I posted a few weeks ago about how I found that my wife had a one night stand 6 mos ago. I decided that due to our having already begun to piece our marriage together that I had to forgive her for that mistake. It was devistating to find out. I think if maybe she had told me of it it would have been a bit easier because the truth would have come from her and not by my snooping to find the truth.
Now just last week I discovered a second(actually first affair) that happened while we were still together. It happened a little over a year ago. About 3.5 mos before we seperated. This affair was even more devistating to me because after even a few weeks the pain of the one night stand was beginning to subside. This affair was also discovered through my snooping. After having a long tolk with her about the ONS I asked her to please tell me if there was anything else she needed to come clean about and she said that there wasn't. I discovered old yahoo IM logs on my PC from the time when she lived here and went snooping again. I found a way to read these logs without the password from the yahoo account and much to my dismay discovered 2 guys that she was IMing quite a bit during that VERY low time in our M. As i read further I found that these IMs were only the tip of the iceberg. That she had in fact had a 2 mo affair with one of these men. When confronted about it she still did not admit to it. Only when I read outlaou to her the things that SHE typed to him. Very ilicite things that left nothing to the imagination as to what had happened between them did she admit to it. Her excsue for not telling me was that she didn't want me to find out. That we had been doing so well the last few months and even the last few weeks after my finding out about the ONS. This affair seems worse to me since it was a long term thing. 2 mo is a lot more involved than a ONS. Something physical only happened twice before things started deteriorating and the IMs started getting nasty because he was being a jack ass. She moved on from that and we separated.
I've still made the decision to try and move on from this as well. I told her that I forgive her for it but it will take some time to movecompletly beyond and hopfully forget about it. I think what hurts the most is the lying. I found out about one and she had the perfect oppurtunity to tell me about the other. To get it into the open to try and get past them both. But she chose not to. That scares me because it makes me wonder if there's anything else she keeping from me, in order to protect me. When I decided to move beyond this second discovery I deleted all eveidence of it from my PC. Not wanting to read them again and be reminded of the pain and hurt. I also have made a promise to myself and to her not to keep snooping into things looking for something.
On the peicing front we are still getting along very well. She spent the last 2 weekends at home and went to a family party with me last weekend and a cook out that a friend of mine was having yesterday. She does tell me how sorry she is for even hurting me. She does tell me she loves me and that she knows she's made HUGE mistakes. But that she wouldn't be with me now trying to make our M work if she didn't truly want to. She admits that it will take time for her to be comfortable enough to come home for good. We still have plenty of issues that led us to this point that don't have anything to do with the OGs. I can and do understand that. I've made my efforts at DBing since I picked the book up and showing the things I can do to make our relationship better. The hard part for me is how do I learn to trust again. How do I face the times when I know she's with friends, knowing that that was an excuse she used to get out of the house to have an affair. How do you cope with the day to day worries and fears while learning to trust again. I have to show her that I can trust her again. But it's the hardest thing I've even done. I keep thinking that at any time she could be lying to me and doing something to compromise our M again. Still she is here, she is working, and she is telling me she loves me. Which are all things that didn't happend during the affair.
Sorry for the book but understandibly this has been a very trying week for me.
Sounds like you've got a really good attitude, though -- and you've made some great progress in recovering your M. Good work! It isn't easy.
I too cornered my H about his lying -- after reading his email and finding out he was seeing the 0-chick again. He wrote her that all he dreamed of was escaping from me.
I let him ream me for snooping and then I let him go. He moved out. Took my guitar.
It was awful -- geez I was so lonely. It hurt to "lance the boil" -- but now the poisonous lying and cheating and rancor have drained away.
I'm moving on with my life -- we are BOTH single. What he does is no longer my business.
And you know what? It's a relief!
Know what else?
Now that he is free to date that pimply pudge, he misses me.
Freedom. What does he do with it? Calls me, comes over, wants to hang out.
We are starting a new friendship.
Don't know where it will lead. Don't know if I want him back. But there could be hope. Like everybody says, whatever R we have will be a brand new one.
Sounds a little similar thing to your sitch, maybe?
Remember how human nature works, let your W save a little face (she's ashamed already, or she wouldn't hafta hide, right?) -- she'll be grateful for a light touch. Like with dogs -- you don't gotta rub their noses in it.
Hee hee, that's DB-ing for ya -- just plain old dog training in disguise.
It does take a lot of patience.
Oh, it also helps to buy a new guitar (mine's cherry red).
Dude, I'm with ya and I see lots of hope for you guys. Will keep checking in.
You know, I find myself thinking the exact same things because, over time, through snooping and my W telling me additional information, there were many things left out of our original "breakthrough." Because of these lies/incomplete information, I suspect that other stuff has transpired that she will never tell me about. If there is and she isn't telling me, then I fully suspect that it's for the same reasons your W hasn't told you--they don't want to hurt us with even more bad news because they truly want things to move forward and work out.
So, where does that leave us, Dean? Really, it doesn't matter what they tell us, we will question its authenticity, right? We will wonder if it's ALL of the information. I guess, for us to move forward, we have to settle for the information they have given us knowing that they fully regret their actions and want to make things work. What more can we really do? For us to move on, we have to resolves ourselves to something, right? If we don't, our marriages will ultimately fail.
Quote: keep thinking that at any time she could be lying to me and doing something to compromise our M again. Still she is here, she is working, and she is telling me she loves me. Which are all things that didn't happend during the affair.
I think the last sentence here says it all... Deep down you KNOW she's not doing anything to compromise your situation because she's behaving in a way that shows YOU she cares.
Thanks Bridget and jethro, Actually jethro, a good friend of mine said almost the same thing the other day. He said, ok lets say you do go digging and find something else that happened some time ago. Where does that leave you? Unless you're ready to walk away, it leaves you in the same place you are right now. In his opinion, I'm better off focusing my attention on learning to trust again and more importantly making "damn sure" that I'm there to make her feel needed and loved so she never feels that she has to go elsewhere to get it.
The good things about this week, which I tend to leave out when feeling upset were that. In addition to my W spending the last two weekends with me. Last week she did some shopping for me and decided to bring it over to me one evening. My first thought was to ask her to stay and watch a movie or something(hoping that she may stay over ) However not wanting to push her if she wasn't ready I decided to say nothing about that. Only mentioned that we could take the kids out to dinner. Well, she called me that afternoon and said she has stopped to rent a movie for us and since it would be so late she'd just stay over!!!! How's that for working out like you'd hoped?
I do really see in her the love she's found again for me. I also see that she's scared right now that things will end up right where they were before. Now it's up to me to prove otherwise and give her the time she needs to understand how things will be different.
She asked me Saturday night why did I love her still after the things she has done to me. My response to her was to ask "Does it really matter why I love youas long as you know I do?" she said no. Then said ILY too. I then continued "I forgive you for the things you've done. It may take me some time to get over them completely but I'm willing to do it. Just be patient with me when I need to talk out those feelings associated with the affair and I'll do the same for you when you want to talk about the things that I did in our marriage that made you upset."
I just hope I can live up to what I've said to her. I'm sure I'll be here trying to sort through my feelings for sometime in order to not take things out on her when it isn't necesary.
I know only too well the place that repeated lies and cover-ups can send you. (Check out my sordid tale, or at least the little summary on page 1)
Even AFTER bomb #3, I discovered a "chat friend" that my H tried to cover up....right after "exposing all" and promising "no more lies" AGAIN.
His explanation? (after the panic attack subsided)...he just SOOOO wanted "all of that" to be behind us, and was petrified that I'd take it as "the last straw" and end our M, that he panicked and lied.
Jethro is right...look at what is happening NOW. I know intellecutally that my H could be lying his A$$ off every day, he could be having another A...but my GUT tells me it isn't so. His ACTIONS tell me he's remorseful, and really working on our M. Go with that!
Hi Dean..does your wife realize that she is the one that has to rebuild the trust..it won't happen overnight. You do have a great pma...keep taking care of you.
Yes she has talked about that as being her responsibility. I think she really stumped as to how to do it though. She feels that no matter what she says or does, I'll always question her honesty after this. I can see where she's coming from on that becasue I probably will for a while.
For instance tonight I called her on her cell about meeting tomorrow to exchange our 2 yo son in the morning. She had made last mintue plans with friends and went out. I admit I was a little jealous of this but didn't say anything to her. She did make a point to tell me that she wasn't bothered by my call ended the conversation with ILY and then called me back about an hour later as she left the restuarant. She also made a point to tell me that her friends mentioned that she should call me to come join them but obviously with the baby here and my two older sons here that was impossible. But all those things made me feel better. Keeping in mind the the affair happened outside of this circle of friends, so I have no reason to be upset with her going out with them, other than my own feelings of insecurity. I do want her to have friends outside our M. That was a BIG problem in our M before. She felt trapped her at home with 4 kids and in a R that was going nowhere due to the fact the we had gotten ourselves intoa cycle of hurt and counterhurt.
I feel like I'm on the right track here but the hard part is making sure that I don't share the wrong feelings with her that will put a back a few steps. Tonight was a big deal for me because my gut reaction was to make a snipy comment about her being out with friends, but I caught myself and in the end I felt better by the things she said.
It IS hard to trust again after such betrayal, but it can and does happen. One of the pivotal changes in my view on the whole issue was this:
I realized that I really could not control what my H did or will do. That he COULD betray me again. What I have the most trust in NOW is my ability to handle whatever may come. I don't project negatively into the future, quite the contrary. But having been through the grinder several times, I KNOW on a deep, spiritual level that I WILL BE OKAY no matter what. To me, that is the essence of trust. It's also a very powerful stance as it does not rely on what anyone else says or does.
Of course on a real life day to day level it sure helps when our S's reaffirm their committment to our M's, say how sorry they are for having hurt us, etc.
Be prepared for conflicting feelings (such as you already had today! ). They are par for the course.
Well just a little update here. Things have been going GREAT between my W and I. We went away without the kids for the first time in years this last weekend. We really needed this. Should have been doing it for a long time now. The last few weeks have been a sort of rollercoaster ride for me(well us) as expected but we've both done well. I still truly feel that she is being honest with me now. This weekend the topic of the A did come up a few times but I changed the subject quickly as I could see it hurt her to think about what she had done to me, to us. I told her that I know if she had found happiness elsewhere and were not remorseful about what she had done, she wouldn't have gone away with me. And also that if I wasn't willing to get beyond it and forgive her that I wouldn't be there either. We laid on the beach, we went out for a not-so-romantic dinner at a calabash seafood restaurant, then stayed out VERY late dancing at a local club. The only complaint that I had or that she had about the whole weekend was that it was too short. Her first thoughts yesterday as we were driving back to reality were about when and where we could go on our next trip!
) However not wanting to push her if she wasn't ready I decided to say nothing about that. Only mentioned that we could take the kids out to dinner. Well, she called me that afternoon and said she has stopped to rent a movie for us and since it would be so late she'd just stay over!!!! How's that for working out like you'd hoped? 
). They are par for the course.