Why can't I end my affair?

[ilovenewyork]

Hi, I need help.

 

I am a married woman having an affair with a married man. It has been going on for seven months now. I am disgusted at myself.

 

I love my husband, he does not deserve this.

 

I want to get back that spark, that connection, the 17 years of bliss we have had. So why can't I end my affair? Why can't I just do it?

 

This affair is making me ill. The guilt is consuming me.

 

But I feel head over heels in love with him...and he is with me.

 

How can I love two men? I know I need to end the affair as it's the right thing to do. Why can't I do it? Help!

[Geishawhelk]

Because you don't want to.

Otherwise, you would.

It's called "Wanting the best of both worlds."

[me4u2]

Wow, I need to read this post over and over and over and over again so I don't follow in your shoes.

 

Having said that, it sounds like you can't end it because you're obviously getting something that you don't get at home. You know you should end it, but you can't because it's euphoric to have everything - some with your husband, some with him.

[jwi71]

This is really quite easy.

 

You divorce your H, your MM can divorce his W and the two of you live happily ever after.

 

See - you can have the love of your life and not be guilty. Additionally, your H is free to find a woman who will be faithful to him. The same is true for your MM's wife. Everybody wins!

 

So what are you two waiting for?

[JamesM]

Affairs are addictive and provide the excitement of a real life fantasy.

 

Marriages are real and take hard work.

 

No matter how you do it, there will be a let down from an affair...even if it ends badly. Yet the only way to escape the addiction is to end the affair. BUT...the best way to alleviate the pain of the affair is to continue the affair, so it is an endless cycle.

 

It will take a determined effort on your part to end the affair and never look back at it. It will take the commitment of learning to love your husband all over again even though now he pales in comparison to the excitement of the affair.

 

There is no easy way. Affairs are exciting and marriages are boring...in the short term. In the long term, marriages provide the best fulfillment if they are based on honesty and commitment.

[Maladjusted]

Maybe someone can help me understand this. How can you ever trust someone that broke an oath they took in a marriage to sleep with someone else that is married?

 

Say the OP divorces her husband, and the OM divorces his wife and they get together. Can they really ever trust each other or be happily married to each other, knowing that they broke oaths to the people they were married to?

 

Not trying to be a threadkiller I just couldn't help but ask.

[Ronni_W]

I know I need to end the affair as it's the right thing to do. Why can't I do it?

Maybe you're feeling as if you "can't" do it because doing it just because it's the "right thing" isn't a strong enough motivator to let go of something that makes you feel good as a person and/or that fills your needs and desires that have been unfulfilled for some period of time?

 

It could just be that the benefits are (still) outweighing the costs/risks, and human tendency is to stay with the same program until the costs/risks are perceived as too high.

 

Have you browsed the articles at marriagebuilders.com? - perhaps that can help you get clear about what you are missing from your marital relationship, and then you can make better assessments and decisions about whether you want to work to repair that, or need to get a divorce in order to ensure your future happiness and fulfillment.

 

Best of luck.

[Bryanp]

How would you feel if your husband was doing to you what you are doing to him? How would you feel if your husband said he was screwing a married woman for the past 7 months behind your back and feels bad about it because he still loves you?

 

You are engaging in total humiliation and disrespect toward your husband and marriage and putting your husband at risk for STD's. You are engaging in lies and deceit. Your lover clearly has no problem cheating on his wife and screwing a married woman. He sounds very special doesn't he?

 

If you have any shread of decency and respect for your husband then you will sit down and be honest with your husband. Wouldn't you want the same if the roles were reversed? Right now you are treating your husband like a fool. Be honest with your husband. You will either have a relationship based on trust and honesty or lies and deceit. The choice is yours.

 

You also need to ask yourself what internally gave your permission to humiliate and betray the person who married you and have always loved you and been with you when you needed him.? You say your husband does not deserve this and that you love him? I am sorry but you judge a person by their actions and not by their words and your actions are speaking volumes. Your actions indicate that you do not care about disrespecting, betraying humiliating and showing distain for your husband. You clearly have also no empathy for the wife of your lover. You have a broken moral compass. What are you going to do about. Only truth and honesty in your life will set you free. Why are you self-destructing your life and inflicting pain on a spouse that loves you? Your story is very sad but you have the power to change the ending. I wish you luck.

[whichwayisup]

You don't want to really end this affair because it makes you feel too good. You're addicted to how this guy makes you feel and all that it brings along. Feeling guilty and worrying that you're hurting your husband in the worst way possible doesn't matter, those feelings of guilt isn't enough to make you stop.

 

What WILL make you stop, or atleast slow down is, getting caught. And that's only a matter of time.

[Reggie]

Self destructive behavior can be very addicting. I don't know why folks do not stop nor do I know how you go about it.

It seems, inmost cases, the behavior stops when you really feel the consequences. I'd suggest telling your spouse so you can start feeling the full consequences. Maybe that will help you stop.

[pelicanpreacher]

Or maybe it might help to give her a free glimpse into the future by reading the fresh thread started by keepin_it real!http://www.loveshack.org/forums/member.php?u=59765

[BlueHarvest]

Maybe someone can help me understand this. How can you ever trust someone that broke an oath they took in a marriage to sleep with someone else that is married?

 

Say the OP divorces her husband, and the OM divorces his wife and they get together. Can they really ever trust each other or be happily married to each other, knowing that they broke oaths to the people they were married to?

 

Not trying to be a threadkiller I just couldn't help but ask.

 

Not a threadkiller at all IMO. It pertains to this thread in a very important way. It's one of the few things people in affairs overlook.

 

When an affair happens BOTH PARTIES are at fault. They both seem to think they are "perfect" for each other. What they fail to realize that if both of their dreams come true and they "legally" end up getting together. How could either one trust each other? In a perverse twisted form of it, the student has now become the master.

 

What I mean is that the thing that probably lead to the first marriage ending will probably be the cause of the second.

 

I have a friend right now that is doing the exact thing you describe. She is having an affair with a MM, and seems to think he's perfect. Even though the MM got himself into "his bad marriage" situation by getting a girl pregnant then marrying her cause he thought it was "the right thing to do" even though he didn't love her.

 

I could go on and on about this situation but suffice it to say that Affairs are not only addictive but they also blind people. BIG WARNING FLAGS in their behavior and actions that would normally make people run for the hills are ignored.

 

The unfortunate truth is we are so blinded by "love" that we end up not seeing the truth (or the real person behind the lust) until it's too late or we have invested too much time in that person.

 

In this case the only way to wake this person up is to let the **** hit the proverbial fan. Someone needs to get the info of the affair out into the open and let the affected spouses know. Someone in another thread about affairs said this...

 

"Affairs are like vampires, they thrive in secrecy and darkness."

 

Guilt consumes those who hide it. Get over the guilt, confess everything to your spouse and get on the road to recovery immediately. It's never too late as long as YOU are willing to do something about it. It's not an easy path but it's the right path and in the end you'll feel better about it and be a more trustworthy person.

[pkn06002]

I wonder how many here that are telling her to confess are FWS or WS??? Humm for some reason I think all of you are BS, there seems to always be a focus on how hurt the BS will be. Just disregard reasons for why she felt justified in taking this course of action since none of those other issues could possibly be of the same pain right? Anyway

 

Well ilovenewyork let me say this from a WS point of view. Stop the affair! You are already in really deep and it only gets more intense and harder to leave moving forward (even if you want to). Don't leave the affair for any reasons but your own. Don't worry about the effects on your husband or the other man. You made this choice for whatever reason and now you need to get out of it for your own reasons or the choice to end it will not stick.

 

Once out of the affair and at least 6 months down the road decided what you are going to do and what you want in life (it will take you weeks if not months to detox). You only went down this road because you are missing something in your marriage. Happy people do not cheat so figure out what was missing and determine the best way to get that out of this relationship or your next one. Again do this decision point for YOU not for your husband, OM, vows or anything else the end decision has to be for YOU or it will not stick.

 

On the idea of confessing, when you stop the affair, if it has not been found out, do it. I tried for months to not say anything and to fix things with my wife and the guilt of holding the secret almost killed me (litterally). It is always better to confess then to be found out anyway.

[Holding-On]

Hi.

Hugs to you. I'm sure you are in a lot of pain.

I would suggest reading a few forums

 

the other woman (they have an entire forum devoted to ending an affair)

and excellent suggestions and been there done that that may help you in ending your affair

 

surviving infidelity and the infidelity forum here. Reading the BS point of view would probably really help you right now

 

As to loving two men, well yes, you do. I'm not surprised that you would. However you are not in a position to actively love both of them.

 

 

I think that you know that your MM is removed from boring and responsiblity, the affair is taboo and thus heightened for the senses and the positive random loving you get from him is addictive. Romantic love in the beginning is very chemical. So that is why it is hard to quit.

 

Again as pkn said you may very well be fulfilling some need and you need to figure out what that is. Or it could just be that your MM is just the right temptation for you, I don't know so...

 

I'd recommend individual counselling (if you can't afford it try a university or pastor etc) so you can work this out. If you are going to to tell your BS, you may want to begin working this out and getting over your MM before you tell your BS. The reason being that there will be extreme emotional fallout. You should be ready for that and firm in some kind of decision before telling your husband all that has happened. It also may take you a bit of time to find a counsellor.

[Reggie]

I wanted to add that it is critical that you stop having physical relations with your husband and let him know he needs STD testing. This is a real risk to him. I thought it was far fetched butI have read about numerous BS's infected by the WS. If you love your husband(I'll never understand that one in light of the health risks and the emotional damage you are about to inflict), you need to protect his health. He should not be exposed to this other guy's sexual history. Wouldn't you agree?

[In Like Flynn]

Ask your self if you had to end one or the other which one would it be?? Then pull the plug!!! At least stop exposing your husband to STD's!!! And yes even if you using protection there is still a risk!!!

 

How can someone actually love their spouse and then state they love someone else??? If you really look at the situation honestly you can't!!! This is actually the worse kind of cheating. If your husband was a bad guy or you just didn't love him anymore that would be bad enough but to say you actually honestly love both!!!

[pkn06002]

You all need to give up on this idea that she needs to think about someone else in this. Because this affair is about her and her needs, plain and simple. She has to decided what she wants/needs to do and go that direction. You can not base you life on what other people may feel about the situation that is part of the problem that got her to this point.

[Reggie]

You all need to give up on this idea that she needs to think about someone else in this. Because this affair is about her and her needs, plain and simple. She has to decided what she wants/needs to do and go that direction. You can not base you life on what other people may feel about the situation that is part of the problem that got her to this point.

 

This is mind boggling, never consider anyone but yourself in taking any actions in life? Some day, we too may visit your planet.

[Reggie]

You all need to give up on this idea that she needs to think about someone else in this. Because this affair is about her and her needs, plain and simple. She has to decided what she wants/needs to do and go that direction. You can not base you life on what other people may feel about the situation that is part of the problem that got her to this point.

 

Huh? This is mind boggling. Never consider others in taking action? Some day, we, too, may visit your planet.

[BlueHarvest]

pkn, There is a DISTINCT difference between thinking about happiness needs and pleasure needs. Affairs feed pleasure not happiness. Especially when kids are involved. You think having an affair will make her kids happy if they knew about it? Not one damn bit.

[pkn06002]

Wow again with the absolutes from the BS's that I am supporting infidelity. Read again I told her to stop.

 

But I told her to stop for her own reasons, you know why because that is the ONLY way she will stop. Stopping for someone is not work, never has never will.

[Reggie]

Stopping in consideration for someone else clearly can be one's own reason.

[pkn06002]

Stopping in consideration for someone else clearly can be one's own reason.

 

Not to pick a fight but I have to laugh at this thinking. She is in an affair, she is not thinking about anyone else but herself.

 

If she had consideration for her husbands feelings she would NOT of gotten into the affair in the first place.

 

Do you really thing that most WS are like those you see over at SI? Most of them (from my reading) were caught so had a deep motivation to stop, they saw (first hand) the wrath and pain of their BS. Add the warden mentality over there (from the BS's) the affair is generally stopped not because of want but because it was forced on the WS.

 

Tell me ILoveWyrk your affair is still a secret isn't it?

[Owl]

Not to pick a fight but I have to laugh at this thinking. She is in an affair, she is not thinking about anyone else but herself.

 

If she had consideration for her husbands feelings she would NOT of gotten into the affair in the first place.

 

Do you really thing that most WS are like those you see over at SI? Most of them (from my reading) were caught so had a deep motivation to stop, they saw (first hand) the wrath and pain of their BS. Add the warden mentality over there (from the BS's) the affair is generally stopped not because of want but because it was forced on the WS.

 

Tell me ILoveWyrk your affair is still a secret isn't it?

 

You're right...its not.

 

But your'e missing the point.

 

But the point being made is that it SHOULD be...and can be.

 

And...can be her way out of the situation she's in.

[pkn06002]

Oh no I am not missing the point that Reggie is making.

 

I disagree with it and don't find it to be a impractical notion. Especially if she is all caught up in the feelings of the affair. There has to be something in HER that wants to make her stop. She cannot use the motivation of someone else's feelings as the motivator. Because if she does stop and it all goes south then she can shift blame to the her BS for stopping what she was enjoying. Which could then give her license to do it again. Where if the reason she is stopping is for HER she has no one else to blame if things go bad.

 

She has already posted her motivation and that is her "love" for her husband. See that is a feeling from her and should be enough.

 

Then comes the next tough decision of does she say anything to him about the affair or just let it go.