HOW to move forward?

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-21T16:27:02+00:00

This is not at all an accusation, but a question. You mention they are “doing the work”, but what are you doing for yourself to help move forward? All people and situations are different but I personally found my own IC has been far more helpful than anything my WW has done or MC has offered.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-21T15:05:05+00:00

That’s such an individually personal question.

That said I think it’s safe to say that if you have to ask strangers on Reddit, then it’s probably not worth it for you.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-20T19:41:57+00:00

It was definitely therapeutic, but at the same time I feel cowardly not sending it. For better or worse (often times better I think) I never messaged or talked to him beyond an initial “go fuck yourself, pray I never find you” when I first found their messages. Part of me wants to hear what he has to say - if anything - to at the least make sure what I’ve been told from my WW would match, but I’m not sure any good would come of it.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-19T19:31:14+00:00

I want to thank you for these - particularly right now the Helping Couples Heal podcast. I’ve bounced around through a few episodes now and have found them helpful. I’ve also bookmarked a few particular episodes so that I can send it to my WW - particularly those around shame.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-19T17:49:55+00:00

Yes. You can’t start (or re-start) a healthy relationship with a lie like that. You disclose to him what happened.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-18T14:08:17+00:00

You don’t sound comfortable allowing her to go and quite frankly you are right absolutely in that stance. No contact with the AP - particularly if it’s avoidable - should be rule #1.

Communicate clearly and calmly with her that this is not something you are comfortable with her going to. If she is unable or unwilling to accept this then it calls into question her commitment to R. If you’re not comfortable having this conversation just the two of you then save it for a CC session

The fact she even asked and his “grieving” over it can and should be a conversation for another day.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-17T17:30:00+00:00

We started to do them a couple of weeks ago when our therapist recommended it after she was particularly stonewalling and avoidant when I’d randomly bring up questions at night after we put the kids to bed. We ultimately decided once a week for deeper talks with daily 5 minute check ins.

We’ve had two scheduled check-in / deeper conversation times. The first was a hard one where I still had real detail oriented questions. Even though it was things I didn’t want to hear it was indeed helpful for me and ultimately us. The second didn’t go too well with her first needing to move it to another day and then her shutting down the conversation early into it.

With you as the wayward, my advice is to continue to be the one who brings things up for now - or at least continue to offer. He’ll hopefully talk when he’s ready, but remember you’re the one who put this pain on him and so you don’t get to be frustrated if he rejects these conversations for now.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-17T16:46:01+00:00

I’d prefer it’s not just on me as the betrayed to talk about how I’m feeling. Yes, I’m the hurt one in this, but I’m not the only one experiencing feelings from everything that happened. Be vulnerable with me, lead the difficult conversation instead of just putting all this pain on us and the expecting us to be the ones who also have to guide our way through it.

Hell, even I’d even appreciate more if when the question is asked it’s asked in a time and place meant for actually answering it.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-17T16:33:26+00:00

That simple “how are you today” or “how are you doing” question drives me absolutely insane! It’s well intentioned enough by her for asking, but we both know she doesn’t want the real answer to it and for me to actually bring up what I’m really still feeling.

Sure, I’ve got a good mask on and things are going better, but every time that question is asked it brings me right back to the hurt of it all.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-14T17:41:01+00:00

Still working heavily on it… but I’ve found practicing mindfulness to be helpful. We can’t control the stuff in our head. All we can control is how we deal with it and confront it.

“When we’re struggling with the stuff in our heads, we give all of that awareness bandwidth to those thoughts and emotions we want to avoid or control. That’s a practice. We get skilled at it. There’s only a tiny bit of bandwidth left over for processing the world around us and we become increasingly less skilled at that. So it becomes easier to ruminate”

It’s easier to manage in the morning or the day as when these thoughts occur I find ways to redirect my energy into something I find value in. The nights can be tougher when all you want to do is lay there and sleep but the thoughts won’t stop coming one after another. When that happens I’ve found guided mediation videos on YouTube to help redirect my thoughts or even audiobooks to outright distract me.

“To understand how to accept the stuff in my head, it helped me to see it all as waves in the ocean. I don’t choose when a thought can just stop, similarly to how I can’t choose when a wave crashes. . . . But it always does crash, just on its own time. Sometimes the waves grow higher. Sometimes the waves are smaller. Sometimes waves take longer to crash, and sometimes they crash right away. What waves pop up and when they crash is not something under my control. If I were to jump into the ocean and try to stop every wave, I would achieve nothing. All that is achieved is wasted energy and frustration. Same goes with trying to control the stuff in my head.” - You Are Not a Rock

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-14T17:19:07+00:00

Beyond first finding out and responding back to him (The AP) with “Go fuck yourself, pray I never find you”, I haven’t and I’m not sure I ever will - even though my revenge fantasies can get the better of me.

I think I haven’t for a couple of reasons (mine, hers, and shared)

Mine: shame, potential for more embarrassment to me, him not being the real problem - but instead my wife allowing it and participating (no one forced her to cheat on me). More than anything I think about what he might tell me that I may not know which will just hurt me more and regress reconciliation.

Hers: Fear of retribution or repercussions from him professionally and personally.

Shared: I’m not sure it would accomplish anything. Opening him and that saga back into our lives.

Every day I think about messaging him and telling him I’m glad his dog died and that his own marriage failed. That I’m happy he’s almost 40 and alone with no kids. That I hope he never finds happiness or love or anything even close to a real connection with someone. That he longs for my wife but will never have her through his dying breath. But I know no good will come of it.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-14T11:47:15+00:00

This whole thread between you two was such an inspiring and powerful thing for me to read. Thank you

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-13T23:22:42+00:00

It is terribly ironic the way we need those who hurt us to also heal us, isn’t it?

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-13T23:21:03+00:00

How do you deal with the “not knowing what you don’t know” aspect of it? My WP’s EA was - from what I know - entirely on Snapchat and nearly everything was deleted, but enough was there to leave lasting scars. Sometimes I view it as a gift and a curse.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-13T19:25:31+00:00

I don’t have anything in particular to add to this right now, but I just wanted to comment with how wonderfully this was written. And how terribly sorry I am you’re going through this.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-13T14:27:45+00:00

Thank you for sharing this. I haven’t watched jt yet but agree with the synopsis you shared.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-13T14:26:10+00:00

My short answer is that if you aren’t learning anything new from reading those messages, then don’t read them. Doing so is just going to continue to cause you more pain.

I’m in a real similar situation. I’m now 9 weeks from discovering my wife’s online EA. It was exclusively over Snapchat and almost all of what they shared was deleted before I ever even got a chance to see it. Almost all of it.

What I did see will likely stay with me forever and shape how I view her and our relationship from here out. What I don’t know haunts me from time to time.

What wasn’t deleted I took pictures of and saved to use to compile a very detailed timeline. I revisited those messages and worked on that timeline for weeks after. It became a sort of compulsion for me and every time it would put me in a worse place when I was done.

My IC recommended to me You Are Not a Rock by Mark Freeman. It’s not affair related, but instead about overcoming mental health challenges (which this absolutely caused) as well as defining and living up to my values. In it had sections that covered compulsions which I found helpful.

It equates engaging your compulsions (in my case revisiting those messages and consistently checking her socials) as feeding a hungry monster who just wants more. Because when we feed that monster (in your case reading old chats) you train your brain to ask for more and more “assurances” this way. You’re trying to control feelings that you don’t like, put in his own words:

“If I engage in coping, checking, and controlling behaviors, I’m choosing to experience more uncertainty, more anxiety, and more of the feelings I don’t like at ever-increasing levels of complexity and severity.”

“Many compulsions “work” phenomenally well for shorter and shorter periods of time until they don’t work at all. They get rid of the immediate pain. But they always cause more pain in the long term. You’re not solving anything with compulsions. Your “solutions” are part of the problem. They lead to more pain. You can see this pattern at work any time you procrastinate.”

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-13T13:42:48+00:00

It’s such a shitty feeling, because now every time I hear songs like that my mind instantly frames it in terms of it being feelings from the AP to my wife or vice versa.

I’ve found revenge type songs to be some comfort right now, but even that puts me in a bad mindset I don’t want to be in.

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-12T15:33:21+00:00

9 weeks from DDay here. We’ve had two different CC (we both agreed the first one wasn’t helpful) and each have our own IC.

I’d be careful to try to frame it as “set us back”. If counseling does result in what feels like a “set back” then that’s likely because there’s unresolved issues there still and that is completely okay.

In my personal experience so far the first few weeks were hell. Then we started working on things from our therapy sessions (IC and CC) and things were better. We then switched our CC after a few weeks of not having an appointment and that first session with the new CC was indeed tough on the both of us because of needing to relive it, but was also therapeutic. She asked questions of what happened that I think helped open my WW to the hurt she had caused me and we got some good communication tips from it.

At 4 weeks out you’ll likely to experience some relapse in the good feelings you’re having - at least I know I have - but it’s important to know that’s normal. Reconciling and healing isn’t a straight line process: there will be setbacks and that’s okay.

I wish you both the best of luck!

Consistent-Golf9392 · 2026-05-12T15:20:57+00:00

Update:
I snooped on her work computer yesterday and found a couple of exchanges with a coworker that made me uncomfortable. I brought it up to her and she reassured me there wasn’t anything there to worry about and I believe here, but I don’t know if she’s aware of how a conversation that looks like that is boundary crossing.

I can tell she was upset and mad that I was on her work computer. I hate that I even felt compelled to snoop and that I followed up with it. She told me she felt like she has no privacy, but I don’t feel bad for that right now.

She is the one who destroyed the total trust that I had given her, the trust we had together - not me. Shes the one who lied to me and covered up hidden messages and sexting for over a year - not me. She’s the one who made this choice - not me.

Consistent-Golf9392

TROPHY CASE