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What's wrong with me?


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D-day here for me. I’ve been wayward for about 5 months and my h just found out. Not even sure how yet. My friend’s husband suspected she was messing around and got into her texts/emails and lo and behold… discovered us talking about MY infidelity. I think he may have told H.

 

Maybe it’s just one of the phases of him finding out… but I find that I can’t fathom the idea of letting go of the cheating. I guess it just made me feel… validated? Sexy? Alive? What’s wrong with me?

 

Been married for 13 years, together 15. Honestly, we’ve never had much of a sex life, and it’s been a problem since day one. Not enough frequency or variety for me. Had a blowout over it one year into the marriage. He agreed to try some new things and more frequency. I probably should have just left then. I almost did several times along the line. Then we had kids and I felt like I was stuck.

 

I still have a lot of sex drive. He’s had ED problems and declined to go to the doctor or try anything. I bought lingerie for Valentine’s day last year and when I came into the bedroom he laughed. I think he started avoiding any kind of intimacy at all because that’s better than being embarrassed by ED. He also gained a lot of weight – he got up to 360 pounds, which I’m sure didn’t help the ED. The last couple of years we’ve pretty much been plutonic friends and co-parents. He’s a good friend and partner and parent.

 

Turning 45 this year was hard. I started dressing nicer, to make myself feel better. I went to a conference and shockingly, several of guys hit on me (I didn’t sleep with anybody). And it felt nice to have someone be sexually attracted to me. I thought, “Wow, maybe I’m not too old or too hideous for someone to want me.”

 

So I thought I would try to be up front about it and suggested an open marriage thing. He said no, which I sort of figured he would. I thought at that point I had three options:

- Get divorced and tear apart our family

- Never have sex again, and continue to get older and lose all my pre-menopause years when I actually have sex drive

- Try to have a discreet affair on the side

 

Obviously I went with the third option. Or attempted to.

 

I actually got involved with two guys. Both were “just sex,” not romantic. Both younger and pretty much into me for one thing I’m sure. One was single, one married.

 

Then, a couple of months after the “open marriage” talk, H went to the doctor and got testosterone shots. He started showing an interest in me and cuddling, etc. But I just felt like I had shut the door on that. I just didn’t want to be with him. I didn’t want a mundane, infrequent, awkward sex life. I was thinking about trying though.

 

H also revealed he had a bondage fetish, so he tied me up a couple of times. Not to do sexy stuff to me… just to tie me up. Hog-tie and gag. He’s especially into the gagging. And then he'd leave me on the bed. Or make me watch TV. And that’s it, the end of the fantasy. Which was fine, it was nice that he shared that with me and kind of fun… but didn’t really do anything for me, especially if there’s not really sex involved.

 

I don’t know what I want. I've been seeing a therapist to try to work through it. I had thought maybe this mid-life crisis or whatever it is would just run its course and I would get it out of my system and put it behind me. But obviously that’s not an option now. I don’t know if he’ll want to divorce or reconcile. Or if I want to divorce or reconcile.

 

He’s accused me of being selfish and not caring about our family. Of course he's right about me being selfish. I don’t want to tear apart the kids’ lives. But I still have trouble feeling much remorse about the affairs so far. I feel remorse that I hurt him. I feel remorse that our kids may suffer. I feel sad that our way of life may change, that we may not have the same friends, that his family may hate me. But I’m still not sorry for the actual act, even though I know logically that it was wrong. I knew it was morally wrong at the time and still chose to do it and didn’t feel remorse (after a while. At first I did). Why is that? Will it kick in later?

 

I'm an awful person I guess, because in a nutshell I'm not sorry I did it, just sorry I got caught.

 

Sorry for the word vomit.

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There's nothing wrong with you.

 

You've taken a very common logical path based on your beliefs and information at hand. I would talk to a therapist to get more perspective and insight to help you solve this problem in your marriage.

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How old are the kids?

 

Haven't hyper-analyzed this yet but off the cuff I don't see self-destroying self-sacrifice as necessarily virtuous. Are you looking for someone to beat you up? Almost sounds like that's what you're after.

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Why not separate and decide whether either of you want to reconcile. Your marriage obviously had problems, it seems you vocalised them, he did nothing about it and now that he has, you're no longer attracted him. I think unless some kind of miracle happens, this marriage has run it's course.

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I agree that separating and continuing therapy may be a good option for you. I think you need to figure out what you want. Divorcing may be scary when thinking about your kids, but many kids turn out just fine from divorced families. It's a lot better than growing up with two parents who barely speak and have a strained relationship.

 

Just be warned, your lack of remorse for having the actual affair may kill this marriage all on it's own, though something tells me you know that already.

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Maybe I was looking for someone to beat me up. Because the fact that I'm not getting totally beat up here is making me cry.

 

After the first time I cheated, I freaked out, developed terrible heartburn and acne, and had to go the doctor. Then I... learned to compartmentalize things, I guess. My whole original post probably sounds like a lot of excuses.

 

My parents cheated on each other, and I always thought it was disgusting. I never thought I'd be here.

 

H came home early and we talked a bit. He left to go talk with the friend who I thought told him (he actually found out because he was looking in my email for a school assignment and saw an email I sent to a girlfriend). He can definitely tell that I'm not really sorry I did it, just sorry that I got caught. I don't know that I ever would have had the motivation to change things at home. Just can't fathom changing my life's course, I guess.

 

Former WS's, will I eventually feel remorse and regret and disgust that I cheated? Where is that feeling now? Maybe I'm just in denial?

 

Our kids are 10 and 7.

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H is asking what I can do to assure him that I'll never do it again, and I'm thinking that I don't really want to stop. WTF is that? I feel like a sociopath. Maybe I'm just in shock? It's only been a few hours since I found out he knew.

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Maybe it's kicking in, because I'm starting to think "Why would I do that to him? Why would I risk making him feel that way and put our family's happiness on the line?"

 

Why was I so selfish?

 

Sorry, I suppose I don't need to put my every thought out here. Just don't know what else to do right now.

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I think having lots of conflicting emotions early on in a crisis is probably normal. If you're looking for practical advice, I'd avoid discussing anything in-depth right now (or doing anything like making guarantees you can't keep). Let the dust settle a bit and see if things fall into place a little better. :)

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autumnnight

First I will say that there is no excuse for cheating. It is always wrong to cheat. I want to get that out of the way.

 

If everything in your original post is true (not that it justifies), then I think I know why you do not, at this point, feel remorse.

 

You were in an intimacy-starved marriage. It created friction and conflict. Your husband could not plead ignorance of your needs, and yet he did nothing to meet them. Even WHEN he began to get interested, it was in acts that did nothing for you but were all about him and STILL not sexual. Eventually not only did the resentment get the better of you, it killed any attraction you might have for your husband.

 

Then you began making an effort on yourself to feel better, and lo and behold people noticed. This probably did 2 things: first, you liked being noticed because you are human. Second, your realized something pivotal. Other people noticed you, which meant that it WASN'T all about your failure. I would bet you probably assumed YOU just weren't worth desiring and that was part of how you coped with your husband.

 

Enter anger. Anger that you had already missed out on what most couples take for granted. Angry that in order to stay married you were sentencing yourself to a life of missing out.

 

Add all that to the opportunity with people who were interested in scratching that itch, and bam! You chose.

 

Now, you do care for your husband enough to hate seeing him hurt. But your eyes are also open enough to NOT want to go back to starvation, and that angry part of you probably thinks, dammit, I shouldn't HAVE to go back to starvation.

 

True remorse for you is way more than really being sorry. True remorse for you means possibly sacrificing intimacy forever.

 

I understand exactly why you are having trouble with remorse. Thing is, until you really face what YOU chose to do, nothing will get better.

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Maybe it's kicking in, because I'm starting to think "Why would I do that to him? Why would I risk making him feel that way and put our family's happiness on the line?"

 

Okay... so there's a thought to start with. However, in the post above that, you said you weren't really sure if you wanted to stop cheating. You either stay in your marriage and stop cheating (this means being completely honest and transparent with your husband, and sadly it seems like sacrificing intimacy), or you divorce him. Staying and reconciling would be a start to show remorse, and I feel so would divorcing him, because you're freeing him of this situation. You can't continue to stay married and cheat. It's not fair to him in any way, shape or form.

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ww_girl - I, like autumnnight, do not believe that cheating is ever a good option, but I also deplore the fact that your husband never cared enough about your needs that he did anything (until recently) about rectifying the situation. This is a marriage issue and a marriage is a RELATIONSHIP between two people who love and value one another and are committed to meeting each other's needs. I believe it to be a sacred thing and everything you said you fear will come to pass if things don't change - the family will be torn apart, your children will be impacted deeply, you and your husband will live separate lives. This is the nature and reality of divorce - but there IS HELP available.

 

Individual "therapy" is fine - if your therapist values family and wants to help you in the process of fixing what is wrong there. There is a marvelous organization, however, called The National Institute of Marriage which specializes in intensive counseling. Their success rate has been phenomenal with couples just like you. If you want more information send me a private message and I will provide it. It's important to understand that inactivity brought you and your husband to this point and now you stand at the precipice of the most important decision of the rest of your life. One of the key mission statements of The National Institute of Marriage is "restoring hope where there has only been hopelessness." I hope you will at least look into it. My thoughts and prayers are with you.

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I think you need to divorce and move on. You married a sexually lazy man who let himself go and put nothing into the marriage. You should have divorced him long ago before you let it go this far. He has neglected you all these years. I too cannot feel very sorry for him.

 

Water under the bridge, but it doesn't excuse your cheating.

 

If you separate all you will be doing is giving yourself the freedom to cheat some more. Get a divorce, split everything and move on with your life. Find a man who compliments you sexually and in all other areas. Let your husband find himself a fat wife who doesn't give a crap about sex.

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The last couple of years we’ve pretty much been plutonic friends and co-parents. He’s a good friend and partner and parent.

 

 

Then there's no reason to believe that you wouldn't be able to remain on good terms and continue to have a good coparenting relationship after the divorce.

 

If it is in his character to be a good person and a good father, then he will remain a good person and good father after the divorce.

 

If you are a good person and a good mother then you can continue to be a good mother after the D as well.

 

Children are harmed by abuse, neglect, abandonment and chronic drama and fighting. They are not harmed by two supportive, loving parents that happen to reside in separate homes.

 

Your marriage is dead. Your husband doesn't light your fire any more. You are involved with other people and are not remorseful about it and do not wish to stop seeing these other people.

 

Your marriage is dead. Mourn it. Have a good cry over it. Give it a dignified and honorable funeral. Bury it and then move on with your new life on your own with shared custody and a new coparenting relationship with your ex husband.

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Good points by LW below. I just added some more detail to it.

 

 

 

If you separate all you will be doing is giving yourself the freedom to cheat some more.

 

 

i agree. Separations are only good for two things. One is a stepping stone to divorce to start adjusting to single life and the other is to separate yourself from a volatile situation and allow the dust to settle and for people to clear their heads and think rationally.

 

Neither of those situations apply here. You are already aware you are deeply dissatisfied with your marriage and you are already involved with someone(s) else.

 

Separation will serve no valid purpose and will only give people false hopes and expectations. Cut the cord, pull the ejection handle and move on.

 

 

 

Get a divorce, split everything and move on with your life.

 

yup. Set a new goal of having as smooth and cooperative divorce as possible with as little amount of chaos and drama as possible.

 

Let it die with a whimper, not a roar.

 

 

 

Find a man who compliments you sexually and in all other areas.

 

yup. You've already raised your kids with this one (since you are 45, I am assuming they aren't little kids) now find one that is a compatible match for you and that will free him to do the same.

 

Let your husband find himself a fat wife who doesn't give a crap about sex.

 

 

that is a possibility but so too is the possibility this will be his wake up call and he will get off the couch and do something with his life and become more fit and vigorous and meet a nice woman that he clicks with and will treat him well.

 

He can't do that if he is still trying to hold on to you and you don't love him and are not attracted to him and continue to cheat on him.

 

If you make a clean break, he can move on and find someone that is compatible with him. You no longer are.

 

 

 

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Maybe I was looking for someone to beat me up. Because the fact that I'm not getting totally beat up here is making me cry.

.

 

If it will make you feel better to get beat up then here it is - it was wrong to cheat.

 

You should've tried to improve your marriage and given him fair warning that you were deeply dissatisfied with him. Then if things couldn't be fixed, you should've divorced him and then started seeing other people.

 

You made a mistake in cheating that will cause some other bumps in the road that you wouldn't have if you had not cheated.

 

But it's water under the bridge now.

 

Before you cheated you had options. Now your options are limited. You can either choose to try to reconcile in which case you will spend the next few years dying slowly inside while you try to stay with a man that you do not love out of guilt. In. Which case you will watch him go through the anguish of mistrusting you (for valid reason) and putting himself through hell trying to lose weight and change who he is in hopes he can keep you out of other men's beds all while you pine for and yearn for those other men.

 

Or you can pretend to be reconciling while you still see the OM on the down low.

 

Or you can cut your losses and and try not to make two mistakes in row and shoot for as amicable divorce as possible.

 

This is all just one guys opinion of course but I think this is just too far gone. I think it will be setting both of you up for failure and heartbreak to try to work this out.

 

He is going to have to under go metamorphosis and change himself into a completely different person to get your interest and keep you out of other men's beds.

 

And even if he does that and gets his balls and dignity back, then he may just see you as a cheating whore and take off with some other gal anyway. Even if he doesn't take off he'll be resentful that you cheated and resentful he had to become a different person to keep you around.

 

And even if he does become a stud, you will become resentful that you had to resort to cheating and come to the edge of divorce to get him off the couch and to put down the Twinkies.

 

If you were 25 years old and had babies that would be one thing, but you two are full grown adults that are in the prime of life.

 

It's all about cost vs benifit at this point. You can put in tons of work and heartache and years of your life in hopes that you both will completely change and hope a known miserable situation will become good.

 

Or you can walk away and hit the "reset" button and take your chances like every other single parent in their 40s.

 

Which do you think has the higher chances of success per unit of work, effort, heartache and time?

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Friskyone4u

Well, before you had three options and now don't . I don't think you are going to get a lot of advice here cheering you on to continue cheating and lying to your husband. So that leaves either trying to resolve this and be faithful or divorcing .

Now , he is going to have to make an big time effort to help fix this but you own 100% of the infidelity . Get over the felling you are entitled . YOU ARE NOT!!!!

You are entitled to show the man some respect, tell him he cannot meet your emotional and physical needs and that you will have to end the marriage as peacefully as possible. Now if you want to be a selfish miserable human being , you will continue to lie and deceive your husband rather than being honest .

Up to this point there can be some argument that there are some serious issues in your relationship . Now that you are caught , it's all on you to do one or the other .

In your state of mind all separation will do is give you more space to cheat some more without him in the way. Total waste of time

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Hope Shimmers

Well I have to say, your honestly is actually refreshing.

 

It is REALLY early for you to be making any decisions. But it does not sound like you and your H have much foundation on which to build any kind of reconciliation, even if you do get to the point of being remorseful and if he gets help for his sex/intimacy issues. Sometimes it is just too late, and that train has already left the station.

 

I think your best bet is to leave the marriage, but that is just my opinion. I can tell you that your kids aren't benefiting from seeing an example of a marriage lacking intimacy and involving infidelity. They will be much better off with two happy and solid people who work together to co-parent.

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toolforgrowth

My xWW cheated on me. And the funny thing is, she cheated on me after I was the one who put in all the effort trying to fix our lackluster sex life.

 

Look, I get being starved for attention and sex. God knows I was! I think those are basic needs that pretty much every human has. And while I don't condone your cheating, I can kind of understand it. And this coming from a BS!!

 

But what you did was still wrong. There's no denying that. I had every reason to cheat on her, but I kept my vows (until I discovered her affair, at which point I hooked up with a kind of old flame who used to model...boy did she hate that lol). While you had legitimate complaints and issues regarding your husband, you went about it completely wrong. That choice is all on you. You need to own it, accept it, and do the necessary work to make sure it doesn't happen again.

 

But you also need to end this marriage. It's a complete farce. Do the right thing and amicably divorce your husband, split the assets and time with the kids 50/50, wish him the best, and find someone with whom you are more compatible.

 

You can't change the fact that you cheated. You can't alter that poor decision. But you do have control over how you choose to conduct yourself going forward. What kind of person do you choose to be?

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I think your husband should make it your responsibility to explain your two boyfriends to your children. Imagine what their idea of a good normal marriage is when they learn that grandma and grandpa and mom all cheated? To answer your question as a stranger that has never met you, the only thing wrong with you is your a liar and a cheater and can't be trusted.

 

What are you going to do to make sure your children don't end up with a skewed view of what a healthy relationship looks like? How will you teach them about honesty and boundaries when you can't honour them yourself, in fact your refusing to because affair sex is more important to you than your family according to your writing. Just reading your words that your sorry you got caught but not sorry you did it made me want to puke, ya, your a keeper. Get some professional help than if being married to the father of your children is to much for you set him free to find a woman more compatible with him, one that honours their word.

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WW_Girl

 

 

First of all your not a girl. You are a woman, a mother and at one time a wife.

 

 

All of your emotions are just starting to come to the surface. You got caught cheating.

 

 

With two guys.

 

 

I understand you feel no remorse. Maybe you never will. If that stays them be honest with your H.

 

 

But if in time you feel remorse then show him that.

 

 

Ask him not to make any long term decisions right now until his emotions settle.

 

You do the same.

 

 

You both should agree on healthy boundaries for now while you still are under the same roof.

 

 

Get some counseling. You need it. You really need to figure out why you decided to cheat and if you can stop.

 

 

You also need to figure out if you can be honest with your H again.

 

 

Do you want to break up your family or not.

 

 

Your H also needs to get his act together whether or not you two decide to stay together.

 

 

Was the sex protected or not? Do both OM know about each other?

 

 

Did you tell your H who they are and does he know them?

 

 

And expect more fall out.....

 

 

HM

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I only have one question: When you gave yourself 3 options, DID you tell your H??????

 

Did you tell him your thoughts? And what option you were leaning towards?

 

Did you tell him how happy you were to hear and reenact his bondage fantasy?

 

And how UNHAPPY you were,it did not result in,wild monkey sex?

 

because you should have!

 

True intimacy is sharing ALL of it. And you need to say I need sex, fun sex, and if you cannot make the attempt to fulfill my NEEDS, within reason, I will find it elsewhere because that is a deal breaker for me.

 

Listen, I do not think you have a marital problem, I think you have a communication problem.

 

I think you are a woman who needs to be desired sexually by her H. That is normal!

 

If you could have the sex you want with your H,,who I believe you admire and love, would you seek strangers? i don't think so.

 

You have to communicate your NEEDS lady,,and tell him honestly and directly what you will do if they are not met....within reason.

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First, thanks for sharing, it is always a good first step.

Secondly, I will come off harsh but perhaps it may help.

 

 

I thought at that point I had three options:

- Get divorced and tear apart our family

- Never have sex again, and continue to get older and lose all my pre-menopause years when I actually have sex drive

- Try to have a discreet affair on the side

 

 

This is simply so narrow in scope, that to assume any sort of rationale is simply a fallacy... as demonstrated especially with your second "option" which went way off course with:

 

Then, a couple of months after the “open marriage” talk, H went to the doctor and got testosterone shots. He started showing an interest in me and cuddling, etc.

 

Ironic how the unforeseen and life throws curve balls our way.

Then we come to the real issue: Cheating is not about your issues with your H or marriage issues, but something from inside you which spawned this:

 

But I just felt like I had shut the door on that. I just didn’t want to be with him. I didn’t want a mundane, infrequent, awkward sex life. I was thinking about trying though.

 

Your H is just an outside variable that can be interchanged and likely never change the outcome. This is what you must peruse and solve from within. This is also why you state:

 

I don’t know what I want. I've been seeing a therapist to try to work through it. ... ...

 

But I still have trouble feeling much remorse about the affairs so far....

 

But I’m still not sorry for the actual act, even though I know logically that it was wrong.

... ...

 

I'm an awful person I guess, because in a nutshell I'm not sorry I did it, just sorry I got caught.

 

 

 

First, you did an awful thing and you WERE an awful person, but you have taken the first steps, albeit your hand being forced to change that.

 

You are not sorry because you still like the "high" and the "fun" which is the point here. Cheating is a form of addiction and many do as you did in the start by making false options to help rationalize this and cover up and deny.

 

You have no idea what life will bring but you owe yourself one thing, to be a new and better wife if your H will allow and the best mom you can be with the most important, being a better you.

You need to look in the mirror and figure out what went wrong and why you pursued such a path when so many options were there, denying the unforeseen for the expediency of the thrill.

Once you begin to heal and fix your internal issues, the remorse will reveal itself. I use the word "reveal" as a point I want to add that the remorse is already there, that is why you are here. You clearly have guilt, you will have to wane off the addiction and as the layers peel off, you will know and feel it.

 

There are quite a few waywards here whom have been in your shoes and are now better, much better than the person they were before. There is nothing stopping you from this but you.

 

best of luck.

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