail, they still had to try. For whatever reason, they had to give their partner more opportunity than deserved to show their POS mentality as being permanent, not changeable. Had they not given their partner that chance, they may have always wondered if they should have.
> 
> The easy comeback to that is obvious. You can't fix stupid. Some of us are just stupid.


Yeah kind of like blowing all your money at the lotto or something. 



> they had to give their partner more opportunity than deserved to show their POS mentality as being permanent, not changeable.


This is part of the problem. Even if they do change (which most of these people who are still suffering say happened) it doesn't matter. The damage is done. This is what needs to be said over and over. The idea that the partner changing is some sort of key to success is just a fallacy. The partner changing is a requirement, but should never be the reason to stay with them.

Anyway, at the very least no one should be encouraging them, it's irresponsible. Just read the posts, without fail there will be some misguided individuals talking about how their marriage can be better then before, very much like the aforementioned lotto.

The responsible thing to do is to empower them to move on, as for the vast majority it is the best and only way to a full recovery.


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

UpsideDownWorld11 said:


> I felt like she ripped my balls off and put them through a dicer. I don't know how you get rid of that feeling


You don't. You just get a new feeling, which is I don't give a damn what you say, I don't give a damn what you do, it is phuck you and the horse which rode you. You are a total POS and I want NOTHING to do with you. Ever again, as long as I live.


sokillme said:


> The idea that the partner changing is some sort of key to success is just a fallacy.


Correct. No change will be observed. She was proud of herself for taking away a fat, green-toothed mid-life-crisis wanker who thought he was Don Johnson and who put on his white Nehru shirt and white pants to prove it.


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## QuietRiot (Sep 10, 2020)

sokillme said:


> without fail there will be some misguided individuals talking about how their marriage can be better then before


Thank you!!! I heard this SAME THING over and over when I tried to reconcile, “your marriage will be BETTER THAN EVER if ONLY you both work very very hard! IT HAPPENS ALL THE TIME!“

Now I feel very much like I’d been given the Kool-aid at the mindwashing convention of marriage counseling. I was fed the same BS by four different counselors.


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## Casual Observer (Sep 13, 2012)

QuietRiot said:


> Thank you!!! I heard this SAME THING over and over when I tried to reconcile, “your marriage will be BETTER THAN EVER if ONLY you *both* work very very hard! IT HAPPENS ALL THE TIME!“
> 
> Now I feel very much like I’d been given the Kool-aid at the mindwashing convention of marriage counseling. I was fed the same BS by four different counselors.


It would be true.. if both parties worked very hard. Invariably one party will back off, seeing an opportunity to do only what they feel is required. The minimum. The odds of both parties going all-in for an extended duration of time are minuscule because it's just not likely that they're both (or just the party guilty of transgression) suddenly more into the concept of marriage and the relationship than they were when they got married in the first place.

If the fish was rotten early on, it's not likely to become fresh at a later time. Any person going through that much change would possibly now be a different person who wouldn't have married their original partner.

Yeah, it's complicated. One of those things where I know what I'm trying to say, I feel it, but I can't get it into words.


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## QuietRiot (Sep 10, 2020)

Casual Observer said:


> It would be true.. if both parties worked very hard. Invariably one party will back off, seeing an opportunity to do only what they feel is required. The minimum.


I have come to terms with the sad reality that even if he did work very hard, and changed all the poopy stuff, it never clears the stuff he already did. There is nothing he can possibly do to make me want to spend my life with him. I’d have to eat a lot of crow just to enable that situation and I know I’d never, ever, feel an unencumbered heart if I did. THATS what I wish a counselor would have told me as a more likely reality along with the glittery less likely outcome, and the very very likely outcome that he wasn’t going to do anything even remotely close to WORK on the marriage.

Anyways... I plan to answer the original questions of this thread when I am far enough out of this situation to have the right to do so. Marking it!


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

QuietRiot said:


> Thank you!!! I heard this SAME THING over and over when I tried to reconcile, “your marriage will be BETTER THAN EVER if ONLY you both work very very hard! IT HAPPENS ALL THE TIME!“
> 
> Now I feel very much like I’d been given the Kool-aid at the mindwashing convention of marriage counseling. I was fed the same BS by four different counselors.


Because you were. You should go back and tell everyone who told you as much. Gotta wonder for whose benefit that advice was for really? I mean think about it, a counselor who tell you "your crazy to waste your time with that asshole". Isn't going to have a lot of long term customers now are they?

First of all long term cheaters are inherently selfish, some of the most selfish people alive. The also have a deficit in there empathy quota. How are you going to have a good relationship with someone like that. The best of them are struggling to feel empathy. Yet somehow that is the person, who has just spent months, sometimes years lying to you and everyone's face, that you are going to base your whole future happiness on? Oh yeah and that whole thing hinges on them tell the truth, not something that comes naturally to them.

Look at it this way say you are partners in a bar with someone who turns out is an alcoholic, even if they get clean you can't expect them to be able to go tend bar with you again. They shouldn't be your first choice to be bartender. 

What I mean by that is it's really unreasonable, and unwise to expect people who behave like cheaters do to be able to have the kind of honest relationship everyone wants. So many of them are really emotionally undeveloped. They just don't have the skills to be able to do it.

Besides that even if they could just flip a switch and you knew they wouldn't do it again, they still did it. There is still the problem of spending the primary amount of your time with someone who did that to you. This person who causes you to trigger. For many people the idea of spending your life and giving your love to someone who abused you is demeaning. And I believe wholeheartedly in some cases where the abuse is egregious it is demeaning, to all of us. Just like any other kind of repeated abuse in society. 

Finally the obvious reason why these people say they think about it every day is because they wake next to the person who did it every day. I mean how can that not be a reminder. Finally as it fails get better there is the creeping realization that it doesn't get better, and they you have settled. They also have to hear from the "well meaning" people how it's their fault for NOT getting better. If they would just move on.

Now look in the very rare cases people do seem to get over it. Though I would love to give these BS's truth serum. But that is the point, it's rare. It shouldn't be sold like some workout regime, if you just work hard enough it can all be fixed. It's really once again unfair to those who were abused, like it's some failing on their part that they can't get over it. No, your really not supposed to get over it.

If your spouse shot you but you lived, then you decided to stay together, if were always flinching whenever they reached in the pocket would anyone be giving you a hard time about that? Saying - "you need to get counseling, only you can allow yourself to feel the fear of being shot". That would be seen as such ********. Yet there are "respected" posters on other sites where that is the exact advice. Some in the threads I linked to in this post. The typical "at this point you should be over it, you need to get some IC, only you can allow yourself to feel this way". Again if they shot you no one in there right mind would be arguing that you should get counseling to get over having an issue being around the person who shot you. Let alone that your relationship with them could be better then ever. Why is it any different when they emotionally shoot you. 

It's my sincere belief is that if the emotional damage from infidelity was visible no one would ever suggest you stay with the person who did that to you.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

Casual Observer said:


> It would be true.. if both parties worked very hard. Invariably one party will back off, seeing an opportunity to do only what they feel is required. The minimum. The odds of both parties going all-in for an extended duration of time are minuscule because it's just not likely that they're both (or just the party guilty of transgression) suddenly more into the concept of marriage and the relationship than they were when they got married in the first place.
> 
> If the fish was rotten early on, it's not likely to become fresh at a later time. Any person going through that much change would possibly now be a different person who wouldn't have married their original partner.
> 
> Yeah, it's complicated. One of those things where I know what I'm trying to say, I feel it, but I can't get it into words.


That discounts the history of abuse though. The best intentions in the world by all parties doesn't mean that the history of abuse isn't still there. You are still eating, sleeping, talking, and having sex with the person who abused you worst then anyone else in your life, for the vast majority of people.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

To answer both posters on the other site --- The --- It's been 25 years, it's been 40 years and I am still not over it, I still think about it every day.....


OF COURSE YOU DO! What did you think that you wouldn't?? You wake up next to that asshole every day, you give them your blood sweat and tears. If you stay with them, IT'S NEVER GOING AWAY! The folks who told any different were saying that from wish not truth.

That needs to be said over and over and over. 

NOT - if you work hard enough it will get better. Define better I say. If better is, I think about it but only a little every day, they yeah it will get better. 

Now read this post again. Divorced people don't think about it at all, and they never think about it emotionally.


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## bobert (Nov 22, 2018)

Oh **** off with your **** already. You see what you want to see and report on whatever confirms your bias. I have seen and heard so many people WHO DIVORCED say how hard it still is, that they still think about it all the time, how much it impacts their new relationships, etc. Real people, not internet trolls. 

Even this guy from the first post you linked:

_"It's been 20 years for me and I'm in the same boat - and I'm remarried. It's the gift that keeps on giving"_ - thatbpguy

So how about that guy? I thought "divorced people don't think about it at all"?? It has been 20 years for that guy and he's remarried, I assume not to the WS, so why isn't he magically off in happyland where he never thinks about it again?

And I can guarantee you not every BS wakes up next to their "asshole" (give me a break ) every day thinking that A) they are an asshole and B) about the affair(s).

But you know, keep telling yourself whatever you need to hear.


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## QuietRiot (Sep 10, 2020)

sokillme said:


> Because you were. You should go back and tell everyone who told you as much. Gotta wonder for whose benefit that advice was for really? I mean think about it, a counselor who tell you "your crazy to waste your time with that asshole". Isn't going to have a lot of long term customers now are they?


It sure would be nice to have found a straightforward counselor, the ones that care about the well being of the person that got their life, heart and dreams stomped into the crap pile. I wish I could’ve heard the things you’ve said and many people here have said in the very beginning. Would I have still tried? Probably, but I’d have had my eyes wide open and been a lot less fragile in my naïveté, gobbling up the crumbs of words I took as the magical signs that my life was going to be better than ever since I was working so VERY hard!


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## QuietRiot (Sep 10, 2020)

bobert said:


> And I can guarantee you not every BS wakes up next to their "asshole" (give me a break ) every day thinking that A) they are an asshole and B) about the affair(s).


Im genuinely interested in what makes you angry about this viewpoint and topic. Do you have experience being a spouse who was betrayed and find it offensive? I’m confused by the reaction.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

QuietRiot said:


> Im genuinely interested in what makes you angry about this viewpoint and topic. Do you have experience being a spouse who was betrayed and find it offensive? I’m confused by the reaction.


Just read his threads. Then give him a brake, like I am doing. He has doesn't have it easy.

Though I don't appreciate that he insulted me, besides that he is entitled to his opinion.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

QuietRiot said:


> It sure would be nice to have found a straightforward counselor, the ones that care about the well being of the person that got their life, heart and dreams stomped into the crap pile. I wish I could’ve heard the things you’ve said and many people here have said in the very beginning. Would I have still tried? Probably, but I’d have had my eyes wide open and been a lot less fragile in my naïveté, gobbling up the crumbs of words I took as the magical signs that my life was going to be better than ever since I was working so VERY hard!


Your life IS going to be better then ever, you are on that path now.


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## BruceBanner (May 6, 2018)

Hopeful Cynic said:


> Not long after my D-Day, one of my colleagues at work was diagnosed with leukemia. I remember being jealous, thinking that I would have preferred having cancer, or one of my kids having cancer, to being cheated on. I still do.
> 
> Going through something awful is, well, awful enough when you have your support network at your side. Being cheated on ripped that support network away from me, and I went through it ALONE.
> 
> ...


I suppose with cancer you'd at least have someone there to support you.


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## Diana7 (Apr 19, 2016)

I will reply for my husband whose first wife cheated on him and ended the marriage. I doubt he would have divorced her if she had said sorry and stopped the affair and asked to come back, as he believes in keeping promises made, but she ended it anyway. 
For him it was actually a relief as he wasnt happy, but of course it hurt as well. Not nice to be rejected for another man.
He has never regretted the marriage ending, we met soon afterwards and married 9 months later That was 15 years ago. 
He rarely thinks about the past and not do I.


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## Sammy874 (Nov 14, 2020)

sokillme said:


> How long after the affair did you decided to end it?
> Did your life get better after you did?
> Do you think you made the right choice?
> How often do you think about the affair?
> How much pain does that cause you?


1. I was in shock denial, we just bought a house it was being renovated, I tryed to stay with him offer forgivness.. I was desperate to keep, what was never mine. It toke him asking me to leave and being away from him to figure it out, I didn't want to be with someone who hurt me and made me feel mentally insane.. so about three weeks we met up talked about MC, but no I was very angry..
2. Life got better, I discovered me, I found out what I like . I worked hard got the job I always wanted and lost a ton of weight got healthy quit smoking. 
3. I made the only choice, I fell in love with me. I don't regret leaving, I had hardly trusted him over the years, couldn't stay. 
4. Too often, but less and less as time gos
5. So much pain, greaving still, I had loved him 💔 so much.


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