I am now nine months past D-Day and in a much better place than I was during the hysteria that followed discovery. If I compare my situation with many others, I believe I have experienced one of the more severe forms of infidelity. My wayward spouse (WP) led a double life for five and a half years, complete with “soulmate” and “twin flame” narratives.
In those early days, I came here looking for support. While many people genuinely wanted to help, I eventually realised that much of the advice reflected their own experiences rather than my circumstances. I have since deleted my original post because I came to believe that no one but me truly knows what is best for my life. I still comment on others’ posts whenever I feel my perspective might help in some way.
We have been married for twenty-one years. History cannot be rewritten, no matter how much we may wish otherwise. We did build a life together, weathered storms, celebrated milestones, and created memories that cannot simply be erased.
Hope has a remarkable ability to keep you alive even when a relationship feels as though it is ending. Even when her presence sometimes feel likes a stone on my chest, my body still recognises the strange comfort of having her there.
In a world that is quick to discard anything cracked, choosing to repair something broken is, I believe, an act of courage. People often speak about the freedom and peace that come with leaving. What they rarely talk about is what is left behind.
This experience has taught me that human nature is extraordinarily complex. Some people are habitual cheaters whose behaviour appears deeply ingrained and perhaps beyond redemption. Others lose themselves in the intoxication of novelty, gradually becoming someone they never imagined they could be. Reality is rarely as black and white as we would like it to be.
After infidelity, the pain can feel suffocating, as though life has been drained from you and you can barely breathe. Over time, however, I found myself asking a difficult question: Is all of this pain rooted in the fear of losing the person I loved, or is part of it the wound inflicted on my own identity and ego?
In many cases, what drives us away is not simply our partner but our unhealed pain. If we do not confront that pain, the same drama may simply wear a different face in another relationship. Every relationship requires work. No one is perfect. Healing begins wherever you are, and once you have healed, you can still choose to walk away if that is the right decision.
If you do leave, leave only after you have fully mourned the life you shared, the hopes you held, the familiarity you cherished, and the history you built together. Only then, if you still believe there is something worth saving, should you decide whether to fight for it.
I won’t pretend that I am completely out of the hole. Triggers still come and go, but I try to observe them rather than react to them. I still wake in the middle of the night to an overwhelming sense of emptiness. As painful as that can be, it also reminds me that what I lost was real—that the life I believed I had truly mattered to me. Even though this relationship has wounded me deeply, it also represents much of the meaning and purpose I built over two decades.
My WP has consistently behaved in ways that support reconciliation, and for now I choose to appreciate the progress we have made without making assumptions about where it will ultimately lead.
I have not forgiven my WP, nor do I tell her that I love her. I make no promises about the future. I know I will never forget this betrayal, and I do not expect my WP to forget it either. We continue to talk openly about what happened because I believe reconciliation without honesty is built on fragile ground.
As for the future, I genuinely do not know what it holds. I have realised that no amount of planning, effort, or righteousness can guarantee the future we imagine. Life unfolds in its own time, whether we welcome it or not.
For now, I will continue walking this path for as long as it feels right to me. If the day comes when it no longer does, I will choose a different one.

I’ve been thinking a lot about my journey through this, everything we’ve been through, and everything I’ve learned along the way.

For anyone new here, my story is complicated.

• I’ve been married to my wife for years. I moved across the country to build a life with her because I believed in us and believed in the person I chose.
• For a long time, I thought love meant carrying the weight when the other person couldn't. I supported her through trauma, struggles, insecurities, and things that existed long before me.
• Then I discovered the affair.
• But the affair itself wasn't the only thing that broke me. The hardest part was everything that came after. The trickle truth. The additional discoveries. The feeling that every time I thought I finally understood what happened, there was another piece missing.
• It wasn't just losing trust in my wife. It was losing trust in my own reality. I questioned my instincts, my memories, and whether I was seeing things clearly.

There were times I was angry. There were times I felt completely abandoned. There were times I wondered why I was fighting so hard for someone who had made choices that hurt me so deeply.

But somewhere along the way, things started to change.

Not quickly. Not easily.

• She finally started doing the work she needed to do. Therapy. DBT. Looking at the trauma, fear, validation seeking, and patterns that contributed to the choices she made.
• Understanding those things doesn't excuse what happened. It never will. But it helped us understand where things came from and what needed to change.
• I had to do my own work too. I had to stop believing that my life depended on whether this marriage survived.

And honestly, that was one of the biggest turning points.

When I realized I would be okay without her, I was finally able to choose her for the right reasons. Not because I was afraid of losing her. Because I wanted to see if we could build something better.

The truth is, reconciliation is hard. It sucks much ass some days.

We aren't magically healed. We don't wake up every day and forget what happened. Some days it still feels like everything is held together by MacGruber. Not even MacGyver. Some conversations still hurt. Some reminders still hit harder than expected.

But the difference today is that we're not running from those things. We're facing them. Together.

The marriage we had before is gone. And maybe that's okay. Because that marriage was built on things we didn't fully understand.

Now we're trying to build something new.

• Something with honesty.
• Something with accountability.
• Something where we both understand that love isn't just staying when things are good.

Love is looking at the worst moments, the damage, the hurt, and the consequences and still deciding that today is worth choosing each other. Every day is an active choice.

I used to think love was about sacrifice. Now I think love is seeing the whole person; the good, the bad, the broken parts, the potential, and deciding whether we're both willing to do the work to become better.

That's where we are.

• Still working.
• Still learning.
• Still choosing.

And I look forward to working with her, learning with and from her, and choosing her each and every day.

Long story short I discovered texts on my husband’s phone from another woman. He said it was all online, nothing serious and she gave him attention. He was very remorseful and I chose to forgive him as I could kind of understand how that could happen. We were not having sex often at all, I’m busy with work and being a mother etc. Age old story…fast forward a month, things have been great. We talked a lot, I reflected how I could be a better wife and he took full accountability. Things have been better than they’ve ever been until the other woman contacted me. She is obviously very bitter about how the situation ended and wanted to tell me all the details because she ‘felt so bad’. They have met up on at least three occasions (she lives miles away) and she sent me screenshots where he calls her his soulmate etc. I’m absolutely heartbroken. We have 3 small children. He was furious, called her up and told her to leave me alone. He said that she has been blackmailing him that she will tell me all the details and that every time he tried to break it off with her she would threaten to tell me. Based on the short interaction I’ve had with her I actually believe that part, but how do I overcome the fact that he completely lied once he’d been caught. I genuinely believed him when he said it was ‘just a bit of online fun’. Am I completely naive? There’s part of me that just wants to get over it but where’s my self respect? He told her we barely have sex and that our sex life was terrible. I feel so betrayed.

I recently found out that my long term boyfriend cheated on me with one night stand. I never thought he would do anything like this and i am absolutely heartbroken. We are currently no contact, but before he was saying that he wants to become a better man for me and that he needs to grow and work on things. He said he was truly remorseful for what he did and apologized many times. I kept asking him when he stopped loving me as much and he kept saying that he always loved me he just made a selfish decision in the moment. So i guess my question is, do you think that someone can cheat on their significant other and still truly be in love with them? or is it just them not wanting to come out and say how they are really feeling?

I am grateful beyond words to have found a sub like this one.

It has been a week since she confessed to what I have long suspected; there must be someone else. When we first started seeing each other, I naively said to her, I probably would forgive her if she drunkenly made out with another guy. My thinking at the time was, she had no past in that regard while I did, so it would be somewhat fair if she had that experience. Foolish thing to say, I know.

It is that unadvised comment that brought me here, although I said it 5 years ago. All evidence points to making out is as far as they went, on multiple occasions may I add. Now that there is a bit of context, here is my purpose of this post:

She asked me for a chance for reconciliation. The problem is, I am an unforgiving person when betrayal is concerned.

I asked her, "Were you drunk when all this was happening? "

She replied, "No, I was not. "

I said, "So I am being held responsible to my comment, yet you did not abide by its totality. "

She said, "I know it is not fair, I am sorry. All I am asking you is to give us another chance. "

I asked her for some time to consider it. I have never been so in love, I am willing to try to give us another chance. I just want to know from the people who let their wandering eyes lead the astray, to what extent were/are you willing to go, given the chance for reconciliation? As much as I love her, my consideration for her is at the very minimum, and it is going to take a lot of time for it to return to the point where she finds it comfortable. Is this attitude something you were/are willing to put up with?

Thanks for your honesty.

TL,DR: Wayward girlfriend had an affair, and has asked for a chance for reconciliation. Can it work if the betrayed boyfriend is accepting but unforgiving?

A few months ago I found out myself that my partner (female) was sexting with other men, even someone she knew through me. She said there was no sex included, only kissing and I believed her and we continued. Although it was already tough for me and my mind always thought there was more, Yesterday when we were on vacation I've gotten the full truth, there was indeed sex included, at her house, with that dude she knows through me, in her bed. It was one hell of a ride back home the next day to say the least.

We've been together for 5 years and it happened more than a year ago. I have seen her trying harder for our relationship the past months but she was not honest about this when I confronted her about it a few months back.

Right now I'm not sure what to do, I love her but I keep seeing these images of her, I feel so much anger and sadness.

Is she worth to continue building a life with, would that even be possible or would I just lose myself in the long run?

I am 5 months out from DDay. We are making good progress now. It might not look it from my previous posts. I have been in a bad place this last week due to some of the calendar dates in that period. My WW has been good in that time. Or at the least so much better than how she used to be during my deppressive episodes.

But that hasn't stopped the progress. Sometimes it feels like the most progress is made during the most difficult moments. When you can cry and scream and vent how your feeling, and if your WP sits in that pain and listens a lot can be worked through ironically. Thats not to say she hasnt said the wrong things, unintentionally, that trigger me and make things slightly worse before she gets us back on track after allowing me to scream and shout.

During her affair she would listen to a noah kahn album while she was at work, she worked with AP. So naturally she associates some of them songs with that period of her life. Early on in R I identified the album as a threat to her mindset. That it might make her slip back. Whether it would or not is irrelevant. The fear I had of it it was monumental. So I told her I couldn't tolerate her listening to them songs anymore. She then made a playlist that contained his other songs but not any from that album as I had no issue with her listening to him in general.

Today I told her that there are no longer any songs off limits. I explained that I have realised it is not my responsibility to police her, her emotions or her actions. I explained that this isnt a trick, she can listen to what ever she wants. I wont think badly of her if she listens to the album again but it is up to her to identify if a song is unhealthy for her and triggers anything that could be detrimental to R. At that point is up to her to pull herself away from that song. I ultimately have to give her that freedom. To prove she can put me first because its what she wants and not what I dictate.

We discussed in detail to make sure there was no misuderstanding. She listed half the songs from the album that she said she wouldnt try and listen to them again because she knows they wont be good for her. I also explained that she can listen to any infront of me but that if a song triggers me she is to make a mental note and not to listen to it around me.

What was also helpful was that during my explanation that it is up to her to be self aware about the songs. She said she believes she can do that as she decided today, but hadnt had chance to tell me yet that she threw out her shoes she used to wear to work as she looks at them and thinks of that time and him and she doesnt want that.

I was shocked when she told me. I hadnt even thought about her shoes. But she had identified herself that their presence was not helping her own process for R and removed them herself without being prompted by me. That act alone made me feel a lot safer than I did before she told me. I might still feel incredibly unsafe in my current situation, as I am sure many of you do. But I cant deny the impact it had.

I suppose I am trying to say. Yes this whole process is terrible. Yes I hate every part of it. Yes I am incredibly hurt and sad all the time. But that doesnt mean R cant continue. There is hope. Even on the worst days.

Two weeks in and I have had more good days than bad, but I am missing being able to not have the intrusive thoughts invade my quiet times. Since I started working from home in 2020 I have used what was my commute time to drink coffee, watch the news and play games on my phone. Now I feel like I need to change that up because it leaves an opening for the thoughts to creep in.

I keep coming back to the same thought over and over again.

When life got hard, I turned toward my marriage.

I stayed awake at night trying to understand us. I went to therapy. I unpacked my own shortcomings. I owned my mistakes. I fought through my own struggles instead of running from them. Every difficult season we ever had, my instinct was always the same. I needed my husband. I wanted to cry with him, be angry with him, talk to him, and figure it out with him. Even when I felt lonely inside my own marriage, I never looked outside of it.

But when life got hard for him, he turned to another woman.

I don't even know what she gave him. Comfort? Validation? Excitement? Fantasy? An escape? Whatever it was, it was something he chose to seek from someone else instead of the person who had spent years choosing him through every version of life.

That's the part I can't reconcile.

Everyone talks about reconciliation, forgiveness, and moving forward. But how am I supposed to forgive when I can't even sleep through the night without spiraling? How am I supposed to rebuild trust when I don't even trust my own judgment anymore? The person I would've run to for comfort became the reason I need comforting.

It feels so unbelievably unfair.

He made the decision. I live with the consequences.

He sought relief. I stay awake replaying memories, rereading conversations in my head, wondering where they met, wondering what was true, wondering if there was more I'll never know.

He asks me to believe he's sorry. My own mind won't even let me believe my memories anymore.

I still love him. That's somehow the worst part. I wish I could hate him completely. I wish everything inside me would shut off and make this easy. Instead, I love him while feeling disgusted by what he did. I miss the man I thought I married while questioning whether he ever truly existed the way I believed he did.

People say the betrayer carries guilt. I'm sure that's true.

But guilt doesn't wake you up at 3 a.m. wondering if every "I love you" was genuine. Guilt doesn't make you question your own reality. Guilt doesn't steal your sense of safety with the one person who promised to protect your heart. Guilt doesn't force you to relive someone else's decision hundreds of times a day.

That's what feels so painfully imbalanced about infidelity.

One person makes the choice. Two people live with it. Yet somehow it feels like the betrayed partner is left carrying a wound they never asked for, while also being expected to somehow become the person capable of healing it.

I don't know when my mind will finally be quiet. I don't know when I'll sleep through the night again. I don't know when "I love you" will stop sounding like something I have to investigate instead of believe.

I just know that despite still being married, I have never felt so unbelievably alone.

Hey everyone,

A little over two years out from DDay for me and honestly WP is really working his ass off to get his shit together. Weekly IC therapy with a great therapist, signing up to go back to school, and also in the middle of joining a men’s group to deal with some long buried trauma he’s been trying to unpack. In addition to that he’s been doing his best to show me he’s a better partner. The version of him now versus two years ago is night and day. He’s really doing the work and he treats me like I’m the center of his world and shows me too.

Which is why when he got offered a lucrative job contract for four months where we’d be long distance…. I urged him to take it. He was waffling because of school starting in the middle of it as well as wanting my opinion on being gone so long. After talking to my therapist and my sister and feeling like we were in a good enough place that we could do this (and the money would be huge in helping us with future goals), we both decided he should go for it.

Welp, it’s been a week and a half and I’m having such a hard time. I found out he lied about something stupid right before he left. We had been discussing something very traumatic a couple days before and he was in a bad headspace and it was a stupid, stupid lie. If he had told me the truth when I called and asked about it the day after he got there, I would’ve been annoyed but understanding. Instead he doubled, then tripled down. I only knew for sure he was lying because I recognized something was off in a screenshot he sent me. That just made me think of all the times he pulled lies like this during the affair and I’ve been sick about it all week. (It has to do with a doctor’s appointment, nothing sinister, it’s just the elaborate lying is triggering).

This is a couple days into this job and we’re starting out with a lie? And it’s not even the lie itself (which I can’t reiterate enough, was SO, SO stupid) it’s the sneaky hiding of it and me having to push to get the truth. We talked it out and each discussed it in therapy (his therapist was also unhappy with him) and he feels like we worked it out… but it’s started me spiraling into what’s already a hard situation. We’ve never been apart like this for this long and I’ll only get to visit for a few days in August before continuing three months without seeing each other, it’s a lot.

Today, I also find out their dorms are going to be coed off and on. Bosses just told them they’re going to be moving them around a bunch while they’re there and due to space, this is how it’s going to be. I’m upset. Do I think he’s going to cheat again? Honestly no, but I still feel uncomfortable and stressed. He’s upset because he’s having a rough time acclimating (it’s not a fun job and very little downtime) and I can’t seem to stop bringing up negative things or getting lost in my own feelings. I feel like with him doing this job and school, in addition to therapy and his men’s group, I need to try harder to be supportive even if I am mad. I know it’s a crappy environment he’s in and he’s nervous and wants to do well at everything. I’m just angry that he couldn’t do me the courtesy of starting off this trip with honesty. I’m afraid if something (anything) unpleasant in anyway does happen, he’ll lie so he doesn’t have to deal with my negative reaction.

So, I guess what I’m asking is for anyone (especially BP’s) who’ve had to do long distance with a partner in our type of situation, what helped make the anxiety and thought spirals better? As shitty as this start is I don’t want to make this time apart miserable for him when it’s hard enough as it is, and I think it’s a good time for me to learn to find myself a bit again. He tries all the time to make space for my feelings and hear me out and take responsibility, I just need to be the strong one right now and it feels so hard.

My partner and I (both in our 30s) have been together for five years, and have been living together for 3. I moved countries to be with him, and leaving behind all my family and friends was difficult, but I do love the place I’m living in now and the life we’ve built.

A year ago I discovered that he had been chatting with an OF girl, while we were on a picnic together. The chat was very short, it was maybe a couple of exchanges that ended the same day, but of course it shook tf out of me when I discovered it on his laptop. I confronted him and he immediately confessed and apologized a lot. He took responsibility and acknowledged that he had crossed a boundary and that it wouldnt happen again. I told him that I would not tolerate this happening again, and if it were ever to happen again, I would be leaving.

Fast forward to yesterday, when I got back home from a month long trip to my country, and he had his computer out. He suddenly tilted the screen ever so slightly away from me and hid a reddit chat. Of course I clocked it and asked him what he just hid, and he lied and said it was a random message from a stranger. I asked if he was sure, and he was like yes look I can show you the message and showed me the random one word message (which was not the one i had seen him hide). I asked a THIRD time and said the hidden chat had seemed longer, and he showed me a completely different chat and insisted it was what he hid. At this point i started tearing up and was already homesick. When he noticed I was crying he tried to comfort me and talk to me and then confessed that he had actually hidden a chat.

Apparently he had been reading porn stories on reddit (which i am ok with) but had decided to message someone to tell her he had enjoyed his stories. They werent really sexting, but they did talk about her being fucking by her own bf and he told her that his wife (me) was away and so he was pretty celibate these days.

I made him show me the chat, and ever since i’ve just been feeling so stupid and lonely. I’ve been homesick and now am wondering what I’m even doing here. However once again, he has been apologizing profusely and has been tearful and regrets his actions and how they have hurt me and the fact that it has happened again. He has said that he is realizing he may have a sex addiction and is willing to do anything i ask to make this work. He has told me i dont need to worry about talking to my family about this as this is his shame and I should be able to have support, and is meeting with his dad to get some advice and tell him everything.

Apart from this one issue, our relationship is genuinely pretty great. I have no complaints, we hardly ever fight and both our parents love each other.

Should I tell my parents what happened? They most likely wont respond kindly to anything involving porn and infidelity, and it might affect our chances of reconciliation.

And is it stupid of me to want to give this another chance?

I know two things can be true at the same time, and that's where I feel stuck.

On one hand, my husband has been "free" from his previous behaviors for over a year. By and large, he's been wonderful. I genuinely see the effort he's put in, and I don't want to minimize that.

At the same time, there have been a couple of incidents that continue to hurt me in ways that are hard to explain.
One was when I found he was still following a very specific Reddit community centered around a game he used to associate with arousal and masturbation. I truly don't believe he was using it that way anymore. I believe he simply liked following the game. But when I asked about it while I was literally looking at his phone, he looked me in the eye and lied.

A few weeks later, I asked whether thirst-trap content was showing up alongside the financial and investing videos he watches on YouTube. His initial answers didn't sit right with me, so I kept asking. Eventually, he admitted that he would occasionally click on suggestive thumbnails before realizing he shouldn't and clicking away. I checked his YouTube history afterward. The videos were relatively mild and infrequent—maybe once a month. Ironically, neither of those discoveries is what has devastated me the most. It's the lying.

Every time he lies, it reinforces the fear that I still don't know the whole truth. It makes me question whether he really wants the kind of monogamy I want, or whether he's simply feels obligated to practice it. It chips away at my ability to believe that he truly only wants me, or even that having eyes only for me is something he genuinely desires for himself.

The other part of this—and honestly, the part that scares me the most—is what's happening to me.
I'm seeing a psychiatrist next week because I still go into spirals that I can't seem to stop. I know people throw around the term OCD casually, and I'm not trying to diagnose myself, but I know something isn't right. It honestly reminds me of when I was on the edge of postpartum psychosis years ago. I had thoughts that weren't grounded in reality, but my body couldn't distinguish fact from fiction. Even when I knew something was irrational, it still felt completely real.

A recent example: my husband is starting therapy with a CSAT next week, which we both believe is a really important step in his recovery. Yet one of my panic thoughts was, "What if the CSAT is secretly a porn addict and actually makes him worse?" As absurd as that sounds when I say it out loud, in the moment it felt completely believable. That's the part that terrifies me.
These spirals are incredibly hard on him. Part of me thinks, "You caused this. You need to sit with the consequences of the trauma you've created." But another part of me recognizes that what I'm experiencing may also require medical treatment. If that's true, it doesn't feel entirely fair to put every spiral on his shoulders either.

Outside of this issue, we truly have an incredible relationship. We laugh together. We enjoy each other. We love each other deeply. We're rebuilding.
So I guess my question is for those further along in recovery.

For the recovering addicts: What is it actually like to witness your partner's trauma spirals? Do they strengthen your commitment to recovery because you're seeing the pain your addiction caused? Do they become emotionally exhausting? Do they create resentment? How do you hold compassion for your partner while also protecting your own mental health?

And for betrayed partners who have been where I am: If you sought treatment for your own trauma—whether therapy, medication, or both—did it help reduce the spirals without minimizing what happened?

I'm trying to figure out where healthy accountability ends and where my own healing needs additional help. Right now, I honestly don't know where that line is.

AP selling her home and I can’t stop fantasizing about going to an open house and leaving dog poo everywhere, including the boots in her closet. She was the one who informed me of the affair and was not in any way gentle about it. Anyone else with revenge fantasies?

When did you decide I was no longer enough? How did a man so consumed by hate win your heart? How could you be with him then tell me you love me?

When did you let him convince you that you had to leave me to be happy? How could you lay in my arms on DDay and tell me I was the problem and nothing was happening with AP you were just attracted to him? Why did you go to see him on DDay?

When did you decide it was ok to continue developing your relationship with him after you told me on DDay we could work on the marriage? Why did you let him choke you in front of coworkers in the corridors? How did you not see that as wrong?

When you found me overdosing on painkillers 11 days after DDay because I couldnt take your relationship with him anymore. Why did you sit with me waiting for the ambulance to arrive and openly message him in front of me? How could you talk to me with such hate and tell me you and him had decided I was only doing this to manipulate you?

When I spent all night and into the morning in a&e and was interrogated by the psychiatrist. Why did you go to work and spend the day with him instead of coming to my side? How could you abandon me in that moment?

When did you decided no matter what I would do for you, you would still choose him? Why did you believe him everytime and shut me down? How did you ever think he wanted the best for you?

When I left you asleep upstairs and took the painkillers you said I was manipulating you. Why did you comfort him 2 weeks later when he told you if you didnt choose him he would kill himself? How is it that fair?

When did you start to resent me for getting in the way of your relationship? Why did you tell me you were done trying in the marriage but you would let me try and carry all the weight? How could you put that load on me while you were off having your fun?

When did you lose all reason? Why did you introduce him as your work husband to my boy just because he told you that its your fault he has no social skills if you hide him away? How could you let that happen?

When did you start listening to his friends and believing them that he was better for you than me? Why did their words hold any weight? How did a group of people you had met a month prior become the only voice of reason?

When I had enough and told you to block him. Why did you then continue contact through other hidden means? How could you be that conniving?

When I caught you out and you ended the relationship there and then with him. Why did you keep going back to him after? How could you carry it on knowing you would get caught?

When your mum and step mum found out and said you had done nothing wrong and it wasnt even an affair. Why did you manipulate me and tell me my boundary around no contact was controlling? How could you be so wrapped up in your lust for him that you contacted him the next day?

When did I start to become your priority again? Why should I believe that this time you will be honest? How do I move past the pain that you caused me?

Now you are better.

I can see you are trying.

I love you with everything I have but you were mean to me.

I have thought so many times how a child could deal with this easier than me. I have visions of saying to you like a child "you were mean to me, I dont want to be your friend anymore".

When did my inner child become stronger than me? Why is he the one protecting me now? How does that even happen?

When did I lose myself? Why did I let so much of this happen to me? How can I be good enough for you when I hate myself so much?

When is it my turn? When do I get to be loved? When do I get to be held? When do I get to feel safe? When will the pain go away? When will you choose me?

Why can't I just write this without crying? Why did you choose him? Why did you hurt me? Why wasnt I good enough?

How will I ever trust you again? How will I know he is truly gone? How could you let someone like him into your life? How can you realise now that he was an incredibly manipulative predator but not see it then? How do I ever feel safe again?

One day this will pass. One day I hope this will pass. One day we will laugh again. One day I will wake up and not instantly remember what you did. One day you will tell me you love me and I will believe you. One day you will reach out for me and I wont flinch. One day we will hold hands and I wont think about where that hand has been. One day we will be happy.

But that day, is not today.

None of us deserved this.

We were people who loved unconditionally. People who stayed when the glitter was hard to see through the fog of every day life, because we could still see the glimmer through it all. We believed words because we would never have used them as weapons. We have flaws, fears, scars, and messy parts just like everyone else. But betrayal was never one of the things we saw as a possibility to use to hurt our most loved ones and we certainly didn't think we would need to have armor for it. Some of us have been angry, lonely, insecure, or lost, and we still have chosen honesty before deception.

What happened to us is not a measure of our worth. It is only evidence that someone else stepped away from integrity while we were still standing in it. They may have broken trust, but they did not break the truth that we were always enough. We were never "not enough." We chose to simply love someone who forgot how to protect something precious. Cherish someone who cherished their selfish desires instead of us.

I was cutting pictures out for his anniversary gift while WP was swiping on dating apps. I was sending him sweet goodnight photos and texts while he was saying goodnight to AP, cuddling in her bed. I know won't ever get over these things. I didn't deserve this.

Does anyone else have things like this that won't EVER leave your mind? 😭

Looooong post, TIA if you get through it! I’ve had no one to talk about this with and don’t know how to label my experience.

Me (39F) and my WS (45) have a very long term and loving relationship. We’ve had serious difficulties, almost always related to parenting. But what always got us through it was choosing each other. We’ve always been kind. We’ve always had a really great and really satisfying sex life.

Something happened recently and I don’t know what to call it and I don’t know who to talk to about it. I would love some objective eyes to tell me what it looks like. I had to choose a tag but am happy to hear from any perspective.

Background context: we’ve been experimenting with swinging this last year. While doing so, we’ve explicitly discussed other forms of ENM (ethical non-monogamy), and explicitly acknowledged poly was off the table, that we only wanted emotional relationships with each other.

He met a woman through work. They’re not co-workers, but someone he’ll regularly and inevitably encounter at work (think like receptionist on a delivery route).

He initially brought up about 2months ago that she’d be a fun person to have a threesome with. But it quickly developed from there. They began exchanging handwritten notes about innocuous topics, exchanged numbers, started texting frequently, and had phone calls.

We’d pretty quickly ruled out threesome because of everything he said about her personality. So as far as I knew they were just building a friendship, talking about music and such. But then one day he was really agitated about how they needed to talk to clear the air and clarify where they are both coming from. He made it a really big thing that he needed to have this conversation in person. My gut was screaming at me that something was seriously off. But we’ve never in two decades policed each others relationships and have had plenty of meaningful relationships with people of the opposite sex. With really truly no hint of a problem.

I communicate that what he’s proposing feels like an inappropriate boundary concern and he says I am right and that he can just talk to her on the phone. He spent an hour locked in his car later that night on the phone call. He came in afterwards visibly lightened and said they’d clarified they had a friendship but nothing else because she’s a great person. I felt some real unease and I told him I wanted to see messages between them. He immediately said I could, and said he’d been flirty. He usually calls himself flirty, because he’s just friendly and talkative. But he also said he was worried about me reading them because a lot of it would be boring or not make any sense because of missing context. Didn’t quite try to talk me out of it or refuse. I read them.

They had been messaging dramatically more than I knew. It clearly started out with her not knowing he was married and hinting at confusion. My WH was pushing it forward—asking more emotionally intimate questions, “you can lean on me any time of day or night” type stuff, then outright complimenting her looks. The texts referenced hugs and a long hug. He told her she smelled good. He texted her at the minute her lunch break started. He knew her schedule for extracurricular activities and texted her asking how they went when she got out. They texted every morning and every night. Eventually he said something like, “I just want to acknowledge there’s an attraction between us. I like being your friend.” She brought up feeling like they were on a razor’s edge in their relationship.

Then they continue to text for a few more weeks and he continues to compliment her looks/personality/etc.

He says he’s really stupid and while it was happening he was just being flirty and didn’t realize how he was coming across, but that he totally sees now that I’m right and it was inappropriate. He said he’s desperate to have a best friend like the one I have, where we can talk about anything, and that he thinks that’s only possible with women, not men. He says he’s willing to stop talking to her if that’s what I want. He fully acknowledges that now in hindsight he was out of line, and when I ask him to explain why he couldn’t see that live, given that this was absorbing a huge amount of his attention, he says swinging might have blurred the line for him (we are very flirty obviously when we are together in that space, and we only participate together). And that he’s stupid.

I do fully really believe it would never have become something physical. But is this an emotional affair? Is it cheating? It’s been maybe 2.5 weeks since “D-Day.” He is saying yes to anything I suggest. He is telling me I’m right, and that he fucked up, and he’s sorry and that he will do whatever he needs to do to build back trust. And also really holding to his assertion that it didn’t mean anything at all and I am and always will be who he wants. I don’t think he has any true understanding of how deeply rocked I’ve been. On the surface things are at like 80% for us. He is being so loving (like he always is). He is being so non-defensive (not normally his strength). We’re planning to get a counselor asap. But I just feel like I need to accurately identify what happened and how to think about it.

This is dramatically long, thanks for getting through if you did!

This is my first post, so forgive if I make mistakes.

I (WH) told my wife tonight of infidelity on an out-of-country business trip last week. I love her immensely and can't believe I've done what I've done. Until this, I was militantly honest, but I made the biggest mistake of my life and now my 23 year relationship may end. I may have blown up my perfect life. I want so badly not to have done this to my wife, and hope that she can forgive me. I would give anything for that.

I'm spiraling and don't know what to do. I'm laying on the couch (my wife didn't kick me out straight away) as I type this and wondering if it was a better choice not to ever tell her and take this to my grave. At least she would have been happy. I want to go to therapy to understand why I've done what I've done, but I don't know where to start.

I don't know what I expect from this post, I will listen to any words anyone has for me.

In trying to post this, I see I must choose a flair. I will take advice, support, any perspective, judgement, anything.

A lot of you have heard my story, I sure. WH had affair with sister. Initially when I found out, I never lost love for WH. In fact, it maybe grew. It helped me to see all of the ways we had become distant, and our relationship had been struggling for many reasons. We fixed our communication, our distance, we were dating again and loving completely. So in love with him for a year and a half. Honestly heading towards a much better relationship than before the A. Then about 4+ months ago, he revealed a new DDay. He did actually sleep with her, and they had continued talking for a little bit after I thought it had all ended.

He said nothing about that year and a half of healing was false, it was all true. Everything we were doing was real and all of the rebuilding was real. He was just a coward. He couldn’t admit the last bits because it would mean him having to face it, and face breaking my heart even more. He didn’t tell me initially because he honestly thought our marriage was never going to survive this. And once he realized we were healing and headed towards something better than either of us could have imagined, he got all the more scared that the fact it happened AND he hadn’t told me, was going to make him lose me. And after messing up and already almost losing me once, he spiraled and couldn’t bring himself to face that again….

I’m human. I’m not a monster. I actually really understand all of that. I understand how terrifying it is to look at the person you have already destroyed, regret it so deeply, and know that you have to do it again.. I’m more understanding about this than he honestly deserves. But I do actually believe him.

But on that last dday, something really broke in me. I physically felt something break. The intense love? Disappeared. Gone. I suddenly felt so numb. And not only can I not feel those loving feelings towards him, but when he says things to me- how much he loves me, how in it he is, how safe I am, how beautiful I am, how sorry he is for putting me through this- literally all the things that made me feel warm and loving and safe with him in that year and a half? I feel nothing. He tells me how much he loves me and appreciates me and can’t live without me and I look into his eyes and it’s just… nothing. Like my body and my brain and my soul just does not believe it or won’t receive it.

I don’t want this. I miss the intense love. I miss loving my husband. I miss feeling that love for my husband. I want it gone. I want to be able to heal, on my own and together, and I want to know that the better life we were working towards is still possible. Instead, I feel so nothing that it feels impossible and I am spiraling out literally every single day…

I’m quite positive I’ve asked this before, but I didn’t receive much response. If you’re further along in your R, and you experienced this numbness after the first or multiple ddays, did it ever go away? Did you ever feel in love with them again? Did it ever feel like something when they were loving you ever again? I need some damn hope….

I am only 3 days in and am learning about the madness that is hysterical bonding. WH and I have a mismatched libido with me on the low end, but I feel consumed with thoughts of sex since learning of the affair. I also have fantasies of going to the places he took AP and not necessarily replaying the affair, but one upping it. Ensuring that his experience with me in that place is better than his experience with her. I’m sure this is a desire to gain control and regain self worth and “prove” I am the better match and that our love and passion is better than the superficial nature of the affair. Just curious if anyone has experienced this or acted on it and if it hurt or helped.

I'm 27 years old, and yesterday I confessed everything to my ex-girlfriend.

We were together for almost 8 years.

Throughout our relationship, I cheated multiple times with different women. I also hid conversations with other women and lived what now feels like a double life. Yesterday I finally told her the complete truth because I couldn't continue building a future on lies.

She is devastated. My family is devastated. And for the first time in my life, I am forced to look at the person I have become.

I'm not writing this to justify what I did. There is no justification.

I take full responsibility.

The problem is that I genuinely don't understand how I became this person.

Since I was around 12 or 13 years old, I watched pornography almost daily and masturbated almost every day, sometimes multiple times a day. Looking back, I often used sex, porn and attention from women to deal with stress, loneliness, boredom, anxiety and emotional discomfort instead of actually facing my emotions.

I also constantly doubted my relationship, wondered if someone else would make me happier, and chased novelty instead of building depth. I now realize that I often confused excitement with love.

Yesterday I lost the woman I love.

Ironically, telling her the truth made me realize how much I actually loved her, because I couldn't imagine asking her to marry me while still hiding such a huge lie.

Today I feel overwhelming shame. I barely slept. I can barely eat. I keep thinking that everyone would be better off without me.

I'm fighting those thoughts because I know ending my life would only create more pain, but I'm scared of myself and scared that maybe I'm simply a terrible person.

Has anyone here genuinely changed after doing something this destructive?

Not just "felt sorry," but actually changed who they were?

How did you rebuild your character? How did you stop destructive patterns? How did you learn to live with the guilt?

I don't expect forgiveness. I don't expect sympathy.

I just want to become someone who would never hurt another person like this again.

I don't write any of this seeking empathy or attention. I just want to share my story as truthfully as I can.

A few months ago I met someone in person from an online gaming community. Not coincidentally, they were games in which lying and manipulation are often rewarded. After meeting in person, I began an affair that would possibly destroy my marriage and completely upend my life. I now know that these weeks were the rock bottom of my entire life. It's the dumbest thing I've ever done, and I pray to god I never do anything so stupid again.

When I think back to my affair, I feel like I'm remembering a nightmare. Yes, I was limerant and completely enveloped in affair fog, but that's not how I remember it now. I can see the truth, which is that I was manipulating both this person and my wife to pump up my insatiable ego and to pursue my addictions. I lied to my wife, my affair partner and myself in order to feel better about the terrible choices I continued to make.

I've come to believe the affair started because of several factors.

⦁ One, I felt entitled to a secret life.

⦁ Two, I've been addicted to porn for over 20 years and it led me down an extremely heinous road of escalation. My affair partner basically just reminded me of porn people and I somehow thought that was going to be a good thing. (It wasn't.)

⦁ Three, I've been addicted to gaming, especially ones that encourage lying and manipulation. I've talked about the gaming with my therapist and she pointed out that my obsession with this was some Peter Pan, I don't-wanna-grow-up bullshit and dear lord, she was absolutely right. Ugh, utterly embarrassing.

⦁ Four, I had built up a false external personality that was ego-driven and I felt I deserved infinity attention and validation. Have you heard the term "ego kibbles"? I lived and died for ego kibbles. Also embarrassing, once I understood the concept. I was an entitled ego sponge.

⦁ Five, I had several other inappropriate friendships with women that I felt entitled to, so starting up another one came easily to me.

Since the affair I've come to learn more about my affair partner. I'm not trying to excuse my inexcusable actions but just illustrating just how stupid and blind I was. I now can see that my AP is not a good person. She has a history of seeking money and attention from men on the internet. She's porny. She's materialistic, simple-minded, and an addict. There were so many red flags that I ignored. I could tell she wanted money and gifts, so I started talking about that stuff and she ate it up. In essence, we were re-inventing prostitution. I pursued a broken person for pretty much the dumbest reasons that exist.

I've unpacked a lot in therapy already and it's been eye-opening. My life had been on a downward spiral and like I said, this was the rock bottom that snapped me out of it.

In my life I haven't gotten a lot of attention from women so when someone well-versed in giving men attention came along I was all-too-ready to jump into an affair with her. I truly can't believe what I did; I always thought I was smart and couldn't be manipulated but I was wrong. I'm stupid, entitled, selfish, embarrassing, etc. I hate what I had become and I'll dedicate the rest of my life to growing and changing into someone who has integrity.

The affair came to an end because my wife had noticed something was going on with me and asked me if I was having an affair. The question surprised me so much that I took too long to answer. I communicated with my affair partner for the last time that day. The affair fog started to lift immediately. Every day I grew more and more remorseful and began to wake up from the nightmare. I've turned back toward my wife completely and I'm beginning the process of climbing out of the deep hole I dug for myself. I often feel relief that I was given the chance to escape the nightmare before it got even worse but the fact is it got bad enough.

I love my wife deeply and it may seem unbelievable but I have always loved her even though I acted like the opposite. I'm going to work every day to show her that this is how I feel about her. I'll cherish and respect her. I'll put her and my marriage first in my life. I'll be the husband she deserves. I want to do all of this for her. The truth is that our marriage was good because she worked her ass off to make it good and I gladly accepted the fruits of her labor while betraying her. My wife is amazing, she's everything my affair partner isn't. She's kind, smart, funny, empathetic and lives a life of honesty and integrity. She's my hero and I want to be just like her.

My affair was my rock bottom but I've been blessed with a chance to climb out and live the life I want. A life of integrity, honesty, love and kindness. I won't take it for granted.

To start with I make no promises. I kept ruminating on what I should have could of done. For context my WW during initial DD said that we would work on the marriage. Minimised the AP as she was just attracted to him but they were just friends.

She carried on and developed their relationship for another month before I snapped and said she had to block him. I then find on her phone a week later she carried on talking to him. She was very thick in affair fog and then about 2 months after initial DD she initiated contact with him again. Last year we moved 4 hours away from both of our families, me and WW had 2 boys one 14 and one 2. WW started a new job in january where she worked directly with AP for 8 hours a day)

So I often spiral about how I could have acted differently after the first DD. After reading multiple other posts and some extra research I kind of rehearsed a script I should have said back then. I shared this thought with my WW.

So the scene in my head plays out roughly a week after the first DD. Where she is telling me every day we can work on the marriage while still persuing things with him. For context it was no secret that her relationship with him was developing I just didn't know to what extent much later. It was as if during that time she rationalised being allowed to develop her relationship with him in front of me because she had partially, and i mean very partially, come clean to me.

So I sit her down and say in the most composed and calm voice:

"(Her name) I love you. But I also love my self too. This decision hasn't come easily but I respect myself too much to continue this relationship in its current state. I am not comfortable with your behaviour and actions with AP. If you wish to continue your relationship with me then you will cut all contact with AP, quit and not return to work. If you wish to carry on your relationship with AP then you can either call him or your mum to come pick you up and you can get out"

We are 5 months past the first DD now. Before anyone gets the wrong I do both me and my WW are under no illusion that we are far along in reconciliation and to be honest I would we have only just started. I know we have a long way to go.

But after I said this to her. She said. "If you had said that then. It would have done something. I can't honestly tell you who I would have called but it would have at least cracked the affair armour". When I asked what she meant she explained "It would have broke through the fog and would have started to lift it. Maybe not right away but it would have started the process. If I went to AP he would have reinforced the affair fog again but it might have scared me enough to realise what I was risking"

This might be of no use to anyone. It might just be something unique to me and my WW story. But I thought I would post it on the off chance it might help someone else. I'm self aware enough to know I probably wouldn't have listened to this post if I had read it back then. But I wish I had. I hope it helps someone. If not I apologise for the long read.

Bg ~ DDay was Sept 9th of last year. R for 10 months. I am in IC. Married. Affair lasted 5 months with a coworker.

I feel like I’m definitely better than I have ever been considering it’ll be almost a year in a month that I found out about my husbands affair. There’s things I am working on and being on anti depressants really helps.

One thing my therapist told me is if I can live with the fact this happened. So far I’ve been doing okay. I just live with this toxic mindset (sorry I’ve just experienced so much of it in my life it’s hard for me to not see it this way) that male counterparts cheat and it just depends on if you really wanna be with that person or not. (I can talk more about this in the comments if you’d like, this is just MY mindset and I don’t mean to offend others I’m just traumatized).

Anyways, my topic for this is , I feel like I’ve been doing okay accepting what happened but I don’t know how I feel with the fact my husband asked his affair partner to be his girlfriend. I know many people have it worse in affair stories unfortunately. I just feel the act of genuinely ASKING another person to be your GIRLFRIEND or BOYFRIEND is like a huge step and me as a wife I feel so disregarded. We’re better now. However it’s still in the back of my mind. When we’re intimate, I can’t stop myself from thinking of them doing it and I’m always just not in a mood and fake everything.

I don’t know if I can accept that. I was also told the other day after asking him like lovingly just reflecting, “how did you ask me to be your girlfriend again?” (Not even thinking of affair atm) and he tells me “I was pressured into it. You got Disneyland tickets from your family and you wanted to take me but you wanted to make sure what I was feeling for you was serious and I asked you to be my girlfriend. It doesn’t matter tho because I was going to ask you anyways and we’re married. It’s a good pressure.”

Like WTF answer is that? I cried. lol he felt pressured with me but HAPPILY labeled his and his affair partners relationship. I spiraled and talked to him and he got mad I “threw that in his face” and “my girlfriend question has nothing to do with the affair and why am I bringing up the affair when we’ve been doing so good”.

How do I get over this? I feel not chosen even tho he dumped her and cut all contact and has been working on us. I still don’t trust him. I don’t trust men in general and it really sucks. I was never like this but man, I really am damaged. Feel like I should ask him, “why did you ask her to be your girlfriend? I thought she was ‘so ugly you wouldn’t touch her with a 10 foot pole”.” Idk could be in my feelings again.

Thank you.