SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Just like all of you, I never thought I would be here. My husband and I have been high school sweethearts. Besides about a 1.5 year break up in college, we’ve been together for about 17 years, 10 of which has been long distance, including now. We are both in very demanding jobs that require a lot of training/ schooling and long hours. I found out 2 weeks ago about my husband’s EA with a married co-worker. Nothing physical (hugs, kisses on cheek, held hand once) but definitely full blown emotional intimacy. Her husband found out, so mine flew into town to tell me in person. In this convo he also told me about a year ago, when he was very drunk, he felt up a girl (according to him, she laid on his lap, played with his hair etc) on a uber ride home. And lastly he also told me that when we were broken up in college, he had sex with someone and never told me.
I am so confused and hurt by all of this. The information withholding for years, both the act of physically touching someone and then being in an EA, all combined seems like a pattern? I feel like our entire relationship has been a lie. Before I found out about all of this, I thought we had a wonderful relationship. The last 1.5 years have been a bit harder (my job for more stressful) but I have never doubted our love for each other.
We will officially end the long distance in 5 months and he will be moving to where I am. I have been looking forward to this for so long but now it all feels crazy.
He is remorseful and wants to make this marriage work but I am doubting his sincerity.
He is now seeking IC and wants to do MC. I am unable to make a decision.

Welcome to SI and I'm sorry that you're joining our club. First, there are some posts that are pinned to the top that we encourage new members to read. Also, there are some with bull's eye icons that you may need to scroll to find. The Healing Library is at the top of the page and has a lot of resources.

I suggest IC for you. If you can find a betrayal trauma specialist, they can be very helpful. Bonus points if they do infidelity betrayal trauma. Please don't do MC until you've had a chance to do some healing. There are some good ones out there, but many use the unmet needs fallacy and shift some of the blame to you. The choice to have an A is all his decision.

If you have trouble with depression, anxiety or sleeping, ask your doctor for some meds. They can be helpful during the initial discovery phase, and you won't necessarily need to be on them for long.

Hugging, kissing & hand-holding is physical. May not have been PIV sex, but it is physical.

You don't have to make a decision today or tomorrow. I would encourage you to see a lawyer for a free consult to get an idea of what D might look like. Knowledge is power. You don't have to D, but it may help you to have the knowledge.

If he's serious, then he should read How to Help Your Spouse Heal From Your Affair by Linda MacDonald. It's a fairly short book and is a nice blueprint to help him to help you. Another recommended book is Not Just Friends by Dr. Shirley Glass. (You can read both, too.)

Sorry you're in this spot.

Thank you for your thoughtful and quick response. I tend to intellectualize and seek resources in times of crisis so I have been looking through all the posts that you suggested.
I have a therapist who has known me for the last 1.5 years who has been immensely helpful. Doing weekly therapy and getting my head on straight and gaining some clarity slowly. I love the advice of not doing MC right away, especially when I still feel so raw. I have told him that I need time which he understands. Giving myself grace to feel all the feelings for now.
I will check out those books as well.

Ditto to what Lea has said.

Chances are quite high that he is minimizing the degree of his physical affair. Unfortunately very common and textbook.

Take care of yourself first. He figured out how to cheat on you, he can figure out how to reconcile if that is what you want.

I’m sorry you are here.

welcome to the last place you wanted to find. But we all understand what you are going through,

First, know that his cheating is 100% on him. It was his choice.

This is going to be a big ugly roller coaster of emotions for a long time. Generally wisdom here is 2-5 years to heal. You will not feel like you do now, but it takes a long time to recover from this, whether your Reconcile (R) or Divorce (D). So be good to yourself. Take care of your body and mind. Eat healthy, drink lots of water, avoid drugs/alcohol, exercise daily, and get enough sleep. If you are having trouble sleeping or with anxiety, see your doctor.

And be aware that there may be more to what happened. We have seen MANY MANY times that WS (wayward spouses) tend to minimize their activities— they want to tell the Betrayed Spouse (BS) the minimum that they can and still say the "confessed". I’m not saying it is true in your case, but often when two grown adults have the means … well. Just know that it is a possibility.

It may be a little gift that for you that you are not in proximity. This gives you the time and space to work through this. I understand that it likely will be difficult that you can’t monitor his whereabouts, but it gives you the breathing space you need. Please see a lawyer or three to understand what D might look like. Not to file. - just to educate yourself. By getting the facts, you will not make decisions based on fear. He does not need to know you did this. Also take a look at finances - make sure he has not been spending marital funds on his activities.

And glad to hear you are in IC. Use this time to explore what YOU want from a marriage, for yourself. What will make you feel safe.
Someone to talk to IRL is really helpful, as is journaling. Keep posting here, too.

What is he doing to help you feel safer? Is he looking to move closer to you sooner? Even if he has to change jobs? What ACTIONS is he taking to help fix himself? Do not fall into the trap where you do the solving- he needs to drive the recovery bus. Just focus on you.

Trust that you will get through this- because you will. It hurts terribly, but you are going to be okay.

I think you should talk to the other spouse if you haven’t already. The flying home seems like damage control to me. I hope there isn’t, but there may be more to the story. I think it’s a positive that he told you about something he’s guilty about that you would have never found out about.

My dad was a serial cheater. He once told me to never take a job with lots of travel if I wanted to have a good marriage. I was 12 at the time and didn’t understand why he told me this nugget of wisdom. Proximity doesn’t prevent infidelity, but a distance seems to be a breeding ground for it.

Maybe this is too much too soon for this post. If you had full blown emotional intimacy with someone and were holding their hand, hugging them, how far off would sexual intimacy be? That part of you post made me suspect he gave you the beginning of trickle truth and there’s more to the story. I hope I’m wrong.

Thank you all for such kind, thoughtful, reasoned and practical responses. To answer a few questions:
1). I have talked to the other spouse. We have compared stories, confessions, text messages, timelines etc. and know that what they have told us (at least from my husband's side) is the whole truth. My husband has said that he is very glad that they got caught because he realized that he created a fantasy world and used minimal issues in our marriage and LDR to "justify" his actions.
2). As far as what he has done so far, he has sought out IC with a therapist that specializes in infidelity and self sabotage and communication issues.
3). We have always shared our locations with each other but since he is back to work and we are LDR, he texts me throughout the day about his whereabouts (work, gym, home, etc). He has said that I do not need to respond to these ut would like to keep letting me know as a way to start building trust.
4). He has looked into moving to where i am earlier but given the nature of his job, it is not feasible (we both are healthcare workers and have certain obligations during training phase). But he is coming to where I am every weekend he has off.
5) He cannot go complete NC with the co-worker due to work obligation but has plans in place to minimize work related interactions. We are working to refine what this means.
6). He is reevlauating his relationship with other female friends to minimize any boundary violations. In the same vein, he wants to stop drinking and stop using "going out" as a means to suppress any hard / emotional issues he is facing.
7). My best friend has gotten me in touch with a lawyer. I have not yet made the move to contact him yet but I have one I can reach out to.

I am pro polygraph. If the unfaithful spouse wants the marriage then they'll do it. It's better imo to get the rock bottom of things right away and prevent unnecessary trickle truth. For many it also seems to be a catalyst to help move the unfaithful towards honesty. Cheaters tend to be pretty good at lying to their spouse and a poly is a pretty good way to help stop the lies or uncover them.

Some groups promote the faithful spouse working on themselves, becoming more attractive on various levels, and not placing demands on the cheater. I'm all for working on yourself and growth. Boundaries are equally important. A boundary for honesty in a marriage, isn't some unfair request - it's healthy.

5) He cannot go complete NC with the co-worker due to work obligation but has plans in place to minimize work related interactions. We are working to refine what this means.

This is where part of the utter selfishness of the WS not thinking of consequences gets me. Is there any way that he is in a supervisory position? Why doesn't he talk to his supervisor and say that he can no longer work with AP? If he's finishing medical school, nursing (or whatever), there may be a clause in the contract that says no fraternizing between students (student-to-student) and if she's on staff, then there's a likely chance that they both have clauses of no student-to-staff fraternizing.

What is his plan to help you feel safe in this situation? Will you be able to handle this or is will this drive you crazy because of all the "what if" scenarios that might run through your mind.

6). He is reevlauating his relationship with other female friends to minimize any boundary violations. In the same vein, he wants to stop drinking and stop using "going out" as a means to suppress any hard / emotional issues he is facing.

After dday1, I told my XWH (wayward ex-husband) no female friends unless I approved. In fact, I even said that he wasn't to be in a room by himself with another female, with the exception to people I named. (He didn't follow this, crossed the line again, and that's why we D.)

Yes, he can stop "going out" to bars, especially with the uber instance. Maybe find a hobby like knitting or crocheting.

And you can reevaluate these as trust is built. Trust is built by consistent actions over time and won't happen overnight.

Paralyzed at 2 weeks out is normal - and you're not paralyzed if you're still letting him talk to you, if you're considering whether you want R or D, etc. Human beings aren't taught how to deal with being betrayed, and it simply takes time and energy to figure out what one wants to do.

Whether or not there's more, this is bad enough. It might be worth your while to start figuring out where your stay/go boundary is, if you have one. For me, on d-day, what was past was past, and I thought about the future.

Was the A really over?
Was my W still lying by omission of commission?
Was it possible to heal?
Was it possible to rebuild an M that was worth my time and energy?
Did my W love me?
Was she in love with me?
Did I still love her?
Was I still in love with her?
Etc., etc., etc.

You've got to figure out how and how much the past means to you.

My reco is to monitor your feelings - the flow of anger, grief, fear, and shame may tell you something about hwat you want.

Another reco is to focus on your healing - processing the awful feelings out of your body, The more feelings you process, the better your decisions will be for you.

Another reco is to focus on what you want. If you want R, then you've got to gird yourself to take the risk - and D may still be in you future. OTOH, if your H's history is a deal killer and you want D, you can go straight to D.

BUTBUTBUT...

Have faith in yourself - you can survive and thrive. Have no doubt about that. You can live a good life whether you D or R.

Thank you again you all. I think I am currently still trying to figure out what I want and have realized that its going to take a me a long time to make a decision. I have always been a "problem solver/doer" so this inability to make a decision is very hard for me. But I am tapping into all of my feelings (like all of you suggested) and giving myself grace.

Re NC: He is not in a supervisory role; they are in equal footing when it comes to medical hierarchy. Currently he has been telling me every time they are in the same physical space together. He is also actively avoiding common areas to avoid potential for shared space. He has sent me any group texts (work related) that have come up.

I love all the straight forward, boundary setting questions you all have posed. I will need to certaintly think about these, in therapy and explore my own boundaries and what I truly want in a marriage.

Thank you all again.

I gave myself 6 month increments to evaluate how things were going and see if I had a decision. You could set 6 week or 3 month increments to evaluate to see how things are going.

For me, it took about a year to see that XWH wasn't doing the work to change. He told me that he was going to IC, but I had my doubts. A little over a year & I was going to tell him that I didn't think it was working. But... he said his IC said we could try MC. But my XWH is a rare bird - actually diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder. He was so good at lying and half-truths, I didn't know if this was true or not. We were in MC around 6 months when he confessed that he'd crossed the hard boundary (any sexual contact with another female and we D), which made my decision pretty easy after that point. I realized he was never going to be a safe partner and I was done.

We have some that move straight to D and some who take their time to decide. Of course, there are some WS who do the work and change to become a safe partner. Read the stories. (You can click on the 'person' icon on the line of a person's user name and see their profile. Some have bios in there, and you can find some insight there, too.)

One saying we have is take what you need and leave the rest. Use the information/advice that fits for your life. You'll find differing opinions.