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Failed reconciliation?


drifter777

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So many couples try to reconcile after infidelity - more than don't - and it often ends in divorce. We follow these kinds of threads here at LS all the time - the kind where it just doesn't work out and things end in divorce. I wonder how many of us view this as a "failure"? We say the reconciliation "failed" but I think what we mean is that it didn't work out. At least I don't see it as a "failure" because the couple tried but couldn't work things out in the end. Isn't that a good thing?

 

Some of you say that staying with a cheater takes courage, and I don't want to argue about this now. I think honestly trying to reconcile and discovering that it isn't going to work and THEN divorcing is very courageous. It is taking the action that you have determined - through painful work - is the right answer for you.

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This is a great post.

 

 

IMO, it is not failure because things do not work out, no matter how much we are programmed to believe it is.

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I think failing to try is the biggest failure of all.....for most, not all. As someone once said to me, "There is a reason you married her to begin with."

 

Real love is very hard to come by. Don't throw it away if it can be fixed. We are all human. We all make mistakes.

 

Love conquers all.....if you BOTH work at/with it. The only failure is not trying.

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I don't think staying with a cheater takes courage. I think realizing that you do deserve better is where the real courage comes in. People stay with cheaters for many different reasons, they feel they won't ever find anyone else and they will be alone forever, etc. Or they tell themselves this person will change and not cheat. Sometimes the person does change, but the relationship is still forever tainted.

 

I don't know about anyone else, but life is short and..I want to spend my life with a woman who would never disrespect me on such a level as to cheat. When I die..I want to know I had true honest to goodness love. The kind of love where I would never in a million years think of cheating, with her feeling the same.

 

So yes, divorce can be courageous.

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I think failing to try is the biggest failure of all.....for most, not all. As someone once said to me, "There is a reason you married her to begin with."

 

Real love is very hard to come by. Don't throw it away if it can be fixed. We are all human. We all make mistakes.

 

Love conquers all.....if you BOTH work at/with it. The only failure is not trying.

 

This was my take, WHEN I FINALLY decided to give reconciliation a chance. I had to try with ever fiber of my being. It's my A student mentality.

 

Whether we thrived or failed I had to give my all, and drag him kicking and screaming to many a therapy session, before I could throw down the gauntlet.

 

After all this effort, I could NEVER feel like a failure if we ever divorced.

 

I gave it MY ALL.

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In my case, I was giving R my all. But WH wasn't. WH was all about gaslighting, trickle truth and then,when he finally came clean on most of it, blame-shifting and still lying about his feelings. So from my point of view we did have a failed R...because unknown to me, WH wasn't doing any heavy lifting,he was rug-sweeping. When he finally realised I wouldn't rug sweep, he left.

 

A successful attempt at R (where both people really work at it) that doesn't work out, well that that's not the same thing.

 

Now if WH genuinely decided to do the work of R, I'd possibly give it one more try. I still love him, but not the cowardly things he's done. So I'd want to know that I'd given it my all before D.

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painfullyobvious

I would rather try and reconcile and have no regrets in saving a relationship then to simply walking away and later wonder if the relationship could have been salvaged. We each have our own levels of courage, tolerance for what we will put up with and egos for how infidelity looks from outsiders. There are many factors that play into the equation of reconciliation

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In my case, I was giving R my all. But WH wasn't. WH was all about gaslighting, trickle truth and then,when he finally came clean on most of it, blame-shifting and still lying about his feelings. So from my point of view we did have a failed R...because unknown to me, WH wasn't doing any heavy lifting,he was rug-sweeping. When he finally realised I wouldn't rug sweep, he left.

I see this as the most common scenario. And it's like being cheated on twice - you lose your marriage and then you lose any chance to fix your marriage.

 

For most WS, their character and personality traits make them lousy at both fidelity and reconciliation...

 

Mr. Lucky

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I see this as the most common scenario. And it's like being cheated on twice - you lose your marriage and then you lose any chance to fix your marriage.

 

For most WS, their character and personality traits make them lousy at both fidelity and reconciliation...

 

Mr. Lucky

 

It's so frustrating. It's possible to change yourself for the better, but many WS just don't seem to have it within them to do the hard work. I have the utmost admiration for the couples that do the hard soul searching and personal changes that R requires.

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In my case, I was giving R my all. But WH wasn't. WH was all about gaslighting, trickle truth and then,when he finally came clean on most of it, blame-shifting and still lying about his feelings. So from my point of view we did have a failed R...because unknown to me, WH wasn't doing any heavy lifting,he was rug-sweeping. When he finally realised I wouldn't rug sweep, he left.

 

A successful attempt at R (where both people really work at it) that doesn't work out, well that that's not the same thing.

 

Could not agree more. In my situation, I put everything I had into working on reconciliation with my WW. However she was actually committed to the process for less than 10% of it. That is a failed reconciliation.

 

When both are committed and it just doesn't work out, I think that is no different than a regular marriage breakdown.

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whiterabbit46

Being me. What is the story behind his betrayal of you, if you wouldn't mind sharing? Good for you for trying to work it out, and shame on him for not taking advantage of the second chance you were offering, the idiot.:mad:

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I don't think staying with a cheater takes courage. I think realizing that you do deserve better is where the real courage comes in. People stay with cheaters for many different reasons, they feel they won't ever find anyone else and they will be alone forever, etc. Or they tell themselves this person will change and not cheat. Sometimes the person does change, but the relationship is still forever tainted.

 

I don't know about anyone else, but life is short and..I want to spend my life with a woman who would never disrespect me on such a level as to cheat. When I die..I want to know I had true honest to goodness love. The kind of love where I would never in a million years think of cheating, with her feeling the same.

 

So yes, divorce can be courageous.

Again both take courage. Forgiveness and humbling yourself enough to not be holier than thou against someone has wronged you takes a lot of courage if you are doing it for a noble cause like keeping a family together. If you stay out of fear that you will never find love again, or because you are afraid to make it on your own, that's cowardly. When I was trying to reconcile it felt a lot more courageous than when I divorced. I was against the world it felt like, loving my family inspite of all the hatred and venom people here threw at me. If I hadn't reached my limit of how much crap I could take I'd still have my family intact. Unfortunately my ex wasn't really all the remorseful in her actions and it was inevitable in my case. I grieved for the split of my daughter's home more than anything else. It's not always just about 2 lovers. It's about entire extended families being ripped apart. My relationship with my inlaws is forever ruined and that's sad. Not just my relationship with them, my mother's, my sister's, etc. 2 whole families ripped apart. That's a disaster worth braving the scary road of forgiveness to avoid.

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