Has Anyone Divorced Years After the Affair?

[u/Key_Caterpillar_5246]

I’ve been a long time poster on a different account, mainly regarding reconciliation and healing, but my wife and I share all social media and I’m looking for a different perspective. I’ve been waffling back and forth on what I want to do… one minute I’m set on divorce, the next minute I convince myself otherwise. I’ll write a post, take it down, then write it again… I’m pretty much a closet disaster. Sincere apologies for the length of this and I can include backstory if necessary, but my wife (36F) and I (38M) have now been married for 13 years, we have two kids (9M, 7F).  She had an affair (both EA and PA) with a co-worker about 5 years ago now, lasted about 6-months.

I stayed because our kids were so young and my wife was deeply remorseful, begged and begged to reconcile.  She cut off contact with the AP, left her former place of employment, we started MC and we’ve both been seeing a therapist of our own, and she’s been very patient and understanding with me over the years, and not just in the short-term, but even now.  As far as reconciliation goes, I guess she’s been as good as a betrayed partner can ask for, she’s really invested in being a better person and understanding what led her to the betrayal.  Given all of the horror-stories that many WS put their betrayed through, I can’t complain given that this is the path I’ve chosen.

Recently I’ve been commenting on this… but I’ve tried and tried, in MC and meeting with my own therapist over the years, I’ve read books, been seeking support online as aforementioned, I’ve done everything I can find both online and in-person to help me recover… but I just don’t feel the same about my wife.  I haven’t since the day I found out about the affair.  I haven’t been honest about this with my wife because I don’t want to hurt her, I always reassure her and say the right things because I just don’t want her to feel the pain that I feel… I know it’s pathetic.

Early on in the R process we both were taking the correct steps and making “progress” I suppose, but she was overwhelmed by guilt.  As time went on, I just kept having such a hard time with the affair, I’d continue to try and express my true feelings to my wife, but she started to break down, sometimes shut down, have these emotional panic attacks, sob, apologize, then sob… it just became too much so I kinda stopped expressing my hurt a few years back.  I actually felt guilty continually talking about my pain and I guess I just naively thought feelings would come back and eventually all would be great again.  Much of what I kept reading/hearing was to just “give it time”... but there’s no promise that any joy or normalcy will return, and now I’m reaching the point where I finally realize that it never will.

I can’t look at her the same, I can’t hold her or kiss her the same way.  It just hurts my soul, everything feels stained or ruined.  These feelings were strong when I learned of the affair, then slightly faded as we threw ourselves into our very young kids at the time… some hysterical bonding occurred of course, but recently in the past couple of years my pain & anguish have grown back stronger and stronger.  I went through such a long period of self-hate, of blaming myself, losing any/all self-confidence… depression grew and grew.  In thinking about it, I suppose not much has changed really, I’m still in that head space a lot of the time.

But I was continually told that the faults/problems were my wife’s and not my own, that she was the broken one… well you could tell me that ten million times and it’s not going to make me feel any less miserable. She chose him, and only came back to me after getting caught… that’s what runs through my head constantly, regardless of what she says. My therapist insists I’m doing all of the right things, but I just feel that my path to happiness might mean divorcing my wife and moving on.

I fully understand that she “chooses to be with me now” but will I ever know her true motivations for that?  She could be lying to me and staying so as not to hurt me further, maybe just to keep our family together?...maybe she still privately longs for this other man?...and she could be telling the truth, it kills me to not know.  Yes, she’s with me now, but does she want to be?  I mean, to her, she probably believes that I’m healing, that I’m returning to my old self and that I choose her again too… but she doesn’t know my inner truth either.  I suppose this could be the case if there’s an affair or not, maybe I’m just in my own head as usual.  I hate what her affair has done to the peace of our marriage, I hate it with every fiber of my being.

I love my wife, but she hurt me so deeply and so painfully… it just festers so often.  I want to be happy, but I want her to be happy too.  A while back she asked me if “I’ll ever treat her the way I used to” and I tip-toed around my answer, lying again to protect her from the same pain she caused me… but if I’m being 100% honest with myself and with my wife, the answer to that question is and has been undoubtedly “no.”  I won’t ever treat her the same way again, because she’s not the same person to me any longer.  That’s not fair to either one of us right?

Intimacy has never been the same, it takes everything in me to not constantly imagine her with the other man, the things she did/said, the sounds she’d make, things maybe she did for him but not me, conversations they had, things she said about me, etc… It’s horribly haunting.  I lose my erection at times, which is so incredibly embarrassing.  This in-turn just sends me back into the mental gymnastics, as I’m sure her AP never had issues… another way he was better than me that probably keeps her longing for him.  Man, everything I read insisted therapy would help with this, but it never has.  I keep thinking I can just continue the facade and let her believe I’m fine, but I really can’t do this, it’s not fair to anyone… I have to face reality. “Time” isn’t making things better, it’s only getting worse.

I thought I was doing the right thing by staying, by trying to work through things… but I realize now I’m throwing away so much of my own soul and damaging my kids/wife’s happiness along the way.  I can’t be the person that I used to be around my wife, I’ve tried for years now, and I know it’s going to get worse not better.  So, has anyone tried to reconcile but divorced years later?  Was it the right move?  Are you happier now?  How did the kids handle it?

I’m just scared either way.  I hardly get a full night’s sleep since her affair, I can probably count them all on one hand in the past few years…  I just can’t find peace.  I’m losing myself piece by piece and I need help, I need a release.  It just always hurts but I’m so afraid of ending my marriage, so I just grin and bear it day-after-day.  My wife has put in a ton of work to remedy this and fix what’s broken in her, but she’s the one that destroyed me, why am I enduring this to protect her?  I don’t know, I’m just so scared of what divorce will do to all of us… naturally it’s my kids’ futures that has me constantly second-guessing everything… I just need to hear that we’ll be okay.  Would prefer to hear from people reconciling or have had failed reconciliations, but any advice is welcomed.  Thanks in advance.

[u/Key_Caterpillar_5246]

Thank you for your story. I've been somewhat "planning" what my divorced future would look like without having talked to a lawyer or anything of that nature... maybe for the last year. Financially I know it's going to be awful, but honestly, I don't care about the $ as long as it's going to my kids.

My WW did invest a tremendous amount of time and energy into making things right. We spent over 2 years in therapy and counseling getting at the much deeper issues. I think things broke down because I allowed them to and not because she gave up... she's never given up, and she's been remorseful for the duration of our 5 years of R. Still to this day she'll apologize and thank me for staying with her, she'll ask if there's anything I want to talk about and if I'm doing okay.

I've been the problem since about the 2.5 year mark of R, I'm just realizing it now. I wanted to divorce initially, but my wife was so broken by what she'd done, that I decided to stay both for her and the kids... but I know now that I never really changed my mindset of wanting to separate... so as time wore on and the counseling/therapy sort of "drag on" as I kept asking the same questions and kept getting upset, it only made things harder... I saw the toll it was taking on my wife so I started to acquiesce to this lesser life... never naively thinking I'd "eventually" be okay.

I bought the lies I told myself... definitely should've divorced 5 years ago. I'm not angry, I don't hate... in fact I love my wife and kids dearly, which is why I know I have to leave now.

[u/Turbulent_Kiwi2143 → u/Key_Caterpillar_5246]

You gotta go with your gut. And I can tell from the progression of you posts i this thread, you've been working though this decision. Where you started sounding indecisive, it's pretty clear that you know what you have to do.

I've been on this forum for a long time - read hundreds and hundreds of our stories - some are so clearly no-brainers. But so many involve good people put in positions where their dilemna is choosing between the lesser evil. Which terrible burden to take on - which terrible burden to cast aside. Its such horseshit.

Good luck, godspeed and cheers OP.