# The sad truth



## Sweet16 (Aug 6, 2016)

I have been married for over 30 years and after a lifetime of lies, cheating and disrespecting my husband I finally see the horror of what I have done. From early on in our marriage I pretended to be the perfect wife. I told my husband that I didn't desire to see or ever be with anyone else. I even came to believe it myself, except my actions proved otherwise. I see now that I have never emotionally connected with him, never made a decision about anything of consequence except the decision to destroy his belief that I was the one. I secretly spent money on "stuff", thinking it would make me happy. My husband has never done anything to warrant any such behavior. He is a kind, caring, giving and selfless man. He has always provided for his family without fail. I wasn't mature enough to see that his words were his logical way of trying to help me become a better person. He is very logical and speaks the truth and as the saying goes, the truth hurts. So I spent my time building up resentment toward him which over the course of more than 30 years I lied to his face , cheated by saying I had no need to see other men's bodiies when in fact I fantacised about friends and family who would come to our house, and the final straw for me was thinking inappropriate thoughts about my own blood relative. That was a year ago. All of these things were found out, not admitted by me. Since then, I have vowed to myself and my husband to no longer be that discusting person who threw away our youth. I may never find the love that I threw away with my selfish ways, but my husband deserves someone who is totally comitted to the marriage. I strive to finally be that person. I can't be sure if there is room for another chance because I have been given thousands. I have hurt him and it continues because the cuts are just too deep. I appreciate you taking the time to read this post.


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## ulyssesheart (Jan 7, 2017)

Sweet16 said:


> I have hurt him and it continues because the cuts are just too deep. I appreciate you taking the time to read this post.


Your husband still remains your husband. Apparently you failed to cut him out of your life. 

He likely is a good healer. He healed himself after each cut, and he healed you back to a guilty redemption. It took him thirty years of turning his cheek?

What are some of these cuts? What did you do to this poor man?


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## arbitrator (Feb 13, 2012)

*There is love in that heart of yours!

Now is the time to use it and to duly make up for all of the lost time with your H!*


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

So you did this all in your head and resented him for it? Or did you cheat with actions?


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## Lila (May 30, 2014)

So you spent money without your husband's knowledge and you had sexual fantasies about other men? How did your husband find out about it...specifically the fantasies? 

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## Lostinthought61 (Nov 5, 2013)

Sweet16, sometimes when we lie so often we can not tell the difference between truth and a lie, they seem to merge and then we have to give pause and think.....the words that come out of your mouth now may be truth but how would he know.....i hope you are currently in therapy because you can not fix your marriage until you fix yourself. And even if he had enough of your actions and words, you still need to fix yourself.


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## Sweet16 (Aug 6, 2016)

ulyssesheart said:


> Your husband still remains your husband. Apparently you failed to cut him out of your life.
> 
> He likely is a good healer. He healed himself after each cut, and he healed you back to a guilty redemption. It took him thirty years of turning his cheek?
> 
> What are some of these cuts? What did you do to this poor man?





sokillme said:


> So you did this all in your head and resented him for it? Or did you cheat with actions?


 He is amazingly loyal and true to his vows. But he is so crushed because the wonderful life that he thought we had wasn't real. I cheated on him by looking at other men with desire and fantasizing about their bodies sometimes while holding hands with him. It would make me hot and that manifested itself by us having sex. I had a mindset that if I only looked at men, clothed or not, it wasn't cheating. I would see a man in a public place and wonder about his physique, primarily his "package". I was a virgin when we married and hadn't had any experience seeing other men. It progressed to where I would even ogle family and friends that would come into our home to visit and purposely position myself to try and see up their shorts. I would try to do this secretly but he eyed me doing it and called me on it and I swore that I would never do it again, but i continued. He tried many times to put us in situations that he knew I would draw the line and say I won't do that, but I always went along with it. Instead of proving that he was the only one for me, I showed him that I wanted to see and think about others. Get excited by those thoughts and go to him for my physical needs. Until finally, a year ago, while sitting in our living room, I found myself looking at my blood relative and thinking about him in a sexual way. My husband saw me and something clicked in me, I knew then that I had reached the bottom knew that I couldn't continue to be this despicable person any longer. 



Lila said:


> So you spent money without your husband's knowledge and you had sexual fantasies about other men? How did your husband find out about it...specifically the fantasies?
> 
> Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk


 I began telling him all of the thoughts that I had throughout all the years of lies to try to heal our marriage. I have tried to tell him anything that I can remember. He wants to know it all. I have never had a physical relationship with anyone else, but the thoughts were as much cheating as a physical affair could ever be. He needs to know it all and I will do my best to tell him everything. He found out about the money when we went to the bank to look into a new car loan. I had to call my parents and ask them to loan us the money to pay off the credit cards. I made payments to them monthly to pay them back and have come to see how important saving money is to our future.


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## sokillme (Jun 10, 2016)

First get a job and pay back the money. Second get some IC to see what your problem is. However I don't think what you did is as bad as actually cheating. Lots of married people have fantasies in their head. You didn't act on them. The looking up the shorts is a little creepy. I have to be honest if you were my wife, we would survive it. But I would want you to get some help with your boundaries. And looking at family members is gross.


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## Sweet16 (Aug 6, 2016)

I did have a job and I repaid my parents back. While I appreciate your words, to my H and I what I did IS cheating. The desire was there in my mind. The issue is that when he asked me to marry him, I knew what kind of person he was and what kind of mate he wanted to spend his life with. I thought I was that person but chose to be someone else. No excuses, just a choice I made to do things that went against my vows to him. I lied and deceived him by saying I was one way, but acting another and now I feel that I am finally the person who knows what she wants in her marriage. I want my husband and no one else. I got married young and I never really had any responsibility. Someone has always taken care of me and I let them. Now it's time for me to take care of my H. The easy thing was letting others in where there should only be him. I have torn down the foundation of our life together and it will take a long time to build it back. Starting with knowing who I want to be with, my H.


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## MartinBeck (Jan 19, 2017)

I think you are being in unnecessarily hard on yourself and much too critical of yourself for harmless sexual thoughts. 

My view, probably shared by many, is that it's human nature and very healthy to notice attractive people of the opposite sex, as long as you're discreet and not gawking and making a fool out of yourself. If you appreciate a handsome actor on TV or check out a good looking guy at the store, then you're a healthy woman and you're not doing anything wrong.

Do you have a strong religious background with a lot of sexual shaming? It kinda sounds like there's a bigger self-esteem and self-loathing issue going on here, and I'd advise you to consider counseling. 

I suspect your husband finds the secret spending and financial recklessness a *lot* more of an issue than you having normal heterosexual thoughts. You need to have a serious conversation with him about budget and transparency and financial priorities.

If your husband is pushing you hard for you to tell him all your fantasies about looking at other men, then your husband has a whole other thing going on.


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## Good Guy (Apr 26, 2016)

Every man I know fantasizes about other women, and I'm willing to bet most women do too. That's not cheating. The money thing would worry me more.


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## Yeswecan (Jul 25, 2014)

Men look at women. Women look at men. Men look at men. Women look at women. When looking sometimes the thoughts are no shall we say pure. We are only human after all. You are coming down on yourself very harshly for thoughts that all of us think from time to time.


Concerning the spending of money without your H knowledge...that is a problem.


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## Sweet16 (Aug 6, 2016)

It seems that many are concerned about the financial part of my story so let me clarify. While my H may keep a watchful eye on our bank account, he has had no reason to distrust my use of money in 15 years. That chapter is closed. I see that many are of the opinion that "fantasizing" is "healthy". I used to tell myself that, but how can a person who is in a committed relationship bring someone else in to supplement their excitement for their SO? If you and yours have the same standards and beliefs then it works for you. My H and I have not been on the same page in that respect but one of the issues is that I pretended to be a person who didn't need other stimuli so that he would think he had found the perfect mate. My lies and actions have destroyed what should have been a perfect union. I used others to fulfill my needs instead of communicating to my H that I was unhappy. I acted selfishly and the only purpose was to escape, but I told myself that it wasn't cheating. I am not here to debate whether others think that fantasies are healthy or not. I am here to gain insight on how to repair and recover our marriage. I am not the person I was, but it was a very long chapter in our life, lasting decades. I have shattered his life and he no longer finds me someone that he would even have a friendship with. You see, I have hurt him deeply for so long. He has tried so many times to get me to see the damage I was doing, but I didn't see. He has given me so many chances to prove to him that he was the "one". I have failed miserably in every attempt that he made. I chose others, I chose to lie and deceive. I know this seems trivial to some as per your comments, but to us this is monumental. It comes down to what someone believes is cheating. Everyone has a different opinion. To us, I have cheated and I am trying to find ways to build back not only his trust in me, but for him to see me as a different person.


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## UMP (Dec 23, 2014)

Sweet16 said:


> It seems that many are concerned about the financial part of my story so let me clarify. While my H may keep a watchful eye on our bank account, he has had no reason to distrust my use of money in 15 years. That chapter is closed. I see that many are of the opinion that "fantasizing" is "healthy". I used to tell myself that, but how can a person who is in a committed relationship bring someone else in to supplement their excitement for their SO? If you and yours have the same standards and beliefs then it works for you. My H and I have not been on the same page in that respect but one of the issues is that I pretended to be a person who didn't need other stimuli so that he would think he had found the perfect mate. My lies and actions have destroyed what should have been a perfect union. I used others to fulfill my needs instead of communicating to my H that I was unhappy. I acted selfishly and the only purpose was to escape, but I told myself that it wasn't cheating. I am not here to debate whether others think that fantasies are healthy or not. I am here to gain insight on how to repair and recover our marriage. I am not the person I was, but it was a very long chapter in our life, lasting decades. I have shattered his life and he no longer finds me someone that he would even have a friendship with. You see, I have hurt him deeply for so long. He has tried so many times to get me to see the damage I was doing, but I didn't see. He has given me so many chances to prove to him that he was the "one". I have failed miserably in every attempt that he made. I chose others, I chose to lie and deceive. I know this seems trivial to some as per your comments, but to us this is monumental. It comes down to what someone believes is cheating. Everyone has a different opinion. To us, I have cheated and I am trying to find ways to build back not only his trust in me, but for him to see me as a different person.


I'll let you in on a little secret. Adam and Eve left Eden a LOOOOG time ago.

Your goal is an admirable one, but I don't believe we humans in our current state have the capacity to drive every lustful thought out of our mind. In my opinion you're simply realizing that you are a sinner. So am I along with everyone else.
Welcome to the club.


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## 269370 (Dec 17, 2016)

Are you sexually attracted to your husband? The reason you might be "lusting" after others may be due to lack of attraction.
We often chose partners for "all the right reasons" except one of the most important ones: sexual attraction.
I don't think you have "cheated" but I would examine the cause of feeling guilty about having thoughts etc.


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## Sweet16 (Aug 6, 2016)

To My Valentine, my Husband,
There is no other like you in the universe . I know the reason that you set such great store in us being special to one another. I see you for the courageous and dedicated man that you have always been. I strive to be that simple, happy person that needs only to be held in your arms. One day we will be that way again and we will be stronger than ever before because of the strength and guidance that you have given to me. On this our 39th Valentine's Day, when our life seems the bleakest, I know than there is hope in our future. A brand new life devoid of resentment and misunderstanding. I love you more than I eve thought possible and realize that what we have is worth fighting for.


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## Anon Pink (Jan 17, 2013)

if you're here to repair your marriage the first thing you need to do is learn to communicate to your husband about what you want from him and need from him.

Don't tell your husband you fantasize about other men, everybody does to some extent or another. there have been many threads here over the years about the difference between what/who men and women fantasize about. Most men say they most often fantasize about their wives when they masturbate followed by some random hot female they may have met or just saw in passing. Most women say they most often fantasize about other men or the faceless lover when they masturbate. Women don't usually fantasize about their husbands. 

So cut yourself some slack and stop allowing yourself to be measure by the wrong yard stick.


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## Inquisitive1 (Feb 17, 2017)

LOL! 😄 Sounds like a man wrote that OP. 

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## release2016 (Dec 30, 2016)

OP - I also think that oggling family members is off the scale but the most important thing is you had no intention to pursue to act anything out with them if I understand you correctly. 

Of course I don't know your H, but if he is the great man you describe him to be, I imagine he will be able to forgive you for fantasising about others. You need to forgive yourself too. If he is a good and compassionate man, IMO he may well take some responsibility for putting up a wall that led you to feel you could not just be yourself. 

I am wondering if you believe your H to be perfect in all respects??? Both you and your husband are only human and just as you made mistakes, he will have made mistakes - maybe even the same kind of mistakes you have made but just much better at hiding them. Also I can't help wondering if he is getting off on having you describe in detail your fantasies about other men. 


Consider both IC and MC


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## aine (Feb 15, 2014)

Why bring up a financial matter that was sorted out 15 years ago?

Fantasizing is quite natural, most people do it. As someone pointed out, if you are of particular faiths this may cast some disparity on fantasizing, e.g a man looks lustfully at a woman, he has committed adultery in his heart, etc.

I think you do have a problem of sorts, you could have some sort of sexual addiction if it is a persistent problem. I would suggest you take some time with a therapist.


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