SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

The essential paradox of reconciliation is that the person with whom you need to work to obtain healing, is the person who hurt you.

I have a fantasy of leaving my current relationship, and starting a new romantic and sexual relationship from scratch. We wouldn't be two perfect people, but the hurts we'd suffered, and the hurts we may have inflicted on others, would not involve each other.

Trying to heal a relationship from within is the very archetype of pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps.

Exactly right. And an unspoken assumption in a romantic relationship is that there is some equality and balance. Infidelity destroys that assumption. One partner intentionally chose to poison the roots of the relationship in pursuit of their own selfish pleasure, causing intense, enduring pain and harm in the other innocent lover. This is the reality that must be faced and overcome to R. Anything less is rugsweeping and a one way ticket to infidelity purgatory. And even facing it may not be enough.
A friend of mine recently summed it up perfectly.

Infidelity sucks ass.

So true Eric, what you fantasize about is the clean cut severance that leads to the place where you can begin a new relationship unencumbered by the pain of the betrayal.A simple but not easy solution to a very complex problem, that I too day dreamed about soon after my wife's confession, but I made the eyes wide open decision to stay because of the very long shared history Ay there,s the rub)and the changes I saw in my wife's attitude and behaviours. When she initiated a series of things I needed to begin to heal with little guidance from.me, I knew I wasn't going to end it all just because of my hurt feelings. And what she did in her several instances of infidelity was off the charts in disrespect and complete contempt for me. But I sure understand how the hurt and frustration can generate escapism thoughts.

The essential paradox of reconciliation is that the person with whom you need to work to obtain healing, is the person who hurt you.

Not much logic in it. Or much logic in relationships in general and really no logic at all when the word ‘love’ gets thrown around.

As for pulling oneself up by one’s own bootstraps, I think that has to happen regardless of the path chosen to move forward.

And the kicker is on starting a new relationship, there are zero guarantees of a pain free, happy landing. My brother has started over twice and he is unable to find a happy ending, and yet, he remains an optimistic, whole human still investing in his new relationship.

Or a worse fate in my mind, some folks remain with an unhealed WS who continues to be unsafe.

But, back to picking one self up, that really had to happen for me before I could decide what I wanted.

Finding our self worth, finding our value is a critical first step.

All that said, offering grace to the person who burned the M to the ground, as noted above, is not easy.

My R really became about the actions my wife took to show why we should make another run at it.

Until the last few days, I had leaned into the marriage 2.0 concept regarding my R, but some recent posts here have changed my perspective.

While our day-today operations have changed immensely, and how we treat each other has evolved a great deal, I’m in the same marriage. There really is a bridge for me that goes from the innocent beginnings, to our early struggles to the infidelity itself (and the years it was kept a secret) to dday and a pair of healed people happy to have made it this far.

I really did want to see if offering a final chance would change things. It was as much about curiosity as love in the early days after dday.

I couldn’t have imagined we could overcome it all.

I am happily surprised, and proud of how hard we worked to conquer all the damage done.

Ending my marriage and starting anew with someone else does at times look like the better option. Preferably with someone who has been a BS, someone who can understand what I and every other BS has gone thru. Someone I can trust to cherish and honor the relationship. Yes I know everyone is capable of deception but at least this new person hasn't deceived me.

My wife recently said "I understand what you are going thru" to which I replied "I need you to stop saying that. You can guess and assume but until you are on this side of an affair you cannot understand what I felt when I found your texts to him. You cannot understand what I felt when I confronted you and you attitude was basically 'Oh well, I'm sorry this upsets you'"

If our youngest (13) was older I think I would have left. At 53 I have a chance of finding someone to finish out my days with. But I am trying to make this work.

I try to stay focused on the positive gains/ changes I've made in myself. Breaking the codependency spell was a game changer. I no longer fear being alone, I'm okay if that happens. I no longer obsess over her finding someone else were we to end.

She's made changes but she's not putting in the level of effort I would like. I have done so much reading and research, watched videos, trying to figure out why affairs happen. Her not so much. The other day I sent her a link to the Affair Recovery YouTube channel and told her most of the videos are relevant to us. So far she has listened to two videos while driving to/from work. I'm tempted to hide a voice activated recorder in her car to see if she is actually listening.

I'm currently reading a book that explains the shame people carry from being victims of child sexual abuse (my wife is one). The book explains how the child's brain is forever altered and how this can forever impact how he/she makes decisions. My wife had never dealt with this trauma nor had she talked with a therapist. The court appointed male "counselor" told my wife he thought she was lying because some of the details were fuzzy which is not uncommon as she was being interviewed five years after the abuse took place.

About 4'ish years ago I suggested we find a MC to help us learn to communicate better and she instantly shot down the idea, said it was a bad idea. Since the affair came to light she started seeing an IC at my urging. My IC said my wife's reluctance to my idea of the MC could be rooted in her childhood memory of the court counselor calling her a liar.

Since we are only six months into our attempt at R I'm trying to be patient. Hopefully she makes progress with her IC. The other day we were talking and I asked how she was doing with her negative body image issues. She was closing in on turning 50 when I discovered the affair and one of the "reasons/excuses" she gave me early on was she was unhappy with her body (weight gain,hair thinning, skin getting looser,etc) and feeling unattractive and his attention made her feel attractive.

She is still unhappy about her body and has not accepted the fact that we all age and our bodies change. I asked what did you think would happen when you turned 50? Did you think I would leave? She said no I didn't think you would leave but I thought you would be unhappy. I have never said or done anything to make her feel self-conscious about her body

The fact she is still unhappy with her body is a big red flag for me. This makes me wonder if/when she is going to once again seek validation from another man that she is still attractive. At one point I considered hiring an attractive man (actor or PI) to hit on her to see her response. I am hoping her IC will help her navigate this. We are having a conversation tonight and this is going to be one of the topics.

I will now step down from my soapbox and my apologies for once again being long-winded ;)

The most powerful thing anyone said to me after d-day comes down to

BS heals BS;
WS heals WS;
together ... if they want to ... BS & WS work together to (re)build the M.

To be an effective partner, the BS needs to deal with the anger, grief, fear, shame, etc. that come with being betrayed. 'Deal with' means, ideally, 'process the pain out of their body.' That usually needs some help from a good IC. One can't really leave their old M unless they do it. This is work the BS has to do on their own.

The WS needs to do the same work. I'd include 'somehow make amends' as the WS's healing work, too, but other's might include that in rebuilding the M. The WS can't restore what they took, but they can show they'll do their damnedest to be supportive for the rest of their lives.

Both partners need to define what they want from M, come to many agreements, and then implement the agreements. IME and IMO, that's a lot easier than it sounds if both partners do their individual healing work.

The paradox Eric wrote about is there, all right. While healing I certainly wanted and took emotional support from my W. I gave it, too. As I say, IME it was easier than I thought it would be - because we both were doing our own work. If giving and taking support had continued to be a problem, I believe I would have confronted the problem, because it might mean that we were just not a good enough fit to really want R.

BTW, I went through a period of going out without telling my W where I was going (though I did say when I expected to be back), withheld discussing what I was feeling, interrogating her again and again, expressing - showing - my feelings. I definitely detached. I reattached only because I saw her do her work in MC sessions - but not everybody had an MC who holds the WS's feet to the fire, as we did.

IOW, the paradox is there, but it wasn't an impediment in my experience - because we both did our work. The corollary is: the paradox is a giant impediment if one or both partners don't do their work, and it's something of an impediment until both partners have started to make real progress in their work.