It's 30 Years Later, BUT...........

[jnj express]

Right now one thing should be driving you---WHY did she look her X-Lover up---You say he is 76, I don't know how old you and your wife are--probably somewhere tween 50's and 70's---if you are on the older end---I know you spend most of your time with your wife, cuz that's the way it is, when you become seniors----

 

But unless she has periodically been staying in contact, why the renewed interest now

 

I would think she wants to be able to finish out her life, peacefully, and not cause you to want to upset the mge---so WHY---

 

You have lived for many years with your burden, unless you are willing to pull the plug, let the past go----(easier said than done), but you just do the best you can---course in your case, not sure whether lonliness, is better than the visions you have of what she has done, if you were to pull the plug.

 

But back to the present---you gave her, her 2nd chance---she gave you, your 2nd chance---there should be no 3rd chances---so lay it out to her---there is no "friend" deal going here----she is not to contact him, NO MATTER WHAT, you tell her you won't allow it, nor stand for it---and if she does not like your take on the situation---there is the door, don't let it hit her on the way out

 

At her age---I would not think she wants to make waves, IF YOU FACE HER DOWN, AND DRAW YOUR LINE IN THE SAND.

 

Once again, all of this depends, on what you want, for your future---this needs to be about you, not her, not the mge., but about you.

[LongIslander]

Longislander, did she really hesitantly admit to "2-3 times in the sack" at first. Then that DEFINITELY means she had sex with him multiple times. Think about the length of their relationship. Think about how she hid it from you for 5 years.

 

I don't understand why you CAN'T JUST SIMPLY SIT HER DOWN RIGHT NOW AND ASK HER FOR THE TRUTH. DEMAND IT. First explain to her in a calm and loving manner how much not knowing the truth is haunting you. Assure her that you won't leave no matter what has happened in the past but that she NEEDS to come clean.

 

Otherwise, threaten to leave her.

 

If you don't do any of the above or my earlier suggestion of either tricking her or taking her to a polygraph machine, then I suggest you forget this thread and this message board. No one here knows for a fact. Only she and the OM know.

 

You are right. As I have laid it out now she absolutely has no incentive to tell me any story other than the one she has told me, for fear of me walking, no way I can find out at this point anyway, etc.

 

But can I assure her I will stay put in order to give her an incentive to stop my misery from doubts, when in fact I am not sure I would?

[LongIslander]

Right now one thing should be driving you---WHY did she look her X-Lover up---You say he is 76, I don't know how old you and your wife are--probably somewhere tween 50's and 70's---if you are on the older end---I know you spend most of your time with your wife, cuz that's the way it is, when you become seniors----

 

But unless she has periodically been staying in contact, why the renewed interest now

 

I would think she wants to be able to finish out her life, peacefully, and not cause you to want to upset the mge---so WHY---

 

You have lived for many years with your burden, unless you are willing to pull the plug, let the past go----(easier said than done), but you just do the best you can---course in your case, not sure whether lonliness, is bUetter than the visions you have of what she has done, if you were to pull the plug.

 

But back to the present---you gave her, her 2nd chance---she gave you, your 2nd chance---there should be no 3rd chances---so lay it out to her---there is no "friend" deal going here----she is not to contact him, NO MATTER WHAT, you tell her you won't allow it, nor stand for it---and if she does not like your take on the situation---there is the door, don't let it hit her on the way out

 

At her age---I would not think she wants to make waves, IF YOU FACE HER DOWN, AND DRAW YOUR LINE IN THE SAND.

 

Once again, all of this depends, on what you want, for your future---this needs to be about you, not her, not the mge., but about you.

 

 

OM is 20 years older than us. At the time of the affair we were late twenties, he late 40s, so now he is 76.

 

I don't think she has any serious notions of actually seeing him again or contacting him. It's what looking him up REPRESENTS: doing so 29 years later is like a "smoking gun" to me that she had feelings for him and slept with him for an extended period. Her reason of "curiosity" just makes no sense to me: if she had no feelings for him and slept with him once only, why would she be "curious" after 30 years?

 

Am I being too "rational"?

[LongIslander]

I really think you could be over reacting to her looking him up. The key is contact and if there has been no contact, then I think you should concentrate on the other issues.

 

Most people are curious and with the invent of how easy it is to google someone, facebook someone, just looking someone up means nothing by itself.

 

After I signed up to facebook and how easy it is to google someone, there have been a few people from my past that I looked up. If I find they are married or committed, then that is the end of it, I don't instigate any more contact nor would I talk with someone other than hello, how are you.

 

Being curious about someone is far removed from contacting them, imo.

 

Even if that person you googled is your only adulterous lover? After 29 years?

[Steen719]

It's not so far removed.

That peak of "curiosity" is the reason why Facebook is called F*ckbook.

 

Ahhhh...true for my XH. It was like a dating site for him. Friends of friends, old friends, old girlfriends, new friends and throw in some dancers and ah hem..well what-ever-they-were. You know - the kind with 3000 friends and they are all men! lol

[LongIslander]

So OK, this is where things stand.

 

Last two weeks have been worst of my life; I have been in agony rehashing the picture of my wife sleeping with him for months and with a deep emotional attachment (all based on her recent googling and my recollection of 29 years ago).

 

Throughout this ordeal she has sworn it was only once and no love. She doesn't have an adequate explanation for why she googled him now so many years later, but she swears it is NOT because she was in love, or slept with him for months, or has warm and fuzzy memories. She still goes by the curiosity thing, but she is willing to explore why she did it, with her therapist and to discuss it with me as we go forward.

 

While my rational and analytical side still can't make sense of her one time only story with no attachment, my emotional side is desperate to believe her; I want to stay with this woman, she is the love of my life.

 

I even went so far as to plead with her that if she were not telling the truth, at this point, it is essential for my emotional well being to know the truth, and no matter how devastating, I would remain committed to the marriage and work to heal. Even after this she swears she is telling the truth. My therapist says, it is possible she is telling the truth. After 29 years, there is no third party I can go to confirm anything.

 

My therapist is working with me to figure out a way for me to move forward even though I am still inclined to believe my version of the event.

 

Thanks to all for your help!!!!

Edited July 19, 2012 by LongIslander

[2sunny]

Since you are still wonder where HER truth is - and YOUR healing is dependent on her truth... Logic shows a lie detector test may be your best option to suggest. Have her take a polygraph. And I'd do it as soon as possible!

 

IF she won't - then you have your answer...

[LongIslander]

Since you are still wonder where HER truth is - and YOUR healing is dependent on her truth... Logic shows a lie detector test may be your best option to suggest. Have her take a polygraph. And I'd do it as soon as possible!

 

IF she won't - then you have your answer...

 

I can't consider a polygraph it's just too humiliating. I am considering a third party; there is one who knew about it, other than the OM - but we lost touch (on purpose though - I insisted at the time). I have tried to track her down, we'll see where that goes.

[2sunny]

I can't consider a polygraph it's just too humiliating. I am considering a third party; there is one who knew about it, other than the OM - but we lost touch (on purpose though - I insisted at the time). I have tried to track her down, we'll see where that goes.

 

Can't?

 

More likely won't...

 

You are road blocking your resources to find her truth. Since you won't - there's nothing to help you with now.

 

IF you don't plan to leave her - since your gut tells you that you don't have truth from her - you will betray yourself by sweeping it under the rug - hence building resentment bigger toward your W for not requiring her full truth.

[DuckSoup]

So OK, this is where things stand.

 

Last two weeks have been worst of my life; I have been in agony rehashing the picture of my wife sleeping with him for months and with a deep emotional attachment (all based on her recent googling and my recollection of 29 years ago).

 

The only way to put your suffering into perspective is to get very philosophical about it. There are billions of people in the world whose lives are incredibly terrible compared to yours. Even assuming your wife cheated a lot more than she is willing to admit.

 

You have to come to grips with the fact that your wife is simply not the idealized wonderful woman that the typical husband imagines his wife to be. You have to accept that your wife, yes, is a cheater, and yes, is a liar, and yes, she fooled you, and yes, that is what you are married to.

 

You also have to accept that, yes, someday you might find out there was a LOT more than she has ever told you. Because that is just the way it is when one is partnered to a cheater.

 

It is a sunk cost. You have to stop regretting marrying someone like this. "Why/how did she fool me?"

 

You have to accept that the woman you married was always capable of lying to and cheating on you and maintaining the pretense that it was less than it really was, for your entire marriage.

 

Stop kicking yourself for being fooled. Cheaters are very good at deception and like most other betrayes spouses you had no chance not to be fooled. You believed what she wanted you to believe, and what you also wanted to believe.

 

Hopefully you got other things out of the marriage that might mitigate your wife's failures. Was she a good mother? Was she supportive in other ways? No it doesn't erase the pain of what she's done to you, and continues to do to you, but it means the marriage wasn't a total loss. And sometimes that's the best any of us can hope for.

 

 

Throughout this ordeal she has sworn it was only once and no love.

 

Clearly this is a lie since she originally, at the very first, told you it was "two or three" times (which actually means it was some higher multiple than 2 or 3 times). She backed off though perhaps in reaction to your immediate reaction.

 

So you have to accept that your wife continues to lie to you about this, that the affair was much longer and deeper then she ever told you or likely will ever tell you, that she still wistfully remembers it, that it was a deep emotionally attached love affair in addition to being a sexual affair, and her memories of this guy (not the reality of a 76 year old man!) is what drew her to google him. I can't imagine she's actually interested in getting together with a 76 year old geezer. She was attempting to relive in her fantasy mind what happened decades ago.

 

I'm sure she has also completely romanticized her affair with the passage of time. In other words she is probably spending a lot of her time fantasizing about what happened 20 years ago and maybe other things.

 

Your wife is probably ashamed to tell the truth and afraid to tell the truth. She doesn't know if you'd divorce her if you found out the true intensity of the affair, but she assumes you would hate her whether you divorced or remained married. Her entire false image would crumble. That phony facade would be completely gone. Ashamed and afraid. Not quite the same thing as "remorse" or even "guilt."

 

You have to accept that you've spent your entire marriage with a woman who to a large extent is psychologically broken. Like many women, and men, in affairs, she has kept up a wall between you for the entire marriage. At its core it is a reflection of the fundamental inability on her part to attain the truest, highest level of intimacy with her spouse.

 

Because of her inability to attain total intimacy with you, her husband, she sought an emotional and physical connection with another man. Of course she's never going to achieve true total intimacy with an affair partner, because of the degree of dishonesty and fantasy that's inherent in all affairs. They are a way of avoiding true intimacy by aping the trappings of physical and emotional intimacy, but not the core reality of true intimacy, which is complete honesty with one's partner.

 

And so, sadly, she's spent the rest of her life to some extent fantasizing about the affair and keeping the wall up between herself and you, thus depriving the both of you of the truest, highest level of intimacy.

 

She's incapable of it, like a lot of people in her situation. And there's really nothing you can do about it accept realize that this is who she is, and it's probably not very likely she is capable of learning how to change.

 

These are her coping strategies--keep a part of herself hidden, a wall up between you, remaining mired in a hidden fantasy life, ruminating about a fantasy lover who doesn't even exist anymore, not the way she remembers him.

 

 

 

She doesn't have an adequate explanation for why she googled him now so many years later, but she swears it is NOT because she was in love, or slept with him for months, or has warm and fuzzy memories.

 

Unfortunately most likely these are all lies. She got caught. What else would she say? Like most cheaters, lying about this stuff is one of her coping strategies. However I don't really think she wants to go for another roll in the hay in the present day with a 76 year old man. (That really wouldn't make too much sense, would it?) She's living in the past, in her head, in the fantasy-land of her affair. When she was in her 20's and her affair partner was (to her, through the lens of fantasy) a powerful, older "alpha male" (in her eyes anyway) who would "ravish" her like a picture on the cover of a romance novel.

 

Sadly, every second she spends living in the fantasy in her head or googling to make it come to life a little more, is time and energy wasted, which keeps the wall up between the two of you.

 

She still goes by the curiosity thing, but she is willing to explore why she did it, with her therapist and to discuss it with me as we go forward.

 

I just told you why she did it. I may not be 100% dead on but I am fairly sure my explanation is closer to the truth than anything she will ever tell you. She did it because living in the fantasy world of her memories is a means of escape from day to day reality which can be boring, tough, and not so much fun. It's no different than if she laid back and took a hit off a crack pipe. She used google to trigger fantasies of her memories in her brain which stimulated some kind of pleasurable chemical response in her brain. Finding info on google about him, and perhaps even just looking for it, gave her a "hit" of excitement. Maybe even some kind of sympathetic sexual tingle as well.

 

But as long as she continues to use lying to you as her preferred coping strategy, nothing she tells you about her motivations is going to be very insightful. She's an unreliable information source and you have to assume everything she says about this stuff is untruthful to a greater or lesser extent.

 

If she told you the truth, then not only what happens to her and the marriage--what happens to her fantasy? It goes up in a cloud of smoke. She would feel foolish and humiliated to admit what she is doing and why she is doing it.

 

 

 

 

While my rational and analytical side still can't make sense of her one time only story with no attachment, my emotional side is desperate to believe her; I want to stay with this woman, she is the love of my life.

 

The rational side is telling you what she's saying doesn't make any sense, ergo, she's lying.

 

The emotional side is what she takes advantage of. Again it's a coping strategy that cheaters seem to have an ability to use pretty well--ability to deliberately or intuitively press the betrayed spouse's emotional "buttons" to get a desired behavioral response.

 

You can have it both ways, though. You can accept your rational side as the objective truth, she is a cheat, she is a liar, and at this point she is what she is and might never change. And despite these flaws, you can still accept and love her if you think her other good points mitigage these major character flaws sufficiently.

 

You are not required to ignore your rational side, and you shouldn't ignore your rational side. What you DON'T have to do, and shouldn't do, is tell her you believe her. You don't have to yell, you don't have to get angry, you don't have to scream.

 

You are permitted to tell her

 

"I don't believe you. I think you have lied to me all these years and you are still lying to me. I'm quite sure your affair was far more extensive than you've ever admitted. You're no different from many other cheaters who minimize what they've done. At this point I don't think you'll ever change and that's a sad thing since you've spent our entire marriage blocking true intimacy between us not only with your cheating back then, but your compulsive lying about it. But despite all your flaws, there is a lot of good in you, I still love you, and I choose to remain married to you and make the best of things despite realizing that you have some very major flaws. My real regret is that we could have had a much better marriage had you simply wanted that. I have given you all I have and I have always given you all I had, but you never wanted to accept all of it. You always wanted to keep a piece of yourself blocked from me. There is still time for both of us to get to a level of true and total intimacy, but we never will as long as you keep lying about what really happened, and as long as you insist on spending much of your time wrapped up in a mental fantasy life from the distant past that isn't really relevant to our lives anymore. The man you continue to fantasize about is 76 years old. No longer the virile stud that you mounted over and over again 20 years ago. That's the reality. I'm sure you remember your sex with him as extremely wonderful and exciting. Sometimes the real world isn't as exciting as our fantasies, but at least it's real. That's the best I can offer you."

 

 

 

I even went so far as to plead with her that if she were not telling the truth, at this point, it is essential for my emotional well being to know the truth, and no matter how devastating, I would remain committed to the marriage and work to heal.

 

You already know the truth, or at least as much as you need to. Placing your emotional health and well being at the mercy of the expectation that your wife will honestly provide truthful and complete "closure" is just a no-win proposition for you, so don't even bother. She's simply incapable of doing what you want her to do.

 

You have to accept she is incapable of being truthful about any of this in the same way you would accept she couldn't run a marathon if she was a quadripalegic. She is emotionally crippled. She is simply not capable of what you want from her.

 

Stop asking her whether or not she's lying. TELL HER that you already KNOW she's still lying, you know why she's lying, and nothing she tells you is going to change that, short of the complete truth, which you know she's incapable of disclosing to you. That's your closure. If she doesn't like that....well....she too can decide if she wants to stay in the marriage. It's up to her just as much as it's up to you.

 

 

Even after this she swears she is telling the truth. My therapist says, it is possible she is telling the truth. After 29 years, there is no third party I can go to confirm anything.

 

You know she is lying (rational mind) and your therapist also knows she's lying. "it is possible she is telling the truth" is just a diplomatic way for the therapist to concur in your suspicions that she's lying. "Anything's possible, right?" If your therapist thought you were overreacting or falsely accusing you he would indicate that. He didn't. He would say "It doesn't sound to me like she's lying, but it is possible she is." But he said the opposite, didn't he.

 

My therapist is working with me to figure out a way for me to move forward even though I am still inclined to believe my version of the event.

 

Thanks to all for your help!!!!

 

The way to move forward is understanding, acceptance (of reality, not that you emotionally accept or endorse her cheating and lying), and not allowing your reality to depend on her lies any longer.

[2sunny]

I don't think you want HER truth as much as you say you do. You'd be willing to leave her IF you wanted full disclosure from her.

 

But you are WILLING to sacrifice YOUR emotional well being by ignoring the truth you already know.

 

Just by contradicting yourself - that shows you can't handle what IS REAL - HER TRUTH.

 

Betrayal of self is the worst thing you could do to you...

[LongIslander]

A private investigator will charge me 750 dollars to find contact information for that person who knew about this, whom we have since lost contact with.

 

That's a lot of money, not sure about proceeding.

[GLDheart]

...not sure about proceeding.

 

I think that is all you really need to say.

 

You feel like you are opening pandora's box by digging. I also sense a bit of fear... I think in some ways you are trying to appease your wife. She has held an emotional gun to your head for 30 years. Deep down you are afraid she will leave you "again" like she did all those years ago.

 

I think you already know the truth but it conflicts with 30 years of marriage... that's a tough thing to wrap your brain arround. I can see why you hesitate to really hear the truth.

[LongIslander]

Thanks for your thoughtful reply DuckSoup.

 

Regarding that she told me at first that it was 2-3 times:

 

When she told me it was 2-3 times she slept with him, it was 5 years after the event right after I had told her about an encounter I had had. So now she says she overstated it then as revenge, because she was so angry at what I had done.

 

This could be true.

[LongIslander]

One other thing that indicates she may be telling the truth:

 

There were two girlfriends she had at this workplace, one of whom was close to the OM and I know she knows about the events.

 

We tried to locate her but she got married and we don't know her new name.

 

In front of me my wife contacted the other girlfriend if she knew how to get in touch with the one who knew about everything; she didn't but if she feared me talking to her, why would she have done that?

[nofool4u]

One other thing that indicates she may be telling the truth:

 

There were two girlfriends she had at this workplace, one of whom was close to the OM and I know she knows about the events.

 

We tried to locate her but she got married and we don't know her new name.

 

In front of me my wife contacted the other girlfriend if she knew how to get in touch with the one who knew about everything; she didn't but if she feared me talking to her, why would she have done that?

 

Because birds of a feather flock together and girlfriends cover for one another.

[LongIslander]

I may find out how to reach her and tell her my wife told me everything, and she knows i am contacting you, but for closure I need to ask a few questions, etc., and not pose them in a way that she will know my wife told me it was once, such as, "Did she sleep with him only once"?, because you're right she would cover for her then. Rather pose the question "How many months did they sleep together?" so she might already think my wife told me all. If to her knowledge it was once only, that would still be answer in spite of the way question is worded.

[2sunny]

I may find out how to reach her and tell her my wife told me everything, and she knows i am contacting you, but for closure I need to ask a few questions, etc., and not pose them in a way that she will know my wife told me it was once, such as, "Did she sleep with him only once"?, because you're right she would cover for her then. Rather pose the question "How many months did they sleep together?" so she might already think my wife told me all. If to her knowledge it was once only, that would still be answer in spite of the way question is worded.

 

Just the fact that you need to ask someone else instead of your wife indicates that's there's been no trust in your marriage.

 

You either believe her or you don't.

 

IF you don't - why would you even stay? Especially when you don't trust the person you should be able to trust more than anyone in the whole world!

 

You don't have a M because you have no trust. She never earned your trust. She's still not earning it because you have no basis to believe her.

[road]

A private investigator will charge me 750 dollars to find contact information for that person who knew about this, whom we have since lost contact with.

 

That's a lot of money, not sure about proceeding.

 

 

You want to spend $750 to get contact info from a friend that was not having the affair so remembering who WW slept with, when, where, why, how, may not be remembered.

 

And most likey this witness was covering up for your WW at that time and will still be in protection mode and will not spill the beans on the WW or the OM.

 

Polygraph test. Schedule a test. Then tell WW the date and time. As the appointment draws near the WW always starts the trickle truth process. WW's throw out some truth hoping you will believe that she has told all there is to know and will cancel the test.

 

Don't believe this ploy. Go through with the test for it will confirm the TT and get the last of the truth out.

[2sunny]

IF she has nothing to hide - she won't have problem taking a polygraph.

[turnera]

Your reticence to stand up for yourself by requesting the polygraph just highlights the lack of equality in your marriage. She rules.

[g450]

I would think she wants to be able to finish out her life, peacefully, and not cause you to want to upset the mge---so WHY---

 

At her age---I would not think she wants to make waves, IF YOU FACE HER DOWN, AND DRAW YOUR LINE IN THE SAND.

 

 

jnj, her being at this late stage in life means absolutely nothing. IIRC there was a 65 year old who left her H after years of marriage. Her H was here posting about it a few months back.

 

Even in my case, my W was in her mid 50s when she found her ex first love over the internet. And she still decided to throw away 23 years with me to be single again. It's that whole middle age crazy thing and it hits later for some than others. My 55 year old wife thought she was back in high school again and found all her old HS friends from the 70s. It was surreal but thats exactly what she did.

 

My point being that OPs wife could very well be having issues late in life and some women deal with those issues by leaving or having an affair. No it make no sense this late in life but it happens all the time sadly.

[2sunny]

Your reticence to stand up for yourself by requesting the polygraph just highlights the lack of equality in your marriage. She rules.

 

I think you're right.

 

Even if he found out she's cheated throughout the M - I get the feeling this poster still wouldn't take any action to change anything.

[2sunny]

jnj, her being at this late stage in life means absolutely nothing. IIRC there was a 65 year old who left her H after years of marriage. Her H was here posting about it a few months back.

 

Even in my case, my W was in her mid 50s when she found her ex first love over the internet. And she still decided to throw away 23 years with me to be single again. It's that whole middle age crazy thing and it hits later for some than others. My 55 year old wife thought she was back in high school again and found all her old HS friends from the 70s. It was surreal but thats exactly what she did.

 

My point being that OPs wife could very well be having issues late in life and some women deal with those issues by leaving or having an affair. No it make no sense this late in life but it happens all the time sadly.

 

You are only describing a woman without morals or integrity.

 

Not all middle aged women do this.

[LongIslander]

I think you're right.

 

Even if he found out she's cheated throughout the M - I get the feeling this poster still wouldn't take any action to change anything.

 

Not true - I have already done more than I did when this happened so many years ago. Then even though I knew something had happened with her and him, I remained silent and suffered and suffered after she told me five years later.

 

Now I have confronted her forcefully, demanding answers to my questions, putting her in position of explaining discrepancies, etc.

 

What can I tell you, I started out from a very bad place years ago; I was just not equipped to confront her and the situation.

 

While many of you feel I am still being a wimp, for me the past 2 weeks has been a big step, and I have defended myself to a far greater degree than I ever had in the past. Everything is relative and we all don't start at the same place.

 

I will keep you posted.

 

Thanks to all for your help.