There’s No Limit To How Much You’ll Know, Depending How Far Beyond Zebra You Go….And Some Of Life’s Lessons Come From The Back Of A Wild Animal

I might as well get this over with and try and figure out my own thought processes behind what I was thinking leading up to D-Day 1 and D-Day 1 itself.

I mentioned in the last post that we were continuing to see counselors.  We were going to the third one when D-Day 1 occurred.  Now leading up to this I knew I could get away with the affair for as long as I wanted.  She asked me about a month earlier if there was anything between me and the OW, even though she never met her.  I lied and told her there wasn’t.  I told her that she had a husband and 4 kids so that would be a little difficult.  It was not a complete bold faced lie.  It was all true, just used to my advantage by leaving a lot of stuff out.  I know that people get caught cheating because their lies catch up to them or cannot be verified.  So the closer to the truth I made things the less chance of being caught.

The funny thing is that reality started to hit me toward the end of counselor #2.  I knew that I could not keep going like this even if it was possible.  I did not know what to do.  I started to gradually see the OW a little less regularly.  I believe subconsciously I knew I needed to end one of the relationships.  I started taking very big risks.  I would make up outlandish lies and I stopped deleting all the texts on my phone.  I had a password on it but I am sure she could figure it out if she tried.  I was reckless.  I really think this was my way of forcing a decision.  It was a cowardly way to go.  I did force a decision, but mostly I forced a decision on my wife on whether she wanted to keep me and try or not.

D-Day #1

One night after a late night of texting my wife stayed up and I fell asleep.  I believe I had to head to work at 5am the next morning.  Well, I was jerked awake by her hitting me and screaming in my face asking if I was F**king the OW.  I was still not 100% coherent so I tried to by time.  I asked her why she thought that.  She told to just answer the question.  While all of this was horrible, here are some of the worst things.  I told her that yes, I had slept with the OW.  She yelled and screamed at me and asked me why?  I told her I honestly do not believe that she loved me, wanted me, or needed me.  She asked me why I would even think that?  I told her that she had spent zero time with me this summer and even in the small moments that we had together, we were not together.  She was giving me jobs to do or napping.  She ignored me, constantly turned me down when I made advances, and I was never in the forefront of her thoughts.

At this point she had been working on herself, exercising, eating better, and she was feeling better about herself.  She told me that she was trying to get better and I just threw it all away.  She yelled that she didn’t understand why I would not come to her and tell her things were bad.  I told her that I did.  Many times.  I didn’t say, “Honey, I am thinking about having an affair because of X, Y, & Z.” but we did talk about how bad our relationship had become and we did nothing to fix it.  Even when I tried, it was one sided.

She then wanted to know about the affair.  She wanted to know how many times we had slept together.  I froze.  I did not know how to answer this.  I did not want to tell her the truth because it might hurt her more than it already is hurting her.  So I lied again.  I told her that is was not very many times, maybe a half dozen times.   She yelled at me some more and I just took it.

In my head I was extremely conflicted.  First, I was expecting to be kicked out and I did not know if I wanted to be or if I wanted to stay.  She asked me a few other questions about where we were doing it and if she had ever been in our house.  I assured her that she had not been in our house or in our bed.  She also was so hurt.  She asked more questions most of them I don’t remember, but what I do remember is that if she asked about the affair I lied and minimized everything.  I told her over and over that I can just leave.  I know she really didn’t want me so maybe it was better this way.  She kept telling me that she has always wanted me, she just put everyone before me and our marriage.  I held her and she cried and cried.  I helped her fall asleep.  This was obviously the start of my sleeping problems.  I did not sleep that night.

The next morning on the drive to work I called the OW and let her know what was going on with my wife and I.  She asked what was going to happen and I said I do not know.  She said this was for the best and that now I can move forward ending my marriage.  I said I wasn’t sure what I was going to do.  I have always said that I was 95-98% done with my marriage.  But I was really beginning to wonder if I was giving my marriage a chance.  Yes, I believed I had tried to work on it for years and years, so I did not think there was anything we could do.

I talked with my wife later that night and she said she has been really working on herself because she can’t help either of us in the state she had been in.  She knew we were bad but she did not know how bad and that she wanted to still see if we could make things work.  I told her I would continue going to counseling with her but I was 98% done with the marriage.  I told her I could not take the constant rejection that has ate away at my self-esteem.  I was a shell of myself and it hurt tremendously to have the person you loved so much reject your views, feelings, and advances for years and years.  I told her I could not guarantee that things would work but at least we can possibly get some guidance in what to do next.

This is where counselor 3 went to crap.  I was okay with her up to this point but in our next session my wife started the session telling her about the affair.  We talked about where we needed to go from here and changed from couples counseling to individual to decide what we wanted to do and where we were going to go from there.  My sessions with her went bad quickly.  She asked if I had thought about all that a divorce entails and the ramifications on everyone around you.  I said I had given it a lot of thought but having not been through or experienced one I could not say that I would fully understand what was going on.

She asked me what my kids would think.  I told her that they would be hurt at first but that if we explained it to them and could both be behind the decision then we could show them that we are doing this to make us both happy.  I wanted them to understand that their happiness is important (a line I got from the OW a lot).  Well she flat out told me that if I do this that I will screw up my kids lives forever.  I just stared at her.  Those were her exact words.  I said that I did not fully believe that to be the case.  I thought that if we explained things to our kids and also supported each other in parenting decisions then the kids would adjust and be fine.  She told me there was no way they would be okay after this.  I was just going to ruin them.

This is pretty much where I checked out of the sessions.  I went but I wasn’t there.  She would tell me the same thing each session in a different way.  So when we finally came together to make a decision, I did not have one.  I finally had to tell my wife that I could not go back and see her.

At the same time I was slowly decreasing my communication and contact with the OW.  We were not meeting as often and I kept thinking I needed to end it with her until I get all my shit straightened out.  She was having a difficult time not knowing what I was doing so now I was receiving stress from both sides.

I was dying inside.  This is where I first discovered what depression really was.  It took a lot of my wife convincing me to go get help before I did.  I had spent days and days in bed and just did not want to do anything or be anywhere.  Thanksgiving came and we cooked dinner but did nothing else.  We participated in none of our usual activities.

I was stuck.  I think I was finally really realizing what I had done.  I was seeing that the OW was really just fantasy land and none of it was real.  My wife helped me recognize this by her asking about the OW and why she was so perfect.  I told her she wasn’t and if I decide to leave the marriage I am not running into her arms.  She has a lot of problems that she would have to fix before I would let her around my kids.  Once I told her this it pretty much shattered the fantasy that I had with her. I started seeing her with her problems and everyday trials just like everyone else.  This is when I decided I needed to end it.  I could not continue this charade any longer.  I just did not know how to do it.  That led to my next set of problems.

There’s no limit to how much you’ll know, depending how far beyond zebra you go – Dr. Seuss

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