Good Wednesday to everyone!

Each week I struggle to come up with fresh discussion topics, and today was no different. So as I was outside this morning on our deck puffing away on a cigar (no I haven’t quit yet), it came to me that we needed to add something more positive.

We’ve hammered away at most all the devastation that affairs can cause but have managed somehow to steer clear of your successes. So…we want to hear some success stories from you.

Tell us some of your successes while recovering from the affair and how you were able to accomplish them.

For example…

Have you been able to forgive? How did you do it?

Has trust been rebuilt? How?

Have communication hurdles been overcome? How?

Are you both working to meet each other’s needs? How?

Have the issues in your marriage been uncovered propelling you towards a stronger, happier relationship?

You get the idea. No success is too small. Please share so that others can learn!

As always, please respond to each other in the comments.

Thanks!

Doug & Linda

See also  Open ‘Mic’ Discussion #14

    38 replies to "Discussion: Tell us Your Success Stories"

    • anaffairtoremember

      I’m so glad you’re doing this post because I have to admit some days I cannot look at this site because it triggers all the negative feelings again. I do think that my husband’s EA was just a symptom of other problems in our marriage and lives and that has helped me be able to stop just blaming him, realize my part in all of this and to have trust again. I truly feel loved and respected and I know that if he could take it all away he would. And if I could, I would take back all those things that made him ever want to leave. I think we learned how to communicate after 20 years and more than anything to try to fill each other’s needs above our own. My favorite idea about marriage is that it is not so much in finding the right person as it is in being the right person. I personally thank counseling for helping us to learn how to communicate and God, above all else, for helping us to find our way back to each other. I never would have thought that I would have stayed in a marriage where I had been betrayed. I always thought that once a vow was broken – that was it, I would never stay. But, I am so glad that we both held on and for anyone just going through this process, don’t lose hope. Though scars remain, it is true that a marriage can heal from this pain and become what you always hoped it would. For me, it’s been a conscious decision to just stop dwelling on the negative, stop dwelling on the past – you can’t change it – and start working on the future. Getting help for the issues in our marriage and my own personal issues has helped me to become someone that I am proud of, and that in turn has made a world of difference in our marriage. Thanks for the positive spin on things today!

      • Doug

        anaffair…, I agree with you. Obviously most people come to this site to try and find help for their issues, but I thought that sharing successes will not only teach but also give others motivation and a positive outlook. Unfortunately, it’s almost 2:00ET and we only have one success thus far. I think that even those that are hurting the most can come up with some sort of success after the affair. Even if it’s the just that their spouse chose to end contact with the OW and stay in the marriage. That’s a success! Thanks for sharing your inspirational comments!

      • New Affair Survivor

        Hi There

        My wife just repented to me last week that she had an affair .It really has thrown my world upside down ,hurt ,anger ,dissapointment ,the whole lot .She knows what she has done and seen the concequences of it .she wants me to give her a second chance which i did as i felt that time after all the anger etc GOD was with me that time .we have gone for therapy and she is really trying her best to support ,be there and work on our marriage ..She knows what a big mistake this was which was not worth it at the end .I am looking for stories as i am struggling through this .I know mine has just started but seeing what you saying i can only look forward .I guess the images ,thoughts etc is so fresh but will give it my all …thank you for sharing this …it does help me

    • There Are Moments

      Success is making it through the day without letting a trigger take ahold of either of us.

      • Doug

        Thank you, There are Moments! Triggers can be killers, so that is certainly a success if you can avoid them.

    • J

      well, I just posted about a problem but here is one major success- I was having a really hard time with my self-esteem (Linda had written a previous post about losing her self-concept that was really accurate for me), and feelings about my appearance. I joined a crossfit gym a few months ago and over the past few weeks we’ve been part of a national competition and although I’m still one of the worst performers I am actually able to do the same workouts as other people- jump on the same boxes, lift the same weights, do things that for months I couldn’t- it is real evidence that I am getting physically stronger and more able and that has really erased all my comparisons. I am just really focused on what I am achieving vs. where I started, and it’s like I shed this inferiority cloak I was carrying around for so long. I guess that is more personal healing/success though.

      • Doug

        J., Personal healing successes are just as important -if not more so – than others. Thanks for sharing, and congratulations on your progress! Working on yourself can make a big difference.

    • Geri

      My husband really opened up to me the other day. No editing, minimalizing or protecting me. Yeah!

      • Doug

        That’s fantastic! I hope that things continue to improve for you every day.

    • Kathy

      One success, to me, is that my H and I are still together. He was literally days away from leaving when the OW showed her true colors and the affair fog lifted almost immediately. For that I can only thank God, because up to that point nothing I was doing or saying made any difference.

      Since then we’ve been addressing the issues that brought him to that point in the first place. Our relationship is much improved, particularly in our sex life because that was his biggest complaint.

      One of my biggest triggers was him keeping me locked out of his cellphone. He doesn’t do that anymore.

      Also, even though my weight loss started as a result of d-day (not by choice; I just couldn’t eat, and all that adrenaline pumping into my system had my metabolism way revved up), I have continued to lose weight by controlling my diet and adding exercise.

      I have taken an interest again in my appearance, and while I don’t put on make-up every single day (like I was doing right after d-day), I do take the time most days to make myself look nice, and it isn’t JUST for him!

      • Doug

        Kathy, thanks for sharing and keep working on yourself–for you! It sounds as though things are heading in the right direction.

    • Helen

      First of all I really want to say a big thank you to Linda and Doug because I don’t know how I would have got through the past 11 months (since DDay) without your site. I found it when I was having obsessive thoughts about my husbands EA and really thought I was going mad. But just to find out that how I was feeling was a normal part of the process was enough to help. Since then I have identified with so much that I have read and I really felt that I wasn’t alone.

      Today’s post has come at just the right time for me and my thoughts echo those written by ‘anaffairtoremember’. My husband has had NC since last September and it has been tough as I wanted everything to be ‘normal’ from day 1 but I can now see how that can never happen as healing is a long process. I feel that my success is in looking back over the past 11 months and seeing how far we have come, I never thought I would be happy again and my husband kept saying he didn’t know if he would ever get over it. Just the other day he told me that he feels he is getting over it and he is sorry for what he put me through, I am sorry too for contributing to the circumstances that made him fall into the trap of an EA. We tell each other we love each other and we cuddle all night, we are closer than we have been for years (and the sex is great too which was part of the original problem).

      So for those of you who have only just started down this road, hang on in there, have faith that things will get better. Do things for yourself (I have joined French conversation classes, swim twice a week and see my friends for lunch – I never did anything before!) No you will never forget the affair but you can use it to make your marriage better and you can be happier in the long run.

      Thank you for todays post Doug, and to Linda for opening her heart to us and helping more than you can know.

      • Doug

        Helen, Thank you very much for the kind words. It sure makes us feel good to hear that we have been able to have an impact on others. Thank you too for your inspirational comment as I’m positive it will provide a ray of hope to others that are going through this. Congratulations on your successes!

      • TB

        Helen what a nice post. Great to speak to those who are early in the stages-(it makes us stronger also to share) I am 2 yrs after finding out and I am still healing- we have made AMAZING strides- BUT MY OWN personal healing and success is the best part out of all of this and this site has been my lifesaver and cannot imagine doing it without getting my emails every week from Doug and Linda- I curl up on myown and read every ones posts- almost like I am meeting with friends…. keep connecting with us all and know that YOUR own personal success is so important because it is what your spouse sees and somehow- that seems to be something that pulls them out of the “fog” that L & D talk about- and they come back to reality….

    • RP

      Two nights ago my husband and I spent the evening helping our daughters with their algebra homework. It wasn’t fun or romantic, but it was important. Our daughters needed help, and we were there for them and each other. All four of us were on the same side, which is probably normal for most families but for us it counts as a successful evening. It’s been almost a year and a half since our D-day, and I think that we’re getting there, in the sense that our lives are more stable again. There is still a lot of pain, but the pain is mostly less intense and less constant.

      • Doug

        RP, Thanks for sharing. People sometimes underestimate the importance of stability in a relationship. It may not be flashy or exciting most of the time, but there’s a sense of security and comfort. Congratulations on your progress!

    • melissa

      I recently accompanied my husband on a work trip. He asked me out for dinner one night -AND lunch the next day, just the two of us. The sun was shining, the food great, we felt relaxed, it was lovely.

      • Melvin

        We have done this a while back. DW loves it as she gets to check out a new city while I work. We haven’t had the chance in years. Another reason to explain why our marriage went into the ditch.

        • melissa

          Sometimes it’s the small things which are the ‘glue’ that keeps people together.

    • Melvin

      *** Turning the Corner ***

      Ok, this may not fit here cleanly, but I think we are on the road to a success story (I hope). I can’t really answer all the questions posed in this discussion, however I’ll try to explain where we are on that road. The details of the affair are here https://www.emotionalaffair.org/the-7-words-that-scare-the-crap-out-of-me/

      For me to move on with the EA, I really needed to hear how she felt about her ex-fiance. She doesn’t want to deal with or discuss this EA anymore, and she has given me conflicting answers previously. Getting her to open up honestly has been difficult at best. After a long discussion Sunday night with her that went nowhere, I decided to print the Affair Survey Results that Doug posted here: https://www.emotionalaffair.org/affair-recovery-survey-results/ It summarized what I was struggling with. I highlighted and ranked those items that hit me the hardest and gave it to her Tuesday night. I didn’t expect much; other material I gave her went in the garbage. Well, last night I was out at a function with my daughter and my wife is at home alone texting me. She had “words” to share regarding my printout. I came home to handwritten notes describing in detail her feelings for this man before, during and after the EA. In fact, they pretty much matched those in Doug’s post last week https://www.emotionalaffair.org/perceptions-of-my-emotional-affair-partner-over-time/ . I sent her this posted today and she stated that the posted was “eerily similar”. She stated that she just started writing away without any editing because she wanted to capture her true feelings unfiltered. I appreciated that. Summarizing, she hated him pre-EA but cared about him to want to know how he was. During the Affair Fog, she stated that she felt great about herself talking with him. He is a true charmer and has a gift for expressive writing. He made her feel good about herself while she struggled to avoid his many sexual advances. Fortunately, they live 6 hours away and physical contact was minimal. She did confess that if he lived closer, they probably would have been physically intimate. She used the word probably. Post-EA, she felt manipulated by him, blind to the snaky ways that made them split up in the first place. She struggled for a better word until I came up with “Player”. That fit to a tee. I had tons of questions after the read and she wanted to just end it. So I came up with a compromise – I would kiss her passionately after every 3 questions she answered. It worked great – we kissed many times over. The kissing and the glass of wine I fed her helped her loosen up a bit. I got lots of answers.

      I felt like she was trying to be honest, although a few answers came out conflicting.

      Doug, I made sure I followed your 8 Communication Don’ts listed here: https://www.emotionalaffair.org/8-communication-don%E2%80%99ts-after-the-affair/ She even thanked me before we quit about the way I handled the Q and A. I credited you and sent her this link today.

      I truly believe I am at a better stage of healing. A bit credit goes out to this website for info, advice and for capturing in words what I was truly experiencing. That and the fact that we are both working hard to improve for each other to save the marriage. My trust in her is still low, although I do believe she understands that this will take time and cooperation on her part.

      I asked her why she responded so quickly and openly. She answered that a text I sent her earlier in the day woke her up. She asked how I was doing and I replied “Doing what I need to do”. What I meant was that I was posting on this Website to gain more advice and help. She read it as her needing to step up . And she did.

      So, what do you all think? Any further suggestions ? BTW, I scheduled a surprise date night for Saturday – a band we like is in town. And next week we take our 2 teens to the city for a ballgame and some sightseeing.

      On the road again – hopefully the yellow brick road.

      • Doug

        Melvin, I think that is just a great success story! Congratulations and hopefully you are indeed on the road to recovery! Oh yeah… see I told you that booze works! 😉

        • Melvin

          Thanks Doug. Did you like idea of kissing after 3 questions ?

          • Doug

            I did indeed. You’ll have to bump it up a notch the next time!

    • melissa

      My H’s at a meeting. His computer is right next to me. I’m not even going to snoop – small success.

      • Doug

        Each small success adds up over time, Melissa.

    • Kathy

      Boy do I feel like such a fool!

      Yesterday I discovered that they were still “sexting” as recently as February 28th (that I know of). I told him that it had to stop NOW and no more contact! He agreed, said he’d been trying to avoid her, blocking her calls/texts. I sent her an email and told her to LEAVE HIM ALONE!

      He says it’s over for good now. I said it better be. I won’t stand for any more.

      g*dd*mnit I’m mad!!!! I’m hurt!!!!

      Then today I see in his work cellphone her number listed under a heading that wouldn’t be “suspect”, and the ringer is set to “silent” only for that number. I don’t know if this means he’s still “keeping his options open”, or if this was one of the tracks he forgot to cover, or was he meaning to delete it and just hadn’t gotten around to it yet.

      I feel so stupid for posting earlier about “success”. I don’t know if I can do this any more. I told him I want complete access to ALL his emails, all his cellphones, EVERYTHING. And if I find one thing, just ONE MORE THING, I’m done.

      This woman is psycho, literally. She has meds for psychosis. He said she tells him things as though they were real…but it’s all in her head (if I can believe him). This woman came to our house without knowing how to get here (he had not given her our address). She’s on her 3rd or 4th marriage and is getting divorced (if he’s telling the truth, or if she’s been telling HIM the truth!). She has two small children that she LEFT. How can a mother leave her children?! She told my H (when he was going to leave me) that he should just have the electricity turned off here, so that his family would be without power (our whole house is electric). Is THIS the kind of person he wanted to be with? Is he really willing to risk EVERYTHING for this???!!!

      He says no. He says he was stupid. He says he doesn’t know what he was thinking.

      Oh, and when I told him that now I DO want the details….he can’t remember. It just wasn’t that important to him. It meant more to her than it did to him. Wouldn’t it be nice if I could believe that? Wouldn’t she love to hear that?

      I’m sorry for this horribly long rant, but I am so angry still and so hurt, even though he SEEMS to be repentant. I just don’t know anymore. I hate that he was STILL lying to me when we were supposed to be working things out and she was supposed to be out of the picture.

      • Robin

        Kathy,
        Almost immediately my husband realized that he didn’t want to lose his marriage, but when he made the decision to work on our marriage he felt so guilty for the damage and pain he was causing the other woman that he was almost unable to see what it was doing to me – I guess because I got to keep him. He thought he was getting into a passionate sexual affair with a confident and experienced woman, and instead ended up with a clingy desperate woman who fed him a constant diet of praise and ego boosting, her conviction that she had loved him since they were in high school and that he was her soul mate, that their affair was fate – AND the constant threat that she would contact me so that the three of us could “work it out”.

        He responded to emails and phone calls towards the end because he was so scared she was going to call me at work or post something on Facebook and also because he was still keeping his options open in case I left him. For the 1st 6 months after his confession of the emotional affair, he blamed the deterioration of our marriage for the affair – and himself never her. He didn’t understand that his defense of her was like a stab in my heart. My point for you is that his inability to separate was caused by guilt caused by what he had done to HER. . . plus it made him feel better about himself to feel like he had walked away from his first love and soul mate to save his marriage . . . and because he was constantly afraid because it took him over a year from our 1st d-day to actually tell me the whole truth – so he was not able to settle in and concentrate on us because he was afraid the whole thing was going to blow up at any moment. Once he told me all of it, and I didn’t run screaming into the highway, we were able to really work on the happiness, instead of survival.

    • melissa

      Kathy
      Hang in there. Your H is not the first to ‘relapse’ (mine did too, also when we were trying to sort things out and rebuild trust). With some ‘needy’ OW, it seems that some men can’t give up all in one go (they still like to feel needed and useful and it gives their ego a huge kick – AND they don’t like to be told what to do even though they know you are right.

      All I would say is there comes a time when you can’t give him any more chances. He has to take responsibility for the way he treats you and respects his marriage. He has to make the decision to be transparent and to give the two of you a chance.

      I so understand your hurt and your pain and how awful you feel – take care.

      • Kathy

        Thank you Robin and melissa for your encouragement. It really helps.

        I apologize for venting on a thread about success stories. I just felt so bad that I had posted about my “success” less than a week ago, only to find that it wasn’t the success I thought it was.

    • Confused76

      read my story on 7 ways to get your spouse to end the affair

    • Trying2Heal

      Since D-day 7 months ago we have had many successes, as well as successful days being ruined by triggers that lead to bad thoughts of his EA.

      A huge success has been that he finally “gets it.” For a long time jr couldn’t understand how I could be so upset when he didn’t “cheat on me” (meaning no physical cheating). Finally, one day after I had a mental downward spiral, he said “I think I now understand – I caused you to lose your sense of stability, self-esteem and comfort that should come from our marriage and what should have been your rock was suddenly taken away. It wasn’t just one betrayal to you, but was a betrayal every day while I was talking to her and hiding it from you.” He got it.

      He also saw her true colors that he asked her apologize to me and she would not.

      We have had some talks that were very uncomfortable for him but he continued to learn to be patient and that the sooner he answered my questions the better off we would both be.

      I can tell him when I am having bad thoughts and he makes sure to reassure me.

      We truly love eachother and realize that we will go to great lengths to be happily joined in marriage.

      Our biggest accomplishment has been that he removed his head from his ass, realized that I am an amazing wife and woman, and I believe he is sincere that he learned he cannot be friends with other women because he can’t differentiate when the friendship begins to go too far and begins to interfere with our own marriage. He can have working relationships, but I believe he has learned to keep these strictly business and not counsel women who come to him for “marital advice.”

      • Doug

        Trying2, Congrats on your success. It makes a world of difference when your spouse finally gets it and can then lend a hand in your recovery.

        • Trying2Heal

          Thank you – we still have our challenges, but our life is a journey and we hopefully time will help me heal. I hope this never happens again and that the safeguards we place around our marriage won’t be breached. This was his one and only chance with my forgiving him for any type of affair.

      • melissa

        I am so, so happy for you – only wish my H could see as clearly as yours does. I’m not saying he’s not trying, I do believe he is more aware of our relationship and his role in it but he certainly won’t talk about it and I don’t know whether he even understands 10% of what I’ve been going through and why I feel this way/why he let the EA happen.

    • Trying2Heal

      Melissa – I carefully choose my times when to discuss the EA and if I’m angry it shuts him out. If I’m calm and he sees how he has hurt me then I can get through to him. I have most definitely had my bouts of anger, however. Had he seen the light months ago and opened up fully, it would have helped me heal quicker. He was selfish and cruel by making me suffer when he could have helped me.

    • Paula

      Just coming up to 2 years since DDay for me, first six months were pretty good, I felt strong, loved, loving and positive, and worked hard on myself and so did H, and we both thought we had “cracked it” and then I spiralled downwards out-of-control into severe depression, suicidal and desperate. My man of 23 years had been involved with an old friend of mine, who also happened to be his pretty dysfunctional ex-girlfriend, for about 15 months. I questioned lots, but swallowed every lie until he ended it and she decided two weeks later that “I needed to know” and so texted me the details while we were at a girlfriend’s 40th birthday party. All of the successes, and there were so many, one of which is that I never hated either of them, and my anger was relatively short-lived and I thought I dealt with it in a healthy manner, but my sense of security and my ability to ever trust this previously most trustworthy of men, or any of my friends, was shattered, and as yet, I have been unable to recover enough to function anywhere near the level I had previously, have now been lost somewhat. We were our friends “ideal” couple, I’ve been told, we ran our business together, we were close and loving and each other’s best mate in the world. Good news, depression gone, but I asked him to move out a week ago,and he has, as this has made me a person I don’t recognise, and don’t like very much – time to work just on me, I’ve become obsessive, and haven’t had a night’s sleep without terrible nightmares since DDay, or a minutes peace where I haven’t obsessed during waking hours, and the quiet panic that this creates is exhausting. A couple of things have complicated this, the double betrayal is hard, who do you trust if your lover and your friends are untrustworthy? H has done abslutely everything required except that there has still been from time to time small amounts of contact, even though he has been very open about letting me know, and showing me, if he hears from her, so I asked him if he thought it would be possible for me to talk with her, but she point blank refuses, even though I was a good friend and bear no malice, just want to chat and explain how she has hurt me. Saddest thing is we love each other desperately, but without my ability to trust him, I’ve gone backwards. Worst thing of all is this is a good man, who got into a bad situation, during a particularly stressful time in our lives with major lifestyle changes going on, who then spent 10 months trying to extricate himself from it, realising he had screwed up badly, and he is so disappointed in himself too, but able to “move on” so much more healthily than me. Whoops, this ws supposed to be “success” – in a way it is, I’m letting him go from the pain 🙂

    • HY

      Where can I find the post around what made Doug eventually end the affair? Thanks.

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