Yes, I was the unfaithful party in my marriage. I am not asking anyone for sympathy. I’m here trying to figure things out the same way you are, and I was responding here with the intent of being helpful. Helpful to you, to get the outcome that you are expressing you desire, not in "defense" of your WH.
I have dated many men, many of whom were made to be emotionally repressed by others. You would be amazed how easy they fall in love with a woman just by her being kind, understanding, empathetic, and, well, soft with them. They are not used to that at all, and many don’t even realize that they have been desiring that softness all along. Maybe "tenderness" is a better word here.
I have been in the same relationship for the last 10 years, married for 6 of those, with a man like that. I feel that I have learned so much. I’ve seen my H make amazing progress with healing from his FOO issues and previous marital abuse, and with being emotionally intimate/vulnerable. I am so proud of him for it. But it took patience and continual softness in order to de-condition him from that emotional repression and "toxic masculinity." It’s not as simple and easy as just cognitively understanding his conditioning and deciding to dismantle it. He had to feel safe to do that work, as sharing feelings is inherently vulnerable, and it takes a lot of time and practice. That isn’t cowardly. That’s human nature.
Yes, I cheated. I regret with every ounce of my being that I hurt him and abused his trust. I took a huge chunk of his progress and stomped it into oblivion in the dirt. It has taken a long time and a lot of effort, and obviously it’s still an ongoing work in progress, but he is starting to trust me with his feelings again. I make sure that I make sure not to punish him for that, because I did at the beginning of our reconciliation journey and it was an incredibly foolish reaction on my part. It took many apologies, much begging for him to open up, and many lesser positive interactions before he finally let me back in.
The other day, he got super deep with it and even cried into my shoulder as I hugged him. Even though it was hard to see how much I have hurt him, I sent a prayer of gratitude up to God in that moment. I’ve never felt closer to him than I have recently. Even though we are still healing, there is so much love between us still.
It’s like many people on here say, after infidelity, it’s possible to build a marriage that’s even better than it was before— even though they definitely don’t recommend the cheating part! Somebody gave the metaphor that it’s like being diagnosed with cancer, going through chemo, beating it, and then achieving better health than you had before your diagnosis because now you’re grateful just to be alive and you start taking much better care of your body. The cancer isn’t what made you healthy, but you end up healthier afterwards as a result. I hope that will be the "prognosis" for my marriage as well. Yours, too.
Anyway, I’m rambling. This is all just to say that I will stop replying on your posts as per your request. But I would encourage you not to discard anyone’s input entirely just because they have cheated. Some of us— hiking out, for example— can offer useful advice.
[This message edited by GotTheMorbs at 3:08 PM, Monday, January 12th]
