SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I don't think it's intuition. I've been on this site for over a decade. Human nature isn't that complicated, although we often complicate our lives for a variety of screwball reasons. People's stories on here are as unique as they are, but the patterns reveal themselves in relatively predictable ways (which is why so-called AI is pernicious as hell).

In response to any trauma our brains automatically try to figure out why the trauma occurred and then, more importantly, how to avoid similar trauma in the future. For instance, if you've ever burned yourself on a stove, your brain rewires itself to ensure you don't do it again. When it comes to shit like infidelity, which has nothing to do with our own actions nor inactions, our brains get a bit frazzled (or completely fucked).

I can understand your frustration and disappointment and why you've been kicking yourself in the pants for nearly forty years.

It's not your task to understand why your wife chose to escape her own issues by having an affair. It's certainly not your fault. It had absolutely nothing at all to do with you. Nothing you ever said or didn't say, nothing you ever did or didn't do, would have made any difference. It was 100% on her and her alone.

At this point, even decades later, I'd say it's high time to hold her feet to the fire and insist that she do her best to open up about it all. It may not completely alleviate your anxiety (or whatever), but it's sure as shit better than silence!

Why

The ‘why’ question…endless and unanswerable. Whatever answer comes up always sounds so pathetic because it can in no way justify the A (and people are deathly afraid that it might).

If you can’t exactly and precisely answer why and how the affair hurt you so deeply, it really is unrealistic to ask them why they cheated. I will say, though, that wherever their desire to cheat and your pain from it come from, they come from the same place.

What you can productively ask about is the facts of the affair. If they give you those facts and you reward them for it (don’t use them as wedges for future attacks) then you will likely get more. Their openness and willingness is something happening right now, too, not something 20+ years ago.

My experience when all of this got churned up again…I told my wife that at the time I caught her and ever since, that she had only ever shared the bare minimum, only ever confirmed what I already knew. Now I needed to know more, I needed for her to tell me facts that I didn’t already know, or I’d be fine going our separate ways.

None of my questions were about feelings, just dates, times, numbers, firsts. Could her answers be lies? Sure, although it’s hard to build up a web of bullshit and not have holes in it. And more importantly, with my questions about the long ago past I was really asking questions about what was going on with us right now. Today. This minute. Are you with me or not?

The actual answers didn’t matter, it was how they were given to me that mattered. I focused not on the answers, but they were given. I watched her. Was it like pulling teeth, or were they provided, reluctantly of course because who wants to admit to being a horrible person, but with an understanding that they were helping? Right now? And when we got to that point, I found I didn’t want to know any more facts, because I knew the answer to the question, are you with me or not?

It also helps greatly to get to the point where you are absolutely ok with or without them. Don’t telegraph the answer you want to hear, just ask the questions.

when I look inward there’s simply an endless, silent void

I can bet the void she saw looking inward during the affair was a yawning abyss of moral nothingness. So she probably didn’t look. She probably turned away. Who would ever want to see that truth? Take the easy path.

"looking for a place to safely share how disappointed in myself that I am for some of the feelings I can't seem to discard. It is not fair to my wife and it is not fair to me."

Got it. You want to reach a level of graceful acceptance while acknowledging that your wife isn’t capable of doing more . In that case, I would recommend listening to Brene Brown’s "Owning your story". There shouldn’t be any disappointment , rather comfort in knowing that you did your best considering the circumstances. You need to own your reality if you are not expecting or demanding for it to change. You also need to own your emotions and not look at them as a failure on your part.

Your wife describes her affair happening because of desperation, which sounds so sad. So I think you need to unpack that. Your childhood gave you a strong carapace to withstand the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune". Hers did not.
Somewhere on the internet I read that the word depression has many meanings but to use it here you have to qualify it, or quantify, whatever. Take sadness/happiness from 1 to 10. Most of us, if we are lucky, operate somewhere around 6-8. A bad day at work can get us down to a 2-3 but we bounce right back to our default setting. Someone whose sadness, at 1, is overwhelming thinks, and even does, suicide. Thank about that desperation. On the other end there is euphoria. A short term high that new love, new job, new car can bring but it is temporary. Where was your wife? If she was hanging on at 1-4 she WAS desperate. Take her word for it. I have had two friends describe it as a black cloak that feels smothering in its darkness. I hope she got help for it.
What you need to do is let go. She cheated. You can’t change that but you can change your outlook. You have a finite time on this earth. Don’t squander it. If you genuine love her, forgive her. Even better, give her a hug. Best thing in the word is body contact. It soothes the soul.

WoodThrush2
Superesse
InkHulk
Sisoon
Unhinged
House of Plane
Straightup
Cooley2here
Abalone123
Copingmybest

I want to thank each one of you for your questions, comments, suggestions, and warm support. All of you, in your individual way, have added some light in the void I had placed myself. I’m not normally black in thought and mood. I love the life I live and especially love living it with the woman I love deeper now than I did 53 yeas ago when I asked her to marry me. My love and affection for her has never been diminished, shaken yes, but not diminished. Respect took a hit but even that I can say I admire, in a different way, who she has become.

It is not unusual for me, at this time of year, to slide into a funk. June is the anniversary month of her telling me about the affair and 32 years post D-day it still stings a bit. Typically, I can pull myself out within a week or two, but this year was, for some unknown reason, particularly difficult to regain balance.

I don’t take any responsibility for my wife’s affair. However, I fully grasp that it is my responsibility to correct my mood. And I wish to do so without causing my wife more pain and injury than she has already caused herself. This is why I joined this site. So, I could shed black ink tears and not bring my wife into the void I was inhabiting.

I read a great many posts and responses to posts before I joined. I wanted a place that was safe for me and a safe place for my wife. (She is not on this site, no sites actually. It is just not her way.) Clearly, I made the right decision in joining and letting my guard down with all of you. As I’m sure most here would attest, it is not easy to show such vulnerability to anyone let alone strangers. I have no doubt I’ll have more to say, and I hope to be as kind, wise and supportive of others as everyone has been towards me.

Asterisk