Wife has filed for divorce

[ngs]

Really? You really didn't think that cheating was going to hurt her and your family? You didn't think that as a role model for your kids, that behavior will forever remain with them?

Yes I knew the cheating hurt her deeply, she has just never shared her feelings with me on specifically how it affected her emotionally until the last couple of months after filing. How she never felt in control of her own life, she stayed out of fear financially, she only stayed because of the kids, the emotional turmoil she has gone through, she should have left me years ago but felt stuck, and so many other things she has recently told me. It is absolutely sickening to me the pain I have caused my wife and it always has been sickening to me what I have done.

That's not how you show sympathy. It shows resignation. Remorse is something that is in your control. It's something that you show. And it takes time. You just sound like you want a magic bullet to fix things NOW even though you took 17 years to destroy it.

I am not looking for a magic bullet, I know that it will be a long road for a recovery of our marriage if it were to happen. She has told me that she does not want to spend the next 5-10 years working on our marriage and I understand that. I have expressed remorse, I promised that I would be faithful, truthful & trustworthy (and I have been) and apologized for many years following. She had told me long ago that my being sorry doesn't matter anymore to her.


She has told me that divorce is her only option for herself to get healthy and be happy and that she is definitely going through with it. Divorce will give her control back over her life, because she was independent when we met and she wants to get back to being independent again. So for me we are divorcing, I have to accept that's what she needs to heal. Even after divorce we will still be living together for quite sometime because of finances, kids and other factors until we figure out how to physically separate. I will continue to work on myself as I have been for quite sometime and that will not stop and I am always here if she were decide to possibly try to work on our relationship.