Just wondering how many details did your spouse share with you about the OP? Were they open or closed? How much of what happened did you feel you wanted, needed, and got, to help you with piecing? Was pieicing hindered by what they wouldn't or didn't share? Do you still have unanswered questions that bother you or trigger you to make healing or moving forward difficult?
I know many people say forget it and move on... but pushing down questions and bottling them inside doesn't seem healthy to me. I can't help but believe that laying everything out on the table, rather than leaving it to the worst things in your imagination, isn't healther. So you can just look at it, digest it and then move on. Otherwise it's always a question, always a mystery, blown up and hanging over you....
There is no arriving, ever. It is all a continual becoming.
I wanted to know a lot, and my H was willing to share. What I found was that knowing made it worse. It set me back a long time...I was holding on to OP much longer than H was, and it affected our R.
What does knowing achieve for you? What's the goal? OP is in the past...OP was more about your H's state of mind and the dissatisfying M then it was the OP. Knowing more doesn't change what happened. Better to focus your time and attention on here and now and how to make your M and R so great that cheating isn't an attractive option.
Once I let go of OP and worked on ME and what *I* could control, THAT'S when I stopped having the questions and started focusing on making myself and my M great.
SD
Me: 40 H: 43 H had EA from 2/06-9/06 Bomb 5/06 Piecing since 9/2006 3/2008: Boundary setting 7/2009: Boundary crossing~dropped my own bomb. 8/2010: Marriage finally on track!
I had to know everything and my H was also very giving of information when asked. After a while he understood that even tho' it hurt I felt I needed to know. It was like some right of passage. He realised that by keeping things back he was actually hurting me more than he would do by being open and sharing it all with me. That way I felt included and that he was being completely honest.
I don't know if I would say it set me back. I agree that it made me think about OW a lot and I was thinking about her long after my H had stopped thinking about her himself. It was the reason I ended up here - the fact that I kept fixating on the OW.
However, it was important to me to know the details in the long run. I needed to know the why's and wherefores so that I could arm myself with as much information as possible to help prevent the circumstances that had led to H having the affair existing again - does that make sense.
The only problem with lots of questions I found is that my H's memory could be a bit sketchy at times and so certain things seemed to change - eventually I had to realise that these changeable things were those items that mattered so little to him that he couldn't remember them well which is why the 'facts' varied from time to time - He really wasn't trying to pull the wool over my eyes.
In the long run I feel that it has helped me to know all these things. I don't cope well with unknowns.
I think how much you need to know depends on the type of person you are - it is a very personal thing. I wanted it all out in the open - I did not want to still be thinking and speculating about it all many years down the line.
Saffie
Saffie me 46 H 46 M in 1986 D20,D18,S16,D13 H's A 01/05 to 07/06 H recommitted to M 07/06 renewed vows 09/06 Going from strength to strength
Hey Root - I, like Saffie, HAD to know the details! I asked and asked and my H was very forthcoming with information, for the most part. I left no rock unturned to the point where he was at times hesitant to reveal certain things, but would anyway. I don't fixate on OW at all. I now know everything I want to know about her and as far as I see it, she isn't the issue. The issue is with my H. I do understand though how knowing everything could cause one to fixate on OW. I would not be able to move past the A if I didn't know the details. It sounds like you might really want to know what went on...it's totally a personal decision and there are pros and cons to both sides of the coin.
good luck! Em
Me: 34 H: 39 M: 7 yrs H A 12/05-8/07
If what you say surprises me, I must have been assuming something else was true. - M. Wheatley
I think each individual is different. I have been very careful on what I ask about OW and the A, although supposedly it was only an EA, but I'm not sure if there was SOME physical contact, although I believe him when he told me initially they did not have sex.
My whole thing has been whatever I know is going to always be in my head, actual pictures of what happened. I have carefully thought about certain questions I THINK I want answered and not actually asked them until I'm sure I want to know the answer.
With me, less is better. I know it happened, and I know H and I are moving forward together so any details I know I am going to have to live w/. I've kept the details to a minimum.
Like I said, I think very carefully before I ask a question. I don't just ask when I all of a sudden feel I want/need to know something because I could change my mind after actually giving it some thought.
Me: 38 H: 35 S4, S5, S10 Bomb 01/07 Wanted D - nothing would change his mind Numerous A's prior to D bomb; EA prior/during D bomb Piecing 04/07 Deployed for a year 05/07 Still Piecing 2010 M 11 yrs 05/10
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this. I think I'm the type of person who just needs to know everything no matter how ugly it is. I need to wrap my mind about things, understand them, and in dealing with it it will lose it's importance and the power over me. It's like... expose the wound so the air gets to it and it can heal.... or CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy).... exposure to uncomfortable or upsetting stimuli until it becomes bearable (I have a child with OCD so I'm pretty well versed in CBT!).
I just know that not knowing (and having a huge imagination) doesn't seem to work. He's claims to be long over it, but I still have some sharp triggers. I have been trying to let things go, not ask questions and not talk about it... but there seems to be things I'm not healing from and this concerns me. I feel like I stuff things and don't think about them, but then something will happen and it all comes to the surface and I start questioning him and he just gets angry... like he's going to have to deal with this forever. But then he never really answers any questions. He won't tell me things because he "doesn't feel it will help." So I don't know how it ended, why it ended when it ended, what exactly happened, what was good about it, what was bad about it, what he truly felt for her, etc......
I wish there was a way I could just cut this part of my brain out so I didn't have to deal with it....
There is no arriving, ever. It is all a continual becoming.
I am the type who needs to know a lot. I would prefer to know every detail. At the same time, I have decided that I will need to choose what is actually relevant in healing the R and that's the part I would want to know (e.g. how exactly did the attration start? what is it that you see in her that you don't see in me? why did you do xxx thing?)
Unfortunately for me, H is still in contact with OW, though PA is over and it is currently not much of an EA, more like H feels guilty towards dumping her out cold. But I told him we cannot live like this forever so we are in a limbo now. Back to the subject, I cannot ask the questions yet. Also, H, at least at this point, already said he will not tell me certain things. He is a very private person so I doubt he will ever reveal much. I don't know if this will change later when he is 100% with me and realize that I really need the info to heal, or I will just have to let go.
IMHO, find a balance between what is useful to know (for healing), and what is just, well, details. If you have that list, may be you can hand it to h and have him answer them on his own timeline.
But what is relavent to healing? What details are needed and which are not?
Sheesh, I just want to get over this, and I don't think stuffing things down and "trying to forget it" is healing. I think it's bottled up stuff that can erupt later, or be used at a later date as a reason for one's own poor behavior. Also, I don't feel I can be close with my husband if there are these secrets. Hummmm.... Do I have secrets? Do these keep him from being close to me? Maybe it's just the knowing there are secrets there....
There is no arriving, ever. It is all a continual becoming.
But what is relavent to healing? What details are needed and which are not?
root
It's personal. I would say YOU need to know more for your peace of mind. Have you tried getting your husband to read the infidelity section in Michele's book? My husband did and it really helped him realise why I felt the need to ask questions and the importance that he reply to them as honestly and fully as possible - even if it gave me pain at the time. It did cause a lot of pain but it did help me move on. I am a need to know sort of person. I also need to understand what happened and why so that I can ensure that I put 100% into making it not happen again, (or seeing the signs sooner).
If I felt that my H was holding back on me I would have been even more unable to trust him. Trust is a personal thing and I know it will take me a long time to trust him again as it is. If I knew he was hiding things from me or I sensed a reluctance there to share details when requested I would feel that there was still a great big stumbling block between us.
The mountain I am climbing to put my marriage back together is big enough as it is - I don't want to keep being knocked back by avalanches when I least expect it. Saffie
Saffie me 46 H 46 M in 1986 D20,D18,S16,D13 H's A 01/05 to 07/06 H recommitted to M 07/06 renewed vows 09/06 Going from strength to strength
