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How do I stop obsessing about my wife's affair?


DarkPrince

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This is getting ridiculous. My wife had a 1 year long affair about 7 years ago. I always knew, but finally got a bit of the truth last June.

My wife refuses to talk about it, and will not get into any details about it with me. As far as she is concerned is a done deal, and I need to get past it.

She will NEVER tell me the truth about it, but its killing our happy marriage by me obsessing about it.

Im smart enough to figure out the details on my own. I really dont need her to tell me them. Im still angry though, and after 7 years and drastically different lifestyles, I shouldnt be. I have the perfect life, and I need to embrace it, not dwell on things I cannot change and will not happen again. (i truly believe she wont cheat again. She stopped drinking, and her personality is day and night difference)

This is causing tons of unnessesary fights, and is stressing the hell out of both of us. I dont want to break up, I dont want her to leave. A sick part of me still craves revenge, and thats the part thats causing the destruction now.

How do I stop this destructive thought process, before it leads into something I will truly regret happening?

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analystfromhell

She had an affair? Do you know she was honest in recounting what occurred? Are you sure there haven't been others or that there is nothing going on now? If you're sure she's told you the whole truth then maybe some counseling will help. Then again, counseling may also reveal you don't think the truth has come out, that she's hiding something or someone and the trust in the marriage bond has been damaged or destroyed. Who knows where it will lead but counseling will help you decide.

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Marriage counseling.

 

It's easy for her to leave in the past, but you've clearly not recovered from it. You need to INSIST that the two of you go to counseling to work through the issues that you're dealing with. If she refuses...then it's clear that her desire to help your marriage is much less than her desire to continue to cover up and hide her past.

 

That might be an answer in and of itself for you.

 

But that's where you need to start. Your marriage, and you personally both need some counseling to help you deal with it, whether she likes that or not.

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This is getting ridiculous. My wife had a 1 year long affair about 7 years ago. I always knew, but finally got a bit of the truth last June.

My wife refuses to talk about it, and will not get into any details about it with me. As far as she is concerned is a done deal, and I need to get past it.

Beyond her obvious refusal to acknowledge your feelings and do whatever she can to help you begin to heal, her behavior is saying to you that she is not really sorry for what she did or that she feels she was somehow entitled to cheat on you.

 

Im smart enough to figure out the details on my own. I really dont need her to tell me them. Im still angry though, and after 7 years and drastically different lifestyles, I shouldnt be.

 

You may be able to put together the big picture, but it's the lack of details that is one of things driving you nuts. And as far as the 7 years thing, don't do that to yourself. The two of you have even attempted to reconcile, you are just toughing it out and hoping that time will heal everything. It's a little like waiting around for a miracle to happen. It's not going to magically heal itself, you both are going to have to commit to a lot of work in order to resolve this thing.

 

She will NEVER tell me the truth about it, but its killing our happy marriage by me obsessing about it.

 

Face the fact that no matter how this ends, no matter how much she swears she has revealed everything, she will NEVER tell you the whole truth. She will tell you as much as she thinks she has to in order to get whatever it is she wants. That doesn't mean she won't tell you enough of the truth so that you can begin a real reconciliation process, it just means you shouldn't expect more than she can give you.

 

I have the perfect life, and I need to embrace it, not dwell on things I cannot change and will not happen again. (i truly believe she wont cheat again. She stopped drinking, and her personality is day and night difference)

This is causing tons of unnessesary fights, and is stressing the hell out of both of us. I dont want to break up, I dont want her to leave. A sick part of me still craves revenge, and thats the part thats causing the destruction now.

How do I stop this destructive thought process, before it leads into something I will truly regret happening?

 

As has been said here, you don't have a perfect life - nobody does. Beyond that, you feel angry, hurt, and betrayed by her cheating. Again, this is really not going to get any better on it's own.

 

What do you mean when you say "destructive thought process"? Are you seeing those horrible porn movies staring your wife and OM in your mind? Do things trigger the memories of what she did and flood you with nearly uncontrollable anger and/or sadness? The only way you can begin to repair this is to work with your wife to repair the damage she has done to your marriage and, more importantly, to you and your psyche. Your description of what you are feeling indicates a great deal of damage has been done to your self-respect, self-esteem, and sense of well being. You really should begin counseling regardless of how things progress with your marriage.

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I understand what everyone is saying, but everyone makes mistakes, dont they? Maybe she's embarrassed to go into the details with me because she's ashamed she did it. The guy wasnt exactly the kind of guy women flock too. In fact if she wasnt drinking, I dont think she would have given him the time of day.

Ive slept with women when I was drunk that Im very ashamed of, and want to act like it never happened now that I dont drink anymore either. So I can understand her there. I think she wasnt in her right mind when she did it (the whole affair)

Now she's a new woman and she doesnt want it thrown in her face since it was a mistake. I can understand all that, even sympathize with her, but I just wish I could maintain that mindset. Some days it just gets to me, and I start treating her like **** without even realizing it, and thats not fair to her of myself. Then after a few days we end up fighting.

As far as the details, I dont even know if I'd want to know now. It would just re-ignite the rage, and Im tired of being angry. My only solace is that 7 years ago she was a sloppy, fat, drunk. Now she competes in fitness model competitions (due to her making the right changes in her life), so I try to tell myself that at least he didnt have her now that she's hot and sexy. Also she had no self esteem back then, now she does. I really just want to get over this.

Of course I say this today then tomorrow I might want to kill her over it. Its a real mind ****. The damage IS there. The turst IS broken and we both know this. Even to this day she wont ever be alone (in a room or house) with a man. She doesnt want me to think anything so she avoids any situation that could make me suspect anything, and its good but it isnt because the trust is gone now.

 

Edit: sorry dont mean to ramble but I moticed one other thing. I only get these thoughts about the affair when things are going really well between us. Its almost like a self desturt program in my head. When we're fighting like now I dont really give 2 ****s about it.

Edited by DarkPrince
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Betrayed&Stayed
My wife had a 1 year long affair about 7 years ago. I always knew, but finally got a bit of the truth last June.

 

Whoa! Back up. What does this mean?

 

From the little details provided, it sounds like this affair has not been properly addressed.

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Ninja'sHusband

What needs to be there to rebuild trust? Truth.

 

It's pretty simple. She hasn't done that obvious thing.

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stopdropandroll

You can't stop obsessing about her affair until it's all out in the open and you both spend a significant amount of time and effort in dealing with it.

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Im going to end up having a revenge affair. If I get to have my cakr and eat it too then

maybe I wont feel as bad. If that doesnt work than ill quit caring. I think it will help though.

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Ah, right.

this is good, I'm with you on that, sure....

 

Instead of addressing the situation, trying to get your wife to open up and go to counselling, and achieve a logical level of understanding, and lay your cards on the table and rescue this so called happy marriage and perfect life - you're going to find some babe who will spread her legs for you, so that you can look your wife in the face and say - "you had an affair 7 years ago, and now finally, i did the mature and sensible thing and f**ked someone else too, so now we're even, bitch!"

 

What a good idea!

Why didn't anyone else think of this? What a master plan!!

Instead of trying to rescue it - let's absolutely annihilate it bury it, and ruin it for good, by acting like a moron!

 

Yay.

 

way to go.

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Im going to end up having a revenge affair. If I get to have my cakr and eat it too then

maybe I wont feel as bad. If that doesnt work than ill quit caring. I think it will help though.

 

It WILL help. For about 2 weeks. You will thoroughly enjoy the attention of another woman. You will feel like you don't much care about what your wife did; you will tell yourself that you even understand what she went through. You will find a new sense of balance and release your anger.

 

I've been there and done that. Even if you manage to end it cleanly (good luck with that part, by the way) and get back to your marriage, you'll still be a mess. My wife ultimately gave me permission to have mine; I had a free pass so I could try to release my anger. Yeah, right. Shortly after it ended, I found myself still not fully trusting her, still having triggers, still having mind movies, and being pissed at her about it. But I hope you hadn't gotten to used to being the victim because you'll no longer have a leg to stand on and she's now really going to expect you to get over it, especially now that she has mental movies of her own to deal with. It creates a freakin' mess, dude.

 

You are only considering the fun part and not the consequences (sound familiar?). You'll try being mad at her for making you into this person but if you make the decision to have an affair, it's all on you.

Edited by Kidd
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Did I mention that my wife is divorcing me now? Should be fun explaining it all to the kids later, just like it is now.

 

Fix your marriage, dude. I wish I had. Or leave her. The people here can help you either way.

Edited by Kidd
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Look your wife was screwing another man for 1 year behind your back and putting your health at risk for STD's. Now all she wants to do is rug sweep it away and forget about it?,,,What is wrong with this picture? This is not just a single mistake. She had the affair for an entire year and made a mockery of your marriage and relationship.

 

I guarantee you if the roles had been reversed she would not just forget about it. Her refusing to discuss it and telling you simply to forget it and move on is very demeaning and disrespectful to you. If she would rather divorce than discuss it with you then you should divorce. It also implies that there are things that happened that she clearly does not what you to know about. Do you know who the OM is? If she refuses to be honest with you then it really time to see an attorney. I think there must be much more to this story than you know.

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confusedinkansas

OR - Perhaps one of two things have happened.

1) it was long enough ago she doesn't remember the details you're asking for

or

2) she doesn't want to bring those memories back to the foreground of yours & her life ~ perhaps she's trying to forget & put it behind her.

 

She made a mistake. Doesn't mean she's a horrible person.

 

However, you're the only one that can decide if you can take those thoughts out of your daily life & move on. No one can do it for you.

If you can't - you should divorce. The sooner the better. It's not fair to either one of you for you to continue on.

 

If you can & you want the marriage to continue you should try to find a way to let those thoughts go.

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OR - Perhaps one of two things have happened.

1) it was long enough ago she doesn't remember the details you're asking for

or

2) she doesn't want to bring those memories back to the foreground of yours & her life ~ perhaps she's trying to forget & put it behind her.

 

She made a mistake. Doesn't mean she's a horrible person.

 

However, you're the only one that can decide if you can take those thoughts out of your daily life & move on. No one can do it for you.

If you can't - you should divorce. The sooner the better. It's not fair to either one of you for you to continue on.

 

If you can & you want the marriage to continue you should try to find a way to let those thoughts go.

 

Wow - mostly agree with CIK! I guess anything is possible.

 

I say mostly because the second suggestion, that you should find a way to let those thoughts go, is really not possible when this has reached a boiling point after 7 years. In my experience, these thought will only get worse so you need to do something about it as soon as you can. If she is unwilling to discuss all of this in MC than it would probably be best for both of you to divorce. Even if she is willing to try to rebuild trust and work on real reconciliation things might not work out. If that's the case at least you know you tried and will be in a better position to find peace yourself.

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Im going to end up having a revenge affair. If I get to have my cakr and eat it too then

maybe I wont feel as bad. If that doesnt work than ill quit caring. I think it will help though.

 

I think so too .... when it comes to you obessing over her affair. So you can put that baby to bed. Just be sure not to confuse it as a solution to your troubled marriage and your good....be sure to have a separate game plan for that too.

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OR - Perhaps one of two things have happened.

1) it was long enough ago she doesn't remember the details you're asking for

or

2) she doesn't want to bring those memories back to the foreground of yours & her life ~ perhaps she's trying to forget & put it behind her.

 

I can agree with the above.

 

She made a mistake.

 

No...she didn't. She did it because she wanted to strap herself on to another man. She knew exactly what she was doing.

 

 

Doesn't mean she's a horrible person.

 

Thats debatable.

 

However, you're the only one that can decide if you can take those thoughts out of your daily life & move on. No one can do it for you.

If you can't - you should divorce. The sooner the better. It's not fair to either one of you for you to continue on.

 

She should have divorced him before spreading them for another man. Its not fair to put her H in the position of having mind movies to replay.

 

Thats rich. She gets to have her fun, try to play it off as a mistake, but the onus is on HIM to divorce if he can't shed the mental images SHE bestowed on him? Thats a hoot.

 

If you can & you want the marriage to continue you should try to find a way to let those thoughts go.

 

NOBODY can ever let the thoughts go completely. One will never forget the betrayal. What he can do is not let images in his head bother him so much and make them few and far between.

 

The onus shouldn't be on him to make things "fair" for her. She should have been "fair" from the get go.

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She sounds very manipulative. She's making you feel bad for asking her to be more forthcoming about the affair;that's not a good sign and it's indicative of a character flaw in my book. On the other hand, why do people even bother to get married? Cheating, divorce, arguing, tolerating each other, going thru the motions.....have at it my friends.

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findingnemo

I understand wanting to keep the M going given that she's changed now. But you do need to get to the bottom of these feelings. If the trust is gone, you must rebuild it. To rebuild it, you'll need to ask her questions and the answers must be truthful. This kind of thing can only happen in MC. It's a safe environment to "discuss" the A and why it happened, and for you tell her exactly what you think.

 

It's quite possible that drunks will do stupid things under the influence that they cease to do after becoming sober. So yes, you're right to think your W has changed. However, you need to understand that the things that lead people into one destructive behaviour eg. addiction often lead to others. So while your W has beaten her alcoholism, there is an underlying issue that should be addressed in therapy. This includes her 1 year long A which like her alcoholism could have been a coping mechanism for her.

 

The only way for you to stop obsessing is by going for MC and hearing nothing but the whole truth. The only way for your W to truly get over what she did and change is for her to be open in MC and listen to all you have to say. You never know, she may have her own issues to bring up.

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Ah, right.

this is good, I'm with you on that, sure....

 

Instead of addressing the situation, trying to get your wife to open up and go to counselling, and achieve a logical level of understanding, and lay your cards on the table and rescue this so called happy marriage and perfect life - you're going to find some babe who will spread her legs for you, so that you can look your wife in the face and say - "you had an affair 7 years ago, and now finally, i did the mature and sensible thing and f**ked someone else too, so now we're even, bitch!"

 

What a good idea!

Why didn't anyone else think of this? What a master plan!!

Instead of trying to rescue it - let's absolutely annihilate it bury it, and ruin it for good, by acting like a moron!

 

Yay.

 

way to go.

Tara, In a marriage, where all things should be equal, why not have a little" eye for an eye"? DarkPrince's wife had an affair and suffered nothing, Dark prince has done all of the suffering, right? Perhaps his wife will value him more if she has to endure a little pain herself? Why would it be DArkprince's fault? The more I read these posts, the more I understand the need for fair play and justice. DP'S wife took a year off to f**k another guy, I think that DP is entitled to the same . Where does this attitude that one has to suffer while the other goes without repercussions come from? Edited by JustJoe
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OR - Perhaps one of two things have happened.

1) it was long enough ago she doesn't remember the details you're asking for

or

2) she doesn't want to bring those memories back to the foreground of yours & her life ~ perhaps she's trying to forget & put it behind her.

 

She made a mistake. Doesn't mean she's a horrible person.

 

However, you're the only one that can decide if you can take those thoughts out of your daily life & move on. No one can do it for you.

If you can't - you should divorce. The sooner the better. It's not fair to either one of you for you to continue on.

 

If you can & you want the marriage to continue you should try to find a way to let those thoughts go.

 

I agree with Kansas, but if DarkPrince thinks having a revenge A will help him move past this then that is fair. I just wouldn't want to know about it, especially any details.

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A revenge affair doesn't make an affair easier to cope with.

 

It just gives both partners TWO affairs that their marriage will have to recover from, rather than just one.

 

Feeling "entitled" to an affair is what led DP to where he's at today, when his wife felt "entitled", "justified", etc...to have her own affair.

 

Two wrongs don't make a right...they just make a bigger mess to clean up and deal with once it's all said and done.

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A revenge affair doesn't make an affair easier to cope with.

 

It just gives both partners TWO affairs that their marriage will have to recover from, rather than just one.

 

Feeling "entitled" to an affair is what led DP to where he's at today, when his wife felt "entitled", "justified", etc...to have her own affair.

 

Two wrongs don't make a right...they just make a bigger mess to clean up and deal with once it's all said and done.

 

 

Well now Owl that really depends on the indiviudal in question here..... theres no definitive right answer to this

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I agree with Kansas, but if DarkPrince thinks having a revenge A will help him move past this then that is fair. I just wouldn't want to know about it, especially any details.

 

As a cheater, of course you agree with her.

 

Why should the onus be on the betrayed spouse to end the marriage after basically being mentally abused by the cheating spouse?

 

Basically what you are insinuating is that he stayed with her, but because SHE caused him this grief, that the responsibility is on HIM to end the marriage when she should have before parting her thighs for another man.

 

Sorry, cheaters don't get to cause mental anguish to someone, then act like they are being horrible for not setting the cheater free.

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A revenge affair doesn't make an affair easier to cope with.

 

It just gives both partners TWO affairs that their marriage will have to recover from, rather than just one.

 

Feeling "entitled" to an affair is what led DP to where he's at today, when his wife felt "entitled", "justified", etc...to have her own affair.

 

Two wrongs don't make a right...they just make a bigger mess to clean up and deal with once it's all said and done.

I don't necessarily agree with this, Owl. IN MOST cases where the WS is , at least, making an effort to show true remorse, and the potential for a new affair is limited, I would say that a revenge affair is counter-productive. In Darkprince's situation, his wife has shown him zero respect, and the potential for a repeat is very high, and will remain so until she feels the same pain that she has caused. It (revenge affair) can also be a way for Darkprince to regain some sense of self worth and pride, as well as force his wife to see him in a different light and possibly be a little more respectful of what she might lose. Granted, considering her attitude, and his obsession, Divorce might be a better choice, but he has stated that he wants to continue in the marriage.
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