Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Marriage is doomed.

Why do you say this?

You are never going to let it go. You will always have questions. Even 10 years from now you will have doubts and questions. He will get tired of eating shit.

If he wants to stay with her, he will do what he needs to do to and will be patient.

No woman is worth that much PP.

- guy

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

It is sad that some wives end up being more intimate with the AP than their cheating husband ever was- they research, do In-depth analysis and extrapolate a great more from the relationship than ever existed. And more time wasted searching for the elusive answer to “Why?”

You can’t understand unless you’re in the situation. Sad implies the wife is being pathetic or weak, which is incredibly unfair and completely lacking in empathy

I meant to imply that the two women (AP and betrayed spouse) probably think and know more about each other in a layered intimate strangers fashion. After a certain point, it is some sort of mental atavistic mate competition that has little to do with the actual cheater. Both women have over-exaggerated ideas of the expanse and depth of the relationship, while the cheater is oblivious to all this manufactured nuance.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of the people telling you to let it go have never been where you are, OP. I have. You need information, and your DH should be willing to answer every single questions you have until you don't need to ask them any more. The mind movies you experience, the need to know every detail - it's so you can heal, not to punish him. And he should know that. My DH answered every question I had, even ones I had already asked. He said he had the absolute responsibility to help me heal, and that *I* got to decide what that looked like.

Four months is absolutely nothing. Of course the cheater wants it all to be over. But it isn't FOR YOU. So ask your questions. And find a decent therapist, cause neither mine nor my DH's would ever say that four months was adequate to get over this.

Everyone in the thread saying "stop punishing him" needs to read the bolded. This is a super fresh wound. OP is trying to heal, not to harm her husband. When you hurt someone really, really badly, you need to understand this dynamic. The guilt and shame you feel? That's coming from you, it's not something your hurt spouse (or whoever) is trying to make you feel. They just want to understand, process, figure out a way forward. And that might mean talking about it, asking questions.

I think OP is trying to figure out how deep the harm goes. That's what the questions are for. How bad was it? What exactly is she forgiving him for? She wants to know the details to understand if, knowing them, trust can be repaired. It has nothing to do with punishing him and everything to do with her getting the information she needs to know whether this can be mended, or to know what needs to happen in order for it to be mended.

Avoiding the conversation is not going to solve it. He needs to be ready for total honesty and for it to take months to get through it. I don't think you can start arguing that it's time to stop talking about until at least as much time as elapsed since discovery as the affair went on. At LEAST. OP isn't even halfway there yet.

... if he wants to stay with her, and she with him. I'm not trying to defend what he did (I've never cheated). You just have to be realistic about what might lie ahead, and preparing for this possibility as well is part of protecting yourself. If all you do is lay yourself bare and vulnerable because he HAS TO be there in the right way, then what happens if he just bags out? Don't let the first time you seriously consider it be with tears on your face while you are still insisting on what you need, and he is giving you the name of his attorney for your records.

But perhaps the only way to get to that point is to lay it all out.

He's the one displaying avoidant behavior, so I don't think he's eager to divorce, despite the affair. He wants to "forget about it" specifically so they don't divorce.

One thing about many men is that even if they hate the sexual confines of marriage, they otherwise LOVE marriage. That's because marriage is set up to benefit men more than women. I've known so many men who cheated or otherwise betrayed their wives (financial betrayals, years of lying, you name it), but when push came to shove, they were begging their wives to stay. They didn't want to actually adhere to their marriage vows, but the idea of divorce was terrifying to them because they still wanted a woman to take care of them and make a home for them. This is true even in marriages where both partners work and you think of it as egalitarian -- women offer a lot of benefits to men just in terms of making life nicer, and many married men are terrified of what bachelor life actually looks like.

I think OP wants to know the details so she can decide whether the marriage is worth saving. And her DH knows it, and wants to withhold the details so she can't get too mad. She wants to address the issues and resolve them (and one possible resolution is of course divorce) but he wants to avoid the issues because that one possible resolution scares him too much.

Anonymous wrote:I just want to note that this is classic DARVO (deny, attack, reverse victim and offender) behavior. Since the affair has been discovered and admitted to he can no longer deny it outright. But he can deny it was a big deal, or deny that it matters anymore. He can attack OP for asking him questions, and he can turn himself into the victim (see all the "why are you punishing him??" comments in this thread, as though asking a question is a "punishment").

DARVO is really common in abusers but it can pop up in any relationship with unequal power dynamics or a lack of mutual respect and care. The goal is to distract you from their bad behavior or to make it seem like you are both equally at fault. So even though he was the one who cheated, he can use DARVO to relieve his guilt and absolve himself by making it seem like the fact that you don't trust him or can't "let it go" (both direct consequences of HIS actions, and not failures or flaws on OP's part) is equally to blame for your marital strife.

I'm not an expert so I don't know if you can fix this dynamic, but I know from my experience that dealing with someone who is DARVOing can be really demoralizing -- I think it's a form of gaslighting. In my case I had to separate and literally move on from the person because their denials and attacks came to feel almost as harmful as the original bad behavior. But in my case it wasn't a spouse, so it was easer to unravel that relationship (still emotionally very hard, but easier than dissolving a marriage).

Good luck OP. Know you have every right to still feel hurt and to still want answers.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

It is sad that some wives end up being more intimate with the AP than their cheating husband ever was- they research, do In-depth analysis and extrapolate a great more from the relationship than ever existed. And more time wasted searching for the elusive answer to “Why?”

You can’t understand unless you’re in the situation. Sad implies the wife is being pathetic or weak, which is incredibly unfair and completely lacking in empathy

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of the people telling you to let it go have never been where you are, OP. I have. You need information, and your DH should be willing to answer every single questions you have until you don't need to ask them any more. The mind movies you experience, the need to know every detail - it's so you can heal, not to punish him. And he should know that. My DH answered every question I had, even ones I had already asked. He said he had the absolute responsibility to help me heal, and that *I* got to decide what that looked like.

Four months is absolutely nothing. Of course the cheater wants it all to be over. But it isn't FOR YOU. So ask your questions. And find a decent therapist, cause neither mine nor my DH's would ever say that four months was adequate to get over this.

Everyone in the thread saying "stop punishing him" needs to read the bolded. This is a super fresh wound. OP is trying to heal, not to harm her husband. When you hurt someone really, really badly, you need to understand this dynamic. The guilt and shame you feel? That's coming from you, it's not something your hurt spouse (or whoever) is trying to make you feel. They just want to understand, process, figure out a way forward. And that might mean talking about it, asking questions.

I think OP is trying to figure out how deep the harm goes. That's what the questions are for. How bad was it? What exactly is she forgiving him for? She wants to know the details to understand if, knowing them, trust can be repaired. It has nothing to do with punishing him and everything to do with her getting the information she needs to know whether this can be mended, or to know what needs to happen in order for it to be mended.

Avoiding the conversation is not going to solve it. He needs to be ready for total honesty and for it to take months to get through it. I don't think you can start arguing that it's time to stop talking about until at least as much time as elapsed since discovery as the affair went on. At LEAST. OP isn't even halfway there yet.

... if he wants to stay with her, and she with him. I'm not trying to defend what he did (I've never cheated). You just have to be realistic about what might lie ahead, and preparing for this possibility as well is part of protecting yourself. If all you do is lay yourself bare and vulnerable because he HAS TO be there in the right way, then what happens if he just bags out? Don't let the first time you seriously consider it be with tears on your face while you are still insisting on what you need, and he is giving you the name of his attorney for your records.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of the people telling you to let it go have never been where you are, OP. I have. You need information, and your DH should be willing to answer every single questions you have until you don't need to ask them any more. The mind movies you experience, the need to know every detail - it's so you can heal, not to punish him. And he should know that. My DH answered every question I had, even ones I had already asked. He said he had the absolute responsibility to help me heal, and that *I* got to decide what that looked like.

Four months is absolutely nothing. Of course the cheater wants it all to be over. But it isn't FOR YOU. So ask your questions. And find a decent therapist, cause neither mine nor my DH's would ever say that four months was adequate to get over this.

Everyone in the thread saying "stop punishing him" needs to read the bolded. This is a super fresh wound. OP is trying to heal, not to harm her husband. When you hurt someone really, really badly, you need to understand this dynamic. The guilt and shame you feel? That's coming from you, it's not something your hurt spouse (or whoever) is trying to make you feel. They just want to understand, process, figure out a way forward. And that might mean talking about it, asking questions.

I think OP is trying to figure out how deep the harm goes. That's what the questions are for. How bad was it? What exactly is she forgiving him for? She wants to know the details to understand if, knowing them, trust can be repaired. It has nothing to do with punishing him and everything to do with her getting the information she needs to know whether this can be mended, or to know what needs to happen in order for it to be mended.

Avoiding the conversation is not going to solve it. He needs to be ready for total honesty and for it to take months to get through it. I don't think you can start arguing that it's time to stop talking about until at least as much time as elapsed since discovery as the affair went on. At LEAST. OP isn't even halfway there yet.

Anonymous wrote:All of the people telling you to let it go have never been where you are, OP. I have. You need information, and your DH should be willing to answer every single questions you have until you don't need to ask them any more. The mind movies you experience, the need to know every detail - it's so you can heal, not to punish him. And he should know that. My DH answered every question I had, even ones I had already asked. He said he had the absolute responsibility to help me heal, and that *I* got to decide what that looked like.

Four months is absolutely nothing. Of course the cheater wants it all to be over. But it isn't FOR YOU. So ask your questions. And find a decent therapist, cause neither mine nor my DH's would ever say that four months was adequate to get over this.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of the people telling you to let it go have never been where you are, OP. I have. You need information, and your DH should be willing to answer every single questions you have until you don't need to ask them any more. The mind movies you experience, the need to know every detail - it's so you can heal, not to punish him. And he should know that. My DH answered every question I had, even ones I had already asked. He said he had the absolute responsibility to help me heal, and that *I* got to decide what that looked like.

Four months is absolutely nothing. Of course the cheater wants it all to be over. But it isn't FOR YOU. So ask your questions. And find a decent therapist, cause neither mine nor my DH's would ever say that four months was adequate to get over this.

Agree. 4 months was absolutely still ground zero in our house. I was still barely functioning. Spouse was in the thick of his own therapy. I had not even agreed to couples counseling at that point. I didn’t ask for anything- my spouse provided it and went through the interrogations and calmly answered questions over and over as the mind movies and triggers were just awful for me. I couldn’t sleep. Nights were the worst.0 He took over everything in the house and was fully supportive. He read so many books about helping me heal and went out and got a vasectomy on his own accord. Told me to draft any pre-nup I needed, etc. It was 6 moths before I even agreed to couples therapy because he needed his own work first.

But this guy at 4 months done with hearing about it? Just no. He definitely hasn’t any clue the magnitude of trauma he inflicted. I question whether he truly is sorry or remorseful.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of the people telling you to let it go have never been where you are, OP. I have. You need information, and your DH should be willing to answer every single questions you have until you don't need to ask them any more. The mind movies you experience, the need to know every detail - it's so you can heal, not to punish him. And he should know that. My DH answered every question I had, even ones I had already asked. He said he had the absolute responsibility to help me heal, and that *I* got to decide what that looked like.

Four months is absolutely nothing. Of course the cheater wants it all to be over. But it isn't FOR YOU. So ask your questions. And find a decent therapist, cause neither mine nor my DH's would ever say that four months was adequate to get over this.

Agree. 4 months was absolutely still ground zero in our house. I was still barely functioning. Spouse was in the thick of his own therapy. I had not even agreed to couples counseling at that point. I didn’t ask for anything- my spouse provided it and went through the interrogations and calmly answered questions over and over as the mind movies and triggers were just awful for me. I couldn’t sleep. Nights were the worst.0 He took over everything in the house and was fully supportive. He read so many books about helping me heal and went out and got a vasectomy on his own accord. Told me to draft any pre-nup I needed, etc. It was 6 moths before I even agreed to couples therapy because he needed his own work first.

But this guy at 4 months done with hearing about it? Just no. He definitely hasn’t any clue the magnitude of trauma he inflicted. I question whether he truly is sorry or remorseful.

This is a positive, for an admitted cheater?

Yes. Anything to protect the family/betrayed. Post-nup, individual therapy, vasectomy. Definitely.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of the people telling you to let it go have never been where you are, OP. I have. You need information, and your DH should be willing to answer every single questions you have until you don't need to ask them any more. The mind movies you experience, the need to know every detail - it's so you can heal, not to punish him. And he should know that. My DH answered every question I had, even ones I had already asked. He said he had the absolute responsibility to help me heal, and that *I* got to decide what that looked like.

Four months is absolutely nothing. Of course the cheater wants it all to be over. But it isn't FOR YOU. So ask your questions. And find a decent therapist, cause neither mine nor my DH's would ever say that four months was adequate to get over this.

Agree. 4 months was absolutely still ground zero in our house. I was still barely functioning. Spouse was in the thick of his own therapy. I had not even agreed to couples counseling at that point. I didn’t ask for anything- my spouse provided it and went through the interrogations and calmly answered questions over and over as the mind movies and triggers were just awful for me. I couldn’t sleep. Nights were the worst.0 He took over everything in the house and was fully supportive. He read so many books about helping me heal and went out and got a vasectomy on his own accord. Told me to draft any pre-nup I needed, etc. It was 6 moths before I even agreed to couples therapy because he needed his own work first.

But this guy at 4 months done with hearing about it? Just no. He definitely hasn’t any clue the magnitude of trauma he inflicted. I question whether he truly is sorry or remorseful.

This is a positive, for an admitted cheater?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All of the people telling you to let it go have never been where you are, OP. I have. You need information, and your DH should be willing to answer every single questions you have until you don't need to ask them any more. The mind movies you experience, the need to know every detail - it's so you can heal, not to punish him. And he should know that. My DH answered every question I had, even ones I had already asked. He said he had the absolute responsibility to help me heal, and that *I* got to decide what that looked like.

Four months is absolutely nothing. Of course the cheater wants it all to be over. But it isn't FOR YOU. So ask your questions. And find a decent therapist, cause neither mine nor my DH's would ever say that four months was adequate to get over this.

Agree. 4 months was absolutely still ground zero in our house. I was still barely functioning. Spouse was in the thick of his own therapy. I had not even agreed to couples counseling at that point. I didn’t ask for anything- my spouse provided it and went through the interrogations and calmly answered questions over and over as the mind movies and triggers were just awful for me. I couldn’t sleep. Nights were the worst.0 He took over everything in the house and was fully supportive. He read so many books about helping me heal and went out and got a vasectomy on his own accord. Told me to draft any pre-nup I needed, etc. It was 6 moths before I even agreed to couples therapy because he needed his own work first.

But this guy at 4 months done with hearing about it? Just no. He definitely hasn’t any clue the magnitude of trauma he inflicted. I question whether he truly is sorry or remorseful.