SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

WoodThrush2,

As previously mentioned, what you consider avoidance or running away from confrontation, I consider the healthier route. I have tried to converse with you in good faith, but I think we've reached the point where we're going in circles.

Logically, why would I continue trying to explain my situation when an interpretation has already been made and continues to be applied regardless of what I say?

You may see what I've said as "virtue signaling," while I see it as simply describing the result of our previous interactions. I specifically told you that I have difficulty with your religious prescriptions, and I've tried to be thoughtful in my conversations with you because of that. When I told you I was triggered and needed to step away so that I didn't miss the value in what you were saying, you used that response to reinforce the position you already held. That's a large part of why I don't see value in continuing a discussion when the information I'm providing isn't meaningfully changing the interpretation.

My spouse has also frequently recommended that I not engage with you, that you're a "stranger on the internet who knows very little about my situation," and that continuing the discussion isn't constructive. I have continued because I think there is wisdom to be learned from you, as there is from all of you. I just don't currently find the perspective you're offering applicable to where I am.

And truthfully, I do choose to believe you have good intentions. I think you genuinely believe you're being helpful and offering guidance based on what you believe you see.

Thank you for your time.

[This message edited by NotMyIdentity at 2:20 AM, Sunday, September 13th]

DrSoolers,

I plan to return to this question when I have a little more time.

Unhinged,

I don’t expect people to predict this. I mean that once an interaction gives you evidence that the person isn’t hearing what you’re trying to communicate, it’s worth considering whether continuing in exactly the same manner is accomplishing the goal.

NMI,

I appreciate the dialogue.

Your welcome.

For me, "meeting someone where they’re at" doesn’t mean avoiding directness. Sometimes that means asking questions. Sometimes it means offering perspective. And sometimes it means being direct because the situation calls for clarity, not comfort.

I understand the point about deep internal realization taking time and how being told what to think can make someone dig their heels in. Real character growth doesn’t happen overnight. BTDT.

But there’s one thing that can and must change overnight. Causing a BS one more ounce of intentional pain.

When I first came here, my focus wasn’t on my comfort or my internal processing. I didn’t show up looking for space to ruminate while my BH was still bleeding out. I came here to stop the bleeding. That required immediate action, even if my brain and self-awareness were going to take longer to catch up.

And that’s the lens I still use when I respond to waywards.

My advice always depends on what the WS is showing through their words. But my number-one priority is the same,  stop any additional harm to the BS, harm that absolutely can stop right now. If a WS has taken the time to sign up and post, I assume they’re ready for that first step. I have a low tolerance for continuing to traumatize an already traumatized BS. So yes, my tone can come off as harsh. I’m okay with that. I’m not overly concerned with whether the WS is stubborn, defensive, or "not in the space to receive" the message. You don’t need full insight to stop causing harm. You need immediate change.

I can be direct, blunt, and no-nonsense. I remember being so confused when (once upon a time) staff asked me to become a guide, I hesitated. I was like me? Are you sure? Their response was that this was exactly why they wanted me. A support community can’t run on soft reflection alone. If everyone is handled delicately, people get stuck in avoidance, blame-shifting, or cycles of self-pity that keep them from moving forward.

Directly naming destructive behavior isn’t about controlling someone’s narrative or throwing cold water for the sake of impact. It’s about refusing to enable ongoing harm. "Meeting someone where they’re at" should never mean leaving a betrayed spouse in danger while waiting for a wayward to slowly arrive at basic accountability. So it starts there for me.

Once the bleeding stops, then I can feel more confident helping with the deeper WS work. And I have enormous compassion for that part. I know firsthand how long, hard, and brave the process is. I also know how rewarding it can be, which is why I’m passionate about it.

It's true, we’re all different in how we learn, how we process, how we respond. But the path? It’s the same path. There’s a rewire every WS has to undertake. The details differ from person to person, but the process itself is universal. It's breaking down the beliefs, fears, avoidance habits, and stories that once ran the show, and replacing them with a values-based operating system. That’s the real rewire. It’s not about "trying harder" or white-knuckling new behaviors. It’s about changing the architecture we've been living in so our values (that we couldn't claim before) actually become the thing we act from under pressure.

And that’s why I speak up. I’ve done this work myself, I’ve watched countless others do it, and I know what it takes to move from intention to transformation. So when I see a place where that knowledge applies, I’m going to offer it, not to dictate someone’s journey, but to help them find the footing that makes the journey possible.

I’ve also seen a pattern many times. I'll use an interaction we've had. At 8 months out you said something like, "Maybe there’s not a next stage or step left for me." That set off alarm bells, not just for me, but for several people. You saw that reaction. And I think that’s where you expected us to "meet you where you were at." From my perspective, I’m not sure how I could have offered anything different in that moment.

What I saw was self-preservation kicking in. You expressed it politely, but the defensiveness was clear to everyone reading. And that defensiveness colored how you interpreted what I said. I never told you that cheating was your entire identity, yet that’s what you heard. I can’t meet someone in that distortion. I reframed it, clarified it, and you still doubled down, which is something I’ve seen many waywards do when they hit the edge of their current self-awareness.

Sometimes the issue isn’t that SI isn’t "meeting someone where they’re at." Sometimes it’s that the wayward isn’t ready for what the Wayward Forum actually asks of them. And that’s okay, readiness comes in stages. But the work here is designed to move people forward, not to keep them comfortable. Meeting someone where they’re at doesn’t mean staying in the place that’s keeping them stuck.

I've seen stuck then later they come back with, "My BS still doesn’t feel safe." "I’m still reacting the same way." "I’m still struggling." Or worse, "I cheated again."

That’s the reality, the internal world that led you to cheat is the internal world you’ll stay in unless you bust your foundation wide open and rebuild it brick by brick. SI is a community, yes, but its purpose is healing, growth, and supporting the kind of change that lasts. The conversations here aren’t meant to shame you, they’re meant to help you see the deeper layers that need attention. Because once you start rebuilding from the foundation, everything else finally begins to make sense.

I respond to the questions being asked. The "right" questions, the ones that open doors, should come from the person seeking help. I’m not here to poke and prod at what I think you need to question. But in every response, there’s inevitably something for you to contemplate. That’s where integration happens, not because someone spoon-fed you the insight, but because you recognized it in the feedback and applied it.

Stop the harm immediately. Support the growth deeply. That is the meeting place.

DrSoolers,

I think it’s less that I don’t fit because I disagree with everything here, and more that several of the ways I see waywards, betrayed spouses, and reconciliation framed don’t describe us particularly well. These are just a few of the differences that come to mind.

Me: I didn't experience a long period of conscious unhappiness with my marriage or a gradual "slippery slope" leading up to the affair. I genuinely thought I was happy. I didn't feel entitled to the affair, and I didn't rewrite history to make my husband or our marriage into something terrible. I loved my husband, wanted my marriage, and knew the affair was wrong. What I didn't understand was why I was capable of doing it.

I also don't identify with the idea of being fundamentally selfish or self-focused. My choices were selfish, but I was actually very other-focused—not in a transactional "I’ll give you something and you give me something" way, but in a genuine "how can I care for you, take care of you, and make sure you're okay?" way. I recognize now that I was so focused on caring for other people that I wasn't very connected to my own emotional experience.

And, per my husband, he doesn't experience me as blame-shifting, minimizing, being defensive, or trickle-truthing. His experience was that I understood what I had done, took responsibility for it, and tried to support him.

I am remorseful for what I did, and I have expressed that remorse to the person I actually harmed. I don't feel a need to continually demonstrate that remorse on a forum. At this point, doing so would feel disingenuous and performative to me. My remorse is something I need to live out in my marriage, not something I need to prove to strangers. I don't feel a need to appear broken in order for my remorse to be considered genuine. My husband knows the depth of my remorse.

My husband: His experience is also different from a lot of what I read here. He believes betrayal trauma is real, but he also believes that having a trauma response doesn't remove his responsibility to moderate his own behavior. He believes remaining undecided about the marriage for years can prolong the confusion and pain, so once he had enough information to make an informed decision, he was willing to make one relatively quickly. He chose to stay and reconcile.

I also often hear spouses say that their partner's affair made them feel like they never really knew the person they married, or that their spouse became a completely different person in their eyes. My husband doesn't ultimately experience me that way. He initially had some of that reaction, but fairly quickly realized that he didn't actually believe I was a completely different person or someone he had never known. He still recognizes the person he knew and loved before the affair.

I also don't think he believes that what I did means I was secretly a person without morals or values. He believes I have morals and values, and that during this period of our lives I acted in ways that were profoundly inconsistent with them. He still tells me that he believes I have those morals today. I understand that may not be a framework everyone shares, but I think there's an important distinction between saying someone committed a serious moral wrong and saying that person is fundamentally without morals or values. In fact, I think genuine remorse can come from recognizing that what you did violated values you actually held

I also often hear spouses say that they'll never trust their spouse quite the same way again, or that although they still love their spouse, the love will never feel quite the same. My husband doesn't feel that way. He believes that, with time, he can get back to the level of trust he had in me before the affair, and he tells me he loves me the same way he did before.

Our marriage: We consider ourselves reconciled and are moving forward. That doesn't mean everything is perfect or that there's nothing left to work through, but the affair doesn't dominate our lives. We're happy and doing well, and we don't experience that as denial, avoidance, or rugsweeping.

And, without meaning this to sound self-congratulatory, I often think part of the reason I'm this far is because of how my husband handled the situation. He often tells me he thinks part of the reason he's this far is because of how I responded. I don't think either of us got here alone. I think the way we each responded to the other mattered.

And I think this ties back to a point I made about how I communicate. I know some people interpret my continued attempts to explain myself as defensiveness. I tend to interpret them differently. I generally assume that if someone is continuing to engage with me, they're trying to understand my position, so I keep trying to explain it. I'm actually pretty slow to recognize when a conversation has stopped being reciprocal or isn't going anywhere, because I inherently think of conversation as something two people participate in together.

I think Foreverlabeled’s current response actually illustrates part of what I mean.

😂 I’m sure if people thought I said things out of pocket before, they’ll definitely have some strong interpretative responses to this.

But if our differences are truly something to be celebrated here, why don’t we consider that there actually are differences? Honestly, that’s why I’m wondering if staying here makes sense for me, and why I’ve been thinking maybe I just don’t fit in. Which is unfortunate, because I do think there can be value here.

[This message edited by NotMyIdentity at 7:00 PM, Sunday, September 13th]

That only means to drop any mask or barrier and meet this someone naked and vulnerable and see if they also are reciprocating.

Then a real connection between the two may form.

When you "meet" you bring your true self, not just the good parts but imperfections and flaws and the scars from healing past ones too.

Compatibility and connection happens if there is mutual acceptance.

If you present only the best version of yourself, you aren’t meeting, you are performing, that might work for the majority of superficial relationships you navigate through life, while it just doesn’t for true connection.

Dropping the facade and truly accepting oneself is both one of the easiest and hardest thing a human being can accomplish in their life.

[This message edited by BackfromtheStorm at 6:47 PM, Sunday, September 13th]

I think Foreverlabeled’s current response actually illustrates part of what I mean.

My response was answering your question, what does "meeting someone where they're at" mean to you. I thought that was participation in the conversation.

To your current response, I hear you. Truly. Your situation is clearly very different from what most people here describe, and it makes perfect sense that the frameworks we use wouldn’t feel like they apply. You didn’t have the long slide into unhappiness, you didn’t rewrite history, you didn’t feel entitled, and you didn’t experience yourself as selfish. Your husband didn’t have the trust collapse, the identity rupture, or the long trauma arc that so many betrayed spouses face. And your reconciliation moved quickly, cleanly, and without the complications that tend to show up for others.

Those differences matter. They shape how you see yourself, how you see your marriage, and how you see this space. And if your internal world and your husband’s internal world both line up in a way that makes the affair feel like an isolated event rather than something rooted in deeper architecture, then of course the conversations here would feel mismatched. It makes sense that you’d interpret the frameworks as describing "other people," not you.

I also understand why you keep explaining. If you assume continued engagement means people are trying to understand your position, then naturally you’d keep clarifying it. And if your husband doesn’t experience you as defensive, blame‑shifting, minimizing, or self‑protective, then it’s reasonable that you’d lean on his perspective as the most accurate reflection of who you are. That’s a very grounding place to stand.

So yes, from where you are standing, it absolutely follows that you might not fit here. If your experience, your husband’s experience, and your marriage’s trajectory all fall outside the patterns this forum is built around, then it’s understandable that the conversations feel off‑target. And if your internal framework feels coherent, intact, and aligned with how your husband sees you, then I can see why you’d wonder whether staying here makes sense.

If differences are to be celebrated, then your difference is clear. You and your husband have navigated this in a way that doesn’t mirror the common arcs we see. And if that’s the reality you’re living in, then it’s natural that the work here might not feel necessary or relevant.

It sounds like the two of you discovered the secret formula for faster reconciliation, smoother healing, and minimal discomfort. I encourage you to stick around and educate us.

NMI, Hi. I'm new to the forum. Happy to meet you! I'm willing to sit with you where you are at.

What do you need? How can I help? << that's what it means to me.

[This message edited by poppypout at 2:43 AM, Monday, September 14th]

@NotMyIdentity

Thank you for your response. I agree that you two seem like an edge case, particularly in how your husband responded to all of this. I’ve seen my fair share of "model" waywards post-discovery, but your description of your husband’s reaction is genuinely rare—I can't recall reading a case quite like it. I can certainly see why some readers might default to assuming rugsweeping because it sounds almost too good to be true. So that's some friction you might rub up against.

I’m not going to assert that, though. You come across as very well-considered, and I suspect if rugsweeping were happening, you would have spotted and addressed it yourself.

On the surface, it sounds like you’re unicorns, but in reality, human behavior operates on a bell curve. We frequently see the extreme end of the spectrum here—people whose responses to infidelity are immediate, nuclear, and where all love seemingly evaporates upon discovery. Without citing specific landmark cases on this site, it's clear that if that extreme exists, the opposite end of the spectrum must exist as well. It makes sense that your end of the curve is underrepresented here, as couples in your situation naturally have less need for a support forum.
There is also undoubtedly an element of luck and timing. A person could do everything right post-discovery, but if their partner holds a rigid, non-negotiable stance on infidelity where reconciliation isn't an option, the outcome would be entirely different. You both did the necessary work, but you were also fortunate that your husband’s baseline disposition allowed space for that work to matter.

While I don't personally relate to or agree with your or your husband's perspective on infidelity, that is beside the point. What matters is that you two align, want the same outcome, and are moving forward together.

My own view of infidelity is somewhat atypical for this site as well, which is precisely why I think there’s value in you sticking around to share your specific experiences. Having diverse perspectives is a net positive for anyone here who might align with your path. What you personally gain from staying is up for debate, but your voice adds a necessary counterweight to the usual narrative.

What I didn't understand was why I was capable of doing it.

What did you do? Why were you capable of doing it?

DrSoolers,

I think your spectrum point makes sense. My husband once commented to our MC that it felt like nobody else had a situation like ours, and she told us she was working with another couple whose story and aftermath were very similar. So I know we're not the only ones out there 😂.

And I do feel fortunate. My husband had always been one of those people who said he would leave if I ever had an affair, so when I chose to confess, I was very prepared for the possibility that our marriage was over. I went into it hoping we could eventually attempt reconciliation, but fully recognizing that I probably wasn't going to get that chance. At that point, my goal was for him to be able to heal and have a chance at happiness, even if that didn't include me.

I also realize that we view infidelity pretty differently, but I genuinely appreciate your perspective. You give me things to think about, even when I don't necessarily end up agreeing with your conclusion 😂. I think that's part of what makes these conversations worthwhile for me.

I'm not sure if any of the following will be useful to you—it’s more just a conversation with no real destination, so feel free to engage if you wish, but I certainly won't take offence if you choose not to.

It might be useful to other users if you felt able to expand on what your findings actually were. You've clearly outlined the reasons you don't think led to the affair: you weren't unhappy, resentful, entitled, or selfish. Ultimately, though, there must have been a core reason. What was it? You've dismissed the typical catalysts, but what was your atypical reason? Presumably, you accept that there must be one, unless you're suggesting the affair happened purely at random?

I agree entirely with your husband’s view here:

He believes remaining undecided about the marriage for years can prolong the confusion and pain

While some people understandably need a long time to process everything, I see far too many couples fall into absolute inaction and indecisiveness. To me, that is the worst possible outcome—people frozen in uncertainty, remaining in acute pain for years.

Where I deeply struggle to relate to your husband—and would love to hear his perspective—is here:

I also often hear spouses say that their partner's affair made them feel like they never really knew the person they married

Fidelity is such a foundational, core value for me. Like I few it as an absolute requirement. Bear minimum stuff. If my fiancée (wife in 16 days' time!) were to cheat on me, I feel I would have to conclude that everything I believed about her was wrong. One of the pillars of our relationship is my trust that she would never betray me; If I thought she was the sort of person who would do that, I wouldn't be with her. If she doesn't hold true to a core pillar, well the thing about core pillars is, pulling it out leads everything to crash like a house of cards collapse. I wonder why it didn't have that fundamental impact on him? I can only speculate it isn't as important to him. That isn't to say it's not important. It just can't be as foundational. Perhaps fidelity is important to him but your relationship is more important such he can overlook one infraction as long as it stays as only one? I'm not sure, I'm speculating.

The same applies to this point:

time, he can get back to the level of trust he had in me before the affair, and he tells me he loves me the same way he did before

If he had previously expressed that infidelity was a firm dealbreaker, yet you had a great marriage with no warning signs, no obvious red flags, and no specific personal issues leading up to it... how can he feel confident you won't do it again?

In a sense, having glaring marital issues that led to an affair—assuming the person was otherwise loyal—almost seems more fixable. For instance, take a typical scenario: a couple struggles with intimacy for years, it goes unaddressed, and eventually leads to someone straying. A spouse could reasonably trust that if intimacy is rebuilt, the motivation to reoffend disappears. In your case, what gives him that level of confidence? Answering that could genuinely help a lot of readers here.

My husband had always been one of those people who said he would leave if I ever had an affair

This initial stance is far more typical. Countless betrayed spouses post here saying they always assumed infidelity would be an absolute dealbreaker until they actually experienced it.

It’s not a sentiment I personally relate to, though that may just be down to how my brain works compared to others. If I make a definitive statement like that, it's because I’ve already thought through the matter deeply, run through the hypotheticals, read about the fallout, and discussed it at length with my partner. So, in my case, my actions tend to align strictly with what I’ve stated I would do.

Given how common that sweeping statement is—"cheating is an absolute dealbreaker for me"—I don't fully understand why so many people make it so readily. Perhaps it's said flippantly without deep forethought, or perhaps it's intended as a deterrent. But ultimately, if you backslide on a firm line like that, it can do far more harm than good depending on your partner's disposition.

If you backtrack on a dealbreaker, you have to be incredibly lucky: lucky that your wayward partner is genuinely remorseful, willing to do the heavy emotional lifting, and committed to never doing it again. My concern is that many waywards might interpret a backtracked boundary as: "Well, I got away with it once; they won't actually leave me." That is why it feels so risky to me. Coupled with the fact I think many other waywards, seem to lose respect when their partner backslide. Sort of: 'wow, can't believe they let me get away with that' - type thinking. This is a large part of the reason my general advice is as it is. You can't control who your wayward is and putting trust into someone who's just hurt you opens yourself up to further abuse. In a sense, your husband was fortunate that you turned out to be the type of person who took full responsibility, learned from it, and won't repeat it. It could have been a lot worse for him.

Finally, I personally don't think you come across as defensive. What is likely happening is that people are reading about an affair with a relatively smooth aftermath and minimal visible consequences, and they struggle to process that when their own experience was so utterly crippling. I understand where they are coming from, but if I were in your shoes, I wouldn't take their reactions personally. My perception is that you appear to be a successful edge case that's done all the right things and had a healthy amount of luck along the way.

[This message edited by DRSOOLERS at 9:12 AM, Monday, September 14th]

Hi-

I just want to clarify my comment around feeling out of control/needing to control—

I wasn’t really thinking you were trying to control the forum, I actually understand why you posted this.

I think I was responding to the personal aspect you were mentioning to woodthrush and seeing you mentioning it before.

It pertained to not liking to be told what to do.

That in itself is not unusual, but there has been sort of a resistance to some of us, and it felt like to me that the concern was more over the delivery than the intention of the message.

No beef about it—-I just wanted to clarify because I didn’t think you quite got what I was seeing. There is nothing wrong with feeling out of control, life can put us in that mindset. Infidelity and also some of the other things you have shared feeling like there is chaos you can’t quite reel in would be perfectly understandable.

But I do accept your answer you don’t feel that way. Thanks.

Hi NMI, I realize now that my responses have not been helpful. I did not mean to be antagonistic and I'm sorry if my responses were hurtful, distressing, irritating, exasperating, or just a waste of your time. I hope you find what you need. For me, it was a single person who made a difference and helped me turn my life around. It may be something completely different for you, and I hope you find it. Peace, Pippin

I can sort of internalize what you are saying.

My affair was born from an existential crisis. So there were a lot of feelings between my husband and I that the behavior was an anomaly. Maybe the difference is that my crisis was less apparent to him for sometime and maybe the two of you share some of the origins of precipitating factors.

I don’t think he ever felt he should not have accountability over his actions and he never name called, and I don’t even remember him raising his voice out of one time, when i was being amazingly obtuse.

I can also see that you tend to be a gray thinker rather than black and white and at one time I was far less black and white than I am today. I think the grey is important because it’s where humanity and compassion exist, and I do not think I have lost that aspect of myself in fact in many ways it has been strengthened. But I did find as the journey curves through that first few years I would find I always thought myself, him, and us to be further along than we were.

That’s my experience and I am not insisting it’s your experience. But without sharing it’s harder to relate.

In the black and white of our thinking that’s where humility exists. Its slap is where the true change can occur—-we can’t change what we don’t acknowledge.

I find a good formula for healing is to have enough grey thinking to be forgiving and compassionate, but enough black and white to have humility to not think that one has it all figured out.

Self awareness is a vast ocean.

Whys are tricky in the same way.

For me they went in this order:

Why did I do this? Because I wanted to.

Why did I want to? Because I was unhappy. And when I say that I had lived 20 years in a great marriage. My husband is awesome. My life would not have been as good as it has been without him.

So I had to dig through my unhappiness. Well, there was plenty to point at—-I had lost myself in a major way and many life events compounded together was showing this to me in horrifying ways. I was also under a doctors care for emotional exhaustion, but I do not blame the affair on this breakdown, I think both were a symptom of the same problem.

Why an affair? Because I didn’t know who I was anymore and I think it was an exploration of an earlier time in my life, a less complicated time, before so much had changed me. Now I had also assumed I didn’t have the space I needed within marriage and I did think I wanted out of it. Not to be with someone else but to lay down all my obligations —I was exhausted. I don’t think I villainized my husband, but I did think our lack of connection in that time was because he wasn’t emotionally in touch with himself.

The universe has a way of showing us what we are by what we are projecting. And I had to reconstruct a life with improvements that safeguarded my needs, wants, and happiness. So I then had to go deeper into the whys and find deeper connections within myself.

I am saying all this because despite my sometimes direct posts, that feeling of lostness was deepened by the affair, not a at of finding my true self. It did illustrate certain things to me however—like what were some of the needs I had been pushing down. But a lot of it was an easy escapism to avoid the feelings of being lost and unhappy.

I believe affairs happen in happy marriages. I don’t believe happy well adjusted people have them. So I think where you get the resistance is there is little conflict in what you share. Whereas having an affair creates internal conflict. Especially ones where people get emotionally invested.

I shared all this to say - I don’t think people have affairs just because they are bad. I don’t think I am a bad person. I do think some people who have affairs are bad but not just because they did that. We are all light and dark.

When you gloss over the dark. The chaos. It’s hard to believe there isn’t any of that. I am just not sure if it’s because you dealt with all that already, which in 8-10 months seems very condensed.

I get why some posts would get to you—-foreverlabeled is a very good black and white thinker. And when I got here she and I had some rounds. But through those rounds what I was pushed to see is that I had far more to understand about myself. That I had some ugly truths I wanted to avoid. I relate strongly to what she writes now, but it took embracing my own darkness. We all have dark and light, embracing that darkness is as important as affirming ourselves.

I don’t think you need to believe what we believe to fit in. You just have to believe we have something to learn from you and you have things to learn from us. Because if you want others to take you in, then they are going to be more apt to if they feel you can take them in to a certain degree as well.

I have been here for a long time, with a few breaks one lasting about a year an a half. What draws me to this site so much is what I learn about myself. Whether that’s from reading or by writing out my experiences and seeing them in different ways, this site is a tool for deeper self awareness. I am not saying it needs to be that for you, but giving you food for thought for your consideration.

[This message edited by hikingout at 5:59 PM, Monday, September 14th]

Unhinged and Soolers, I figured these questions were somewhat overlapping, so I combined them in my answer:

What I did was have an affair. I cheated and violated my own values in the process.

As for why I was capable of doing it, I think there were several things that came together. I had become pretty disconnected from myself and from my own emotional experience. Looking back, I think a lot of that came from growing up learning to orient myself around other people's needs and emotions. I genuinely thought of that as loving and sacrificing for other people, and I didn't realize how much I had failed to develop a sense of myself separate from that.

My husband and I were also disconnected in ways neither of us really recognized. We both thought our marriage was just normal and to be expected considering the circumstances. There was a lot going on in our lives at the time, but I genuinely experienced myself as happy.

The friendship itself started out pretty innocuously.

My husband knew about it, and we both thought it was an innocent friendship. We talked about work, restaurants, and places to take our families. It wasn't built around deep personal conversations or talking about our marriages. I was pretty naive about it in general, and I didn't recognize what was happening at first. But at some point I realized I really liked this person beyond friendship. I think that's where the conscious slippery slope really began. Instead of stepping back, I rationalized that we could continue being friends.

I think the fact that being with him made me feel happier during a period when everything in my life felt chaotic mattered to the attachment that formed. I sometimes wonder if that's why it started—not because of deep conversations, but because of the normalcy of it. I liked how I felt when I was with him, and I didn't question that enough. I also think my ability to compartmentalize played a significant role. I'd always thought of it as a strength because of my profession, and I didn't recognize how easily I could use it destructively.

Eventually, I got to a point where I couldn't compartmentalize it anymore. I knew this wasn't who I was, that it went against everything I believed, and I couldn't continue harming my husband. I also couldn't reconcile saying I cared about my AP while continuing a relationship that was harmful to him, his wife, my husband, and myself. And so I broke it off and confessed.

I fully believe I'm "one of those people" in the sense that the underlying mechanisms really aren't that different—slippery slope, disconnection, rationalization, compartmentalization. I think what's different is the timeline of when those things were happening in my life, how they interacted with everything else that was going on at the time, and some of the other things I've mentioned.

As for my husband's trust, I think it goes back to other things he believes as well. He doesn't see the affair as proof that everything he believed about me was false.

I also don't think his confidence is based on believing he can somehow know with absolute certainty that I will never make another terrible choice. It's based on what he's seen from me since the affair, and I suspect confessing on my own rather than being caught played a big role in that.

I don't think that means fidelity isn't foundational to him. I think it means he doesn't see one profound violation of something important as necessarily invalidating every other thing he knows about a person. He can believe what I did was completely unacceptable while also believing it was profoundly inconsistent with who I am rather than the revelation of who I really was all along.

And I think that's probably the biggest difference between his framework and yours. If fidelity is a foundational pillar to the point that violating it necessarily collapses your understanding of the person, then I can completely understand why an affair would fundamentally change how you see your partner. My husband just doesn't seem to experience it that way.

And honestly, don't ask me why that works for him. 😂 It just does. I can tell you how he seems to think about it, but I don't have some deeper explanation for why his brain works that way.

[This message edited by NotMyIdentity at 7:25 PM, Monday, September 14th]

Hikingout,

I understand what you’re saying. I don’t believe I’m finished with discovery. What I do believe is that at some point you have to quit digging, work on what you’ve learned, and remain open to what comes next.

Forgive me, I don’t have time to give your reply the full attention it deserves right now. I’ll try to respond more fully at a later time.

My concern is that many waywards might interpret a backtracked boundary as: "Well, I got away with it once; they won't actually leave me." That is why it feels so risky to me.

First, life is risky. To live as fully as possible, one MUST take risks, since even staying at home risks accidents, sometimes fatal. We are always vulnerable to the unexpected. We can prepare to protect ourselves against many vulnerabilities - just not all of them.

The risk inherent in life cannot be avoided. The best way to deal with the risk is to learn to take the hit, process the pain and move on. Odysseus reportedly handled life-threatening surprises pretty effectively, though he lost all his Trojan War companions. Alexander, maybe not so much, though IMO he did a lot to protect himself. So much was done to protect Oedipus, but look at how he ended up (although he established a whole genre of porn, which isn't how many people want to be remembered)!

Coupled with the fact I think many other waywards, seem to lose respect when their partner backslide. Sort of: 'wow, can't believe they let me get away with that' - type thinking.

I agree that a WS who thinks they got away with it once is probably less likely to change from cheater to good partner, but that becomes evident over time, usually not a lot of time in the context of most lives. I know DRS and others want to get out of pain quickly, but they can't. Pian is unavoidable - getting through the pain of being betrayed takes more time than anyone wants it to. Dumping the WS probably stops taking on more pain from the WS, but the pain of betrayal still needs to be processed. Dumping the WS does nothing much to end the pain of being betrayed.

I don't see that attitude in WSes on SI. A BS may pain shop by reading in forums for cheaters. That reading plus SI should give a BS some insight in distinguishing between a healing and a non-healing WS in their lives.

The problem on SI - and on any other 'net forum - is that BSes can not fully describe their WSes, and WSes can't fully describe themselves. There is usually - almost always - so much unsaid that it's difficult for a reader to really know what's going on in the parties involved in any specific case.

*****

As for making one relationship principle paramount, I see how violating that core principle can lead to splitting.

But my experience has been that relationship needs shift over time - the implicit (and maybe explicit) contract shifts. That leads inevitably to shifts in paramountcy of principles.

At the beginning of my relationship with plainsong, we were in a LDR, and we basically had to arrange our schedules to allow meeting. When we got married, we needed to arrange our schedules to support each other. I had certain strengths. W had other strengths, we had to use our strengths in our individual lives and for the benefit of our M. When our son was born, we had to develop and deliver new strengths. When he went off to college, we had to rediscover old strengths - just the 2 of us were together, and parenting became a matter of checkbooks - and develop more new ones.

That's 5-10 years of support and growth for - maybe - most Ms. The shifting needs and roles build bonds. When one person cheats - maybe not because they want more or different sex, which is rarely seen on SI, but because they haven developed the skills to be themselves while acting their various roles, which is seen on SI again and again - dumping the cheater means giving up those bonds.

Many BSes say they didn't know their WSes at all. I'm not sure I agree in most cases. I suspect that cheating reveals new aspects of the WS but does not negate the support the WS has given to and received from the BS. I suspect in many cases the mutual support was very real.

Now, the BS is free to decide the A(s) essentially negate the support and so dumps the WS. But if that's based on a principle adopted by a teenager or by a child and implement by a mature adult, the adult may choose an action that is far less than optimal - for example, a Disney decision may lead a person to hold onto an unremorseful WS, or a justice-based childhood decision might lead to destroying a family with a remorseful WS and a BS who would choose R were it not for the decision they made as a child.

I definitely knew my W had a dark side, and I knew she was vulnerable to self-harm. She had supported me at my lowest. She supported me freely, without thought of reimbursement; her support directly benefited only me. Did I not owe her something?

IDK ... what decisions in adulthood are ALWAYS clear and consistent and apply to everybody, including oneself?

*****

Remember, DRS, you are engaging with people who have violated your primary principle and with people who see it as flexible. Doesn't that tarnish your principle?

As you know, I see nothing good in or from infidelity. Sure, my M is better after W's A than before it - but that's because of the work we've to make it so. That work came after infidelity, but not because of it. The A was just something had to deal with in accord with our ways of living - resolve issues rather than bury them.

I worked for a company that had principles of 'no alcohol on you or in you on Company or customer property' and 'no reimbursement for expenses for alcohol'. When I was moved to Chicago, my new manager showed me how to get reimbursed for the booze I drank while waiting for W and son to follow me. Come to think of it, at the dinner that welcomed my classmates and me (Oh, the HJ in the Mid-Hudson Valley), the bar was open, and I doubt that booze appeared as lin item in the bill.

IOW, IMO, 'principles' are decisions made by children who see black and whit but not gray or colors because that's what children do. Adults see almost the whole spectrum, unless they decide to block something out or are color-blind.

Well NMI, the additional information obtained from your comments above has lead me to several conclusions.

First, you and your husband are doing great!! And that is wonderful. Assuming your husband knows absolutely everything, which I think he does, I don't see any reason for concern and I don't feel there is any advice you even need from anyone here.

It seems your affair...whatever the particulars were...are not something that causes your husband the levels of trauma that many experience, and hence both you and he are able to move forward in a healthy manner.

I would consider an example of this type of phenomena in other people's marriages. Some married couples may not feel threatened or injury with their spouse occasionally watching porn. Yet others it would totally crush. People have different capacities for different things. You and your husband just may have the capacity to absorb your affair much more readily than 99% of couples.

As far as the "Meet me where I am at" concept.....I honestly don't even see that as applicable with you and your husband and the people of this forum. In my mind, the context of that phrase is this ...

Person A is in a state where a notable change is needed.

Person B has the knowledge, desire, and ability to help Person A progress towards that change.

Person A cannot or does not want to handle the pace or method at which Person B tries to help.

Person B can still help Person A, by "Meeting them where they are at". Meaning Person B still helps them make change and Person A is accepting of that help....just not as fast or with the most efficient method Person B could offer them.

With respect to your marriage, I don't think you require progress towards a notable change. You are there.

Now....what may be entirely true, is we folks on the forum may need to be mindful in what could possibly be more accurately labeled as an exercise of "Inclusivity". You essentially are what in society would be called a "Minority" class....but within the "society" of affair recovery.

Now, with all that said, I still think there would be disagreements on how certain members interact with you. As you have admitted...you get sensitive and rather testy about this or that issue. And certain folks might resist in kind.

Also, there might be rather normal disagreements on ancillary issues, such as the virtue of disclosing to OBS's, quitting common jobs, etc. Those things are all open for discussions if warranted.

In any case, peace.✌️

[This message edited by WoodThrush2 at 3:19 AM, Tuesday, September 15th]

NotMyIdentity

Thanks for your response and interesting insights. Hopefully, that will be useful to other users.

Sisoon

I was tempted not to engage with your response for fear of threadjacking what felt like useful dialogue, but ultimately you left a series of accusations, incorrect assertions, and one point could not go without being called out in particular.

First, life is risky. To live as fully as possible, one MUST take risks, since even staying at home risks accidents, sometimes fatal. We are always vulnerable to the unexpected. We can prepare to protect ourselves against many vulnerabilities - just not all of them.

I agree that life is inherently risky. However, I would never advocate for a victim of abuse to continue engaging with the source of that abuse. Removing oneself from active harm is the very definition of protecting oneself against known vulnerabilities.

but that becomes evident over time, usually not a lot of time in the context of most lives

Where is your evidence for this? There are countless accounts of people reporting that cheating appeared to stop, only to discover 5, 10, or 15 years later that the unfaithful partner simply became better at hiding it, or that the behaviour recurred.

Losing a decade of your life is a monumental loss. Frankly, I'd take divvying up my assets in exchange for 10 years every day of the week... and twice on Sundays. Think of what could have been achieved in that time—you could be remarried to a genuinely loyal partner. Depending on your age, that lost time can actively destroy your chances of ever building a relationship founded on true integrity.

I know DRS and others want to get out of pain quickly, but they can't

How are you defining 'quickly'? I do not recall ever stating this. I have previously argued that people who leave unfaithful spouses tend to heal faster. Removing yourself from the source of trauma generally accelerates recovery. I can quote a host of adjacent psychological literature that backs this claim up. It is never instant, and it always requires work; I processed my pain and put in an immense amount of effort to heal over time. I often think that your perception of me - not being 'healed' is blinded via our philosophical differences. Do you accept that its possible to be both simultaneously healed whilst advocating separation from a cheater? Or to be healed one one need to share your philosophy?

Now, nearly nine years removed from it, I have been with a new partner for over six years. I do not experience triggers. I see many posts - and if you were being honest you will too - citing many years into reconciliation a betrayed spouse will still experience month ruining triggers. I do not have such triggers, I see this in part because I have separated from the source of trauma. My partner doesn't wear a specific outfit or walk past a certain location only for my day/week/month to be ruined by memories of what was done to me. So yes, I believe separation is a faster and more effective route to long-term recovery, but none of it is 'quick'.

I don't see that attitude in WSes on SI

So because you haven't personally observed it on a forum, it doesn't exist, and we should never warn against it? We often don't see the WS's perspective at all. Many betrayed spouses are here and their partners don't dare to venture in. Consider why.

Remember, DRS, you are engaging with people who have violated your primary principle and with people who see it as flexible. Doesn't that tarnish your principle?

You think I have a principle against engaging with people who hold differing philosophical outlooks? As someone who has repeatedly—including in this thread—advocated for hearing differing opinions, why on earth would I hold that belief? My principles dictate the exact opposite.

But my experience has been that relationship needs shift over time - the implicit (and maybe explicit) contract shifts. That leads inevitably to shifts in paramountcy of principles.

You believe the core principle of fidelity shifts over time? I strongly disagree. If you don't mean this, please provide an example of something you would define as a core principle that has shifted over time and why you feel this was a good thing?

maybe not because they want more or different sex, which is rarely seen on SI

Sexually motivated infidelity is one of the most commonly cited reasons for cheating, regardless of its specific prevalence on any single forum.

Many BSes say they didn't know their WSes at all. I'm not sure I agree in most cases. I suspect that cheating reveals new aspects of the WS

It reveals that they are someone incapable of upholding core principles. I don't mind if my partner reneges on failing to save as much as we'd planned for a festival. Or skips the gym because she's had a tough day at work. Core principles should be unwavering. Upon discovering someone could not uphold a base requirement, it is entirely fair to assert you never truly knew your partner, as you operated under the reasonable assumption that they shared your foundational values. For those of us to whom fidelity is vital, that revelation changes everything.

An apt analogy would be this: I enter a relationship on the foundational understanding of who my partner fundamentally is. I have no issue with anyone undergoing gender-affirming surgery or identifying as transgender; however, suppose it was revealed years into a marriage that my partner was assigned male at birth and had transitioned in their twenties without ever disclosing it to me.

That would be a more than valid reason for separation, as a core pillar of the relationship has been dismantled. I would feel as though the entire relationship was built on a falsehood.

Some might argue: "Well, the relationship wasn't a lie. The love you felt was real, and the shared memories weren't fake." I can see why some might attempt to rationalise it that way. But for others, if you build a house on sand, it does not matter how beautiful the rooms are or how warm the memories made inside them were. The structure itself is fundamentally compromised. Once you discover the ground beneath you was never solid, every single memory is retroactively tainted by the deceit that made it possible.

a justice-based childhood decision might lead to destroying a family with a remorseful WS and a BS who would choose R were it not for the decision they made as a child.

This is the section I take serious issue with. Do you truly view someone who leaves due to infidelity as 'destroying a family'? This is classic victim-blaming. Sounds very much like: 'She should not have dressed provocatively, she was asking for it to happen' or 'well they shouldn't have had that much to drink, they put themselves in that situation'

When a relationship is built on mutual fidelity—often with explicit agreements that cheating is a dealbreaker—the person who breaks the deal is the one who destroys the family. I actually think the majority of waywards on this forum would agree with that. It was their choice. Attempting to guilt betrayed spouses into staying by claiming they are the ones destroying the family is manipulative, and I firmly believe you should retract that statement.

Did I not owe her something?

If this is a genuine question, no. If a partner breaks the fundamental terms of the contract, the contract is null and void. In my view, they are owed nothing outside of what the law dictates in divorce. I suppose if you had previously broke the terms of the contact and she forgave this - perhaps it would be reasonable for her to expect the same.

IOW, IMO, 'principles' are decisions made by children who see black and whit but not gray or colors because that's what children do. Adults see almost the whole spectrum, unless they decide to block something out or are color-blind.

This is a tired argument, usually deployed as a convenient justification when sound logic runs out.

Are any moral issues truly black and white? I presume we can agree that acts like rape or murder are unequivocally wrong. If we agree that certain actions are inherently immoral, why is infidelity conveniently reduced to a shade of grey? Seems very arbitrary to me.

Invoking 'shades of grey' is the exact mantra unrepentant waywards use to justify ongoing deceit. Perhaps this philosophy of abandoning principles when convenient is what allows some people to reconcile so easily—you have to share a philosophy of flexibility around core integrity.

Furthermore, the idea that children see the world strictly in black and white is flawed. Children often start with clear rules from parents—such as 'do not steal'—until an unattended cookie jar appears. Then, they rationalise: "Dad said I was good today, so I deserve a treat." They start to see the grey. The inability to hold firm to principles when temptation arises isn't adult sophistication; it is the very definition of childish self-justification.

[This message edited by DRSOOLERS at 3:28 PM, Tuesday, September 15th]