AriesMan83 Posted January 13, 2020 Share Posted January 13, 2020 Alice81, You and MM stopped being friends the day you both decided to have an affair. Every human being has flaws.During an affair,a person minimize the flaws of the affair partner and maximizes the good things of the affair partner.You projected your wants and needs on him.What you are missing is the illusion of MM that you created in your mind.What you are missing is the fantasy that you created in your mind. Self pity is a very powerful emotion.It let's a person to concentrate only on his/her pain.It stops a person from facing the problems his/her actions caused.Stop feeling sorry for yourself and start working on getting out of infidelity. The more you understand the dynamics of an affair,the more you will understand the extent of betrayal and the pain caused to a betrayed partner.The more you understand the extent of betrayal and the pain caused,the more you will develop empathy and remorse for your husband. During an affair,a person diverts his/her attention and emotions towards his affair partner.You need to divert your attention and emotions towards your husband now.Working on your issues may make you realize that you love your husband. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
mark clemson Posted January 13, 2020 Share Posted January 13, 2020 3 hours ago, AriesMan83 said: Alice81, People in happy as well as unhappy relationships/marriages cheat.Affairs have nothing to do with the state of the relationship/marriage.Betrayed partner or spouse have no role or part to play in an affair.Cheating partners are solely responsible for an affair. Some of the reasons for cheating are low self esteem,low self worth,childhood trauma,FOO issues etc. Respectfully, while I agree with everything else around it, that bolded statement just isn't true. Certainly not all, but many APs ended up that way as a response to being unhappy, e.g. during an extended rough patch in their marriage or similar. The spouse may (or may not) have had a lot to do with that unhappiness. That doesn't mean an affair was the "right" response - totally agree it wasn't. If someone's unhappy in their marriage the right thing to do is either fix it or leave. That said, I suspect that some significant percent of affairs would never have happened if the WS had been happier in the marriage OR had chosen a more logical means to help themselves feel better. 3 Link to post Share on other sites
carhill Posted January 13, 2020 Share Posted January 13, 2020 So, there is no affair, husband is disclosed and apparently wants to reconcile and move forward. Big sticking point is recurring thoughts and attendant emotions regarding her former affair partner, apparently whose wife she is on speaking terms with. What to do? Rehash the past seems to be the dominant theme under discussion here so far, along with pointing fingers. If H is OK with things moving forward months downstream, cool, IMO go with that. As BS he's in the driver's seat. I'd take his lead and see where things go. Ask him OP what he suggests to get through this sticking point. Work it as a team. If you haven't been to MC, here's a tip from our psychologist..... each spouse is responsible for the marriage and the unfaithful spouse is responsible for their infidelity. Separate it out and work it. The desire for forensics and 'you did xxx first' is strong; resist that. Take responsibility and move forward, and that includes each spouse taking responsibility for their roles in the marriage. No human, nor marriage, is perfect. It can still be an imperfect, but loving and healthy, partnership. Both partners decide that, together. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
AriesMan83 Posted January 13, 2020 Share Posted January 13, 2020 Mark Clemson, I respectfully disagree.. If the state of a relationship/marriage is bad or toxic (Betrayed spouse may or may not be responsible for the state of the marrage), the other partner can talk to the partner about the issues in the marriage.The partners can work on the issues with each other or take the help of a marriage counselor.If the issues are still not resolved,then the partner can end the relationship/marriage and exit gracefully instead of having an affair which increases the destruction of a relationship/marriage.Cheating is morally wrong.Why should a person sacrifice his/her own integrity and moral values by having an affair to stay in a relationship that is bad or toxic instead of ending it?Human beings are not mind readers.Until and unless a partner expresses his/her unhappiness/issues,the other partner will never know the reason or will be able to help.Keeping emotions or feelings bottled inside leads to resentments which wayward spouses use as a justification to have an affair.Why doesnt the wayward partner work out the reason of his/her unhappiness/issues with his/her betrayed partner instead of having an affair. If the state of marriage/relationship had been responsible for an affair,then both the partners in the bad marriage/relati tionship would cheat. If the state of marriage/relationship had to be blamed,then no one in a happy marriage/relationship would cheat. A person cheats because of poor boundaries.A person cheats because of his/her poor coping mechanisms with the stresses of real life. Link to post Share on other sites
mark clemson Posted January 13, 2020 Share Posted January 13, 2020 All of that is true. It doesn't make the original two statements true though. An affair can be seen (in the subset of cases we're discussing) as a dysfunctional response to a dysfunctional situation. That said, the situation IS dysfunctional (in those cases) and the affair IS the response that is often chosen, for whatever reasons. To say a spouse has nothing to do with a marriage being unhappy for their partner normally isn't realistic either (say, if the response wasn't to cheat). There is (or at least has been) a tendency around here to portray BS's as innocent victims of "selfish monster" waywards. Sometimes that's actually true. But sometimes it's not. All that said, I don't disagree with the majority of things you're stating. Rather than continuing a T/J, I'll agree to disagree (with your two points from above or at least how they were phrased). 1 Link to post Share on other sites
AriesMan83 Posted January 13, 2020 Share Posted January 13, 2020 (edited) Mark Clemson, Thanks for the reply.I have read a lot of your posts and you posts are brilliant and insightful.I will try to explain it a bit more below.I hope you will forgive me for posting my view. I wrote in my earlier post-Affairs had nothing to do with the state of the marriage.Betrayed partners have no role or part to play in an affair. When I say Affairs had nothing to do with the state of marriage, I mean People cheat because of their own flaws and issues.The decision to cheat is not related to their state of marriage.A person if unhappy should divorce and then find someone who is compatible.Wouldn't leaving a bad marriage and finding someone compatible be better than cheating with someone? When I say Betrayed partners have no role to play in an affair,I dont mean Betrayed partners are not responsible for the bad state/toxic narure of the relationship/marriage.A relationship/marriage is between two people.Both partners are more or less equally responoble for the state of the relationship/marriage.There are relationships/marriages in which the betrayed partner is more responsible for the dysfunctional condition. But either a person should try to solve the dysfunction or leave gracefully.That is the right thing to do.A person shouldnt add more dysfunction to it by choosing to have an affair.By making the choice of having an affair,the wayward spouse is adding more issues to the relationship/marriage.No one deserves to be cheated on.Irrespective of which partner is more responsible for the toxic nature of the relationship/marriage or whether the relationship/marriage is salvageable or dead, a person should leave instead of adding more problems to it. Edited January 13, 2020 by AriesMan83 Link to post Share on other sites
DKT3 Posted January 14, 2020 Share Posted January 14, 2020 As it pertains to Alice and her thread I'm not seeing any indication that her marriage was good or bad, she simply doesn't seem to give it or her husband much thought so I'm not sure it's a valid debate on this one. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
mark clemson Posted January 14, 2020 Share Posted January 14, 2020 Aries that was certainly kind of you to say. Your posts certainly contain a lot of insight as well IMO. I agree with much but not all of what you wrote to elaborate in the post just above and in fact your thinking and mine seem to align pretty closely. This may be because I've learned a lot from fellow LS'ers over the last year or so. I do have an issue with the 2nd sentence of paragraph 3. To avoid T/Jing this thread to delve further into the weeds, if it's ok I'll save it for a different discussion if/when we get to it. Generally I have a tendency to react to blanket statements, so apologies in advance if at some point I question points in what are generally really good posts IMO. Link to post Share on other sites
2BGoodAgain Posted January 14, 2020 Share Posted January 14, 2020 2 hours ago, mark clemson said: Aries that was certainly kind of you to say. Your posts certainly contain a lot of insight as well IMO. I agree with much but not all of what you wrote to elaborate in the post just above and in fact your thinking and mine seem to align pretty closely. This may be because I've learned a lot from fellow LS'ers over the last year or so. I do have an issue with the 2nd sentence of paragraph 3. To avoid T/Jing this thread to delve further into the weeds, if it's ok I'll save it for a different discussion if/when we get to it. Generally I have a tendency to react to blanket statements, so apologies in advance if at some point I question points in what are generally really good posts IMO. you two need to find a room and duke it out, and let us read all the interactions. you two are pretty aligned, with subtle differences... and that's ok. 2 Link to post Share on other sites
AriesMan83 Posted January 14, 2020 Share Posted January 14, 2020 Mark Clemson, Thanks for the lovely response..I believe that there is no age limit for gaining knowledge and you and fellow LSers insights have helped me think more what I feel about various topics.It's very enlighting to be honest.. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
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