No second chances

[Southern X]

long story short

 

 

More than 10 years ago I had a brief affair. So did my wife .

It was early in our marriage and extremely traumatic, but we decided we would tough it out for the kids.

She forgave me - never mentioned it again. I told her I forgave her too... but I didn't. The devil was in the details.

 

 

This thing poisoned us slowly, the fact that I harbored all of the rage and anger for so long, obsessing over it.

 

 

I must have told myself 1000 times I forgive her. I go through all the motions. I say and do the right things ...but I don't ever get there.

 

 

Now we have been separated for 3 years and we are both miserable without each other. We are talking about getting back together ... but... in my heart of hearts I know I still haven't forgiven. I want to give it another chance, but I know without me being right with myself it's doomed already.

 

 

My question is why can't I forgive and make my peace with it ? I have no idea why it is easy for others to forgive and forget. I just don't seem to have the mechanics in my brain to allow it. It's 10 years later, and I am still stuck.

[d0nnivain]

That is a very deep & profound Q but only you know the answer. You may need professional therapy to get to the bottom of it but it sounds a bit like a Whore/Madonna complex. Since you know your wife was with somebody else, she feels tainted, impure & unworthy. Since you did the same thing it's a bit of a double standard. Maybe you having forgiven yourself for your betrayal too & thus you feel conflicted about moving forward. There are too may possibilities for this to properly addressed on the internet.

[Southern X]

Sure...i have considered the Madonna thing, it did come up in counselling and therapy that i have sought at various times over this extended unhappy period. Certainly the desire for each other physically dwindled ...but...i always wanted to get that desire back. Again, this is over a long period of time and i kept the story short, but a lot of effort went into the " stay together" agreement between us, from both of us.

 

Yes, I carry guilt of my own actions and completely acknowledge the double standard. In some ways I'm even envious of her ability to forgive me when i am unable to reciprocate. Enter the Madonna?

 

Im a devout athiest, but I'm aware that forgiveness is a strong theme in Christianity and at one point i even consulted a priest for views on what it meant to forgive.

 

The therapy and other consultations made perfect sense to me. I understand the mechanics of forgiveness, and I've followed all advice and put these actions into daily practice. Daily practice became years of what turned out to essentially be acting, because the actual emotional, or spritual, relief offered by true forgiveness just never truly took root in me.

[Beachead]

Hey OP,

 

I don't have much wisdom to offer in this situation so I will try to offer an alternatie perspective.

 

Right now you have the choice to be with her again.

 

What if that choice was taken away? What if she met someone new and moved on? What if she moved away to a different city or country? What if she passed away? How would you feel?

 

If any of these thoughts make you want to return to her an hold her close to you, then is it really worth holding an affair that occurred so long ago, against her? Especially since you did the same. It makes complete sense as to why you feel this way. But then again, in a world where so many people readily give up on eachother, here you both are 3 years later feeling miserable without one another.

 

Despite the mistakes of the past..there she is willing to be in your life.

 

- Beach

Edited July 17, 2018 by Beachead

[Adiron]

You both cheated. Fairs fair in love and war.

 

 

 

Either accept that you're "even" and move on or forget about trying to save this thing.

[BluesPower]

You both cheated. Fairs fair in love and war.

 

Either accept that you're "even" and move on or forget about trying to save this thing.

 

Dude S*** or get off the pot already...

 

And if you really want help, give up some details?

 

Did she have better sex than you in her affair, did she what to leave, were they both physical.

 

You guys rug swept the whole thing and you wonder why you are where you are at?

 

And you do not understand that mechanics of forgiveness.

 

Forgiveness is a daily decision with this kind of stuff. And you never forget, only God can actually forget, humans cannot.

 

You have wasted 10 years of your life on this? Dude move on or don't move on.

 

Or give up something that does not make you look foolish...

[SpecialJ]

Have you really gotten to the bottom of why you both cheated in the first place? Hard to forgive yourself/her if you haven't, and even harder to fully recover and trust. Why did you do it initially, and is there any circumstance in which you could do it again? If so, do you project that onto her, and fear she could do the same?

[Southern X]

Thank you for the replies.

 

 

It's easy to justify jealousy and anger with saying something like " her affair was worse than mine". I believe there are no degrees of how bad an affair is - once you cheat it's already the worst possible thing right off the bat. And I can't really point fingers cause I was no saint either.

 

 

I have heard the argument " fair's fair - you both cheated now you're even" before, and this more than anything is probably what kept me hanging onto the marriage for so long , because I could not take the moral high ground and leave.

 

 

My affair was short lived. I met a random girl in another city and we met on 2 occasions. I didn't like the way it made me feel about myself, it was something that I was not proud of at all. She had no connection to our lives at all, and if all the other drama hadn't unfolded I would have taken that secret to my grave. Why did I do it ? I guess I was flattered that someone took the time to be interested in me and stroke my ego. Things were not great at home, no real sex life to speak of, and it felt good to be excited about something again. There was an opportunity to do it and never ever be caught, and I took it. I'm not proud of that. But I realized almost right away that this just wasn't the answer and I hated the way it made me feel about myself. I ended it very early on, and we never had any contact from that point on .

 

 

Her affair was an on again/off again relationship with a close mutual friend of ours over quite a period of time. It had started even before we were married. This was someone I considered a close and trusted personal friend, someone I admired greatly. He was close to me, and our kids loved it when he came to visit too. When times were tough we would often go for a beer and, as guys do, he would press me for details of my sex life etc. And then commiserate with me when I told him there was not really much exciting to report. Things like that really got to me in hindsight... knowing now that the problem with my marriage was sitting right in front of me, smiling and being supportive, but trying to find out his own info about our intimacy at home.

To make things worse most of our mutual friends and other couples in our social circle knew about the affair. These are people I trusted and would have expected some sort of loyalty to me to show itself... but no one gave me the heads up. Even if one of them would have told THEM to quit it I would have appreciated that as a gesture of friendship to me. I cannot count the times we were all in a room together, at each other's weddings and other social occasions , where every body present knew what was going on , except me . When the s**t hit the fan, I realized that trust was broken on so many levels and with so many people I loved - it really felt like it took a very high level of sneakiness and a conspiracy between many people to pull this off for so long without me knowing.

They had been in love, so I was told. And there was a lot of push/pull going on while she figured out if she wanted to leave me for him , or not .

I had no clue any of this was going on at all.

 

 

I felt I lost everyone all at once. I cut all my ties , and be default that meant she was obliged to too. The fallout cost every friendship we had.

After " those people" were out our lives we went forward as best we could. Everything was swept under the rug while every day was a trial to just make it through. Nothing was ever spoken about, no attempts at reconciliation were ever made by me or any of the friends. We just pushed on with the mundane day to day stuff that was life, focusing on our kids, making sure they had what they needed.

 

 

Eventually I moved my family to another city. Fresh start, new beginnings. Less than I year later I moved out finally.

 

 

Even now all this time later I am cold with adrenalin as I write this. By now this should be ancient history.

[Beachead]

Thank you for the replies.

 

 

It's easy to justify jealousy and anger with saying something like " her affair was worse than mine". I believe there are no degrees of how bad an affair is - once you cheat it's already the worst possible thing right off the bat. And I can't really point fingers cause I was no saint either.

 

 

I have heard the argument " fair's fair - you both cheated now you're even" before, and this more than anything is probably what kept me hanging onto the marriage for so long , because I could not take the moral high ground and leave.

 

 

My affair was short lived. I met a random girl in another city and we met on 2 occasions. I didn't like the way it made me feel about myself, it was something that I was not proud of at all. She had no connection to our lives at all, and if all the other drama hadn't unfolded I would have taken that secret to my grave. Why did I do it ? I guess I was flattered that someone took the time to be interested in me and stroke my ego. Things were not great at home, no real sex life to speak of, and it felt good to be excited about something again. There was an opportunity to do it and never ever be caught, and I took it. I'm not proud of that. But I realized almost right away that this just wasn't the answer and I hated the way it made me feel about myself. I ended it very early on, and we never had any contact from that point on .

 

 

Her affair was an on again/off again relationship with a close mutual friend of ours over quite a period of time. It had started even before we were married. This was someone I considered a close and trusted personal friend, someone I admired greatly. He was close to me, and our kids loved it when he came to visit too. When times were tough we would often go for a beer and, as guys do, he would press me for details of my sex life etc. And then commiserate with me when I told him there was not really much exciting to report. Things like that really got to me in hindsight... knowing now that the problem with my marriage was sitting right in front of me, smiling and being supportive, but trying to find out his own info about our intimacy at home.

To make things worse most of our mutual friends and other couples in our social circle knew about the affair. These are people I trusted and would have expected some sort of loyalty to me to show itself... but no one gave me the heads up. Even if one of them would have told THEM to quit it I would have appreciated that as a gesture of friendship to me. I cannot count the times we were all in a room together, at each other's weddings and other social occasions , where every body present knew what was going on , except me . When the s**t hit the fan, I realized that trust was broken on so many levels and with so many people I loved - it really felt like it took a very high level of sneakiness and a conspiracy between many people to pull this off for so long without me knowing.

They had been in love, so I was told. And there was a lot of push/pull going on while she figured out if she wanted to leave me for him , or not .

I had no clue any of this was going on at all.

 

 

I felt I lost everyone all at once. I cut all my ties , and be default that meant she was obliged to too. The fallout cost every friendship we had.

After " those people" were out our lives we went forward as best we could. Everything was swept under the rug while every day was a trial to just make it through. Nothing was ever spoken about, no attempts at reconciliation were ever made by me or any of the friends. We just pushed on with the mundane day to day stuff that was life, focusing on our kids, making sure they had what they needed.

 

 

Eventually I moved my family to another city. Fresh start, new beginnings. Less than I year later I moved out finally.

 

 

Even now all this time later I am cold with adrenalin as I write this. By now this should be ancient history.

 

Oh man. That was tough to read. I'm truly sorry that you experienced that.

 

This is a deep wound. Trust in different relationship classes were broken. Trust in your wife, trust in a best friend, trust in other friends. It all amalgamated into complete destruction of social dynamics. I bet now whenever you meet people, it is hard to get close on a friendship and on a relationship level right? And worse is everytime you speak to this woman, it triggers how once upon a time, all these people that you cared for made a fool out of you. I don't know if I could ever be okay with it so I wouldnt expect you to be either.

 

But, going forward, it sounds to me you two just buried it and carried on as if it never happened and you've been pretending to be okay all these years when you obviously weren't.

 

Did you ever try to tell her everything that you wrote in your post?

Edited July 19, 2018 by Beachead

[Becky_19]

Wow Southern X, I’m sorry you had to experience that.

 

It makes complete sense that she was able to sweep it under the rug and forgive you and you haven’t been able too. You deserved to be treated better and was humiliated by everyone you cared for, even in your very home, he was was even close with your kids. I don’t even think I could forgive her.

 

You say you’re miserable without her, but is it really what you want? Her actions seem to have caused you a lot of pain and hurt for many years, were you the only one going to therapy? I don’t think this is solely on you to forgive and forget. I’m not a relationship expert but I don’t think was broke your relationship was that you couldn’t forgive her, what broke it was her betrayal!!