I didn't want to threadjack a post in Divorce...but it got me thinking about the strength of my marriage prior to d-day.

I'm curious...if your relationship had not been turned upside down due to infidelity...would you and your spouse eventually had some major relationship issues that you would have had to overcome? Do you think that you were always compatible and would have stayed compatible? Do you think you would have been in MC at some point in your relationship? Do you think that you may have separated/divorced down the road? OR Do you think that your relationship was good enough to have continued 'as-is'?

I know that there are often problems in the marriage that lead WS down the path to infidelity....but I can't help but wonder whether some relationships would have ended at some point anyway. I find it frustrating to think that I could end up spending a lot of time and energy on a relationship that just wasn't 'meant to be'. The flip side to that, is that I don't want to look back and regret not trying to make it work.

But I often wonder whether H and I were ever a 'good' match...and maybe our relationship was doomed from the start.

<<I asked this question on another site...and after someone's response, I added this:>>

There are no hard and fast rules to guarantee a successful marriage. There are an infinite number of variables that could make a marriage successful or make it fail.

But....what about 'those' relationships? You know...the ones that we envy. The marriages that have lasted 50+ years...the people whose eyes still light up when their spouse walks into the room (after 50+ years of marriage)...the combination of two people who have truly partnered with each other for life and who genuinely respect and adore each other.

I'm not talking about 'fantasy-land'...these marriages DO exist. I'm not so naive to think that these relationships have not weathered a few storms...maybe THEY have even been affected by infidelity (who knows?). But these relationships seem to be powerful enough and strong enough to make it through a lifetime of ups and downs. Do we need to go through something as traumatic as infidelity in order to have a relationship like that? Or is there just a certain combination of the 'right' two people that are able to overcome anything that life throws their way?

I know these questions are fairly broad...but I have not felt any 'love' towards my H in a long time. I question whether I ever did 'love' him....I question whether I even know what love is. The 'healing' process (for me) is starting to branch out...and I find myself looking at the 'bigger picture' now.

KARA WROTE:
"But....what about 'those' relationships? You know...the ones that we envy. The marriages that have lasted 50+ years...the people whose eyes still light up when their spouse walks into the room (after 50+ years of marriage)...the combination of two people who have truly partnered with each other for life and who genuinely respect and adore each other."

Again...too many variables and too many choices. We have no idea what life threw at them and how their choices as individuals affected their marriage...what made them grow as a couple and what may have made others wither and die.

For those marriages that make it, for some people maybe it was a strong belief in their marriage vows no matter what happened they vowed to stay together and over time came to respect and adore each other for just being there always... what I would call mature love. To get there I suspect it was working as a couple to make it through crisis situations (dedication). If you cannot work together through the hard times you drift apart. So I think it is a stern committment from both to put the marriage first at all times, through good and through bad and to not take the marriage or each other for granted.

The problem with many marriages today is that we can get divorced so easily so if it doesn't work out you can just leave. If you go into the marriage thinking this way it is doomed. If it happens sometime along the way, you're in trouble, but there is hope if you work together to repair the damage. Others feel there has been too much damage and that has killed the love and their drive to try, so it is over.

In the end, no matter how you look at it it is all about personal choice, IMHO.

Carol~

>>>would you and your spouse eventually had some major relationship issues that you would have had to overcome? Do you think that you were always compatible and would have stayed compatible? Do you think you would have been in MC at some point in your relationship? Do you think that you may have separated/divorced down the road? OR Do you think that your relationship was good enough to have continued 'as-is'?>>

For a number of years my husband and I had a good solid marriage. We enjoyed each other's company and got along (for the most part) great. And even though we have opposite personalities we always felt we were compatible. I know it sounds kinda corny, but we have both always felt we were each other's one true love.

Unfortunately we let the stress of life and kids get in the way of "our" relationship. At some point we both realized that we needed help in the way of counseling. Sadly, if we had just stopped and discussed our problems and agreed to work on them, then we might not have even needed the counseling. But we didn't, and then I had an affair. 

There is no doubt in either of our minds that had we gone to counseling before my affair we'd still be together and happy. I'm not sure we would have survived "as is" before the affair. It was getting pretty bad. But not bad in the sense that either of us felt we couldn't have turned it around.

We have always felt that we were meant to be together, even after the affair. And we have always both been able to say without a doubt that we still loved and were "in love" with each other.

>>>Do we need to go through something as traumatic as infidelity in order to have a relationship like that? Or is there just a certain combination of the 'right' two people that are able to overcome anything that life throws their way?>>

I don't think people have to go through infidelity to have a relationship like that. I know a few people who have happy marriages that have lasted a lifetime with no infidelity involved. I think there is such a thing as a combination of the right two people.

We believe we are the "right" two people. Otherwise I don't think we would have weathered what we did. One of us (I believe) would have said...this is not worth it, and walked away at some point during the past 6 years.

GT

GT wrote >>There is no doubt in either of our minds that had we gone to counseling before my affair we'd still be together and happy.<<

Welllll...not so fast.

We did go to counseling first. I recognized almost two years before d-day that things were bad. Frankly, HER issues were surfacing, she was trying to blame them on me, and she really needed help with them. Finally, she agreed to start counseling about nine months before d-day...I don't know if she was already talking to OM or not at that point.

The physical part of the affair happened WHILE we were in counseling.

Chris.

You miss so much here when you go away...
I think about this a lot actually, we did have problems prior to A but nothing more than anyone else has,and yes if it hadnt happened we would have seperated somewhere down the line....but for different reasons.
I would (have) consider(d) myself happily married,ups and downs but basically a sound foundation pre A,she has always had problems opening up about things - important and trivial - and has preferred to bottle them up, im talking years and years worth...this just made her resent me for something I didnt even know about and generally question her position, but again she didnt talk about it despite me trying to get things out of her.
This has been coupled with a certain vanity on her part,she was a stewardess for a major airline and was used to compliments and attention,despite what she said about wanting to give up when she did, I think she 'lost' something and despite still looking great and youthful for her age,she felt a bit empty and anything I said in the way of compliments was just ignored..and then came her depression.
And my so-called friend,he saw something was up and just homed on in there to fill the void...and she took the bait.
We are a bit more wiser now,she is starting to understand that she has been incredibly stupid and childish,not hurting just me but our kids and families into the bargain,she is trying very hard to make up for it but Im still worried about trust! She lied too easily for my liking.Im feeling a lot better but have moments when Im really down and she sees it and tries to help.
So yes we would have been doomed had this not happened but then maybe we still are??? thanks Jon

'One cannot answer for his courage when he has never been in danger'

>>The physical part of the affair happened WHILE we were in counseling>>

But what if you had gone to counseling before the OM was ever in the picture? We had problems way before I ever met the OM. But basically we were still happy in the marriage. When we first started recognizing problems we ignored them. And then when they got bigger and bigger we just kept ignoring them.

I wanted to get help, and we even discussed it at times. But didn't follow through with that thinking. In a lot of ways I saw my husband's not wanting to deal with our problems as him not caring.

I talked with my husband about this again last night. We both still believe that had we gone to counseling at the onset of our problems we could have worked through them.

GT

GT we said the same,I said 'why didnt you just tell me when he started chipping away at you,and we could have sorted it then and prevented all this,instead of you acting like a spoilt 17 year old' and she says she wished she had but it felt nice that he was complementing her and anything I said was discounted as fake.The 'affair bubble' I believe its called, ta Jon

'One cannot answer for his courage when he has never been in danger'

It all comes down to honesty, I think. If the betrayer was honest enough to point out really clearly that there was a huge problem that needed to be sorted, then a lot of these affairs wouldn't have taken place.
My H reckons he didn't know he was unhappy in his marriage until he found himself having a one night stand, and I believe that about as much as I believe, well, can't think of anything, but something unbelievable!!
Oh! I know! That's pigs fly and cows jump over the moon.

I wasn't trying to say that you and your H wouldn't have gotten help from counseling sooner. I was trying to say, "your mileage may vary...mine did".

I was trying to illustrate that even with counseling some people make the wrong choices about who to talk to about their problems.

Some marriages don't get fixed.

Chris.

"But I often wonder whether H and I were ever a 'good' match...and maybe our relationship was doomed from the start."

You know your question is funny because I have really been thinking about this type of thing so much lately. I'm sure you know I've been dating someone for quite a few months here lately and he has definitely made me feel that ex and I were just plain old an awful match even in the beginning. I just don't think I would have ever realized it if I hadn't gotten out of it. I probably would have stayed in that marriage forever and would have been fighting over his porn addiction and general pushing away from his family for ever. He was always on a computer or watching TV and even did these things when visitors would come by. He was downright rude the first time he met one of my brother-in-laws, staying on the computer for several hours when they came down to our house for the weekend. In a way, he forced me out of our marriage by not getting counseling for his addiction and not caring to be a better person. I thought I was married for life and would never have intentionally left my marriage because of my sense of obligation and responsibility to my children especially. But my BF and I seem to be an incredible match and I am lucky to find this so soon after ex and I broke up.

I have found that this new guy and I have tons more in common than ex and I ever did, such as, we like the same types of food, even share each others plates often, we both have very close knit families and enjoy the craziness of large families all getting together often (our families are much alike), we are both givers (this was not my ex at all), we are both very financially responsible (my ex was not financially smart at all and is now showing signs of not being responsible financially on his own), we both are pretty darned good at getting along with the others child/ren (we seem to function as a family unit when we are together fairly well), we seem to be an incredible match even in the bedroom and we both agree maybe unusually so. I had thought my sex life was good before except I never felt that I could please my ex enough b/c I think I was constantly being compared to all the porn stars he liked to stare at. He sometimes asked me to do things that I thought were somewhat degrading. It is strange being with someone who I have no ill feelings toward and never have had any. We haven't fought even once and I find that unusual too (ex and I definitely fought in the early months because of selfish things he was doing even back then when we were young. I was just too young and stupid to know any different:>( or to realize that he would probably only get worse. No, BF and I are not living together and things could change a bit from there but I find he is one of the most conscientious men I've ever met. I honestly didn't realize a man like this existed and I don't mean that to be mean because there seem to be plenty of decent guys on this site dealing with infidelity.

The weird part is that ex and I probably would have made it for a long time had he not cheated and I am actually happy that he did now (I know that sounds crazy!) Now I have seen that there are better men out there who know how to treat people. I was naive enough to think that lots of guys were like my ex and it would be hard to find a good one.

I'm not saying that anyone else should get divorced or be happy about their ex cheating, I'm just saying it is giving me a second chance at a happier, more fulfilling life :>)

Charlie

I am as inspired by your story, as I am when I read stories of couples who re-built wonderful marriages after their spouse had an affair.

I think about this alot. If H and I are just NOT a compatible couple...then at what point do you say 'enough is enough'? I am not at that point yet (I'm only one year past d-day)...but I often wonder if attempting to reconcile with my H is worth it. He is remorseful and wants to re-build the marriage, but his affair has made me take a long, hard look at our relationship AND at what I want out of a partner. I know my judgement is clouded by the anger and hurt of his affair...but I am not certain that H is the person for me. On the other hand, we have children together and (if for no other reason) I feel as though I have to make an attempt to work on this relationship for them. I know that I will find these answers for myself, over time.

I read you story and I wonder if there is someone out there that I can have a wonderful, loving and trusting relationship with (preferrably without having the relationship rocked by infidelity). Then I read stories from others who re-built incredible relationships with their spouses (and who were in my shoes at one time)...and I wonder if our marriage could be like theirs.

Well...I guess time (and constructive use of that time) will someday give me all of the answers I'm looking for.

Kara

My first marriage was to someone with whom I had maybe too much in common. My current marriage was to someone with whom I embraced that we didn't. I feel more like my current wife in spite of the contrasts is still the one.

Given that I have had two different marriages take the same turn does leave me feeling that I was always 'settled for' or 'Mr. Right Now' until something better comes along. I'm just not sure that I could have done anything to prevent what happened. I didn't help it not happen, but I do feel there is something about me that just makes it easy to happen to me.

No, it's not self-pity. It's just a thought I get when this keeps happening regardless of the type of relationship I have. The "It Must be Me' syndrome.