I just read the post on this site for the first time in about 3 months. I was surprised at the feelings that came over me as I was reading them. I was sad to read the post of the people that are new to this whole affair mess and my heart goes out to those people. It is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to go through. This is a great site with many wonderful people on it.

On the other hand, I couldn’t help but feel exhausted reading some of the post from people that have been going around & around, just stuck spinning, since before I found this site, almost two years ago.

I’m sure if you’ve been on this site for any amount of time, you know the people I’m talking about…….. The ones that have been cheated on again & again, abused physically & emotionally and constantly saying how they caught S in yet another lie…. These people make me want to scream. These people make me want to shake them and tell them how they deserve better, how they should love themselves enough not to tolerate this type of behavior. If you are one of these people, please, please realize that you have been in the same spot for TWO YEARS!

Your S is a liar & a cheat, it wasn’t a mistake & they are not going to stop…. They have given you more than enough reason to leave them & you don’t. Instead, you become a detective; it is now your full time job to catch them in yet another lie…. My question to you is why? You already know what you are going to find and just like before, you cry, get upset, kick them out, post “poor me” threads, take them back & start the whole routine over again…. I say “poor me” threads, because you clearly haven’t listened to any of the great advise you have been given on this site.

Please, if you are one of these people and for what ever reason you can’t bring yourself to leave, at least come to terms with who your spouse is. Your spouse is a liar & a cheat, this is who they are. You can’t change them & they have proven they are unwilling to change for you. Instead of investing so much time in what new lie they are telling, enroll in a self enrichment class, go to therapy, make your kids your life. Stop caring what your S is doing – stop letting them have this emotional control over you. After two years they are no longer to blame for your unhappiness, it is all on you. Stop doing this to yourself.

I am not sure why some people continue to "hang on" to the past...actually wanting to control the present. I think that for each person the experience is different...

The irony of your post....YOUR wanting so badly for these people to "move on" and get on with their lives...which most obviously want to do...is not different than their wanting something to change in their situation with their WS....there is nothing they can do to change their situation except let go and move on. Your frustration with them (us...I guess I need to include myself in your category of those that continue to hang on) is not different than the feeling they have toward the WS....wanting them to "see the light" recognize their mistake and make a 180 turn. Do you get what I am talking about?

I am still so stuck in the vortex of this mess....I think I need something from him...what? I don't know. At some level I do know. I need to know that he made a mistake, that his decision to abandon his family and simply pick up with another one was wrong...that I was the better person in his life...that I am the only one who can nurture and care for him...BUT...he can't do that because he is not there...he will probably never be there.

What I need to realize is that whatever it is I need from him, I will never get. BUT, I haven't been able to convince myself of that just yet. I think the learning curve is different for all of us. I am anxiously awaiting the day that each of you describe...the day I will be driving down the road and all of a sudden the "light" goes on....I realize that I am the luckiest person in the world to have the life I have...even without him in it.

That hasn't come for me yet. I don't know how to make it come. The frustration you feel for people like myself is the same. I want to shake myself too...I want to make myself look in the mirror and convince myself that it will not happen, that this is my life now....that I am responsible for making my life what I want it to be. BUT, there is a piece missing in my life...I am thinking it is him...I have to figure out that it is something about me that is missing and only I can give it to myself. BUT, I am not there yet. I have done everything for myself I think I can do. I have traveled, read, exposed myself to new experiences....I have never worked so hard and put so much energy into something in my life.

I don't resent your words but I do question your giving advice without the recipe for making it happen. So....how did you do it? How did you let go of what was a major part of your life for so many years? How did you finally put closure on it?

I think that all of us would like to be where you are. I want to simply have neutral feelings toward my former H....but I don't. Am I insecure? Do I have a low self-esteem? Am/WAs I co-dependent? Who knows. What I know is that I was "hood-winked" and "blindsided" by the man I thoght was my partner in life forever. I don't like the mistrust in humans that is now a part of my thinking...I don't like the continued questioning the things we did as a couple...that I now know meant nothing to him. I don't like having to keep my "ego" at bay while I try to discover my soul and what it is I truly need in my life. I dont' like thinking every moment of every day that he is with another person from whom he is getting his needs met and I am not the one that is able to do it. I don't want to think about him shopping for her at Christmas and looking forward to the excitement she will show when she opens her gift from him. Those are the thoughts that occupy my thinking. I wish I could schedule a lobotomy....I wish I could wipe the thoughts of him out of my mind. But, I can't. I don't even know how to attempt it. I don't have contact with him..I still wish he would contact me and want me in his life..but he does't. I don't even know what that is...the continued pinning for someone who is so very destructive. A total jerk. A total waste of taking up space in this world.

Did he not have a responsibility to me? Yes, he did. Did he do what he needed to do? No, he didn't. I feel like I have been left here to clean up after him....my home, my soul, my heart, my childrne's hearts, my friends' hearts....I don't like being in a position of wishing harm or hurt to anyone...but I do to him. I hopw he is miserable. Is he, NO. He has moved onto another group of souls whose lives he will impact only to leave them as well.

I think all of this is about control and time. He has control over something but I don't know what it is. I am not even sure that he doesn't know what it is I need and refuses to give it to me. Oh, he has said that he is not happy, that he made a mistake...so what? That doesn't help ME to move one.

I guess what I am saying is that I am not sure if all of us know what it is that we truly need. I don't want anything...but I certainly need something. I am yearning for something. Is that an indication that it is just over the horizan? I don't know that either. Is that an indication that a major "shift" is going to occur? I don't know that one either. I awaken each day in fear. Fear that I am going to still pine for him. Fear that I will get so depressed and sad that I will bawl and have a meetin ghtat I have to go to and "act" professional etc. I don't like living my life right now...it is not authentic. It is now who I want to be.

Know that we don't want to be in this place. Know that we know we are the only ones who can move on....but, also know that for some of us the journey is very challenging and difficult.

I look forward to the day when I can awaken "cleansed" and free from the pain. The pain is excruciating....it has taken over my life. I don't want it anymore. I wish I could hire a "pain eater"...someone else who could take this from he. I want to have my memory erased....but that's not possible either.

Give us some advice...give us some support....give us some encouragement. I want encouragement that I too can get to the point where you are. BUT, I want my soul and self in tact. I want to awaken each day excited the sun is up and I have an opportunity to live the day to the fullest. I awaken now, at this moment in my life, with thoughts of what the two of them will be doing together and the thought that I am not part of his life. That is where I am stuck. I need to put all of that energy into my life and making my life worth living....any recipes for that?

Sorry that this is so long....I just got off....know that we really want to be where you are...but we haven't made it yet. Someone has to come in last. Coming in last is fine with me, as long as I can finish the race and make it over the line.

Thank you for a thought provoking post....

The 2 years you are referring to is not a bench mark - recovering from affair(s) is a process and some of us take more or less than the 2 years mentioned.

Altho I understand your irritation at some posts, reading about "come here - go away" cry of some of our members, we need to realise we are not made up the very same. From the ones who have come to the sad realisation that the marriage is over there are the posts from the ones who travail in a very positive way - whether together or by themselves. The closure that so many of us look for, the closure that we wish could give us some respite to the pain is a MYTH. Closure does not exist and never existed. It may be the sacred grail we look for. The day of reckoning comes only if and when we accept the affair, when we accept we have no control over anything and anybody except our own self, our feelings and behaviors.

The why of an affair IMHO is not so important as the "what am I going to do about it" and the "where do I want to go from here". We sometimes fall asleep at the wheel so to speak, take the other for granted willingly or unwillingly, and an affair is a wake up call for both individuals and the marriage. Some of us are more resilient than others or not, some marriages are more resilient than others or not.

Altho some posts do and will try, at times, our collective patience we can only agree to support or not support the poster. It is their reality as sad and iritating it can be at times.



And as you walk you make your path Kat

Kats- < The day of reckoning comes only if and when we accept the affair, when we accept we have no control over anything and anybody except our own self, our feelings and behaviors.>

AMEN Kats, great post. I'd like to add acceptance can be a minute by minute experience. And reassurance to those who are struggling is a kind thing.

TLMM