I appologize for the length of my post, seems I had a lot to say! I hope you don't mind but don't feel like you have to read it all. I hope some of you will continue to respond despite the length.
Thank you all for responding. It has certainly helped me to see things from the male perspective, not only from the spouse who's wife cheated on him. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised really. If we take the A out of the equation, there are still issues in our M that we have yet to master, but at least we're trying now. Men and women will never completely understand eachother, so why should I think this situation should be any different? We each have our reasons for how we react to the other.
I'd like to respond to each of your questions.
FA, without revealing too much, the reason we are now just starting to deal with the A is because I was sick and got very sick near the end of the A and completely shut down for the few months following it. My H stood by me and put his own needs aside, as any good spouse would do. Which is probably why I isolate myself so easily when the A is brought up. I feel unworthy of him, and that is my problem that I need to deal with. Following that we had another significant even in our lives (nothing bad) but it consumed our time. We went through it together, like we knew we were meant to. That brings us to June when 'nothing' was happening in our lives, and then the problems began. Basically, H was free to open up about his feelings about my A and is now going through all the emotions. Which is why I know most of his reactions are totally normal, I just need to know if there's anything I can do to help him.
Hurt = Angry is interesting and makes sense. Like many guys H was never shown a mechanism for dealing with hurt. He is not aggressive or loud, and is probably in more danger than the average guy of having his feelings ignored. Thankfully this is something I've learned about him over our 5 year history and like a lot of women I talk his ear off about every issue. He doesn't seem to mind, rather encourages is since he needs help communicating. I do think he's stuck though, and I hope the C will help him with that.
There's an overwhelming response that H's efforts to be intimate following a discusion of the A has to do with his ego, or whatever you want to call it. Very helpful, thank you! It helps to hear it expressed by other men in his situation. Honestly, let me tell you how I interpreted it. H would talk about the A, about me being with the OM, how pictures run through his mind, and then he would want sex. Ok, here's what I see. Not only has H managed to make every fun thing in our lives relate to my A, even though it had nothing to do with it, now he is relating our intimate time to my A. I think that when we would have sex, he would not even be there, he would be in his own little world, he would be thinking about me with OM. Does that make any sense? It scares me is what it does. Our counsellor told him several months ago in response to his question about how to stop thinking about the A, to imagine a giant, red stop sign that would appear in front of the bad images in his mind. Anytime he was reminded of anything that bothered him ,to put up the stop sign. Anyways thanks for a different perspective which shows me that he is probably completely switching from one thought to the next and not related them as I have been. That helps a lot. It is still going to be a problem if the A is discussed and then intimacy is expected however.
Cat03, I am sorry about what has happened to you, and that your poor kids are probably dealing with it too. It still amazes me the depths of my selfishness, if I had drug my children (I don't have any) through it I'd probably be institutionalized by now. You are a very strong and forgiving woman. H too has mentioned that sometimes he just wants to know more and more details, but fights himself so he doesn't ask them because he knows he doesn't want to know about it. The fact is I hurt him the most I ever could and what's the value in discussing it any further. I think I would have been too scared to not answer his questions, but it sounds like your H made the right choice, despite angering you further. It's good that you realize that there are other issues that need to be addressed. Lately, it seems to me like H thinks his slate has been wiped clean which is ignorant to say the least. It's how he's always been though, not addressing the real issue. It kind of feels like we're treating the symptoms not the problems. We're getting there though.
Strangely, he does not want to see a counsellor on his own, he only wants to go with me. Any thoughts on that one?
Stevie your question is valid, "what do you hope to accomplish by being angry", but I know for me ( I tend to be the one who gets angry easily) it's not a feeling a person feels they can control, especially if they react quickly to situations like I do. H is different and thinks about it more first before getting angry. This situation may be too much for him to handle on his own though. I don't think anything gets accomplished by being angry but it's important for him to feel like he can express anger, because that tells me that he is trusting me more and more. During the A when I "wasn’t sure what I was going to do" (that makes me sick) he was only nice to me, never angry, scared I believe. Now that he can show me a more vulnerable side of him it's good, because he is trusting me to take care of him. It helped me to hear you say that after all the anger was out was when you wanted to feel closer to your W. That made me feel like I am important to him and he does need me.
To answer your questions, my A started in September 2005, it got physical in October and then I stopped eating pretty much all together and was put on sick leave. Unfortunately this just made it easier for me to see the OM who was also put on stress leave. I left for about two nights and went to stay with some family, all the time thinking I needed to get away from my situation ( that was before it turned physical). But the pull towards the OM was too strong and I too weak. (It ended mid november). OM and I had certainly managed to create quite the fantasy world in our minds, how we would have such an amazing life together all that BS. Come on. How can a good, decent relationship stem from lies, hurt and selfishness? The weird thing is I knew it, like a smoker knows they're killing themselves, while they light up another one. Addiction to attention is the best way I can describe it. It's humbling that's for sure, I feel a lot of the time when H brings up the A that I should be walking around with one of those black arm bands they used to give women in the old days who committed adultery for the world to see. I find I walk with my head down more now. I guess it's because I really do have something to be ashamed of. Part of me thinks I have revealed my true character and that is too hard a pill to swallow, and another part of me feels like no, that is not who I am. I made bad decisions, and I regret them, but it doesn't define me.
What brought me back to H? I woke up. I physically removed myself from my life, literally going to another part of the world for two weeks, you could call it withdrawal, because I was unable to remove myself emotionally. Was I in love? Who knows. I don't trust that part of my judgment. I trust myself now, but I don't know what to call that. At the time yes, I believed I was in love because all the feelings were there that go with love. But real love does not involve inflicting pain on someone else, or myself, both of which I was doing liberally. Without sounding like I'm defending my actions, there was a lot of pressure from OM to leave my H. H got a new job that would take him out of town a lot (I mean more than half the month a lot multiple days) and I feared a lonely life plain and simple. Now I can say with confidence that I am exactly where I want to be and I will never question it again. I am so unbelieveably fortunate to have my H and never again will I compromise our M. Therein may lie the core problem, we are just not on the same page yet. I look at my wedding pictures and see the happiest day of my life, he looks at them and sees a whole first year of marriage destroyed. I can't see that. I want to try to fix him, and I can't and it's killing me. I want things the way they were when I said 'yes'. I think it can happen. Someday. I'll work at it til the day I die.
GH you posted last and I've just been going down the list of questions but I hope I've answered some of yours already. If your W thinks she is still in love with OM she needs to see a counsellor immediately to help her sort out whether or not she is. To be honest with you, there were definitely feelings that developed between me and OM, but now I look at them like as if he were an old boyfriend who was important to me at one point in my life, but now I have moved on. I'm not really sure what it's like for men, but if you sat an old lady down and asked her to tell you about her life, she would tell you about all the people she's loved, not what jobs she had, or places she's been. There's no denying that a woman's life is full of relationships that impact her in very deep ways. An A is a relationship that happened out of sequence. At least mine was. Of course there are always other factors depending on the situation, a big one being lack of self respect or self esteem. What your W needs to realize is that it was not a healthy or true relationship because it was based on anxiety, mistrust, lies, selfishness and lack of respect. It is not enough for her just be back, she needs to believe she is where she ought to be. I get the feeling that she is where she wants to be, and that she's getting over a time in her life that the door needs to be closed on. When that happens, is when you will trust her again. H says he trusts me. He says it is the damage that he is having a hard time with. I wanted to mention that we do have the book, and have both been reading it on and off since our C recommended it. Maybe we should start reading again.
If your W is like me she is scared. Scared that you refusing to move forward and leave this baggage behind will mean that you will never completely let yourself be happy. Not that you don't want to but that you won't allow it to happen. The fact that she become annoyed by your comments means she cares a lot. Sounds weird I know, but it's every human's instinct to live and live well. The day she just takes it and shuts down is the day you should be worried. I know it scares me that if H continues to relate everything in our world to my A that soon it will consume our lives like a virus and we will suffocate to death, together. The truth is it's just not fair to you. She has hurt you and you cannot retaliate because you love her. You can look at it like she wins because she got to do what she wanted to do at your expense and now she's decided to come back to you, and you just had to take it. Or you can look at it like she likely is, which is that she will have to deal with the fact that she deliberately and selfishly harmed you for the rest of her life. When you continually bring up her A, you are telling her that she will never get you back completely. Yes you may reside under the same roof but your relationship will be hollow. This is not a comparison by the way to the OM. You have to make that choice to see it that way. You will know if you can trust her because she will look you in the eye when she talks to you. What all this means is that you have to do more work to heal. Is it fair, no, but who cares? If it means you have a happy life together with the woman you have chosen to be your wife then isn't it worth it? I can't imagine how difficult it's been for you after being hurt so badly.
