I fear the end is near. Every time I step forward or move to get out of this cloud I am thrust back in violently. I have a hard time believing that this will ever be salvageable.
I know I have had the best last few weeks. A couple somewhat difficult days but for the most part it has been getting better and better. I started thinking positively and being optimistic. I guess I should have known better. If anything I think I am getting out of all this is that it really doesn’t matter in the end. Nothing does, because it will always be there.
My mistake will always be there staring at me in the face. Haunting her as we try and go about our lives. No there is no escaping so in a way there is no living. Not real life where we can both be happy and only have to worry about our day to day lives. Where we are anxious to see each other at the end of a long day. No, what I have given us is a bastardized version of life. I may be excited to see her at the end of the day, but will she be excited to see me or has she ran into something or someone who has brought her back to this place. We can’t make plans without checking off the list of the things we no longer feel comfortable doing.
All this from my choice to seek attention outside my marriage. Now I am stuck, I have no outlets to try and decipher all these things in my head. Even this post may not be up long before it goes private. I cannot figure out how to move on or where to go. We had a huge setback in the last 24-36 hours and it feels like we started all over. How can this be moving toward happiness (which actually does not exist) if this is what we have to look forward to in life?
We all know there is no forgetting. There is trying to move past it, but how do you move past when it steps in front of you each time you try and move forward. It is like that big bully from grade school that won’t let you move until he gets your dessert. I don’t know what this bully wants so how can I give it to him to move forward. I just can’t understand it in my own feeble brain.
I am writing this as fast as I can so that I won’t go back and delete it all. Or keep it in my drafts folder. If only you saw the number of drafts I have written that I have not posted. But this one is different. This one is one that won’t go away.
People left and right keep telling me I need to forgive myself and that as time goes on it will become easier. I get that it will never be the same but how can it be full of love and happiness when you have this dark cloud hanging over you just waiting to shoot lightning bolts at you every time there is even a hint of sunshine. I do think I am that unique, maybe I am because I don’t see an avenue for forgiveness and I don’t see the tunnel I am walking down getting any brighter anytime soon.
So what am I left with? choices, that is all I am left with and not very good ones at all. Let’s see Option #1: stay and work hard on our marriage, as I am doing it with no guarantee that it will actually get any better or she may just decide that it is too much and want to leave. Option #2: We split and put our kids in very difficult positions. We both still love each other so seeing each other will just be constant torment. We will have trouble moving on, her because she won’t be able to trust as she should. I took care of that. And me because I will always have this scar, this brand that I am what I am based off what I did. It is not the man that makes the pure and righteous decisions, no it is those decisions that make the man. Option#3: Keep taking absurd amount of drugs and alcohol that distort reality and pretend everything is going well. Live in a haze on the border between reality and dreamland. Option #4: Blow up the entire world and then see what happens.
I look at this list and I see pain in Option #1 and #2. I see Option #3 as the least painful, but I know it really is not something that I could keep up. I don’t like taking drugs that much. Option#4, I think it is the back-up plan of back-up plans and then I don’t think I could find enough gun powder.
I am lost again. I should probably go back and look though all my posts and chart the level of despair or optimism in each post. Maybe there is pattern. At least then I could see it all coming. It is something that I can plan for, not this. The unknowing of me forgetting something and her finding it and it throws us back into a tailspin again. Or us just running into someone or something that brings it all back. There is no hiding from this, there is no getting past this, there are only decisions. And not very good ones.
I know, some of you are going to say hang in there. It really does get better with time. You can be stronger in the end. What end? There is never an end to this. How can it get better? Can I forget this? Can I look at her and not see the pain? Can she look at me without constantly comparing herself with the OW? While I wrote a post on how I don’t believe in hope, I sure can believe in hopelessness. Maybe this is what I get when I write a rally positive post. Sorry you all have to read my whining of the hopelessness of my situation. I just wish it could all be different.
It looks like a hiatus is going to be coming. I need to shut down. I need to build a fortress and this just breaks that down. Who knows, maybe I will be able to get it figured out, or stop trying all together.
How the Grinch stole Christmas – Dr Suess
Surviving the affair....the cheaters perspective 
The sun is always waiting behind the clouds.
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I asked my wayward husband these exact questions…is he willing to live this way for the rest of our lives? The constant reminders and setbacks, because I never see them going away. He hasn’t answered me yet.
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Forget about hope or hopelessness. Life only goes 1 way – forward. And there’s no trying option 1,2,3,4 and see what each of them takes you. You can guess, but even that usually doesn’t pan out the way you think. So you can only pick one and go along for the ride.
The pain you see in her eyes – yes, you might just have to live with that, and the constant reminder for the rest of your life. But she has to live with the pain. You’re both fighting a different battle, but for the same goal – to save your family, and save your marriage. Deep down, I think you both still love each other. Right now, she’s wiling to live with the pain. Are you willing to stay on this battle with her?
Things are different, things aren’t turning out the way you’d hope they are – dreams shatters but new dreams are made. If you give up now, then these dreams will always be just that – dreams. But if you hold on and buckle down, then maybe one day, these dreams will come true. Are you willing to sit on this rollercoaster for the CHANCE that your marriage might get better?
Things ARE getting better. But maybe you just so tired of this ride you want it ALL to be better NOW. But it’s going to be a long journey…
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Frankly man, I can imagine how tough it is to keep all this stuff in your head. It the reason I write it all out also. It is cathartic. You fucked up I get it. However, remember that any relatinship s a two way street and affairs do not happen in a vacuum. I am not saying it is your wife’s fault. I am saying that the affair was a symptom of a problem that existed in your relationship before the affair ever happened. Reading this post, it seems to me the two of you haven;t solved the original issues and are getting hung up repairing the damage caused by ONE of the symptoms. Another being her inability to trust and/or forgive. My father in law allegedly had an affair
30 years ago. We don’t really even have the details because mom-in-law only refers to it obliquely. they stayed married for the kids , and his career. however, she never forgave him and let me tell you they are in their mid seventies and fucking miserable. they hate each other and now neither can leave. It is a sad thing to see. I don’t know your situation. I am not telling you to leave. However I feel compelled to comment to assure you that this failure in your marriage is not ALL your fault. The two yuo you need to come to terms, forgive and address whatever the REAL issues are. The affair was damaging, but you still have mines to uncover and deal with that were there before hand. Hopefully you will just disapprove this comment 😉 because I am thinking about deleting it myself. Email me if you want to just correspond. and for the record option 4, whatever you are hinting about there, should be off the table. Don’t hurt yourself. You’ll only hurt your kids worse.
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If you took the kids happiness and her pain out of the equation, what would YOU want to happen? Now, of course you can’t discount your kids, but their happiness rests in your ability to find your own. Whether that is with your wife or without her, is something only you can decide. It would be ideal to keep their family intact and full of happiness. However, it would be better to have two happy parents who live separately than unhappy, struggling together. Get someone to take the kids for a weekend, go away to a neutral location, lock yourselves in and start talking. Be open and raw and truthful and exposed. Don’t be intentional hurtful and hateful, but prepare to hurt and hate. You have to in order to get through the scars to find the healing. After spending a couple days doing this, you will both better know the direction you are heading. I wish you both only healing and happiness. ❤️
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At first I thought it was over because being unfaithful killed us.
He thought it was over because he thought that nothing he ever did would unbreak my heart.
I haven’t left yet. Neither has he. We fight the same fight everyday. You are the one who told me to remember that we aren’t fighting each other, which may have been the best advice I’ve gotten so far.
Nothing can unbreak her heart. But all of you shouldn’t have to drown for your mistakes. I think you just have to stay the course and stop thinking about a way out. For those of us who weren’t unfaithful, we know our spouses have given up on us and don’t have the “til death do us part” commitment we thought we signed up for…so now I think weighing your options is a bit unfair. The choice is hers now. If you want to stay, then stay everyday and do the work that you didn’t do before and stop looking around for things to be better. That’s where the pressure for us comes from. That’s where the triggers come from. If we aren’t happy enough, we can’t help but wonder if that’s what made you seek out time with the OW and so while you say you will do the repairs, do you have a time limit? Do we have to recover before you get frustrated or insecure again? Because then we know that we aren’t the priority and it is still about the needs of the unfaithful one, and we continue to feel inadequate, which makes everyone feel inadequate, and then no one heals. I think you have it in you to do this and your guilt can be your strength and your weakness. It shows that you have integrity but it can’t consume you and stop you from moving forward – together. I so hope that you are able to find a way to do this because I am so hopeful that my husband will find a way to do this. I’m not ready to give up – but he has to do more of the work because he did more of the damage and that’s just how it goes. I truly hope you guys get through this.
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If you divorced, would you feel less pain? I don’t think you would.
I also don’t think you need to – or even should – forgive yourself. You need to be (to WANT to and then DO) the sort of person who would NEVER betray his wife and family. You WERE that person and deep in a hole of guilt and shame… but you don’t HAVE to be.
I think the real question is do you have in you to be that person? Would it be more merciful, to your wife, to let her be? She wants that man… the one who will never betray her. But only if you actually ARE and are not, instead, only acting out what you believe that man would say and do. That wouldn’t be real and she’d know it.
It’s a difficult road ahead – and for that, I send you good wishes for eventual peace of mind and soul.
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It sucks, but over here in reality what did you think was going to happen? Now you are facing the aftermath and it’s hard…so do the right thing…you know that thing you didn’t do in the first place. You have to stay if you love her, for as long as it takes to make it right, or until she asks you to leave. If you wanted the fairy tale, you should have worked on your marriage first, instead of having an affair and then deciding to work on it.
Be the man I think you want to be, the man your wife deserves and tuck in your balls to your big boy panties and take the hard road…stick it out. Not for your kids, not for your wife, but because if you don’t then I really don’t think you’ll ever find your happiness.
I hope you take all of this as tough love…not me being a bitch.
P.S. Please don’t blow up the whole world, I’m beginning to like it again.
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I hope you have much better days. Because you both have so much to look forward too
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