After an affair, your life doesn't belong to you anymore. For over a year, I couldn't control my own thoughts.
The turmoil in my head was viciously repetitive but savagely random. With this blog, I began to exorcise the demons holding my head hostage.

Thursday, May 9, 2013

Responding to the "Hit & Run"


On my last post, I received a comment suggesting that my blog is holding heavy on info about Jaymie and rather light on how I dealt with Richard.  Here's part of the comment:

 look towards the source of your anger. It wasn't just Jaymie- you can call her every name in the book- but your husband made a decision to cheat on you with her... you can blame her for the rest of your life, but that was HIS decision to make. He made the vows- NOT HER. So to behave like he was blameless is misplacing the blame-- but to dwell on her just tells me that you weren't secure in your relationship in the 1st place. If you were to ever heal from what HE did, you'd learn to let yourself heal from it and move on. But every post is dwelling on Jaymie... and I for the life of me, can't see where you're coming from and WHY you feel like you deserve her pound of flesh. 

It's a from an Anonymous writer.  I hate that!  If you wanna challenge me, don't run away.  Stick around and chat a while.  I welcome all opinions here.
Most that remark on my obsession with Jaymie or try to defend her in someway, don't comment more than once and I doubt they read my replies.
I call those comments "Hit & Runs".  Chicken-shits!

However, this particular Hit & Run gave me pause.  Not for the reasons detailed above, but for something else.  I feel I have been a bit remiss in sharing some very crucial pieces of my story.  You know about my obsession with the emails and the lengths I went to for satisfaction in that regard.  That means my story has centered around my dealings with Jaymie.

Shouldn't the story contain more on my relationship with Richard?  I don't mean "to dwell" on Jaymie, as the comment above suggests, believe me!  I really wanna forget all about that slutty bitch, but I can't write this damn story without talking about the scuzzy whore bag.  (plus, it's just so much fun calling her names!  Tee hee!) But...point taken... I guess I need to refocus for at least one post.  Once again, writing this blog has opened my eyes.  I have not revealed much of the trauma I suffered at home with Richard.  This blog needs some diversity.

Thanks to the little wake-up call from anonymous Hit & Run:
FOR TODAY...Jaymie  goes on hiatus.
I'm gonna tell you about how Richard and I were doing during the first half of 2011.  Let's call them...The Email Months.

Richard called himself my barometer.  The quality of his life depended solely on my mood du jour.  By April, 6 months post DDay, I had stabilized enough, in public at least, to function at work, keep my kids clothed and fed and maybe even socialize a bit.  My inner demons came out in the privacy of our home.  I guess you can imagine I was prone to frequent massive swings in my emotional state.  You know about the Roller Coaster from Hell.  I was still riding, but had been granted small breaks from the coaster courtesy of Lexapro.  I always thought mind meds kept you on an even keel.  That ain't necessarily so.  I had moments of relative calm, as I mentioned before, but when something, anything tripped a trigger....I was locked, loaded and on full automatic!  Poor Richard.

6 months post DDay is a weird time for betrayed spouses.  Many of us figured at 6 months out we should be getting over this shit storm.  Richard can attest to the fact that there is no 6 month expiration date on the pain caused by infidelity.  Nope.  Not even close.

Our relationship during the Email Months can only be described as volatile.  We experienced highs that would make the greatest of love stories on the big screen pale in comparison, like date nights filled with passionate kisses, deep eye gazing and words of eternal love.  We suffered through lows that required days of Richard behaving as contrite as an altar boy caught peeing in the holy water before I would allow him the pleasure of merely touching my arm.  Anything could be a catalyst to the low days.

Richard never had anyway to know which side of the bed I'd wake up on.  He used to tell me he didn't care about himself.  He prayed every night for me to be happy.  I believed he prayed for me to be happy, because then he got to be happy.  At that time, in my mind, the guy couldn't do anything right.  I was determined to be angry.  As I look back, I think the highs were my respite.  Mentally I couldn't maintain the anger.  I'm tellin' you, people!!  Anger on that beastly a scale takes a freakin' toll on you!  As hard as the Coaster was on me, it might have been even harder on Richard.  He craved the highs!  I teased him with the highs.  I allowed the highs from time to time only so I could snatch them away and torture him with yet another low.
In me, infidelity spawned evil personified.

That's about it.  That's why I haven't written a lot about Richard and I during the Email Months.  I sort of figured you wouldn't have to be the Amazing Kreskin to know what was happening in our unhappy home while I was visiting Crazy Town.  I guess I thought the obvious would be boring.

I can leave you with this little gem of a factoid....Richard knew exactly what I was doing.  He was completely aware I was trying to score the emails from Jaymie.  He cringed when I contacted Daddy James.  He also knew when I chose to involve new boyfriend, geek boy Kevin.  He was alerted to all of my Crazy Town behavior because I made sure he knew.  I was completely attentive to his reactions to my antics.  If he hated it, I doubled my efforts.  So, Anonymous Commenter, don't doubt for a New York nano-second that I was only about punishing Jaymie.  To this day, I am incredulous that Richard and I survived the Email Months.
I asked him why he stayed when I was so cruel for so long.
He said, "Because I made you that way and I'll be sorry forever."

Hope that cleared up your questions, Anonymous.
My next post will get right back to telling you about my response to geek boy Kevin and of course, bashing Jaymie!!  Whoo Hoo!

32 comments:

BS said...

Hi Shawn:

I have a crawling suspicion that the anonymous commenter is either Jaymie, geek boy Kevin, or some other friend of theirs or another cheater reading the posts.

Who else would bother to defend a worthless prostitute like Jaymie to the woman who is the hurt spouse in a sordid affair.

Another hurt spouse would understand your roller coaster, and already know that you are angry at both Jaymie and Richard.

Also someone who has never been involved in an affair would be likely neutral about it.

I also was very angry at both. I do think both deserved my anger. The OW was a cheating prostitute because she was married but accepted gifts and trips and dinners out in exchange for getting laid, and my cheating husband whored himself out to her, willingly

I am sure you understand my feelings, any hurt spouse would.

Being cheated on by the one person in the world you are suppose to trust to watch your back is a devastating experience.

Although, my marriage survived, I still have deep wounds. The trust is also something that will forever be broken.

My husband regrets his affair, but the damage is done, and he can't take back the damage he and the OW both wreaked on my mind and heart and soul.

This affair has warped my mind in a way that I myself do not like. But thankfully the counselors have told me my feelings are normal.

It is nice to hear that your husband said he stayed when you were at your worst because he knew he made you that way.

My husband has said similar things to me post dday, still, the triggers remain. They are fewer and farther between, but I am still occasionally triggered by something seemingly innocuous with an intensity that frightens my husband as well as me.

I hate the triggers, but as has been explained to me, it's a PTSD reaction.

In my case the anger is a good thing, IMO.

In my case, I had my husband up on a pedestal thinking he was this super loyal honest guy. I trusted him when he went on his men's trips telling he would never cheat on me, and we were life partners, and I had veto power in any decisions we made regarding us and our lives.

Well where was the veto power in the affair. I wasn't even a tad suspicious, that is how much I trusted him.

Sadly, I still look at him and think who is this man, the man who lied to me for so long, and hid things from me?

But then there are the good days and in many ways my husband is now a better husband than he has ever been.

It's sad that I don't trust him anymore, although I do still love him.

He keeps saying he wants to earn back my trust, but sadly that will never happen.

As the saying goes......fool me once.

shawnthewife said...

BS: Who knows? Anonymous Hit & Runs are not a rarity around here. I allow almost all comments and I am more than happy to engage in debate. Jaymie found my blog once. I suppose she might read it, but truly...I don't give a damn one way or the other! This blog is for me. There ain't a hater out there that can shut me down.

About you....I really hope you're walking the Road to Happy, moving forward and focusing on your tomorrows. Triggers suck, but they can be controlled. I call it a "shift" in thinking.
I'm rooting for you!
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

BS said...

Hi Shawn:

I am happy. As happy as I can be given my particular situation. I had to adjust to that.

I am happy because I shifted my thinking to realizing that in many ways my husband is a better, more attentive, more emotionally and financially generous husband now than prior to the affair.

The MCs say that is caused by the reality of me filing for divorce. He realized finally what he was going to lose.

Also due to our culture, cheating is dramatically on the rise and marrying someone else won't protect me from an affair in the future.

Nevertheless, I was diagnosed with entrenched PTSD by a well known infidelity psychologist/psychiatrist.

The reasons why are long and involved, including being stalked by the OW.

With situational PTSD the triggers my resolve, with time, but with entrenched PTSD however they will never likely go away.

They can be reduced to some degree, but will most likely never be completely vanquished.

Not everyone who has an unfaithful spouse develops entrenched PTSD, though.

TryingHard said...

Shawn
My H has the same reason as Richard. It's almost as though I dare him to go ahead, leave me!! I challenged him to leave me. If he didn't love me enough and wanted to be with the Pathetic One, go ahead, they deserved each other. That is when he would hold me even closer and show his love for me. OK my questions for you is, with your H being an attorney, didn't he ever say Look Shawn what you are doing could get you into legal trouble. I would love to harass the pathetic one but she was an employee and she could sue us. Oh yeah I've gotten my pound of flesh but with revenge it's never enough. I've read so much on this subject and yes while we may fantasize crazy things in reality if we did them we would feel worse. I choose to believe this. I've never been very revengeful and I believe the BEST revenge is a life well lived and that is what is happening for us. I console my self with the thought of her crying her eyes out and knowing she lost and to ME the awful, frigid, wife....BWAHAHAHAHA!

I understand your blog and airing the crazy months. I agree Anon is probably a OW or whatever. As if it took Anon to tell you it was Richard who betrayed you not Jaymie. Well fucking DUH, why didn't you think of that??? Hey I'll bet you didn't know smoking is bad for your health!!! OK so you were crazy and did crazy things. You are trying to show us how it was the ULTIMATE waste of time and perfectly good energy. Sorry to say not all your readers are intelligent enough to get that!! This is YOUR blog and you can tell your story the way it works for you. Someone doesn't like it they don't have to follow you. Simple as that. Delete their posts and move on. They don't even deserve an explanation.

Torn Apart said...

I am now almost 6 1/2 months PDD. Yes there has been some sunshine come in but not enough. My husband still feigns amnesia to knowing why he did it and when it actually happened (assumption of Feb. 2011). There were a total of 4 encounters, including 2 lunches (one for a BJ and the other for sex), 1 office fingering and a visit to a roach motel (consummated twice). He has claimed she kept nagging him to go to lunch, the motel, etc and he HAD to do it. Like really? Did you have a gun to your head? I received a letter but without much detail when I was 5 months preggo. And again found messages from the whore when my baby was 8 months old. The whore is a co-worker. He claims he kept a fake friendship for the last two years to keep her at bay from telling me. I wanted so much to believe that this didn't happen that I guess I closed my eyes to the obvious. :/

I always told him if you ever want to cheat just leave me. Didn't I have the right to make a decision as to whether or not we stayed married and had kids? He says he's deeply sorry and wishes he could undo it all. I can't let go. Knowing myself I will never forgive him, I will always carry this burden. This shit really sucks.

And bc she is a co-worker I haven't had the pleasure of destroying her "life" or reputation for fear he will lose his job. Double blow. The whore was also married 20 plus years and was 10 years his senior. She had the opportunity to raise her children in a two parent home.

What on G-D's green earth did I do to deserve this? If you weren't happy or satisfied or just a plain old scumbag, why the heck did you have to punish me too? Why didn't you just pack your bags and leave? And why is it so hard for me to let you go now?

Flaca said...

He said, "Because I made you that way and I'll be sorry forever."

that made me cry. crazy town is a hellish place. we all have different roads through it. it ain't pretty - it makes me happy to know that richard didn't abandon you there. best wishes & have a great weekend.

Anonymous said...

The comment from Anonymous was asinine...but you handled it in a great way. I think it's ironic that he/she accuses you of solely blaming Jaymie, but they want to place the blame completely on your husband. Do they not understand that it takes TWO to cheat??? Jaymie is just as much to blame as Richard. It's irrelevant that she didn't make any vows with you - she should have kept her vagina closed and said NO! Nobody forced her to have sex with a married man!

You DO deserve a pound of flesh from Jaymie, and then some!! Anonymous is probably an adulterous spouse anyhow, otherwise he/she would grow a set and own their opinions instead of hiding behind anonymity!

shawnthewife said...

TryingHard: Great question! Richard knew I could end up with a restraining order against me. (which I did!) but Jaymie wouldn't have had anything on him. He got her a job working for another attorney that rented office space from him, so no harassment issues for my smart adulterer!
I wanted her to drag me into court. I wanted to shame her and Richard in a public forum, consequences be damned! I was an idiot!
You, my friend, are the smart one! Let sleeping dogs lie, Ladies! That's a mantra for the ages!
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

shawnthewife said...

Torn Apart: You didn't mention if your WH is remorseful? Is he doing everything you need to help you find a way to heal from his horrendous choices? Words are great. I heard enough "I'm sorrys" to last a lifetime, but actions are the only thing that matters.
Why did they cheat instead of leave? Because they never wanted to leave. They are selfish. They wanted more, something that would make them feel better about themselves. It had nothing to do with their relationship with us. Nothing. Infidelity is all about the cheater, not the betrayed.
I hope you're in MC. We needed IC, too.
Your questions are legit. You should pose them to your WH. You gotta communicate. You gotta be honest. You gotta let him know what you need. A WH may be truly remorseful but not know how to help you. He might be just too damn scared he'll say or do the wrong thing, make it all worse. (as if that's possible!) So, talk to him. We had a special time everyday to talk. To get it out. Then, in MC...we REALLY got down to it!
You can always come here and vent, too. Get the poison out. You're not alone.
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

shawnthewife said...

Flaca: Richard was full of remorse, regret and heavy guilt. He got to the point of self-loathing. I could barely stand it! Why did he get to have a break down when I was the one that the stabbed in the heart??
Sometimes when he said he was sorry, it just pissed me off more.
Now...I can look back and be very thankful he was so apologetic, so remorseful. I never would have made it out of Crazy Town without him.
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

shawnthewife said...

Trishinreallife: I try to respond to everyone that comments. I think it's really important to address the misconceptions from Anonymous writers.
Some may not care what I say. There will always be haters. Let them judge...no skin off my nose. I just wanna be sure I clarify any misinformation they try to disperse. None of that crappolla will stand on my watch!
They don't know me. I can admit my own mistakes.
AND...if it makes me feel better to call Jaymie names, like whore bag, scrawny skank and baby bimbo, I say truth is an absolute defense!! :-)
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

Anonymous said...

part 1:

Dear XXXX,

On this mother’s day I had a trigger about last year, a painful memory of my discovery of your 15, very desperate-seeming, back-to-back texts to my husband on our very wonderful mother’s day together last year. It’s been nearly one year since this despicable thing has ended, and I just wanted to share with you my new reflection on the matter…..

Your very bad judgment to have a an affair with a married man of 20 years, with a pregnant wife, then new baby, and 7-year old son at home with a very serious and life-threatening cancer syndrome makes sense in light of my recent discovery about your dad, courtesy of my husband’s disclosure in response to said trigger, about you having “no shortage of insignificant problems regarding your dad or sister to text at all times about,” and this morning’s internet research for details on your dad’s felony conviction:

Description of Action: PLED GUILTY TO 1 COUNT USE OF INTERNET TO ATTEMPT TO INDUCE MINOR TO ENGAGE IN CRIMINAL SEXUAL ACTIVITY, 1 COUNT DISTRIBUTION OF CHILD PORNOGRAPHY, 1 COUNT POSSESSION OF CHILD PORNOGRAPHY.

I am sad and disgusted for you! Your father is a pedophile sex offender….despicable! It goes without saying that there is no fucking way in hell you and your fucked-up family would have had ANY role in my children’s lives. Good it didn’t come to that, then again, it never was going to come to THAT. My husband would have had to REALLY love you first, not just the lightness that came along with ignoring real problems, life threatening problems confronting our son, and the heaviness that it had created in our family and our relationship. I grant you that your problem (i.e. dad) is not “insignificant”, just that it doesn’t have the same weight as a parent’s grief for a sick child. Following my discovery of that stupid oral sex reference disguised as poetry on 12/28/2011, my husband’s brief, albeit painful character departure and revisionist take on our 20 years together in an attempt to justify his awful decision-making, was a temporary confusion at best. Lucky for him I held fast to that belief while he groped around in the dark trying to find his way out of the mess he had made of his life. We’ll call his “wayward fog.” He has always loved me. He did NOT love you; and you, like me, must know that now. After a year, my hope is that you see yourselves for the pathetic broken people you both apparently were….nothing wistful about that.

Anonymous said...

My husband had his own context, one I have grown to accept, but I always wondered about your excuse for being deplorable, then NEWSFLASH via Google today! It SEEMS you had a lousy role model, and your family was no doubt rocked by the news above. YUCK! I guess at the time you felt entitled to a little of your own happiness at the expense of others, or had adopted a “misery loves company” stance on life. It’s only sad to me that you didn’t take your life’s experience and decide NOT to be party to equally devastating events for someone else’s family, or to prey on someone else’s brokenness and vulnerability to get your own emotional and physical needs met, like…should I say it….your dad. I guess when confronted with an intriguing, temporarily overwhelmed, married stranger on a business trip you couldn’t take the high road; the one that the majority of women would have taken if confronted with the same prospect. A night’s indiscretion wasn’t so bad in my eyes; drinking, low self-esteem, aging, stressors at home all acknowledged reasons for a temporary lapse of judgment on his part; maybe, I even reasoned, on yours. But the decision to continue for so long and to such an extreme is mind-blowing. I have since learned that mid-life crises apparently last for that duration. But for you at 26, I can only surmise that it was too hard to fight nurture (or is it nature in this case?) I guess they say that’s how it goes. And your sister in an abusive relationship to boot!, You really have an uphill battle ahead of you to have normalcy in your relationships. So far, it seems that neither of you are off to a great start. Then again, you’re only in your 20s….it’s not too late to grow up, be good people, and have good relationships. Good luck to you and your dysfunctional family! So glad our intersection was brief, and only in the rear-view now.

shawnthewife said...

Anonymous: I'm thinking you really needed to purge! So glad you dumped that letter to the OW here and did not send it on to her.
I think writing down your thoughts, your anger, your depression, your brain worms or any part of the affair that haunts you is the best freakin' therapy ever!! Write it down and let it go!

Feel free to drop by and dump all of your betrayal trash here anytime!
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

Anonymous said...

Thanks. You're right...there's a lot of anger there that just spewed forth. Truth is I don't let it out on my husband that much, I really want us to move forward and sometimes I feel like there's no way to do that if I let HIM have it too often. I use the time in the car on the way to work to get it out (talking to myself like a crazy person), or an occassional letter sent nowhere to vent some anger instead. He already thinks we talk about it too much. Anyway I do feel lighter. I would have felt really lousy if I had sent it anywhere but here. I should clarify that I had alot of feelings about this revelation, including some sympathy for the the context of her life that led up to the decision to engage a married man, with a pregnant wife, and older child with medical problems for a year and a half. I was told that she never cared that he was married. And by the way...I'm not one of those people that ignore my husband's culpability in all of this. I do mostly blame him, but I knew his context, and I always tried to figure out what kind of character she must be to feel OK about that. He said she "cried alot". At one point I erroneously assumed that she may have cried alot about what they were doing...her concsience getting to her a bit. Turns out she was more selfish than that; crying mostly about her problems with her scumbag dad or other trivial issues that plague a college kid. I get the impression that her problems with her dad are just with the impact that the revelation had on her family and her challenges of trying to build a relationship with him as an adult. Not that she was the target of his sickness, thus I say it's not as "significant" as the problems we were having in our family life. As a result, there's another part of me that's not that sympathetic to her use of my husband to lean on and talk hours to about that scumbag waste of a person. It especially angers me to think about how I felt my husband's absence in our lives when I really needed him most(birth of our son, early months with the new baby, and the constant occurrence in our lives of waiting on the results of the latest scan or lab test for our older son). During that time he was busy being there for her via text and phone (this was a long distance affair with occassional hook-ups including a 2 week international trip that I thought was business, but turns out was simply an expensive holiday that I paid for); during that year he was very distant, almost cold and zombie-like with me. The low-point for me was an emotional moment where we were waiting on the results of our son's MRI, and I began vomitting over my nerves in the hotel bathroom. I came out and told him I was scared and tried to hug him. He looked at me blankly and said "I'm going to go get a coffee now." Lots of hurt to process, but we really have come so far. It's just dissappointing to me that I can still have a trigger a year leater that will send me into a rage that I have to quietly vent or run the risk of destroying all the progress we've made. Thanks again.

shawnthewife said...

Anonymous: First: I hope your son is doing better. Nothing scarier than sick kids. In my book, even infidelity takes a back seat to the kiddos.

I'm starting to think triggers are kind of forever. Just the other night, two commercials came on back to back that are triggers for me. Chili's is one...Olivia Wilde for Revlon is another. I can ignore one...but back to back!! I blurted out, "Seriously! Two triggery commercials in a row! Ugh!" Richard knows why those are triggers. He gets it. We didn't have to talk about it. I just needed to vent for a second.
If I had needed to talk about it, which I do from time to time, I let Richard know. I tell him I need a little reassurance and a good hug.
I surely expect him to tell me when he needs something, so I do the same for him.
But, if you would rather purge poison here....bring it, Sister! We get it!
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

Anonymous said...

Hi Shawn, Thanks for the support. I find myself going through a phase of really needing reassurance to fight against insecurities I feel. I do share my feelings with my husband, I just try to be sympathetic to his day and not drag it out as often as it's actually on my mind. I do well to keep it at bay when we're together. We have good, light,happy time together. But when we're apart it creeps in. I am currently in a phase where I want reassurances from him that I do not have to solicit. I have told him that, but it still seems hard for him to initiate it. I understand that he does not want to bring it up if I'm not insisting that we do, but I still sometimes just want him to look at me and say out of the blue..."I fucked up, and I'm so sorry." I also feel the need to invalidate the feelings he professed for her in the early weeks following the discovery of the affair. He never used the words "in love" or "love", but I read them into his statement that "he loved me, just wasn't in love with me anymore" and that he had "feelings" for her. He was already working himself out of those feelings during the months of our seperation, acknowledging that it was "an escapte" or "from the groin not the heart" but those words still haunt me and I'm still confused about how they happened at all. Though his answers are sometimes unsatisfying, the best he has to offer is that it wasn't about her, that he never planned a future with her, that he was trying to find ways to end it before I discovered it, that he has always loved me, that he was confused, that he really messed up, etc. If that's all true...why did it get worse before it got better after I found out? Why didn't he plead to make it right immediately? If he was never planning a future or it was never about her, why go visit her in another state (twice) after my discovery and continue to lie to me about it? He says it was because he was confused, and trying to clean up the mess he had made without hurring anybody anymore. I know he was probably scared of my anger; I did insist tht he leave our home and I filed for a legal seperation that he did not want. Maybe he felt like it couldn't be fixed; then again, part of the affair happening in the first place was alot about lacking the energy to improve things in our home life. We had gotten so heavy (and sexless) during the few years of dealing with our son's medical diagnoses. I wanted to try to work through it immediately, though he gave me no reason to stop moving forward with a seperation. I did not trust him or his judgement at all, and his ambivalence about recommitting to our marriage and trying to fix it was confusing. I don't know why I still crave more from him to undo the pain and disbelief I felt at those earlier comments. I don't know why I need him to confirm what I already knew im my heart that allowed me to hold on to our marriage in the first place. I feel insatiable. What does your husband say now about his feelings for the OW? Or do you even have that need to invalidate them?

Anonymous said...

I feel just as you do. My husband did tell others (2 of his 3 affairs) he loved them. I want him to undo that somehow. I want him to go up to them and tell them it was all lies. They get to go on with their lives thinking they are secretly the love of his life and he is just settling for me. I hate that!!!
Karin

shawnthewife said...

Welcome, Karin: Yea...the love part hurts a shit ton. But, do I care what Jaymie thinks about her time with Richard? Nope. She knows he came back to me. She knows he never tried to stop me from making her squirm. If it makes her feel better to convince herself that she really meant something to him, she's even dumber than I thought.
I'm fairly certain most OWs eventually understand that regardless of what they THOUGHT they had with the affair partner, it wasn't enough to end a marriage. It sure as hell wasn't TRUE love. Affair love is all about LIES.
They will go on with their 2nd rate lives, knowing one thing for sure....they were used like a condom and when the fun was over, tossed in the trash.
My point....don't waste another second caring about the OWs. Trust in karma and let the bitches go!!
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

shawnthewife said...

Anonymous: You wanna know what Richard says about his feelings for Jaymie? He says he cared about her. He thought he loved her during the affair, but now he realizes it was just the high of the affair. He didn't love her, but he did love the idea of her. Does that make sense? I get it. He needed to feel young again. She sure had that going for her! Richard said he loved that she was very sweet and naive. That worked in his favor.
Does knowing any of that make the of reading his words of love to her any less painful? Hell no! Do I still think about it? Yes, but I don't dwell on it.
Time, communication and lots of reassurance make it hurt less. Richard is very good at reminding me he never stopped loving me. There was never any doubt that he would never leave me.
So...I focus on that. He loves me, always has, always will.
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

Anonymous said...

Thank you Shawn for your warm welcome. I feel like I have been here for a while already reading your sage advice and bonding with our common sad events. I am 1.5 years out. It really knocks your whole life out from under you when you find out you have been living every day with a big, fat, selfish, cheating liar. Luckily, after being shown the door to our life together and having to face reality, my FWH did quickly come to his senses. We are on our road back to happy, some days, absolutely there, others not so much. I won't use the name Karin any longer, because his last ow is quite the stalker. You never know where she will show up. Thanks for helping me so much along the way. I feel like I want my life to be about something else now,this affair shit is so draining. You have been my connection to sanity some days. My husband's three affairs have not been with stupid 20 somethings, but people that should know better. I last one is a nurse practitioner in the women's health center for Kaiser. Can you imagine having to go get tested for STD's and being serviced by that slut? No safe sex from the bitch either! There is a special place in hell for her. I would love your opinion on one thing. Ow#1 was 12 years ago. She had a 1 and 3 year old. I think it lasted about 1-2 years. FHW "can't remember." She pursued him and he jumped all over it. I don't believe her husband ever knew. I am trying to decide if I should let him know. If the shoe was reversed, I sure as hell wish someone told me. I have found a blog online so I don't think they have the best relationship because he mentioned working on their marriage. I know we didn't begin to heal until everything was on the table. He is a sheriff though and that scares me a bit. They live a couple of hours away now. How do you tell someone that? I have been debating this for 6 months. I will be Tangerine from now on. They were the only things I could eat the first few weeks after dd. They saved my life. Hugs for all you do.

Anonymous said...

Hi Shawn,

You said something earlier about Richard getting to the point of "self-loathing". I am afraid of that for us. I think in some ways I keep wanting my husband to express more often that he fucked up and show more of his feelings of regret/remorse to help ME feel better. It's not that he hasn't said those things MANY times by now, but for some weird reason it's like the don't register with me, and I need more. Thus the insatiable feeling. For him I think once or twice is enough, now he just wants to focus on us and the future. But, sometimes I feel like the more I push for the apology,and the more he accomodates that need, that we run the danger of him going to "self-loathing" town. I've seen glimpses of it, and I needed to see some of it, but I've also seen depression in my husband before, when we were much younger; and I know that it would NOT be good for our relationship now should he get to that point. Part of me though feels like I might be sabatoging this...pushing to this point that I know will not be good. Most of my girlfriends tell me now that it's time to just let it go. I ranted to one the other night about the revelation I shared in my earlier post to you. She called back the next day to leave a voice message to suggest that she was concerned about the anger I was harboring...telling me to just let it go and quit thinking about this other person. I'M TRYING! Seems though that I am just getting around to some of the questions and feelings that others have had much earlier. I seem to keep quiet for a bit, fighting this internally, until I can't anymore. By the time I let it be known, it's probably confusing and out of context for my husband after we've done pretty well for the year. Oh well, I'm rambling now...when did "self-loathing" begin for you all, when did it end, and how did you get through it?

shawnthewife said...

Tangerine: Your question is very easy for me to answer....NO. Do not contact the husband. Do not do anything that drags the OW back into your life. Does he deserve to know? Sure. Maybe. I don't really know the answer to that. What I do know, for sure, is you do not need to be the one to tell him. NOW...if you asked me the same question right after your DDay, then maybe I'd say let him know, but your 18 months out....lots of work has been done. I can not imagine how telling the husband about the A could benefit you. It might help him to know his wife is a whore bag, but it ain't gonna do you any good. To utilize a tangerine metaphor...the juice ain't worth the squeeze!

Focus on your WH. Live in the now. How is he treating you NOW? What happened will be with you forever. No denying that. But, if you're gonna find your Road back to Happy...it sure doesn't start with the OW!
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

shawnthewife said...

Anonymous: The self loathing happened right after DDay. Richard was a limp rag, a shell of himself. It was pathetic. He would sob! Sob, snot dripping out of his nose! He would say he hated himself for what he did. He hated himself for being so stupid, for hurting me so much. I think he felt bad for hurting Jaymie, too. He just felt like a complete loser. I don't think he felt bad the first 3 times he cheated because he didn't get caught! But, this time...he saw what he did to me and that knocked him to his knees. It lasted for at least 6 or 8 months, then through IC, Richard learned to forgive himself.

We all have different paths on our Road back to Happy. When you say you NEED your WH to continue to apologize, I can't tell you not to ask. But, maybe you could try asking yourself why you need it? Whether it be lots more apologizing, needing WH to reassure you he will never cheat again...whatever. WHY do you need it?
For me, I beat up on Richard for over a year because I was still in pain. Misery loves company!! That's the same reason I wouldn't let Jaymie go. If my life was a shit storm, hers was gonna be a shit tornado!

Then, I learned to OWN my own happiness. My happiness did not depend on them being miserable. I took responsibility for my own emotions. Same thing happened for Richard. He had to OWN his happiness...not wait for me to be happy so he could join in. That's no way to live.

Short answer.....no one gets to tell you to get over it. You gotta go all the way through it. YOU get to chose when that time is and then take back your life!
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

Anonymous said...

Thanks Shawn. To answer your questions, I think I need it because I fear that my husband has a tendency to compartmentalize things, and not really address them the first time around. He seems to be jumping to the "let's just move forward" part and I'm scared to not heal the right way and have this come back later (for either of us). I want to be focused on the present/future, and most days I can, but sometimes I can't. He never brings up the affair now, but I know him and at some point he will revisit all of the reasons why. He can be very introspective at times. I just want to heal the right way, now. I don't want old demons rearing their ugly, homely looking heads years later. When all this came out, he used a one-night, drunken indescretion/ mistake I made 13 or more years ago (after married, but before family) to partially justify what he had done. The similarities between what he did recently and what I did all those years ago stop with an infidelity. I was drunk and traveling with somebody happy to exploit the situation. When I woke in somebody else's bed once, I experienced immediate remorse, shame, viceral disgust at myself and the person that I felt had violated our friendship, a desperate need to be honest with my husband about what had happened, and a prayer that he could find it in himself to forgive me. We spent years counseling and recovering from that mistake, even decided afterward to start a family. All this allowed me to finally forgive myself and put it behind us, but he invoked it all again during his "fog" as you called it, in an attempt to justify what he had done. Revisiting that was hard for me, and confusing about whether or not my husband had actually ever forgiven me or just stayed with me for 15 or so years just to punish me later. Sometimes I feel like this affair was about midlife crisis from our more recent context, and sometimes about revenge/anger from way back. Then again, I don't really see that angry person in my husband now...just a loving, kind man that professes his love for me and seems willing to make it all right and move on. I really hope we do....

BS said...

To the poster who talked about not wanting her husband to feel shamed after Dday for too long

I was advised that this shame is a good thing. It need not be relentless, but I don't think it should be easily removed from the equation, ever.

A wise person told me this, and although I do not shame my husband personally, I do not protect him from feeling it, nor do I try to remove it or gloss over it,, when he feels it.

I was told I would truly see a shift toward recovery in our marriage and my spouses remorse when he started to allow himself to feel the shame he should feel for having an affair.

If one is unhappy in a marriage, there are many choices that could be made rather than cheating.....counseling, divorce, a separation. Cheating is so cruel and disrespectuful and insulting to a loyal spouse.

I think protecting cheaters from the shame of it all is in part why cheating is rising so reapidly in the last 10 years.

Instead of feeling shame, they feel trendy and cool.

One of the emails I saw between my spouse and the OW was informing my husband about how cool she was for having multiple affairs and how far superior she was to backwards type folk who did not cheat.

She said among her friends an affair would be nothing.

This is a woman who was raised in a lower class neighborhood and lived in a trailer. She married well, but was not in love with her, as she put it, fat husband.

She fancied herself being more sophisticated than she was when in reality she was just insecure trailer trash.

Ironically, too, although she despised her husband for being fat, She herself at the time of the affair was plump and had a lifelong weight problem she remedied using her husbands money to get liposuction, frequently. Too Weird.

Susan WG said...

Hi Shawn,

I need some advice and thought this would be the place to get it. I posted my story here a couple of entries back...married 33 years, post DDay 2 years, WH has a wicked hooker/dating site hook-up habit. WH gave up his "hobbyist" lifestyle when I confronted him but had 2 relapses 6 months later and I asked him to leave. I've been in IC since the beginning and have made wonderful progress in discovering who I am and what I need and thought I was well on the way back to happy. We had been separated almost a year with WH in IC about 9 months and making some progress. We started MC about 3 months ago, again working hard and doing well and I was just amazed at how much better our relationship was now than before. He moved back home and life was really good. I was able to start seeing that we were making our way back to a true partnership.

At our last MC appointment we talked about my need to ask him questions about what he did and why he did it so I could process the hurt and let it go. I told him I needed him to be sincere and honest and hiding things from me only made me more fearful and mistrusting. He wasn't allowed to decide what hurt me. Pretty good, huh?

He hates to talk about what happened. He hates the therapy time. He says it's like constantly picking at an infected sore but asked me to give him a list of questions and he'd write down the answers so I did. Here comes the bad part...in the answers he confessed that one of his dates was a man, one was a man who dressed like a woman and several were t-girls (men who still have dicks but have had breast implants and dress like women) He says he is not gay but may be bisexual but prefers women. He enjoys giving and receiving anal sex and did both with these partners. T-girl and anal porn were were a couple of his favorites.

At first, hearing this didn't bother me, I thought this is my husband and I still want to be with him. But the next morning I felt like I was back to square one. I got in the shower and sobbed for 30 minutes. I feel like my head is going to explode...it's like DDay all over again. I can't eat and made it to work but have been sitting all day staring at the PC screen.

He pulled the shower curtain back this morning and turned the water off and said "You know I'm still the same person you loved so much yesterday and were so happy living with."

I don't know, is he? Why is this hitting me so hard? I know that he lied, that he cheated and spent all of our money. What difference does it make that some of the people were men? For me it's not a moral or religious issue. My brother is gay and one of my very best friends is gay, I have nothing against their lifestyle.

The other question for me is, as you have warned so many times, I've opened the door and all of these men and women have come marching into my head. The fat school teacher, the blonde YMCA aerobics instructor, the pock-marked one with the dog collar, the rich guy with the big dick...follow me around all day long. How do I make them go away? What do I do?

shawnthewife said...

Susan WG; You give me too much credit. I'm not sure I have the answers you're looking for. I can share what I thought as I read your comment with a knot in my gut. I know that pain.

I also thought....Trickle Truth sucks! Each time you are "graced" with new info about the A from WH, you're back at square one. The wound is reopened and the pain is fresh. It's a vicious cycle. Ask questions to help us heal. Get answers that cause more pain. Ask more questions to clarify the pain from the answers we got before and get kicked in the gut again!! Just brutal.
Your H is right about one thing. He is the same guy. I just hope he's the same guy with a much stronger moral compass. We all have a stranger inside that we don't show to the world. Your WH is trying to show you his. That's kind of brave. I gotta give him that. Maybe you can try to focus on the fact that your WH is trying to give you what you ask for. That's a big step.
Now...about the brainworms....Let yourself think about them for a short time everyday. MAKE yourself think about them. Think hard. Then, when your time is up....stop! Think of your brain like a water faucet. Turn it on, turn it off. Shorten the time you think about them a little everyday. Pretty soon, you get good at beating those brainworm bastards down. I have a mantra that I use.
"I don't need to think about this now. It will not help me to think about this now. I will NOT think about this now." I used it before asking questions, too. I'd think..."Will it help me to know this? Will knowing this help me heal? "
It's simple behavior modification. Sounds stupid, but it worked for me.
MC is gonna be crucial for you both. Your WH has some serious issues with controlling his sexual desires. I hope you can find boundaries that he will respect.
Did any of that help???
I hope so!!
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

Susan WG said...

Thank you so much for this, Shawn. Yes, this is a big help. It helps to know that I am not losing my mind, that all this makes sense to someone, and there are others who have spent sleepless nights asking the same questions.

It's true that my WH is working hard to become a better man and own up to what he did, name his triggers, and trust that he can be safe revealing this to me. I just hope that this last secret revealing session is the final one, I can't imagine going through another one.

The sex addiction is a difficult thing to work through. We are working to understand it and as long as he accepts responsiblity for the pain he has caused, shows true regret, and tries to help me get back to Happy I'm willing to work as well. So far he has done everything I have asked but I am still a bit reserved and maybe always will be.

Thank you again!

tammy toole said...

Who are you calling chicken shits you nutty as broad? You wouldn't be saying that to my face if I you saw me in the street. By the way Jaymie emailed Richard twice in the last two weeks at his firm. Did he tell you about those? Or is he still lying to you? Let me gues, you'll confront him tonight and he will deny it right? When are you going to stop fighting shawn? He's cheated on you countless times & he will do it again. He is only staying cuz you scare the shit out of him...oh & the kids...and the comfort and the obligation. Crazy town isn't a place you visit, it is who you are. He will always miss the laid back non confrontational soft jaymie he grew to love. Set the man free already. Do you realize how this whole situation makes you look? Like a bitter old vindictive shrew

shawnthewife said...

Tammy! My aren't you feisty?!
I wasn't gonna reply to any comments while I'm on vacation with my family, but I just couldn't wait to chat with you!
The chicken shits I referred to are the readers that comment with scathing criticism, then bolt! They never wait around for me to respond to their self righteous ridicule. I should be given ample opportunity to respond to those that judge me.
Now.....how in hell could you possibly know that Jaymie emailed Richard? Come on...if you wanna challenge me, you're gonna have to do better than that.
Richard made many mistakes over our 30+ years together, but I have chosen to look forward, as does he. He doesn't miss Jaymie. He wishes he never met her. Then...I was crazy as hell! Now....I'm just crazy enough to make life fun. My Road to Happy isn't paved with regret. It's covered in Hope.
I write about the past. I live for today and tomorrow.
If you wanna go another round or two, I'll be here.
Hope & Hugs, Shawn

shawnthewife said...

Oh...Tammy! One more thing:
You're not fooling anybody with your subversive bullshit emails, DogTown.
Unless you have something constructive to add, like maybe why you are so bent out of shape over my finally happy mariage, I suggest you go get a life.
No Hope or Hugs for you! `Shawn`