For 6 weeks all we did was talk. No tv, no movies no time apart except when I was at work. Absolutely no time apart other than my job. It’s all we knew to do at the time. I didn’t want to be anywhere else and niether did she. She does not work outside the home. From the very first day after she told me about the affair, every day that I was at work, she would call me when she left the house for any reason and call me again when she returned. That was her idea before I thought of it. She still does it today.
I have full access to her cell phone bill, email account and she told me she feels more secure knowing that I WANT to keep tabs on her. She has always had access to mine but then, there has never been any reason or suspicions on her part to check up on me.
The thing that makes this accountability work is that most of it has been her idea and she gives me absolutely no resistance. It is part of our plan to rebuild our marriage and not just my plan .
What am I doing to meet her needs that I wasn’t doing before. Everything. For some reason, I almost immediately knew what I had to do. I can’t explain it except to say, deep down I knew what I was with holding from her…and my new mission in life?…Make sure she never has to go outside our home to get what she needs.
The night she confessed everything to me, I thought we could never have sex again…I even said that to her. But after I forgave her, I knew I had to start immediately to get that part of our life back. So..the very next night we made love and went for about 65 or 66 days straight. Skipped a day and then started again. Not trying to break any records. Just a new attitude and reorganized priorities on my part. I had almost lost the most important part of my life and I was not about to let that happen because of anything that I was unwilling to change.
I began talking to her while we made love. Telling her how much I love her and how I was feeling and well, I don’t need to get to descriptive except to say that our love life changed radically and it was something she had always wanted but I had been too uncomfortable to do. It is still that way today. Honestly, I was about a once a week guy before. Too busy chasing success. Worn out at the end of the day. What a waste of life.
Also, she almost immediately began counseling with an incredibly brilliant lady (professional Christian counselor recommended by someone else). She went once a week for about 10 weeks. We scheduled the sessions on my days off so I could go with her. I would drop her off and go to the drug store and buy her nice card and meet her with the card when she came out of the counseling session. Then we would go have lunch and talk about it.
Of course I got counseling also, but I was meeting with another counselor. I wanted her to have her own private sessions with a female counselor so she didn’t feel like she had to hold anything back because of me being there. The counseling helped her tremendously which in turn helped me.
Other things I am doing that I didn’t do before: Clean up after myself. Voluntarily do the dishes and pick up the house. I give her a massage after we make love once or twice a week. The thing is I enjoy doing these things now. It’s kinda weird.
This post is really getting long. Once I get started, all of these thoughts start coming to me and I don’t want to leave anything out because I feel like if I don’t tell the whole story, someone will think that I’m not being real or whatever and that I must be naive to think that we could possibly have things together already. Trust me when I say, it is still very hard sometimes. The images that come into my mind were overwhelming and overpowered me mentally for a time.
I eventually learned to recognize those thoughts as “my enemies”. The thoughts will try to destroy you. The thoughts will try to get you to hate, to curse and even to kill. I am now much quicker to recognize when my mind is going in the wrong direction and I am able take control of my thoughts back…most of the time anyway.
There is so much more to say about what has helped me, us deal with this. I will be happy to talk about it in more detail in future posts.
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
I’ve been reading your posts and am amazed at how similiar our path to forgiveness has been. My wife had various affairs over the 20 years we have been married. She revealed this to me in February 2010 and has done all the things you have mentioned in your posts to show me I am the only man for her. We are more passionate for each other than ever before. However….even though our marriage is better than ever, I still have these severe shifts in emotional ups and downs (highs and lows). We have never seeked counseling and in fact have never told anyone outside our marriage. Do you still have these ups and downs? Since I have not seeked cousel, I’m wondering if I should.
Thank you for reading my posts. It has been a rough ride for me emotionally and I must say that I still have my ups and downs as well. It seems it would be impossible not to. I will never completely forget what happened, nor will I ever feel good about it when the thoughts come to mind of what tool place behind my back.
I have however learned to control my thoughts to the point that they do not influence what I say to my wife and the way that I treat her. Because of the fact that she continually expresses her love to me and her obvious change of heart, I will not jeopardize that by making her feel that I have not forgiven her.
It is a strange thing but I realize for the first time that I am capable of living my life with her in a way that I am always able to express to her how much I love her, in both my words and my actions, while at times I am experiencing feelings of hurt and betrayal. As time goes on I sense that my love and forgiveness for her is much stronger than those negative feelings. I must emphasize here that if she were defiant and refused to depart from her old behavior, I would not have that strength that I speak of. This kind of restoration is only possible for us, and I believe for anyone in our situation, when both parties want nothing to do with the hurtful behavior of the past.
As far as counsel goes, yes, I believe that good counsel from someone you know and respect is extremely valuable. I did get counsel the day after I found out. I called a good friend who is a Christian minister. I was fortunate enough to have a friend that is a very good, non-judgemental individual. I called him and he came to my home immediately from his home which is about a 1 and 1/2 hour drive from mine. He and I spent several hours together. I was a basket case that day. He helped me get through it and then we continued to talk by telephone for several weeks. It was tremendously helpful to me.
I realize that there are a lot of counselors out there and I would be selective about who I choose to confide in. If you do not personally know someone, than I would recommend that you seek counsel from a professed Christian counselor that has a good reputation and a good record of successfully helping people.
Good luck to you as you continue to do the right thing. I pray that God will bless you and your wife with many happy years ahead. Making it through infidelity is a bittersweet success. The pain can seem unbearable but the fruit of sticking it out can produce a marriage relationship that many, if not most married couples will never experience.
Thank you..This helped me tremendously.
Thank you for sharing your story. I just found out my wife of 12 years had an affair, which just ended after she told me a couple of weeks ago. Its really hard right now, but reading your posts gives me some hope. She tries to reconnect with me, but it has been an emotional roller coaster. I hope that I can post another message here in a couple months and say that things are getting better.
hi still hurt dont get hurt anymore, evryone of us, gets hurt either us or the one who hurt use. just make yourself beautiful and more loving so she will have a regret seeing you next time around, the best thing you could do is love yourself more. dont let her love you as thats the most stupid thing to do. i was also a victim and till now is a victim of a very viscious husband, hes more than an animal for aside from cheaing he is the one who alwys make fun of me in front of his friends. he alwys tell he loves me but never in thought or in any action even a single manner he would show it. so i decided why should i wait for him to love me, i dont need him anyway, i have lived my whole life eing alone and was able to prove myself i can do things even without any help from him.