SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hiya people,

I wondered if anyone else here might have some insight, or a similar experience, to something I've experienced recently, quite some years after being betrayed. I'm a BH, M41 and ten years back my W was unfaithful to me. It was an unusual act of unfaithfulness, kind of a 'one night EA'. I'm not going to go into the full details right now (I may some other time), but a 'TLDR':

An out of town relative of mine (same age) who I was very close to was staying on our couch. Everyone always got on well with him, he was the life and soul of the party kinda guy.

One evening him, me and my W were having some drinks. I had work the following day so headed up to bed around 11pm, W decided to stay downstairs drinking with relative. They got on well too, nothing at all untoward prior to this particular occasion. Anyway, thankfully, I couldn't sleep. From the room above I heard everything. Over the next few hours, the situation downstairs went from completely innocent chit chat to undeniable emotional infidelity. Secret swapping, "don't tell X (me)", suggestive physical compliment exchanges etc. Some very low grade physical cheating occurred, hair stroking of all things. Ick. Anyway, I put an end to it once I had had enough - honestly up to that point I was so dumbfounded and this was so out the blue, I kinda sat there upstairs in denial and also needing to know to what extent these two most trusted individuals would actually betray me (it was of course a double betrayal, not just my W or my relative but both, in cahoots).

Needless to say this emotional-one-night stand was extremely traumatic. The next few weeks were chaos, all the patterns and routines I've read so many of you folks describe on here. But W did get it and make the right moves after a short period, NC was fully established and although she attempted TT initially, gave it up pretty quickly. That was the only solitary incident, that I know for a fact.

Anyway over the the next few months a lot of things were worked out, worked on and a very genuine reconciliation was achieved and we were/are very happy.

It isn't really so much the act of infidelity itself I was hoping to seek some input on, but what happened 9 years later (last year).

There was a trigger and for me suddenly for me it was as though the whole thing had just happened, like happened that very day. The trigger cause everything to come rushing back, the emotions, the roller coasting, the doubts, the questions (oh the questions), the mental insanity - all of it. Raw as the very night it happened. There had of course been many triggers over the years since the act itself, but none had had a major effect on me until this one.

Question 1, is this normal!?

But, what came next was worse. Whilst this revisited trauma was still in full swing, I developed (completely out the blue) absolutely 100% debilitating health anxiety. Like, I knew, I KNEW I was dying and had XYZ terminal illness. It was horrendous and totally new - I'd never ever had this problem before. This lasted several weeks, I lost many kg in weight and had to be signed off work for several weeks. Eventually it passed with some hospital intervention and the health anxiety and the infidelity trauma passed and I foolishly thought it was an isolated incident.

It wasn't. Around a year or so later, the health anxiety struck back, in exactly the same way. Different 'symptoms' but same problem and absolutely crippling. Weight plummeted, time off work, bed bound, absolutely horrendous. And then again, it passed. This time there had been no prior flashback to the infidelity.

Like I said, I had never had this occur before, until I had the re-triggering of the infidelity and trauma of nine years prior in 2024. Then the health anxiety and panic attacks returned a year later for a second time.

Question 2, can this happen? Is the onset of health anxiety potentially linked to the trauma of betrayal? Can being a victim of infidelity and the emotional damage of that prompt seemingly unrelated mental health problems? Or is it just an awful coincidence?

Any thoughts or insights would be much appreciated, thank you people. I'll do what I can to answer any questions but as I mentioned, the infidelity itself isn't so much what I was hoping to discuss for the time being. Thank you all.

I suggest EMDR. Your brain is remarkable at trying to hide trauma from you so you can get on with your life. Sadly, as you know, it does not stay hidden. EMDR is a short term therapy that pulls those memories into the "sunshine" to take their power away.

You might need a thorough physical exam just to make sure all cylinders are firing properly. Sometimes a change in hormones does this. You need to make sure you are ok physically.

You and your wife rug swept before you processed what harm was done to you. We NEVER forget insults, and their behavior that night was an insult by two people you trusted. That needs hashing out once you get your therapy going.

You and your wife rug swept before you processed what harm was done to you.

It's hard to know without more details about how his wife reacted or if she showed true remorse and did the hard work to make amends, but I was wondering the same thing when op said "over the the next few months a lot of things were worked out, worked on and a very genuine reconciliation was achieved and we were/are very happy."

Granted, it wasn't a full blown physical affair - that you know of, but it can, and usually does, take years to reconcile and heal from betrayal trauma like this.

Hi people, thanks for your replies. I understand what you're saying. EMDR is definitely something I'll look into.

One of the things I'm wondering about the most though, for now, is whether it's possible that the betrayal trauma can actually lead to/cause other seemingly unrelated mental health issues? Eg in my case health anxiety?

You might need a thorough physical exam just to make sure all cylinders are firing properly. Sometimes a change in hormones does this. You need to make sure you are ok physically.

Do you mind expanding on this a little? I've never heard anything about this aspect of things in the wake of trauma?

Granted, it wasn't a full blown physical affair - that you know of, but it can, and usually does, take years to reconcile and heal from betrayal trauma like this.

I do know for sure that it wasn't a full blown affair thankfully, and ironically. As I mentioned above, when this evening occurred, it started out 'innocently enough'. No boundaries were crossed for a while, just idle chit chat and then they were, as the alcohol flowed the secret swapping and progress begun.

At some point my relative asked my W if she'd ever cheated and swore he wouldn't tell me if she had, she answered "no, I'm not a cheat". Now the irony of this is that this was well after many boundaries had been crossed and plenty of non-physical cheating had already happened. The silver lining of that is that I can be 99.9% sure that it wasn't said "for my benefit" (as in deliberate for me to hear) because conversations were happening before and after that particular question which would neeever have happened in my presence. They either hadn't given me a second thought or assumed I was asleep/couldn't hear. On top of that, I immediately obtained all correspondence between the two for months prior to that event. There was quite little and what there was was friendly but nothing dodgy.

But I absolutely appreciate your point about it taking years to get over, I never ever expected it to come up in my head like it did again, let alone nearly a decade later...

[This message edited by inconelblue at 3:18 PM, Monday, September 29th]

Trauma certainly can mess with our system. The connection between the "master gland" in the brain, the hypothalamus, the pituitary gland (also in the brain) and the adrenal glands located over the kidneys gets very sensitized due to the state of alarm the body is thrown into by sudden shock. The endocrine system controls so many functions in the body. That is how hormones govern chemical reactions basic to life.

But I absolutely appreciate your point about it taking years to get over, I never ever expected it to come up in my head like it did again, let alone nearly a decade later...

The knowledge that it didn't turn physical takes some of the sting out of it, but boundaries were still broken and there was still a form of emotional infidelity involved. I can imagine how you must have felt listening to that conversation. The point being, and what's meant by "rug sweeping," is about whether or not it was truly dealt with and the proper amount of time, conversation, and effort was put into processing and making amends for all of it, or if it was prematurely swept under the rug, life went on, and that betrayal trauma was just buried and laid dormant for all of these years, only to manifest itself the way it did for you a decade later.

It's just food for thought. I'm not a counselor, therapist, or experienced enough by a longshot to say anything for certain so take what I say with a grain of salt, but a few months doesn't sound like sufficient enough time to deal with the potential trauma you may have experienced.

[This message edited by Pogre at 6:10 PM, Monday, September 29th]

inconelblue, to your first question, yes, triggers can happen many years later, and they can be just as vivid as the original event in terms of emotional impact. Ask any war veteran. Betrayal trauma can absolutely cause PTSD.

To your second question, I'm not sure that there's an established link between betrayal trauma and health anxiety specifically. It's more common for betrayal trauma to lead to depression and anxiety, especially in the immediate aftermath. It's possible that the health anxiety is something you're likely to develop, and the trigger last year cause it to flare up, especially since the health anxiety happened again without the infidelity trigger.

It's easy for us to mix up two kind of pain because both are so intense. As a personal example, I've dealt with a lot of trauma and grief about an incurable and disabling chronic illness that developed about a year before dday. It is tempting to blame some of that on my WS's behavior during his affair, but the truth is that I'll never really know if his emotional neglect contributed or if it was just a coincidence. In the end, it doesn't really matter, and personally, I decided that there were plenty of facts that he was guilty of, and I didn't to add something inconclusive to the pile.

Are you in regular therapy (like once a month if not more often) to understand and manage the health anxiety going forward? You might also want to explore any repressed feelings about the affair, childhood traumas, etc. Check out the book "The Body Keeps the Score" if you haven't already.

Definitely read the body keeps score. This should give you some insight to what's happening in your own body and why.
I too suggest a full physical medical checkup and screening for any and all age related testing that may be due or near due. Just to put that anxiety to rest.
That may include colonoscopy, stress test, cardiac cath etc.

Try not to allow this to turn you into a hypochondriac. Do what you can to keep yourself as healthy as possible. That will help you identify that you are doing all you can to stay well.

I am going to threadjack this to comment on trauma and health. I suggest you watch Dr Nadine Burke Harris whose TED talk is all about trauma, especially in childhood.

The anxiety you are feeling might be something from your early years that creeps up through the cracks in your psyche whenever you feel out of kilter. (I had such a wonderful childhood that the very few semi bad things I remember very clearly. But suppose there had been an undercurrent in my life that kept me off balance all the time. It might not have triggered fight or flight but it could certainly caused low grade anxiety.) After a while the issues in the family impede emotional growth. If, as a child, your energy was spent trying to make sense of senselessness, you would bring that unbeknownst issue into your adult life. Then if you become too tired, too stressed at work, that anxiety shows up because it has never gone away. My point being is the more traumas people bring with them into adulthood makes them wobbly anytime the loved ones misbehave. It does not have to be much of anything to trigger anxiety. All it takes for that to show up is the trusted spouse do folks harm, regardless of the behaviors.