If her despicable behavior is a deal breaker for you then that is completely understandable and don't feel like you're doing anything wrong if you won't tolerate it. To be honest I'm still not sure I can go on. I hate to show a crack in my reconciliation armor but her infidelity changed me. I notice women now. I really didn't when we had our innocence and were living the great American love story (or so I thought). Well, all innocence is gone now. Now we're grown-ups who see the world unfiltered. We've now joined the modern cynical society. Not only do I not trust her one bit, but I don't trust anyone now. I used to. Now I see her differently. She'll never be on a pedestal again. Once you've fallen from a virtuous pedestal you can't ever get back on one.
I see that she's a middle aged woman who questioned her life so instead of seeking help from those who love her most, instead she lied to everyone, including her children, and her "soul mate". We're working on us together now but when she says things like "we really are meant to be together" I just say stop, that's bullsh!t. There are no soul mates and nobody is meant to be with anybody. That's all romantic fiction. It's not real. People can love each other but at any given moment either one of them can betray and destroy the other. It happens every day. It happened to me. Once it does you can't ever go back to the other side.
Not only did my wife destroy my ability to trust her but she destroyed my ability to trust anyone, or possibly another love interest in the future. That's another thing that changed. I used to not even be able to imagine us apart and me in love with someone else. Now, not only can I imagine it but I think about it more than I probably should. Now when a woman flirts with me or subtly gives me non-verbal signals that she's attracted to me, I notice. I never used to because I was in love with my wife and had zero need to notice such things. Now I notice, I think about it, and I don't know if I can stop that seed that has been planted.
I love to give advice here because if I can help anyone then that makes me happy and not a lot of things make me happy these days. I'm no therapist but I am a survivor of the marriage sh!tstorm. All I can offer is my own experiences and things I've personally seen work and not work. I hesitate to write these things out because my wife reads my posts and hearing some of these things hurts her because she thinks we can get back to the way we were. Maybe we can. I'm no expert here. I'm just learning as I go.
If you're truly decided to move on then you're really ahead of the curve and should be able to recover. This is a time that can be exciting for you. Do whatever you want for you. You no longer have to check with anyone else. It's your time.
