Thank you so much for the responses, very helpful and much appreciated. I intend to stand for as long as I can, for her, for the kids and of course for me. I realized my intro post is a little thin on specifics so allow me to fill in some more of the blanks.
My wife dropped the bomb late September and in hindsight I would say she was in full blown replay from early summer. I found this board early (thank goodness) did the recommended homework and was able to start DBing shortly after BD. Up until then our relationship was awesome, we loved each other very much, we were best friends and were a fantastic team.
Some background on my wife:
At the age of 11 she became aware her dad was having an affair(s). Her mom confided in her to look for support while bashing her dad. In her teens, her dad made no attempt to hide his lovers bringing them to his office (and other public places) where my wife worked part time. Her parents are still married, and as long as my wife can remember her mother has always been an emotional wreck and has been a severe alcoholic for the past 25 years. My wife has always been suspect of her mothers role in her dads infidelity. She thinks it was quite possible they had a sex starved marriage because of her. Both her parents do love my wife very much, although they are not the best examples of what a married couple should be. My wife moved out at 18 to Canada from overseas, no doubt to leave behind the mayhem. It was during this time her mothers alcoholism really got bad.
Some key background info on our marriage:
At 6 months of age our son was diagnosed with cancer and he lost his left eye. At 8 months of age he was further diagnosed with a massive brain tumor with CSF involvement. We were told to take him home and enjoy him as he only had weeks maybe a few months to live. We were approached by a wonderful doctor who had a trail treatment regime that she thought could save him. His first birthday coincide with the start of his bone marrow transplant (thank goodness we banked his cord blood from birth as we could be sure it was cancer free). For the next 8 years of his life he underwent chemo treatments in his CSF through a shunt that was placed through his brain into is CSF sack. Initially my wife and I agreed to having 2 kids, but we had a third primarily so we could bank cord blood should our son need it in the future. My wife was pregnant during our sons bone marrow transplant where she was stuck in a sterilized 10 x 10 hospital room for ten weeks caring for a one year old with no immune system. We decided to have a fourth baby primarily for the same reasons, but he died shortly after birth due to complications. We later had a healthy baby girl and now have 4 beautiful kids. Our son is truly a miracle and is now a kind, handsome and intelligent 12 year old who loves life and is prospering very well.
My wife and I got through all of this with really no help from her folks or mine (who are mess as well), we were an unbelievable team. There is so much more I could say, but the respect and love i have for her cannot be described. If it was not for her advocacy, my son would not be alive today, however that is another story.
My wife has been a rock during those trying times, there is a lot that I think she has never really dealt with. I'm standing because I have hope she will find her way.
Thank you!
P.S. I never attributed cake eating specifically to an affair/sex with other men. I was more using it in the sense that living in the same house with me affords her the conveniences of utilizing me as a babysitter, sharing household chores etc... all the while allowing her to have more time for the "single life". My wife and I have not been intimate since BD and I intend to keep it that way until she gets through this. Lastly, during replay my wife has been drinking much more. She never drinks when she is out as she always drives, but when she is at home she starts drinking before the kids go to sleep and ramps it up after they are in bad. interesting tidbit happened today, my wife left a current issue psychology magazine out in the open that had articles listed on the cover about trusting (or not trusting) intuition as well as addiction solutions. All this while having one of her worst monster episodes in awhile. She came home with my son who had as semi annual full body MRI and when I asked how thinks went she laid into me because I should have known things went well otherwise she would have contacted me. Yikes! Thanks for letting me vent, strength to you all!
