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DD was Sept 3 2023. Husband had seen escorts while on business trips 3 times this summer. Almost from that day I have felt that my husband of 25 years is doing everything he can to work on himself, save our marriage, and made amends to me. I have listened and been receptive. He is in IC, I am in IC and we re in MC. These past 3 weeks I have cried almost nonstop.....after initially thinking we'd be ok.....I'm now just so sad and disappointed in him and am not sure I want a future where this is part of the story. Ive spent too much time worrying about his mental health, my adults college aged kids finding out and need to focus on my own healing. I have done my work many years ago and am frustrated that he is just beginning to heal childhood wounds and trauma that got us here.....just not sure Im up for it. :( I always thought we were rock solid, we had an affectionate loving marriage - no clue he would be trying to fill some apparent void in himself .....with alocohol porn and escorts. He stopped everything the day I found out and he's doing "great...but at my expense. Im just not sure I believe in us anymore.

Welcome to SI and sorry that you've had to find us. The Healing Library has a lot of great information, including a list of the acronyms we use.

First, it takes years to heal from infidelity so three months is just a drop in the bucket. Your emotions are going to be all over the place - it's normal.

How to Help Your Spouse Heal from Your Affair by Linda MacDonald is a very good blueprint for your husband to know how to help you during this time and what he needs to do. Not Just Friends by Dr. Shirley Glass is another good read, and her information on boundaries helped me to try to explain them to my XWH (wayward ex-husband).

Be careful with MC because the therapist can subtly blameshift the A onto you. You may have 50% ownership of problems in the M, but the As are 100% on him. He didn't make a mistake, he made hundreds of conscious decisions to betray you. It wasn't anything you did or didn't do, said or didn't say, etc.

R is a gift that you may decide to bestow on your WH. You don't have to make a decision now, and it's ok to say that you don't want R. The various As are reason enough to want to D.

You are barely 100 days from a trauma and I dare say it’s not an easy decision to make regarding reconciliation.

I can tell you that my H begged me to R. For months. I didn’t want to. It was his 2nd affair and he was planning to D me during his mid life crisis affair to be w/ the OW. That aspect of his betrayal I believed there was no way I could recover from.

It was my therapist who pointed out the positive things he saw. He said if I thought here was even the slightest chance I could try for a period of time. If it didn’t work I could change my mind.

I woke up every day for at least 6 months straight thinking "I can’t do this". I’ve made a mistake. I need to D him.

And years later we are happily Reconciled. But those first 3 years of R were difficult. Good days. Bad days. Two steps forward. One step back.

I dare say you are not obligated to make a permanent decision right now. And if cheating is a dealbreaker for you, then it’s a dealbreaker and you should not feel guilty about it.

Process this trauma. Seek healing for yourself. Get professional help. Do what is best for you right now. You will figure it out. And it’s ok to change your mind too.

The rose colored glasses are off. You will now see the cheater in a whole new light.

I hope this helps you.

Thank you for the responses. I’m struggling

" First, it takes years to heal from infidelity so three months is just a drop in the bucket. Your emotions are going to be all over the place - it's normal."

I’m not sure I’m willing to give this precious years from my life …

The sad thing is you have to "give" precious years of your life to healing whether you R or D. Either way you will mourn the loss of innocence and dreams. There is just no escaping the bereavement process. Take it easy on yourself. Focus solely on you and what gives you even fleeting moments of joy. :) you’ll get there.

I’ll elaborate on my first post. For the better part of 3 years I cycled between wanting my husband near me and wanting him gone (as in from the Earth) . Takes a lot to admit that, but it’s honest. For those years I chose me everyday. If I wanted him close he was. If the pain and the ick was too great we’d separate to separate bedrooms and literally ignore each other for days. Whatever it took for me to feel okay. I told him then that I had no idea what way it would eventually go. If the days wanting him near grew longer or the days wanting him gone would become the norm would be what dictates the success or failure of reconciliation. . Therapists didn’t necessarily agree with it, but I knew me and what I needed to heal. Lucky for him the days of wanting him gone grew less and less to the point where him always being near me felt safe, warm, and normal again. It could have gone either way and he too could have pulled the plug on my endless cycle of emotions. But, I needed it. During our "separations" I spent time with girlfriends, my kids, getting massages, etc. I still do those things for me, but now he is allowed in on the fun of he wants.

I’m not sure I’m willing to give this precious years from my life …

I agree that you have no choice. You've been betrayed. That doesn't change whether your D or R.

My experience was that months 4-6 were the toughest. The reality had sunk in. I knew I was in pain, but I had no idea how much or what the healing process was or how long it would take or how I would be after healing or what life would be like... lots of reason for uncertainty, lots of reason to fear the future.

Here's the thing: you'll hit your rock bottom of grief, anger, fear, and shame, and then life will get better. Life gets better slowly, but you will start to feel better if you let yourself feel the pain. Slowly, slowly, and then more quickly.

Disappointment is a normal part of the process. How could it not be? My reco is to focus on yourself and on what you want. Put off deciding between D & R until you know what you want and what is possible. Don't judge yourself - you want what you want. What you want is not the same as what you will do.

Have faith in yourself to heal. You can survive and thrive after being betrayed, but it takes some of us more time than we think it should.

I feel your pain and felt very similar at the point you are. I actually felt more hopeful the first year and still felt like I loved my husband. The reality really hit me at about a year and I’ve been muddling through this last year. I’m prioritizing myself and doing lots of self care. I relate to on theothersideofhell post almost completely. I cycle between wanting to reconcile and actually feeling hatred and contempt toward my husband. I wish I didn’t feel so extreme but I do. I’m in therapy weekly and I’m hoping I’ll have the outcome of seeing him mostly positively at some point. I think it will take at least another year for me to decide. If someone would have told me I’d still feel like this two years ago I would not have believed them. I can’t believe how unsure and unhealed I still feel. But I think that is largely normal. Just a few days ago I was thinking I wanted him out of the house. And he has been doing everything right for the last 18 months. This is not something any of us want. Truthfully if I did not have kids and so much financially intertwined I would have cut ties. The pain and disappointment in betrayal is so deep. I honestly know I will never feel the same for him again. I’m just hoping I can feel something positive and be happy in the relationship at some point. I hope for healing for you. I also had what I thought was a very good marriage and looked forward to us moving into our empty nest stage. This has hit me like a ton of bricks.

(((Satya))) I have been through something similar but after only 4 years of marriage.

Couple questions:

a. How did you discover this news? I only found out because I happened to open a joint credit card statement and found some suspicious charge at a time he was out of town doing a sporting event.

b. How did your WH admit that number of escorts to you, under your questioning? That is a key indicator of whether to keep your faith in the future with him: if the truth only comes out bit by bit under duress, it's not promising.

(After months of stories about that suspicious credit card charge, my WH finally "broke down and confessed" to our MC that he did the escort call girl thing but it was just that one time after our marriage and at a time we were going through buying a bigger home, with a lot of other commitment stress. Something didn't add up to me about that, to go from happy newlywed to same-day sex with hooker as with the wife that morning, so I kept asking about number of times, and of course, all the "whys." Months later, under my relentless questioning, he admitted he'd been doing the same gig every so often during the 4 years we'd dated, but still swore he stopped after we married. Said he thought marriage would "cure" his itch. I was starting to get the picture. Five years later, I stumbled across an old massage parlor receipt while cleaning out his carry-on luggage. The date on it? A full year earlier in our marriage than what he had sworn to me and the MC. So, more of the sordid story came out. Then, 12 years after D-Day 1, he did it again while right in our home town. This time it was a police sting, made the local papers, so we lost friends right and left. Total humiliation.)

I hope you get some solid answers from the beginning when you are most needing your agency and the support of a good IC. Not all MC's are aware of the dynamics with this level of betrayal, which seems to strike people completely out of the blue.

Superesse

I founded an encripted email acct on his phone when using it to turn the lights off in an ap.I was super calm when I approached him and said whatever you say next will determine if we stay married or if you destroy our family; He told me everything Didnt sleep for two days. I ignored him as we had a trip planned and I went alone. He spent a week online, reading researching, contacting his employee wellness program - therapy, and by the time we reunited he was clear and focused. Hes been in therapy and on a self help track- but Ive been in shambles. He agreed to a lie detector, which I dont want or need but he said no problem if I wanted one and so here we are.

Sorry you are here Satya.

I agree with what everyone is saying in that you are in the early stages and the "roller coaster" has only just begun for you.

However, for some folks this is a dealbreaker. It may be for you. I'd say give yourself more time to sort through all of your feelings. Focus on you, what you want from moment to moment, day to day and then into the future. Put the marriage aside and heal you.

I'm not suggesting you wait so you can reconcile. I'm suggesting healing work for you so that you make decisions that are the best for you. The quicker you stabilize, the quicker you are off the roller coaster and can move forward in confidence and peace.

Thanks for the support. It’s really helping

I want to share my counseling experience.

My counselor and I were in sync. He got me. Straight shooter. None of this "love language" crap. So that was a huge plus for me.

He never says "you should D". But when it was obvious we were headed for D (due to my H refusing to quit cheating and demanding a D) - he helped me understand the process, talked about how to tell kids, helped me stand in my own two feet.

He used to say I was the calmest about to-be D person he met. I had to hold it together b/c if I completely fell apart I was doomed. My H was being a manipulative jerk and I needed to stay one step ahead of him.

When my H ended the affair and was begging to R, my therapist helped me see we had a chance. I was committed to D.

So therapy for you can help you figure out what you want. I wanted my marriage but my husband was going to have to accept some pretty serious changes. He was not getting back the same wife.

During R I had a hard time being around him initially. I went out (alone) often. Hair salon, meet my friends for coffee, curl up with a good book etc. That was the new me. I came first. I had to do what I needed to do to heal.