SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

MH, H had series of escapist EA's and one final EA/spiritual affair with a close friend. I had EA/PA with MCOW.

Not really sure whether this should be in WS forum, but I don't see myself as a WS any more- more fWS. 3 years of IC (going on 4), medications, MC, nearly D (told H when he was abusive in his rage, IC or D, I have papers and can file- he chose IC... for a short while). Did a lot of work on myself and our relationship.

So, for various reasons, we're really struggling right now. I'm a bit exhausted from it to really go into detail right now. I guess what I could use help sorting out is whether I'm a failure as a WS if my H decided to D. Like, is all the work I did put in not enough? Am I still the crappy person who cheated? Or is this a case of H not being able to reconcile despite our best efforts?

It sucks. We can have great times that feel like "dates" and then go back to roommates. Every time I go into work or have a work day trip (one overnight coming up), H is enormously triggered. Those who know my story know I changed job roles and campuses (OEM w/ multiple job sites) after the A and have been NC with AP. I discussed with a few lawyers a sexual harassment complaint (no grounds due to different places in org). I put in several complaints of hostile workplace over AP becoming belligerent in the hall (at prior campus before move) after H told OBS. AP moved campuses to mine, HR didn't tell me (like they promised they would) and I ran into him in the hall. Had a panic attack, called HR and reamed them out... to no avail. Told H that same night. Haven't left job as I'm 80-90% WFH (even though we're supposed to be back in office), love what I'm doing (I'm aspie and it's my "special interest"), and am paid very well for it. I have also figured out where AP's area is in my building and take paths to avoid it. So far we haven't run into each other.

I do want to add that the job security is extremely important to me due to H's financial abuse during the long course of our M. He even said this morning that the only happiness he had in our M those years (and even now) came from being able to indulge himself materially. So, thinking about that, makes me feel even worse... like a cash cow. Fun.

I can empathize though- I had untreated post partum depression for years that made me exhausting to be around. Didn't help that the joint MC that I begged for over the years and years and years during that time were denied me as, once my PPD was diagnosed after 3 MC sessions, "I was the problem, not him." I was left to fix it alone. My counselor was not versed in treating PPD, we didn't have mental health coverage, I was at home with the kids and we were getting foreclosure and tax auction notices... so I only got 3mos Zoloft at a MINIMUM dose and was deemed "treated" and sent on my way. Yah, nope, not enough. But it was my problem, I was the problem and that was the shit sandwich I got to dine alone on for years.

All this to say... the thing wearing on my H is that I still work for the same OEM. I call and text him regularly during business trips and days on campus, tell him details about my day and who I talked to and overall have built and kept excellent boundaries with my coworkers. All of which he acknowledges. Still, there's the knife in his gut that I firmly planted and twisted with my A. It's draining on him. It's draining on me to be shut out for a whole 10ish days before anything work related and a good week after. Basically we're roommates with physical intimacy about 1-2x per month. We're both exhausted.

H says that my work (going in) is a hard boundary for him... but he doesn't say what that boundary is. I ask and ask him if it's a deal breaker to the point of D. He says he doesn't know. Then walks it back the next day. "I love you and I always will. I didn't mean when I said that your job was a hard boundary that I want a D." I asked him what it did mean then- what the actual consequence was, he didn't know.

It's like the detain and torture path that the "How to Help your Spouse Heal" book talks about. Except, I think now we're detaining and torturing each other.

I think he could heal better if I quit... but that would be giving up a HUGE part of me. It's my boundary from all the financial abuse I endured earlier in the M. He could still decide to D anyway and where would that leave me? I'm trying to decide if I'm being incredibly wayward selfish in keeping the job vs. quitting it for the sake of H and our M. Is it selfish or self-preserving? I've endured so much unending criticism from H in our M, that really, between the financial security, the joy of the actual work itself... sigh. I don't know.

So, not asking whether it would be better to D or not... were at a low point for sure, but things have been better over the past 4ish years, and have been worse.

Just, if we do end in D, does that mean that I'm a failure as a WS?

Thanks for sticking with the novel. Needed to get that out.

Failure as a WS? I'm not sure I even understand the question. Being a WS is a failure, in all of the ways you too clearly know, but based on your posting here, I'd call you a fWS. How can working on yourself, changing for the better and maintaining good boundaries around your marriage make you a failure? You've moved the ball from WS to fWS. That's the opposite of "failure."

Your marriage "failing" is another thing altogether. That actually takes two. Yes, infidelity did serious harm to the marriage. However, he chose to stay and you both chose to work on repair. So the "failure" of the marriage at this point, lies with both of you. If your infidelity was a deal breaker for him, then it is and that's fair. All you can/could do is what you have - been willing and eager to transform yourself and save your family. It may not be enough, but it's not a current failure of yours.

No one has the answers for you but I would say that I would not give up my very good job. It brings you joy. And leaving it puts you in a vulnerable position in your marriage where you now need to rely on him more heavily for financial support, etc. I would not be doing that whilst my spouse continued to treat me less than and engage with other women he finds "interesting."

You don't have to sacrifice yourself for this marriage. Despite your affair. All situations on this board are different, but in your case, I wouldn't consider putting all my eggs in his particular basket. I don't see how it serves you. I don't see how it protects you. And I'd guess, if you do, he'll have 5 other ways you don't measure up after that.

FWIW I don’t think you’re a failure. Aside from the A on both sides., would it be fair to say that there’s been some level of dysfunction in your marriage for years?

Perhaps the marriage couldn’t and shouldn’t be saved. From an outside perspective, it does sound like you’ve done the work. If you’ve grown as a person, that’s not a failure IMO.

Just, if we do end in D, does that mean that I'm a failure as a WS?

It takes two. No one is perfect but even if one does everything right, the marriage may still fail if the other isn't fully onboard. Doesn't he still work with his latest EA? How is that ok and your job not?

I've followed your story,and your progress.

Your husband has not put in the work. You have.

Both of you needed to put in the work.

Your are a success story. Your marriage not working out doesn't change that. You have a lot to be proud of.

Thanks guys for the support. You're right, it does take 2.

He doesn't still work with his latest EA. She moved jobs almost 2 years ago now, but they still talk on snapchat (which I'm not happy about) and see each other for lunch w/ another mutual male friend (which I can tolerate). I'm not sure it's really an EA so much as a superficial friendship with poor boundaries. And mutual affirmation. Ugh. That sounds slippery slope at the least.

His EA ended when I told my "friend" that the reason I was done with our M at the time of my A was because my H idolized her so much- that she was the standard that he compared me to as a woman (failing of course). She was shocked and had no idea (denial, oblivious) and that put strain between them, her H and my H and, of course, myself. My H told her about my A when it first came out as she was such a good friend and support already and "spiritual" and understood him so well. H resented me and still regrets the loss of that friendship. The whole thing was sick and twisted.

would it be fair to say that there’s been some level of dysfunction in your marriage for years?

Yes it would. Two dysfunctional people getting married tend to do that. My dysfunction was of a more obvious sort. His... more on the level of emotional illiteracy, entitlement, insecurity and denial and projection of all of that.

I think it's fair to say I've done a ton of work, am still doing more, and likely will be on meds and have an IC for the rest of my life. I really don't want to backslide on any of this.

For H, he's not interested in counseling really. He feels the communication has improved and sees the MC we have done as useful in the more practical aspects of our daily life. I guess right now he's struggling with whether or not he can be happy in our M with me as I am. I don't think he has (or really ever will to a deep extent) turn the question inward on himself to see whether or not he can be happy in any deeper relationship with any one as he is.

Or maybe I'm projecting there- I grew up is such a toxic environment that I see dysfunction everywhere?

Is dysfunction everywhere (to some extent), or is everyone who seems "normal" really full of shit?

Do truly wholesome families exist?

Simply put, your relationship is really dysfunctional and toxic. The blame game of who cheated first and how badly is, at this point, irrelevant. If you divorce, I don't think that makes you a failure as a person or discounts your personal growth. In fact, I think remaining married to your husband is going to stagnate if not stunt the further growth and healing that you need to do.

You might still love each other a lot and not want to get divorced, but I don't think that either of you can be your best selves while remaining married.

MI,
I think you have done a tremendous amount of work on yourself and have earned the FWS moniker.
Regardless of who is the BS and who is the WS, each must clean up their side of the street. You have cleaned up yours.
Short of leaving your job, you’ve done everything you can to be NC including working with your HR department. And you can’t leave your job b/c your husband has been financially abusive for years.

Yours is the H who wants you to change your appearance and everything, right? That’s so f’ing damaging. He has spent all your money on toys for himself. And he’s engaged in poor behavior with his EAs that are still continuing— not even pretending to go NC.

I think you are a success story.
I think your M is toxic, and not due to your A. (Although that made it worse.)

You WERE the crappy person who cheated. You are NOT that person now.

Your H had to overcome the A and his own demons— might be too much for him, and he has not done the healing work all BS must do. He actually seems to have double-downed on his EA/flirtations as bit of an FU.

You’ve come back a couple times of years with updates and nothing has changed. He has not changed.

I think a D would show that you not only worked on yourself so much that you will not cheat again, but that you have improved yourself to where you will no longer accept his emotional, psychological, and financial abuse.

I know this is hard. But I hope you find peace and happiness.

Just, if we do end in D, does that mean that I'm a failure as a WS?

No, but I think I understand why you're asking. Waywards come from a place of terrible boundaries. We have trouble distinguishing between healthy self-esteem and toxic selfishness. We lie to ourselves first and foremost to create justification for bad behavior. Once we finally "get it," we want to live it and own it. We want to do better and make amends. So when a zero sum decision arises between what's good for us and good for our BS, how can we trust our own compass? What does it mean about our remorse if we're willing to leave a stone unturned?

In your case, Mig, I think divorce would prove you are healing. The foundation of your affair was people pleasing -- gritting your teeth, accepting double standards, and leaving your family financially vulnerable in order to please/appease your husband. If there's a failure in the offing, I would argue that it's allowing resentment to build up again instead of doing what you should have done the first time and finding courage to enforce healthy boundaries. Imagine if, instead of cheating, you had said, "We clearly cannot/ will not give each other what we want and need in a partner, so let's end this honestly and live independent lives the way we choose." I'm not saying it wouldn't have hurt, but your integrity would never have been compromised.

Of course, the landscape is different now. Stay or go, you won't be wayward again. But if you think we're here to teach people a better way of clenching their teeth and being miserable -- just as long as they don't cheat! -- then you still have a lot to learn. Fortunately, I don't think you do.

Just, if we do end in D, does that mean that I'm a failure as a WS?

No. The purpose/goal of this site is not "remain married after infidelity". It is to get out of infidelity and move past it. You have done that Migander. We always counsel BS that the goal is to save themselves, not necessarily the marriage. You can only control yourself. You need to put your lifejacket on first.

If your marriage fails, it's not because you didn't do the work. You can hold your head up high on that one. I also truly believe that if your marriage failed, you would still CONTINUE to do the work. You are not the same person that you were, and have no intention of backtracking. I see that.

Look, as a BS whose husband continues to work at the same company as his AP, I understand how this is a legitimate concern. I really do. Part of me really questions whether it's really the sticking point that he's now apparently saying it is though. My impression is that he's looking for reasons to be mad to justify being miserable (this is the same guy who lost his mind because of a nice date at a seafood place rather than a steakhouse, am I wrong?). The same guy whose previous issue in the marriage was that you weren't dressing nice enough right? The same guy who sees no problem going for frequent boozy lunches with his female coworker, even though he knows it bothers you, right? My point is, it wasn't this, it would be something else.

I agree with others who say that your marriage was toxic before the chelating. I wonder if his issue with your job is just another way to control you.

I do want to add that the job security is extremely important to me due to H's financial abuse during the long course of our M.

This makes a lot of sense to me.

Are ya'll saying that the BH SHOULDN'T be triggered when his WW still works in the same place as her AP? In the same building? Where they've met in the hallway at least once? Where she is going on overnight trips (hopefully not on the same trips as the AP).

Isn' the very first advice everybody gives to a betrayed spouse whose betrayer had a workplace affair that they MUST get another job away from the affair partner? I've just read at least 3 threads in JFO and General where this is given as gospel. Why is the advice different in this case?

It is clear from what the OP writes in this thread that the BH is TRIGGERED. She even recognizes that what he is experiencing is TRIGGERS - 10 days before her potentially being in contact with her AP and 7 days after. Apparently, her affair was a mere 3 years ago. Do ya'll assume that he should be no longer be triggered? I read again and again that betrayed spouses often have triggers many many years later, and that it is generally accepted on this site that this is not abnormal. Again, why is this situation treated differently?

In short, why do ya'll advise that the best course of action is for HER to divorce HIM because HE is triggered and, essentially, "not getting over it fast enough". While the best advice may not be for her to quit her job, why isn't the best advice for her not to get discouraged and to try to do more to help him ally his triggers?

I didn't take from this that her H wasn't getting over it fast enough, but rather that he's not putting in the work that it takes to R. MIgander did, and is, and is now a FWS. Her H apparently is still essentially an active madhatter WS with the same EA OW who's being wishy-washy AF about what he's willing to do, and what he needs from MIgander, to heal the marriage. At least that's the way I read it.

MIgander, I'm not really sure how or if this applies, but if you get something from it, cool. About five years after DDay, we had essentially recovered from infidelity, but I was still feeling the same old pressure that I'd felt since the beginning of our marriage to be a better homemaker and cultivate a bigger sexual appetite. It was partly him sharing how he'd like for me to be, and partly societal pressure that I was buying into about how wives should act. I reached my breaking point and told him, "This is who I am. I am not going to change. Take it or leave it." I meant it. I was ready for the pressure to stop, however that had to happen. If he left, well, at least I wouldn't have to feel perpetually inadequate anymore. If he stayed, then he chose to be with me as I am.

I think that maybe it's time for you to tell him to take it or leave it, that you've got a career that you love and you're not going to give it up. Especially since he's not doing his part to be a solid partner. And maybe, even if he decides to take it, you'll decide to leave it.

[This message edited by SacredSoul33 at 4:09 AM, Thursday, April 6th]

I've been through some shit. My D-day was almost 7 years ago... and it triggered a terrible bout of depression that included a very pathetic suicide attempt. I have eventually learned that my ex-wife basically cheated on me throughout our entire relationship. She then went full-out weapons-of-mass-destruction during our divorce, which led to one of my three children barely speaking to me and a very strained relationship with another child (the child with whom I was SUPER close prior to our divorce starting). Since getting divorced, my ex-wife immediately started a relationship with another man, lied about that relationship to our kids (she claimed that they were "just friends" but "thinking" that they might date in the future). I also know from our phone records that my ex-wife was having another affair (different AP) before we divorced and that there were likely other ONS stands while we were together (for example, she texted me that she had ripped her underwear at work, which was why she would be coming home without underwear. That's believable, right?). I also know from my phone records that my ex-wife cheated on her current SO for at least the first 8-10 months of their relationship (that's when we finally separated our cell phone plans).

Why did I write all of that?

The answer is not what you think. After surviving infidelity, which I believe I have achieved, I now know that NONE of that matters at all. The only thing that matters is me and how I reacted to all of that. How did I react? Like a shit-show. I handled it HORRIBLY.

So what actually matters?

YOU!!

If you want to acknowledge that you handled things poorly, that's fine. We all make mistakes. I definitely recommend that you try to learn from those mistakes. That's my current thing: what did I do wrong? How should I have handled it differently? What should I do in the future if something similar happens? And I think that you have all of this too. Great!

Beyond that, who are YOU in the present tense. Do you like you? Do you like your life?

In reading what you wrote, you seem to like you right now. I mean, you don't think that you are perfect but you are someone that you like. At the same time, everything that you wrote says I WANT TO GET A DIVORCE IS THAT OKAY? DID I TRY HARD ENOUGH? CAN I BLAME HIM?

Forget all of the bullshit related to infidelity, financial abuse, etc., for a moment. Is this a guy to whom you want to me married? No, you do not.

People change and evolve. It's impossible to stop. You and your husband have evolved and you are NOT good for each other now and you are likely NEVER to be good for each other. That's plenty of a reason to get divorced and that doesn't make either of you a failure... it just makes you two humans who evolved apart rather than together.

So, yes, please go get divorced. It's okay. You can be a wonderful person and get divorced.

Thanks everyone for the support. We've had a few rounds of exhausting talks and are at a better understanding at this time, I think. I'm going to think on what everyone here said, take my time with it and see where things go as I do what is right for me.

Thanks again for the support and reassurance.

Life is a two way street sometimes. What applies to you as a spouse applies to him.

Soooo your H has continued to lie and disrespect you with his EAs.

In turn, you are in a position at work that you may run into the AP even though you took every precaution to prevent that. And that upsets your spouse.

There may not be a perfect answer here. But what you both agree to is putting in your 100% best effort into your marriage otherwise it will not be a good relationship all around.

It doesn’t or should not matter who cheated first or why or how. What should be the focus is that you respect each other and show a deep understanding for the other’s fears and boundaries and general peace of mind.

If you are always living in the past it is hard to move forward. And it sounds as though your H cannot get past your affair, despite all you have done to make amends.

Maybe it’s a deal breaker for him. Doesn’t mean you failed — it means he cannot accept the affair. So sorry for you.

MIgander, you mentioned being an "aspie" so it sounds like a qualified professional told you this? If so, has anyone evaluated your spouse, as well? Because it can be true that one person's type attracts a similar type. This can work, but I expect it makes healing from independent behaviors of each spouse more of a challenge. Just my opinion, as I'm living for decades IHS with a man who exhibits ASD/NPD ways (but never formally diagnosed). I wonder sometimes if his annoying issues are partly mine too. In other words, perhaps my temperament makes his issues all the worse for me - and thus for a "happy marriage."

It sounds like you have done a lot of work. Don't beat yourself up.

@Dec15 - yes it is pretty standard advice that a WS should leave their job after a workplace affair. Pretty good advice at that.

What you are seeing in this thread is based on MIGander's journey and some specifics that make this situation a little different.

It can be hard to tell around here sometimes but the general advice isn't dogma. If the goal is to support and help, the OPs situation has to be heard and factored in.

Supresse, I haven't been formally diagnosed. When my son was going through his diagnosis, I checked many of the boxes in his report. High-functioning, masking, stimming (pick my hair and nails incessantly), social anxiety and trouble reading cues. The fact that I also have very strong and deep special interests, highly intelligent... yeah, I'm reasonably certain I have some form of apsberger's. I'll likely have to go and get diagnosed this year, but right now, I'm a bit too exhausted to do it.

Thanks for all the help guys, stay or go, in or out, you've all helped me a ton to get my head wrapped around my original question.

MIgander, please please please do not allow the fear of unknown stop you from getting out of this toxic relationship.
Your spouse has not done the work is too angry to even try to reason w/ and honestly from what you share it is causing you immense pain and unnecessary struggles.

I would encourage you to at least separate for a while to see how you feel.

You are responsible for healing you, and you can't do that if he is stuck and not doing the work he needs to do to heal as well.

Thanks TN,

From our latest argument, (see General thread), I've told H that I'm not interested in being romantically involved with someone who sees me as a slut. That it's up to him to repair on this one.

For now, I hope he can demonstrate some remorse in our latest dust up. Until then, I think we're going to take a pause from trying and being romantic and just be roommates for a while.

Any time H is in pain, he bottles it up and then lashes out as he finally bursts. I keep putting up the image of the wounded bear. I hit a bear with my car. When I pull over and see the damage, I can clearly see I hurt the bear and empathize with how bad it's hurting. However, if I approach the bear to help it heal, it will maul me. H mauls me and then claims it's never about his pain.

Nope, sorry, you don't get to lash out at other people (and bring up sexual history from before M and compare AGAIN to other women) and expect them to then make it all about your pain.

I think I just need to train him that he doesn't get to have his pain dealt with after he lashes out at me.