If you cheated and stayed married

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I cheated twice during my 25 year marriage. He never knew about either one. We got divorced for other reasons. That was a long time ago and we are still friends.

Best way to stay happily married is for the spouse to never find out.

You are not and never will be happily married. Don't kid yourself and don't assume he doesn't know.

LOL maybe I wasn't clear. We were happy for most of the 25 years and he doesn't know.

You wouldn't have gotten divorced if it was a happy marriage!

Let me tell you, people catch deceitful people one way or another. If you're a cheater no doubt you're a liar and cheater in other areas as well.

The fact you believe not getting caught was essential shows the kind of person you are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I cheated twice during my 25 year marriage. He never knew about either one. We got divorced for other reasons. That was a long time ago and we are still friends.

Best way to stay happily married is for the spouse to never find out.

You are not and never will be happily married. Don't kid yourself and don't assume he doesn't know.

LOL maybe I wasn't clear. We were happy for most of the 25 years and he doesn't know.

You wouldn't have gotten divorced if it was a happy marriage!

Let me tell you, people catch deceitful people one way or another. If you're a cheater no doubt you're a liar and cheater in other areas as well.

The fact you believe not getting caught was essential shows the kind of person you are.

You’re an angry mess. Please get a therapist or an exorcist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I cheated twice during my 25 year marriage. He never knew about either one. We got divorced for other reasons. That was a long time ago and we are still friends.

Best way to stay happily married is for the spouse to never find out.

You are not and never will be happily married. Don't kid yourself and don't assume he doesn't know.

LOL maybe I wasn't clear. We were happy for most of the 25 years and he doesn't know.

You wouldn't have gotten divorced if it was a happy marriage!

Let me tell you, people catch deceitful people one way or another. If you're a cheater no doubt you're a liar and cheater in other areas as well.

The fact you believe not getting caught was essential shows the kind of person you are.

You’re an angry mess. Please get a therapist or an exorcist.

It's obviously true. A therapist might help with the honestly issues before the next relationship is destroyed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you broke your vows once, why wouldn't you keep breaking them. Depending on circumstances, I might not divorce you but the marriage would be over for good. You could sleep with every woman you meet except me. I don't like liars and cheats. If you cared about your marriage, you would have worked on saving it instead of screwing around.

I kind of hope your husband cheats a ton.

Why? They have a valid point. If she has sex she'll never know if he's cheating, and passing along a serious STD. It's a big risk, not to mention it's already destroyed so much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I cheated twice during my 25 year marriage. He never knew about either one. We got divorced for other reasons. That was a long time ago and we are still friends.

Best way to stay happily married is for the spouse to never find out.

You are not and never will be happily married. Don't kid yourself and don't assume he doesn't know.

LOL maybe I wasn't clear. We were happy for most of the 25 years and he doesn't know.

You wouldn't have gotten divorced if it was a happy marriage!

Let me tell you, people catch deceitful people one way or another. If you're a cheater no doubt you're a liar and cheater in other areas as well.

The fact you believe not getting caught was essential shows the kind of person you are.

It wasn't that happy the last five years and I wasn't cheating then. But I'm very happily divorced and have been for years. I am not a liar or a cheater in other areas. I don't really care what kind of person you think I am but I do care what kind of person my ex thinks I am and he and I are good FRIENDS! You are really very smug and self-righteous. I stand by what I said, if you want to stay married hope like hell they never find out. That means your dalliance didn't cause them immeasurable pain and heartache. And by the way, my cheating consisted of a ONS and a three night fling, not a long term affair. You really don't know everything you know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You show completely remorse - an understanding of how your actions impacted your spouse and kids (directly or through the impact on your spouse).

You provide transparency and answer honestly any questions your spouse wants answered. You make sure that if you are holding some info back (to protect your spouse) or if you have lied about anything - that you come clean. Finding out new or changed details later is often the nail in the coffin.

You accept that you swung a wrecking ball through the house that is your marriage. Whether or not the foundation is still intact enough to rebuild on takes time to determine.

Realize that for the first 2-3 years after discovering the affair, your spouses processing of the event and feelings about it will continue to change. You need to accept that months from now there can be periods of mistrust or anger or a need to revisit it. It is a loss and there is grief and it takes time to process.

Visit survivinginfidelity website. they have a forum on reconciling and first hand experiences from people who have been both successful and unsuccessful at reconciling.

Thank you, this was helpful. One of the issues I struggle with is answering the questions, particularly the ones about why it happened - I truthfully don’t know. I can identify that I had poor boundaries and got caught up in some stupid feeling of excitement, but it’s not like I was seeking this out. I was not unhappy or unfulfilled in the marriage, which my spouse is having a hard time with (understandably). I was just a really stupid thing to do, and I can’t identify with what I was thinking/feeling at the time.

You need to dig deep and come to a conclusion as to why you broke your vows, since you said you weren’t unhappy or unfulfilled, and work on that or else you just may repeat it. You asked in your original post about straying again. Do you think you’d stray again?

No, I wouldn’t stray again. It was stupid, and I regret nearly throwing everything away. Maybe I already did throw everything away. I don’t know how to repair this. I don’t think I had a deep reason for doing it, just...stupidity. Taking everything for granted. Letting myself get carried away. I would never do it again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You show completely remorse - an understanding of how your actions impacted your spouse and kids (directly or through the impact on your spouse).

You provide transparency and answer honestly any questions your spouse wants answered. You make sure that if you are holding some info back (to protect your spouse) or if you have lied about anything - that you come clean. Finding out new or changed details later is often the nail in the coffin.

You accept that you swung a wrecking ball through the house that is your marriage. Whether or not the foundation is still intact enough to rebuild on takes time to determine.

Realize that for the first 2-3 years after discovering the affair, your spouses processing of the event and feelings about it will continue to change. You need to accept that months from now there can be periods of mistrust or anger or a need to revisit it. It is a loss and there is grief and it takes time to process.

Visit survivinginfidelity website. they have a forum on reconciling and first hand experiences from people who have been both successful and unsuccessful at reconciling.

Thank you, this was helpful. One of the issues I struggle with is answering the questions, particularly the ones about why it happened - I truthfully don’t know. I can identify that I had poor boundaries and got caught up in some stupid feeling of excitement, but it’s not like I was seeking this out. I was not unhappy or unfulfilled in the marriage, which my spouse is having a hard time with (understandably). I was just a really stupid thing to do, and I can’t identify with what I was thinking/feeling at the time.

You need to dig deep and come to a conclusion as to why you broke your vows, since you said you weren’t unhappy or unfulfilled, and work on that or else you just may repeat it. You asked in your original post about straying again. Do you think you’d stray again?

No, I wouldn’t stray again. It was stupid, and I regret nearly throwing everything away. Maybe I already did throw everything away. I don’t know how to repair this. I don’t think I had a deep reason for doing it, just...stupidity. Taking everything for granted. Letting myself get carried away. I would never do it again.

Are you in individual therapy? That is where you are going to figure out the why. And it seems like the why has to do with you and not your marriage. It’ll probably be a combination of “I’m getting older and she made me feel young again. even if she herself isn’t young. The jolt that sexual energy makes every feel young. “It felt good. No underlying reason other than it felt good. And I compartmentalized married me from selfish me.” Or “real life is messy and complicated. And affairs are easy and uncomplicated. I wanted to step away from real life.”

Go talk to a therapist. When doing root cause analysis, ask 5 whys. Meaning, every time you think of a reason, ask why. Once you answer it, ask why again. Keep going until you get to the heart. She can’t move forward until she knows why because if you don’t know why, how can she ever trust you won’t fall into another affair?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My ex would have had to admit what he did, expressed remorse, cut off all contact with his affair partner (including transfering jobs or resigning), provide me all access to his accounts, and start individual therapy on his own to find out why he decided to cheat rather than use his big boy words to tell me what he was going through and why he was struggling.

Then I might have entertained marriage counseling. But the trickle truth, gas lighting, and displaced anger focusing on how horrible I was doomed it from the start.

+1
I feel like I could have written this word for word.

+1
Plus he would have had to try and win me back regardless of the chances instead of putting his feelers out on any possible acceptance of blended families. He would have had to come clean to the OW, too instead of keeping that option for probability that I wouldn‘t reconcile. He would have had to accept that no matter what happend after, he has taken away a big deal of our child‘s hapiness and innocence instead of shifting responsibility to me by trying to get me to do exactly what he wanted and selling it off as best-for-the-child. He would have had to jump at the opportunity of the plan (pps first para) and not take one week and a talk with his best male friend to see how lucky he could consider himself of having been offered. Too bad for him because now he has to follow the plan anyhow except that the prize to win is now reduced to going from no contact with me to face-to-face contact when picking up his kids and regaining a shed of respect and acceptance by his own parents.

As advice for the cheater: come clean to everyone involved, accept and admit the additional burden through gaslighting and emotional abuse, if kids involved see an individual therapist and listen to people who went through divorce as children to put some understanding and truthfulness behind your apologies and actions. Good luck. I have respect for any cheater who really faces up and tries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you broke your vows once, why wouldn't you keep breaking them. Depending on circumstances, I might not divorce you but the marriage would be over for good. You could sleep with every woman you meet except me. I don't like liars and cheats. If you cared about your marriage, you would have worked on saving it instead of screwing around.

I kind of hope your husband cheats a ton.

I know the first PP is off-topic, but why the nasty reply?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you broke your vows once, why wouldn't you keep breaking them. Depending on circumstances, I might not divorce you but the marriage would be over for good. You could sleep with every woman you meet except me. I don't like liars and cheats. If you cared about your marriage, you would have worked on saving it instead of screwing around.

I kind of hope your husband cheats a ton.

Why? They have a valid point. If she has sex she'll never know if he's cheating, and passing along a serious STD. It's a big risk, not to mention it's already destroyed so much.

+1 agreed. When people think about cheating, they only think about the relationship aspect. However, there are so many other issues at play. STDs, as PP mentioned, which can cause lifelong damage and harm the fetus of a pregnant woman, etc. Financial infidelity often occurs hand and hand and can destroy the innocent spouse's future. The list goes on and on and on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I cheated twice during my 25 year marriage. He never knew about either one. We got divorced for other reasons. That was a long time ago and we are still friends.

Best way to stay happily married is for the spouse to never find out.

You are not and never will be happily married. Don't kid yourself and don't assume he doesn't know.

LOL maybe I wasn't clear. We were happy for most of the 25 years and he doesn't know.

You wouldn't have gotten divorced if it was a happy marriage!

Let me tell you, people catch deceitful people one way or another. If you're a cheater no doubt you're a liar and cheater in other areas as well.

The fact you believe not getting caught was essential shows the kind of person you are.

It wasn't that happy the last five years and I wasn't cheating then. But I'm very happily divorced and have been for years. I am not a liar or a cheater in other areas. I don't really care what kind of person you think I am but I do care what kind of person my ex thinks I am and he and I are good FRIENDS! You are really very smug and self-righteous. I stand by what I said, if you want to stay married hope like hell they never find out. That means your dalliance didn't cause them immeasurable pain and heartache. And by the way, my cheating consisted of a ONS and a three night fling, not a long term affair. You really don't know everything you know.

We know that you're trying awfully hard to justify your cheating behavior.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you broke your vows once, why wouldn't you keep breaking them. Depending on circumstances, I might not divorce you but the marriage would be over for good. You could sleep with every woman you meet except me. I don't like liars and cheats. If you cared about your marriage, you would have worked on saving it instead of screwing around.

I kind of hope your husband cheats a ton.

I know the first PP is off-topic, but why the nasty reply?

Her reply was nasty, and so is your “naïveté”. Cut to the chase next time and write that you hate the OP, etc. It’s tiresome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You show completely remorse - an understanding of how your actions impacted your spouse and kids (directly or through the impact on your spouse).

You provide transparency and answer honestly any questions your spouse wants answered. You make sure that if you are holding some info back (to protect your spouse) or if you have lied about anything - that you come clean. Finding out new or changed details later is often the nail in the coffin.

You accept that you swung a wrecking ball through the house that is your marriage. Whether or not the foundation is still intact enough to rebuild on takes time to determine.

Realize that for the first 2-3 years after discovering the affair, your spouses processing of the event and feelings about it will continue to change. You need to accept that months from now there can be periods of mistrust or anger or a need to revisit it. It is a loss and there is grief and it takes time to process.

Visit survivinginfidelity website. they have a forum on reconciling and first hand experiences from people who have been both successful and unsuccessful at reconciling.

Thank you, this was helpful. One of the issues I struggle with is answering the questions, particularly the ones about why it happened - I truthfully don’t know. I can identify that I had poor boundaries and got caught up in some stupid feeling of excitement, but it’s not like I was seeking this out. I was not unhappy or unfulfilled in the marriage, which my spouse is having a hard time with (understandably). I was just a really stupid thing to do, and I can’t identify with what I was thinking/feeling at the time.

You need to dig deep and come to a conclusion as to why you broke your vows, since you said you weren’t unhappy or unfulfilled, and work on that or else you just may repeat it. You asked in your original post about straying again. Do you think you’d stray again?

No, I wouldn’t stray again. It was stupid, and I regret nearly throwing everything away. Maybe I already did throw everything away. I don’t know how to repair this. I don’t think I had a deep reason for doing it, just...stupidity. Taking everything for granted. Letting myself get carried away. I would never do it again.

Are you in individual therapy? That is where you are going to figure out the why. And it seems like the why has to do with you and not your marriage. It’ll probably be a combination of “I’m getting older and she made me feel young again. even if she herself isn’t young. The jolt that sexual energy makes every feel young. “It felt good. No underlying reason other than it felt good. And I compartmentalized married me from selfish me.” Or “real life is messy and complicated. And affairs are easy and uncomplicated. I wanted to step away from real life.”

Go talk to a therapist. When doing root cause analysis, ask 5 whys. Meaning, every time you think of a reason, ask why. Once you answer it, ask why again. Keep going until you get to the heart. She can’t move forward until she knows why because if you don’t know why, how can she ever trust you won’t fall into another affair?

NP here. I think the reasons you cite ... "it felt good" "It made me feel young" and most importantly, "I wanted to step away from real life, this husband, and challenging children and have some uncomplicated, selfish me time ..." resonate with me. I have excuses, of course. I have some resentment directed at my husband for action/behavior that let me and our family down. I'm still married, but shouldn't be. I'm still married, but not a loving wife. I'm still married and faking it much of the time. Husband is a fine person. No plans to divorce. Hoping I'll curl out of the U-curve of unhappiness and discontent soon.

[Anonymous]

Can we just be honest about it? No one person can satisfy another's total needs. It would be better for people to come up with an arrangement that works for them rather than going through all the lying and cover ups. I used to be disgusted at swingers, but if a couple swaps with another and has communicated boundaries, why is that a problem?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you broke your vows once, why wouldn't you keep breaking them. Depending on circumstances, I might not divorce you but the marriage would be over for good. You could sleep with every woman you meet except me. I don't like liars and cheats. If you cared about your marriage, you would have worked on saving it instead of screwing around.

I don't like jerks who are the first ones to respond but immediately stray off topic completely ignoring the initial question(s) presented and totally disrespecting the original poster. Start your own damn thread next time you thoughtless jackass.