one unfaithful's perspective

[saffie]

Up

W reasonably wants honesty, and she reasonably wants me to express my love for her in an affectionate manner. sadly, i do not feel this love for her - while there have been good times, I cannot rekindle the flame (and sincerely doubt it was ever a flame, as opposed to a detente in which we managed to get along).

Please tell me that you ARE aware that these feelings are the usual ones when someone has been involved with an OP. That's what the endorphins generated by the A make you feel - they also make your brain rewrite history in order for you to be able to justify your actions - after all no-one wants to feel the bad guy/gal.

I am not 'having a go' here, Up, I am just stating the biological facts. My H thought he was in love with OP but only a few months after recommitting he told me, (without any prompting),that he hadn't really loved OW. Now if you asked him that at the beginning of me knowing about the A he would have said the opposite. Once H and I got things sorted and back on track he changed. I am glad you are going to look at Retro and give this a shot. I agree with Going Forward though, if you do all this and still feel after giving it a proper try that you are just staying for the children, then that's not so good. Plenty of people do stay for that reason alone, but personally that was not enough for us. I didn't want to waste more years on a M that wasn't going to work and lose precious years to such misery,-(I didn't include time trying to work on the M in the wasted years category- I owed my M and my family that). Luckily for me it didn't come to that and the M was renewed.

I wish you luck - don't forget to let us know how you get on - either way. Please be sensitive though to those on this forum who are in great pain after discovering infidelity. It is very useful to hear things frm the betrayer's point of view but if put across insensitively it really hurts. That is not to belittle the hurt you are going through; just an observation.