SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hi All,

I just joined this site today. I've been struggling lately and am looking for advice or outlets to help me talk and move on.

Backstory-
I caught my wife (at age 44) cheating by finding chat conversations on FB. I was shocked by her double life. I didn't say anything and let it continue. I kept looking at her FB messages and subvertly following her around to see what she was up to. I would know she was going out to have her fun while I stayed home with our kids. I would ask her questions when she got home,or the next day, to see what kind of lies she would tell me. This went on for about a year and a half. SMH I know.

We divorced a year later for other reasons (4 years ago now). I never told her that I knew she cheated. I don't know why and this is bothering me so much lately. Is something wrong with me for not saying anything to her while it was happening?

I want to shift gears and move on. Any advice?

I'm new here so if there is a topic about this on her already or if I need to ask in another area please let me know. I can tell more of the story too. Just don't know how/what to say.

~Herzy

I don’t think you needed to tell her then or need to tell her now. You can divorce for any reason, and I can’t see what good it would do to tell her now.

BUT. I think it is worth exploring why you swept her cheating under the rug. Why you allowed it to continue. It is an absolute shock when you learn your wayward spouse (WS) is cheating, and we often recommend waiting a little bit to confront so you can get your ducks in a row. But it is unusual that you never confronted. And it OFTEN takes a long time for the betrayed spouse (BS) to be ready to leave the marriage if they don’t decide to reconcile. But usually that is after DDAY.

I think you need dig into why you allowed her to continue cheating. Was it fear? Insecurity? Afraid to rock the boat? Afraid that it was a reflection on you? No right or wrong answers, but I think you need to address that to help YOU heal and to help you understand what you would do differently if ever in a similar situation.

IC (individual counseling) is REALLY helpful in this exploration. Look for one that is trauma- informed because infidelity is a TRAUMA. And that trauma may have been why you kept quiet, but it also means you probably didn’t process the betrayal. And you need to process that betrayal or it will hang around for many years.

You will heal eventually, but IC can help accelerate that process while helping you see a clearer path forward for your next relationships. And you will get there - we all do. :-)

Hang in there, and sorry you are feeling sad.

Thanks for the wisdom Barely. That is what I'm trying to figure out.

Part of it is that our s** life wasn't good for a very long time and I think I was okay with her finding it with someone.

I was hoping there were others that ran into this.

I second what BearlyB said. The only thing I’ll add is if you were ok with your wife getting sexual gratification from another guy then maybe you thought her lack of gratification with you was your fault and this is something that you didn’t want to shine a light on. So you never brought up her infidelity so as to not wake that sleeping ogre. I’m not a therapist, hope you get one and dig into your whys. By the way, I would guess that most BH’s at least wonder if there was something lacking in their performance.

We divorced a year later for other reasons

her infidelity didn’t factor in at all?

It factored in from my perspective but I never said anything.

Now I want to go and ask her about it for closure in my mind as to why, what did I lack for her. But I don't know how to go about that other than just talking with her.

It factored in from my perspective but I never said anything.

Now I want to go and ask her about it for closure in my mind as to why, what did I lack for her. But I don't know how to go about that other than just talking with her.

I can entirely understand the want for this information for your own growth and closure.

Ultimately, I would avoid reaching out, a lion doesn't concern itself with the opinion of sheep. Now you are divorced, why concern yourself with the opinions of someone who wasn't worthy of your time to begin with.

If you ask her why she cheated, the answer you’re going to get (assuming she even admits to it) is that she cheated because the marriage was crappy (for whatever reasons you already discussed when you divorced) and that she was seeking happiness elsewhere. She’ll probably also say that the fact that you knew and said nothing is proof that you didn’t really love or care about her.

I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I find it curious that you use the word "guilty" in the subject line to describe your feelings over not confronting her in the past. When I clicked on this post, I thought that you were going to say that her AP was married and you feel guilty that you never said anything to the other betrayed spouse.

So why do you feel like you wronged her by not confronting her when you found out? That’s the only reason I can think of that you would feel guilty.

If closure is what you need to recover and move on, you’re not going to get it from your ex-wife and learning why she cheated. You’re only going to get it if you dig deep within yourself and figure out why you suffered in silence for so long.

I guess I want to know who she all cheated with. The curiousity is killing me.

Do you want to know why she cheated, or do you fear she cheated because of something like an inadequacy in you?

The problem is that your W probably thinks you were the problem, whereas the actual problem was her. She chose to cheat rather than address her problems, but she probably doesn't realize it. Worse, if you fear you're somehow the problem, you won't believe her if she does tell you she knows she fucked up.

I, too, think a good IC can help you stop dumping self-doubt on yourself.

How do you not who she cheated on you with if you had access to her FB chats and were monitoring her activities?

And if, for some reason, you didn't know the identify of her AP(s), why is the curiosity killing you now and not when you were married to her?

If you wanted or needed to know all the gory details of her affair, the time to ask for that information was when you were still married to her, which is when those details would've been relevant and you had some kind of leverage over her (ie, the ability the make full disclosure a condition of reconciliation).

I'll be blunt: asking for all this information 4 years after you're divorced is going to make you look very silly. You will also boost her ego by revealing that you haven't gotten over her. Even if that's not true, that is the impression you will give her by attempting to grill her about her infidelity now.

I don't think you have anything gain by humiliating yourself in such a manner. More likely than not, she will either lie to you or tell you to piss off completely... leaving you right where you are right now, except with less dignity.

[This message edited by BluerThanBlue at 7:41 PM, Monday, January 12th]

Your ex wife didn’t have an affair because of you. It had nothing to do with you. It also had nothing to do with how she felt about the marriage at the time.

The affair partner could have been ANYONE. There was nothing special, great, or unique about the AP.

Affairs are fake "relationships". They exist in a fantasy world, where both affair partners can pretend to be anything and anyone they want. They have no real life responsibilities together, such as bills, or kids, or relatives, or taking out the trash or cleaning toilets. It’s a fake relationship, in which they both just act as mirrors for the other. They never criticize, always praise. Every joke is hysterically funny. They’re always dressed up, always ready to talk about or have sex. Always agree on everything. The relationship is not real - it is a stage set up to cater to the ego, nothing more.

I ask you this: what information do you believe would help you in moving forward now?

You already know she had the affair, how long it lasted, and that you resent her for it. Would knowing details help you resent her more, feed your anger and pain? Or do you think that knowing who he is would somehow heal you - and not open more anger and questions?

Without the aid of your ex wife, you will not get this information. But the fact is that your ex-wife WILL LIE. It is what waywards do when confronted. And yours recovery with a perfect spouse would have taken two years or more, once the truth was out.

What do you think the chances are that your ex would be willing to be that "perfect spouse" and help you for two years?

For me, this feels like you would ask, she would lie, and you would be no farther down the road than you are now.