SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hello,

So - it’s been three months since DD.

I decided to stay, I love him (sadly it seems to be something that doesn’t switch off even when they betray us beyond belief) and we have two young children together.

Things have been okay, obviously I still have incredibly difficult days and some days I wonder how I actually get to the end of the day.

Now, I found an email address of his, not one I knew. Being a typical stupid male, the password was the same as he uses for everything.

Curiosity got the better of me - I found bookings over a 5 week period of 9 hotels - costing approx £1,000.
Now we do not have that sort of money (the past year has been especially difficult), we get by month to month but I watch our money and have sacrificed days out with the children ect to get ourselves straight (obviously not aware what he was up to!!!).

I feel so angry, so hurt that he would put a dirty little ***** before me and his children. Spend money we didn’t have on her, so he could get his leg over. How rather than working on our relationship, taking me out - he was too busy taking her out.

I’m honestly questioning who this man is and whether I can be in this relationship. I have zero trust.

My question is - I knew he had an affair, and I decided to stay. Things have been going in the right direction and I have had hope that we would be able to get through this. I guess seeing things that just really hits home, seeing physical evidence of what he was up to.

Do I just accept that this was part of the affair and continue to move forward?

I’m so sorry, I’m hurting so bad, I just needed somewhere to come and let it out

I really hope you are all doing okay xxx

If things were going in the right direction, you wouldn't have found a secret email,or more info. He would have told you. He's clearly not being transparent.

He's still lying and hiding things. This is not the right direction.

What is he doing to become a safe partner?

At minimum, he should be..

Fully transparent. You get full access to every account,and his phone. Passwords included.

Std testing.

NC with the OW. If she was a coworker, he needs a new job.

He answers all of your questions without anger or defensiveness.

He understands this is a process that takes years.

He figures out why he cheated.

He is proactive in healing the damage he has caused you,the marriage, and himself.

And anything else you need to start feeling safe.

Your job is to take care of yourself,and watch his actions. And inform her husband.

You don't have to reconcile. It is ok if this was a deal breaker. He put another woman as a priority before you and the kids. He betrayed you,and the kids. You don't have to reconcile that.

[This message edited by HellFire at 6:04 PM, Thursday, December 29th]

The last update you gave us was that he was gaslighting you and refusing to admit or own up to cheating. When you say things were moving forward, what does that mean? Has be subsequently admitted to an affair and done the necessary disclosures since (ie, been willing to answer all of your questions)? Has he taken full responsibility for what he’s done?

We all have our breaking points, and they don't always make sense. A straw weighs next to nothing, but in certain circumstances, a straw can break a camel's back.

If your H's spending money you could have spent on yourselves (either for pleasure or health) is your breaking point, so be it - there's no need to apologize.

Not coming clean is a more common breaking point, though. It certainly looks like your H is NOT doing the work he needs to do to be a good candidate for a long-term, loving, monogamous relationship.

Welcome OP. I’m sorry you are hurting. Please feel free to vent your frustrations and hurts and feelings. This is a safe space and there are people here who have seen it all.

Reconciliation is not just about staying and pretending that the A never happened (ie. never revisiting things, never talking about things, etc). In fact, I am (gently) critical of anyone who decides to R without m having a real sense of what they are up against. How can one make the decision to work towards forgiveness with knowing what they are deciding to forgive. I strongly encourage you to ask any question you can to try to understand the A fully before you make any serious decisions

That said, it’s totally normal to have one foot edging towards the door during the first year of R, even if things are on paper going well. the up and downs of emotions and grasping the true extent of the hurts and harms that have been uncovered is unpredictable and healing rarely ever occurs in a straightforward way.

At 3 months, it’s totally normal to be unsure of whether R seems likely to succeed. That part is okay. What isn’t okay though is that there are still some giant unknowns for you. It isn’t okay if there are still lies and secrets. Ongoing lies are absolutely antithetical to reconciliation.

You simply can't reconcile without full disclosure. He has obviously kept secrets. How can you rebuild a marriage on the lies? You can't.

Like Sisson has said, it may not be the hotels/money itself, but the fact that you still do no not know the full truth of what he has done to you. That is a ridiculously vulnerable position to be in. It makes total sense that you'd go "walls up" and start to question the marriage again.

Put simply: you are not emotionally safe with a liar and secret keeper.

Try not to rationalize this or minimize this for him (ie it's part and parcel of an affair). It's another lie. It's financial infidelity. It's important.

Perhaps it's time for a come to jesus with him. Enough with the lies and trickle truth. Sit him down and tell him you want all details, right now. Ask whatever questions you can think to ask (how much money? gifts? meals? cash? how many other affairs?). Tell him you want it written out. The timeline everyone refers to. You want it in 72 hours. Then tell him you will need a polygraph to verify.

I'm not a huge fan of polygraph and the polygraph card that is often suggested. I kind of feel like what is the point. Meaning, if you have to ask for that to get your freaking spouse to be honest with you, well, s/he isn't spouse material.

I do see the value in it for one reason: to give you some power. You ask the questions. You demand what you need and you hold his feet to the fire.

Internally, you need to decide that you will do if he refuses. I think it is fair to say (given his betrayal) that his refusal means there is more to hide. How will you deal with that?

[This message edited by TheEnd at 9:40 PM, Friday, December 30th]

I'm a big fan of written timelines - my W's saved me a lot of pain - but not timeline ulitimata.

My reco is is to make the demand and negotiate a deadline. If the TL arrive before the deadline, it's positive for R; if it doesn't, it's negative.

Also, know that your WS will document the things that seem important to themself in a TL, and you may think other things are important, so be prepared to ask many questions about what your WS writes, if they do write.

What may work best is for you to work on the TL together. The WS can name an event and place it in time; then you ask questions and they or you write down the answers; then you move on to other events and do the same - name the event, ask questions, write down the answers.

The advantage of doing it as a joint project is that you'll ask for the info

you

want, and, perhaps more important, you'll fond out how well you work together, which is required for R.

I second the thoughts of him not being transparent and also a real timeline should be helpful for you. And, these things take time. At 3 months, I was still finding out new things, not because he tried to hide them, but because he didn't understand that I needed him to go all in on transparency. We sat together and went through everything. I used a voice recorder, followed him on location apps, etc. Even then, I still questioned everything. And, each new tiny bit of information re-shuffled my deck. Restarted the process of healing. You'll have to do that whether or not you decide to stay. I may be misreading your posted, but it does sound like he's hidden the email account. He may not like having to do this, it may also restart his process of dealing with the damage he's caused you and your family. There is a lot of shame in that.

If you need to deep dive into every piece of electronic media associated with him, do it. There is no shame in you doing what you need to make yourself feel safe. It is a consequence of his choices.

If you need a break from him, or this is too much, that would be normal. Awful, but normal. I also decided to stay, I couldn't turn off my love for FWH either. It's heartbreaking. I gave myself a specific timeline. It really does take 2-5 years to recover from this. I decided to keep my side of the street clean for up to 3 years. IF we couldn't recover and reconcile by then, I knew I gave it the best I could. But, I also had to see him do the work. Be human, maybe occasionally handle things wrong, but no new A related behavior. If I said I needed him to lasso the moon to make me feel safer in the relationship, I better see him wearing a space suit and figuring that sh%t out. For us, it worked out, but it will always be a little different. A little less fairytale. I also had him write a post-nuptial that was favorable to me. We had separate bank accounts. I had him put aside funds for IC, MC, and just a little to get me secure in a rental separate from him if I decided I needed it. If he could figure out how to spend money on the AP, he could figure out how to make me feel a little safer. I didn't want to chose to stay because of the finances. If we were going to work on this, money wasn't something that I wanted factored in the decision.

At 3 months, I was still figuring out just what I needed to be ok. That would change daily. Be kind to yourself. Do whatever you need to care for yourself as you might a dear friend going through the same experience. You will be ok. Your kids will be ok.