worried after the emotional affairFor the next couple of weeks both Linda and I will be extremely busy.  I’ve got a huge event going on for work that will demand a ton of my time, while Linda is dealing with her mother who was just diagnosed with possible kidney cancer.  (It was detected early so we’re pretty sure she will be OK, but let’s just say that her Mom is a bit of a basket case at the moment).

So, what that means is you may see some oldies but goodies as far as posts are concerned. 

This particular post, Stupid Things I Did After the Emotional Affair, was written by Linda and it generated a ton of comments back when it was published about 3 years ago.

We’ve included the entire post, plus we added some of the additional “stupid” things and/or comments that some of the readers mentioned.

Please share your experiences and add any of your own “stupid” things you did after the affair in the comment section below the post.


Stupid Things I Did After the Emotional Affair

A few years ago I wrote a post about the stupid things Doug said while in his emotional affair, and got to thinking that I also did some stupid things.  Well, at least some things that sure wasted a lot of my time when I could have been having a pedicure, eating a bowl of ice cream, or getting a massage by a gorgeous masseuse.

Most of these wasted activities were related to my pseudo-obsession of the other woman. I wonder if any of you can relate to these:

  • Pulling up her picture on the internet and staring at it for minutes at a time, thinking I would get some kind of revelation or epiphany.
  • Map-questing the route to her house and contemplating a drive by, thinking it would tell me what kind of person she was.
  • Combing through Doug’s phone records and texts, and then creating a spread sheet outlining their day.  (First they would text from 7:30-10:30, then a 20 minute phone call, back to texting, then meet for lunch. Etc.)  I still don’t understand how this information was helpful to me.
  • Color coding my date book and writing a description of calls and texts in case I needed a quick reference.
  • Thinking that every blond actress, newsperson or lady on the street looked like her.
  • Re-routing Doug miles out of our way so we wouldn’t have to drive by one of her advertisements.
  • When I was alone I would drive by the advertising signs on a daily basis just to see if I could get a glimpse of her or see how successful she really was.
  • On the flip side, I was often afraid to go to the mall, supermarket or other public places for fear I would run into her – even though I probably wouldn’t know who she was if I came face to face with her.
  • Focusing way too much on her and allowing her to consume our marriage.
See also  Getting Over an Affair – Doing Work

I really regret all the time and effort I spent on the OP after Doug’s emotional affair.  I believe that if I would have let her go and stopped making her fantasy so important we would have healed so much faster. I allowed Doug’s fantasy of her to become mine and I believe I had a more difficult time letting go of the fantasy than Doug did.

I really haven’t figured out why, but I know I need to stop letting her get to me.  She has been out of our lives for over two years and it is time to bury her and any memory that is associated with her.  I know in all the healing and recovery I have accomplished since his emotional affair this is my last feat and I know I will conquer it and move on.


 Here are some things that readers mentioned

Locating her on Facebook and looking at her picture or going through her friends list to see if anything was “new” or “different.” I accomplish nothing by looking at her picture except creating new fear and doubt in my heart.

 

It’s not so much the OW…I tell myself…it’s the lies, the complete deceit that floors me still…6 months from D-Day… So it is not the OW I am comparing myself to, it’s how mentally sick & temporarily insane my husband became when he thought ‘that’ was possibly a better life for him…with someone who didn’t even respect herself by being with a married man living at home with his wife & 3 kids.

 

Sometimes I think I was more obsessed with the guy than she was! One of the dumb things I did was to find out as much junk as I could about him, so that I could tell my wife about how awful he was.  That didn’t work so well!

 

Going thru the phone bills meant knowing the truth, once I knew the truth I could better process it. I know now I have to trust my gut instinct.

 

Creating fictitious email accounts to send her messages about how everyone knows what a tramp she is. (I did this even against my own good judgment). Then I’d wait two or three days, felt remorse, and then deleted the accounts. Never saw a response from her, which is just as well, maybe my emails ended up in junk.

Creating a fictitious Facebook page to gain access to her page, which I did successfully. Aside from checking out the page several times, I did nothing, eventually, I deleted the account.

 

Speaking to a psychic! She really worked me up, telling me that my husband was in extreme danger, that she could ruin him, etc. I had to stop calling the psychic, she was causing me added anxiety.

 

Honestly, if I had not pushed, fact checked, and eventually started trusting my own instincts, I do not know that he would ever have told me the whole truth – or even faced it himself…I know we would have never have healed because the lies would have continued to fester!! So, we are actually closer and happier than we were for several years before the affair. I am not bothered by triggers often, and having info about her popping up on a friend’s Facebook  doesn’t bother me anymore. I actually have more trouble with the lies than with her. I have actually no regrets about the obsessing and investigating – it gave me a focus when I desperately needed one and it led me to the truth.

 

See also  Struggles After the Emotional Affair

Once again, please share your experiences and add any of your own “stupid” things you did after the affair in the comment section below the post.  Thanks!

 

    41 replies to "Post Rerun – Stupid Things I Did After the Emotional Affair"

    • exercisegrace

      I can relate to some of these. I think we all can. I will also say they are not entirely stupid. While painful, much of it is what we go through as we try and process the trauma our spouse has put us through. It is a (partly misguided) attempt at control. Timelines become crucial because that is time that was stolen from us. The story of our lives were re-written. We were written out of the script and we are desperate to know exactly what scenes were filmed without us. We think if we *know* what happened and when, etc….then we will *understand* it and then we will *accept* it and then……..But the truth is, NONE of it makes sense and it never will. The more we learn, the more we realize how meaningless the whole thing was. I see much of this as a necessary evil to arrive at the understanding that the OW has NOTHING ON US. It was not about her and it was not about us. It was about a selfish, broken spouse. Sometimes to get to the other side of something, you just have to walk through it.

      I don’t look back at the things I did or said in the wake of d-day and call them stupid or smart. They just are. They just were. Linda, you say that if you could have let go of her sooner, you would have healed faster. I submit to you that your process took what it took. You did what you had to do, to get where you are. You have reached true healing and a better life. You had to process, and work and go through it. There are no shortcuts, unfortunately.

    • gizfield

      You know, Eg, I think you are so right. Your mind is trying to protect you from the truth. Your spouse basically ruined your life with some worthless skank, and it meant nothing. Not cause of you, or that she was better, he just had inadequate coping skills and there was an available slag. That is it.

      • exercisegrace

        Giz, you know that a newly betrayed spouse could join the board today. We could all tell her to forget about digging out the timeline. Forget all the questions. Forget trying to make it all make sense. And she would hear us, but she would still walk through all the steps we did. It is the grieving process of the betrayed spouse. Some of it may be crazy, but I believe all of it is necessary. Reaching true healing is an arduous process.

    • gizfield

      I agree, and you have to learn these things on your own because you wont believe them otherwise. It goes for the cheaters as well.

    • gizfield

      Later on, my husband probably had to admit, “you know, someone who dated me while I was married with a five year old daughter isn’t actually a good person.” Lol, you think. How do you defend someone like that?

      • exercisegrace

        OMG. That so much reminds me of things I have said to my own husband. Basically, how. on. earth. could you think that a woman who admittedly, deliberately, pursued a married man with children could in ANY way, shape or form be even a halfway decent person? Was her morals, her character, her behavior……something you could be PROUD of in a partner? In a spouse? Is that the kind of person you would want in the lives of your CHILDREN? Influencing them? Teaching them by word or example? When you told me she was a “strong Christian” were you JOKING? LYING? Because last time I CHECKED, adultery is one of the biggest sins in the bible. God is pretty clear about his opinion on THAT. SO CLEAR, in fact, that he gives it as one of the FEW reasons to divorce.

        <<>>>> because after all, there really is no response to what I said.

        I guess you are right. Cheaters DO have some things they have to learn on their own as well. It’s that THEIR list seems so OBVIOUS to the rest of us.

        • Strengthrequired

          Eg, it’s a huge sin, adultery, there is nothing good about it. Not a thing.
          I said the same thing to my h, trying to get it through to him that she was no good, yet it didn’t work.
          I often asked how does he think she is a good descent person, if she was able to try and break a marriage, and to top it off there are children involved. He never really responded, I guess he didn’t want to see it for what it was. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

          • exercisegrace

            I’ve said this before but it bears repeating. Right after d-day, he felt sorry for her and admitted as much in counseling one session. While he acknowledged that the kids and I were hurt the most by far, he said that we all “suffered”. He said he would feel bad if he hurt “anyone in his life”. The (now ex) therapist said to me “would you really want to be married to man who didn’t feel bad?”. I laughed in the man’s face! I told him……..why YES. I WOULD. She was a whore. She CHOSE to pursue a married man. He told her repeatedly that he still loved me and would never leave me. If she thought or banked on otherwise, well….pity the fool!

            In the most awful sense of the term, she ended up doing me a favor. She lawyered up when she sold out her shares of their business. She claimed sexual harrassment, etc and wanted almost a million dollars (that she knew we did not have). She proved that she was in it for the money all along, and the rush she apparently feels from damaging yet another marriage. After that she stalked and harassed me and the kids on various social media outlets. Including revealing vile details to our teenaged daughter. She showed who she REALLY was. What she was REALLY after. She showed a complete and total lack of decency. Thank you whore, for proving to him beyond ALL shadow of a doubt that you are a whoring POS. I never have to worry about him contacting her ever again!

    • gizfield

      One day, we were bickering about this broad and he said she was doing nothing wrong. He then said, with a straight face ” she has the highest MORALS of anyone I know.” I was stunned. I said “is that because she (alledgedly) wont fb@# k you?” I think he said yes. I then said “just so you know, if shes not f#@king you it’s because she

    • gizfield

      Oooops. It’s because she doesn’t WANT to.” I then dissolved into a fit of laughter. So not boinking a married man you are dating is now called having High Morals. Back in my day, we called it being a Dick Tease. Which is what it is.

      Oh well, besides bringing me hours of amusement, cause I still can’t think of it without laughing I realized this. The person he was defending was NOT her, it was HIMSELF. if shes a whore, hes a whore.can’t have that.

      • Strengthrequired

        Giz, my h thought she couldn’t do anything wrong,and she was a victim, and everything that she was doing was because she luvvvvvved him. Omg, I can’t believe he was serious, he actually thought she was so damned wonderful, that she loved him so much, that it wasn’t just because he was an easy target, easy to manipulate, and easy to get money from, it was because she luvvvvvvved him. Puke…..
        When I met him, he had nothing, not a thing, I’m sure she would have turned her nose up at him, because there was nothing he had that she wanted, and nothing that he could provide for her with.

      • exercisegrace

        Giz. You are EXACTLY right. One day when I was ranting and raving angrily about what a filthy whore, what a no good piece of crap, what kind of person walks into someone’s house and has dinner with the wife and kids of the man she is screwing, etc. etc. He got very uncomfortable. He admitted that she is a whore and an overall terrible human being. But he told me it was hard for him to hear because I could say all the same things about HIM. Actually even worse, because that was HIS house and HIS family that was being so grossly violated.

    • Tabs

      I spent hours if not days, looking for any pictures and further communications from the OW on the computer. After months of digging (and learning another language, the OW lives in Shanghai), I just gave up. There were no more emails or chatting. So I stopped cruzing the internet. But of course, that didn’t stop me from doing one last thing. I managed to create an email bomb for the CS. It’s amazing how much a person can learn on the YouTube.

      • Strengthrequired

        Tabs, I had to look up what a email bomb was, I had no idea. Lol

    • gizfield

      My goodness, most of these therapists are something else. We are talking ADULTERY, people. If your spouse and this person killed someone, should they feel “sorry” for each other? Wrong is wrong. Enough said .

      • exercisegrace

        I agree. I struggle with what I know I should do as a Christian, and that is forgive them both. Which is NOT at all the same as saying it is “ok” or that I am fine with it now. I should forgive for myself. I can forgive my husband because he is repentant, sorry and working himself stupid to make amends. Her? She sees herself as a victim, if indeed she sees any wrongdoing AT ALL. She has done this before and I don’t doubt she will do it again. I pray about it and leave it in God’s hands.

    • CBb

      My CH’s AP writes on her blog how she could never be with a man who cheats. Yet she was with my H for one year.

      She also posts nasty things about me, how I am weak for staying with him (I have never told her if we are together or not). She also blogs how all the guys tell her how they cheat and “open up to her” about how unhappy they are.

      She is a 30 year old nut job. She has no morals and claimed she did not want to be the other woman. Yet she continued to try to resume the EA after it was over.

      These woman are all losers and I just hope it comes back to haunt them.

      I did NOTHING stupid after the EA. I did not have that luxury because I had to keep my family together as I watched my CH unravel for the better part of a year. His mid life crisis and EA was my summer vacation last year.

      Lucky me.

    • gizfield

      Eg, I dont really worry about forgiving. Adultery, lying, killing etc. is breaking Commandments. Forgiving is not a commandment. The Golden Rule, Do unto others, is kind of like the New testament commandment.

    • gizfield

      Had an interruption, lol. Anyway, the people who are so adamant about forgiveness are usually the ones doing stuff requiring forgiveness. Quit doing the S#@t and it wont be an issue!!!

      I really am a pretty tolerant person and don’t hold grudges. I’m at my worst on here, unfortunately. There are only two people I have a grudge against, my husband’ s girlfriend and also an evil ex supervisor who tried to ruin my life. (and pretty much everyone else’s too. They are actually very similar. Sanctimonious, treat others badly, never think they do snything wrong. They really are people who could be classified as Evil. Do not ask for forgiveness cause they already think they are perfect. It just really bothers me my husband could hold someone so vile in such high esteem. Too bad she doesn’t know how vile she is.

    • Rachel

      Well, I made it thru award night as well as graduation. No eye contact is key, and I thank my friends here for that suggestion. As he walked in the gym, I looked at my friend and said, “another face on the bus”. She just said ok.
      I had t walk by his family on graduation day and my head was never so high. New dress, new shoes, this I’m sure made them mad. The wicked witch of the east side( the ex MIL) hated when I spent money. I would always have to explain to her that it was my money. I would have loved to have walked over to her and showed her my outfit and said “alimony “!!!
      My kids were upset though. The ex said, to my oldest , ” do you think your mother would like a picture taken with all 4 of us? My son walked away and said, “see ya”.
      My youngest very upset said he ( that’s what they call their father), goes to my award nigh and my graduation and where was he all those years?? He wasn’t there for me at all. He’s all show, just to make himself look good. I couldn’t agree more but didn’t say anything. I hate when he hurts my kids, he’s do friggen clueless !!!!!

      • Strengthrequired

        I’m glad you had a good time Rachel, yet I do feel sorry to for your children, they have felt the rejection and trying to figure out why they are do important now to him. Hugs to all of you.

    • Gizfield

      This comment is especially for Strength Required. She asked recently why her husband could talk so much to cousin it. Well, I got to observe one of cousin it’s kind last night at my aunt’s 94th birthday party.

      This girl is a friend of my cousin. I don’t really know her, except that she has a four month old baby, and apparently a history of bad relationship. And an inappropriate sense of humor. Anyway, we had played games, then I went off to the living room and watched t.v.by myself. No lights were on in there, and this girl came in and got on her cell phone. Apparently a guy she is going to start dating. They talked about an hour and a half. Our rather, she talked. I didn’t hear a lot of it, but it was ALL about herself. Non-stop. Like her love of reading. She has two bookshelves full of books. She gets them everywhere. Friends, thrift store, library. She then mentioned she read Fifty Shades of Grey three times. All three of them. And she “got turned on” by them.

    • Gizfield

      Sorry, had to go cook pancakes for my daughter. Anyway, listening to this girl, she reminded me of the girl who sat by me at work for a while, and spent her days talking to a guy who was “unavailable.” Lots of talk about herself, how hard her life was, ADVICE on his life, sexual innuendo, and whispering and cooing. The girl last night was proud of the fact that she “has no filter” and just says whatever she wants. I’m pretty sure my co-worker was the same way.

      Looked at her facebook this morning. Says she’s “in a complicated relationship”. Was engaged before, then in another complicated relationship. Married before that, for a bit I guess. She rarely mentioned her baby, and indeed, I didn’t really know it was her baby most of the day cause she wasn’t with the baby hardly at all.

      Now, I have no reason to think the guy she talked to was married, I’m not saying that. I am saying that talking a lot about yourself, does not make you someone’s SOUL MATE, or apparently even someone you can have a successful relationship with. This girl knew I was there so I wasn’t spying or anything. Some people just love to talk, and the other person gets to be the Listener. Doesn’t really matter who they are as long as they have EARS, lol.

      So Strength, just know that whatever cousin it and your husband talked about, it was most likely stupid. Sorry to be so blunt, but these other women are not usually brain surgeons, or rocket scientists, or usually even very bright. They like to think they are, it’s really sad, kind of. My husband’s girlfriend certainly thought she was one of the brains of the free world.

    • Gizfield

      Rachel, yay for you, but sorry your kids are going through this. I bet your husband liked to talk about himself a lot. Did he?

      • Rachel

        Yes, too much !

    • Strengthrequired

      Giz, thanks for that. My h told me that she would talk about the same things over and over again, but I guess I just didn’t believe it, even if she just rambled on and on about nothing in particular it just made me wonder why after several hours of talk, he would call her again and again, then not wait to see her so he can listen to her again. All sounds a bit pathetic actually. I do think since she is a cousin she would have talked a lot about .

      I’m wondering why I am here still with my h, I truly feel like I am not missed when he is away, which is all the time. I have barely spoken to him all week. So this weekend I told him not to call me, I needed to feel him miss me, because I just don’t feel it. I’m so tired of feeling like I mean nothing to him, and work and everything else comes first.
      He says he misses me, but how do you explain, the little contact when he could call her, put her in front of our business, our family, every time. Yet for me, I’m still waiting to be put first, and to feel like I’m missed. I am not feeling like he cares enough for me, yet I know I need to keep trying for my kids, and just hope when I move soon, it will be better than this.

    • gizfield

      I hope that helped a little, SR. It’s really hard to figure why people do the things they do. My husband says all his girlfriend did was “bitch about her job and kid.” That sounds thrilling. Maybe it makes them feel “needed” or something. Wish I knew.

      • Strengthrequired

        Giz, it did help. Thanks. Yet my h is now upset with me because I didn’t answer his call. I won’t be seeing him now until the weekend, so two weeks. He was going to come home today, but all he would have done was stress about the work hours he lost if he did.
        What a wonderful few years since dday we have had.

      • Rachel

        Giz, I think they feel like they are rescuing the bimbo’s. My ex said the “soulmate” would tell him how miserable she was being married and just pray it would be over during intimate moments.
        Really?? Who needs to know that?
        PIG!

        • Strengthrequired

          They are all rescuing the ow, who they believe need rescuing because that’s what the ow wanted them to think. My h ow would answer the phone to her h in front of my h and would get him angry, then put her h on speaker so my h can hear him, so he would see she was telling the truth. Idiot.
          I told my h, what do you expect, that a h and w won’t have an arguments. I told him how wrong she was for putting him on speaker, it was idiot a way of her reeling him in.

    • CBb

      I am seeing a common trend here.

      All of us writing are strong, capable, emotionally secure, kind, loving and stable. Most of us are moms and ran the house, worked, acted as a parent and supported our husbands and put others in our lives first.

      And the CH falls for some psycho woman who is emotionally crippled, no morals, no brains, not stable, some with addictions and horrendous histories (multiple marriages, affairs, etc.). She has a “hard” life according to what our CH tells us. The OW or AP is spontaneous, deep, and all the crap our CH believes or falls for.

      In reality the OW or AP is self-centered, needy, narcissistic, mean, vindictive and has no morals.

      And that is what we are being compared to.

      My therapist told me part of the reason my H cheated is b/c this idiot AP made him feel needed and I just managed everything everyday and made his life easy. Too easy.

      Think about it. If we BS went out and acted like that, what would we attract? Losers. Guys we would want nothing to do with. And that is exactly what our CH ended up with. Females they would usually want nothing to do with had they not been in a weak moment and rationalized their behavior to themselves.

      And that is the sad commentary of what our H have become. Mid life crisis cheaters who are so STUPID that they fall for this crap. I mean really are they that dumb?

      I now realize how morally different I am from my H. If someone flirts with me that I find crosses a line, I back off and recognize them for the flirt and loser and probably cheater they are and have very little interaction. My CH on the other hand does not act that way, he continues the flirtation and enjoys it.

      Difference between men and women. Men just want the sex (usually) while women want the relationship. Men who flirt w/ me and cross the line are looking just for sex. They do not care about me at all. I am smart enough to recognize it. I see thru the facade.

      Too bad our CH do not have that ability.

      • Rachel

        Great blog CBb

    • Strengthrequired

      CBB, exactly. That is what I have noticed too. The ch wants to be a hero for their ap. the ap plays on the victim, ohh woe me card, and the ch falls for it. Stupid midlife crisis. I never expected that my h would suffer a midlife to this extent, yet he did.
      First he started feeling old, so grew his hair, then he needed a faster car, then he had a friend who had a heart attack but it was lucky it wasn’t fatal. Then he started questioning his life, his existence, where he is compared to where he wanted to be, he was working long hours with our business and people were not paying, and the bills started building, he stressed about raising and providing for our family, then “BAM” cousin it comes into the picture, or sad and lonely and stressing out how she is going to look after her family, considering she left her husband, and the rest is history. We ended up almost losing everything, because of his stupid midlife.

    • gizfield

      Cbb, I totally agree with your assessment of the AP, needy, selfish, uncaring, self centered, etc. That’s exactly how I was as a cheater (20 years ago). It’s part of the territory, and I personally dont think anyone escapes it while they are an active cheater. I dont think it’s a life sentence though and you can go back to be ing a decent person, IF YOU CHANGE YOUR WAYS. Your therapist sounds likes the best I’ve heard yet.

    • gizfield

      I guess thats one thing that threw me off about my husband, because he has never even once, flirted or acted inappropriately in front of me even once. Behind my back, thats a different story.

    • gizfield

      I also think that anything “stupid”done by betrayed spouses does not even begin to compare to the “stupid” acts of the cheater. They are doing something stupid every single second they are sneaking around breaking their marriage vows. Every single second, from the first inappropriate contact to the last. The BS are only reacting to this massive show of stupidity. In my personal opinion.

    • Strengthrequired

      Giz, we have everything thrown at us all at once, we are stuck in some sort of dark world, where everything is do or die, yet we are trying to figure out what we are supposed to do, to survive, and if it is classed as being stupidity then so be it, yet I don’t consider it as being overly stupid when you as you said, your cs is acting even more crazy and stupid, we are merely just trying to find our ground, and try to understand what is actually happening around us, so we can best deal with it. When we don’t know, how can we deal with what is happening appropriately.

    • tabs

      So what happens if the CH finds someone who is half his age, fashion model beautiful,and no kids?

      • Strengthrequired

        Jrs, there is your ch infatuation right there. A huge midlife crisis sign showing there. What is it men seem to revert back to childhood once they reach a certain period in their lives.
        I’m sure she is just one of those ow, that is looking for a sugar daddy. I believe there is always a pathetic reason a ow, doesn’t matter of what age, hangs off the ch. it is always a selfish reason, one that benefits the ow in some way or other.

    • Gizfield

      Well, tabs, I guess the first thing I would ask is why would she want him. Those people are just as insecure as the rest us.

    • Tabs

      GIZ,

      Thanks for the insight. I hope it’s true! I’ve often thought that the OW wanted his passport. She’s from China where visas are rare or expensive. However, she now resides in London. So my logic is all wrong.

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