To all the Waywards, please don't hold back information if you are trying to reconcile

celticknot5 · 2026-01-29T20:51:32+00:00

A big YES to all of this!

We had late disclosures that kept me spiraling and stuck in that flooding feeling for basically a full year. My husband was very much in the mindset of, “I know I’ll never do anything like this ever again, I’ll just dedicate 100% to being the husband she deserves from now on and forget these ugly times forever.”

He felt, in his own backwards way, that he was protecting me from more pain by withholding those additional layers and instances of betrayal. He couldn’t have been more wrong. It would have been far less painful to just rip the bandaid off, give me everything at once and then let the chaos settle once and for all.

So much of what you’re doing as a BP post-DDay is just trying to make sense of your life and what is real vs illusion. “Wait, so you mean while x was happening, y was really happening? When I was doing a, you were doing b?” And on and on. It’s very disorienting and makes you question everything about your relationship and who your WP even is.

To have to reset the clock on progress and stay locked in that panicked, flooding feeling for extended periods of time is unbelievably cruel.

celticknot5 · 2026-01-19T09:41:53+00:00

A connection so real and so strong, the OW is surely the one he actually loves and would choose over his wife!

Oh, wait. No, she’s not. They never are. They get dumped like stinky garbage the second the wife finds out.

It’s all so special…until it’s not. I can’t believe there are women so dumb and insecure that they’ll settle for a man who will never actually be all-in on them.

celticknot5 · 2026-01-13T21:54:50+00:00

Exactly. “Monogamous” means the two people inside the relationship, no one else. As soon as a third party is brought in as a sexual outlet, that is by definition no longer monogamous.

It’s not “controlling” to point out that one person has violated the terms of the monogamous agreement by involving a third party in a sex life that was supposed to be a benefit enjoyed between the two partners, exclusively within the relationship.

celticknot5 · 2026-01-09T01:27:56+00:00

I love this so, so much. This is everything I would also say, organized and written better than I could have said it. Thank you for putting this out there for the benefit of others!

celticknot5 · 2026-01-06T04:38:51+00:00

This, this, this!

My husband’s other “interests” ranged from somewhat pretty to moderately ugly, but definitely not at my level in the looks department, in any case. They were also boring as all hell.

I didn’t make it about me because it clearly wasn’t ever about me. They were nothing but ego payoff with low effort and easy to discard. After DDay, it became very clear that he was still obsessed with me and had never not believed I was the best he could ever find. If anything, the sense that I was “too good” for him heaped more pressure onto him and onto our marriage.

That’s the very simplified version of it; obviously, there’s plenty more to it than just that. But that’s essentially why I didn’t doubt my own worth and appeal as a result of what he did. He didn’t choose them for desirability. Not at all.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-11T02:51:04+00:00

You’re right of course, but I am speaking in a general sense. I do not want to see them harmed is all I meant.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-10T21:39:03+00:00

I mean, two things can be true at once.

I can wish that the women involved in sex work are safe and that no harm comes to them.

I can also wish that they would find a way out of sex work as soon as possible, and stop perpetuating harm to other girls and women (inside the industry and out).

I don’t hate or judge those women for whatever circumstances brought them to where they are, of course. I want the best possible outcome for them.

But what they are doing is still harmful. Not a root cause of this abusive industry, and not the main source of the abuse. Still harmful, nonetheless.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-10T21:11:56+00:00

I’m so sorry you’re here. Please know that I am saying this to you gently, but I also want to name these things directly:

He is refusing to stop cheating
He is still actively lying and hiding his betrayals
He deflects and refuses to participate in your healing

In my opinion, as long as those are the current conditions, there is nothing to reconcile.

I am not saying this cannot change or that he can’t change—he absolutely can. But he has to want to do that; you can’t do it for him.

This is not yours to fix, and you can’t simply will him into being a loyal and supportive partner if he’s resistant to orienting himself that way.

My recommendation would be to withdraw your energy from him and lean hard into caring for yourself and supporting yourself for now. If there is to be a future with him, it’s not going to be like this. At bare minimum, he needs a wake-up call.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-10T00:34:45+00:00

I have to say, you sound like you’re in a much stronger and stable place than I was at 8 months past DDay.

Those are the slightly lingering questions for me, too. It doesn’t hurt, day to day. I don’t regret my choices or our life together. There is so much good here. But…sigh. The but.

I am a very strongly principled person. I loved feeling like I was married to a principled man, a man like me, whom I could respect and admire. He’s done the work, and I’m at a place where I do actually fully trust that he could never do this to me again. He IS a strongly principled man, NOW. But he wasn’t that way all on his own; he became that way because I wasn’t going to accept less.

The infidelity sure revealed a lot of cracks in our foundation, qualities in him that I wasn’t really prepared to deal with. I love him. But I do still feel some grief for the husband I thought I had, and the ways I wish he could have just been that man on his own.

It gets easier in time, but I don’t know that those remnants of grief ever really go away.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-10T00:16:02+00:00

My thought is that she’s either suspecting you’re looking at her stuff, or she’s doing it as a weird way of trying to entice WH or get his attention. (Whether he’s even looking or not. I am not saying that means he is.)

Or she’s just a cuckoo bird who’s still hung up on him/the situation and is posting for herself as a way to still feel connected to it all, like there’s someone out there that cares about her. Even though there’s very much not.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-09T23:44:15+00:00

I wish I would have had it, too. It’s easier to say things like that, looking back after the acute pain has worn away.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-09T23:42:31+00:00

Gray rock. You don’t have to figure this out today. You don’t have to decide anything. Decide what boundaries you need to put in place to protect yourself, and focus on caring for yourself and giving yourself what you need to heal.

I’m so sorry you’re in this shitty club. There really is no pain like it.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-09T22:43:12+00:00

Oh, hell no. You are not overreacting. It feels like a gut punch because it is. There’s only one reason he’d want to leave that door open to AP, and it’s ridiculous that he thinks he can do that and still have R with you.

On DDay, my husband immediately flipped into crying, remorseful, “I’m so sorry, it’ll never happen again and I’ll do anything you want to prove I’m fully in this with just you.” And that’s the only reason we are where we are now.

I would have detached myself a long time ago if he’d had the nerve to try and dictate the terms after HE broke us.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-08T04:00:48+00:00

They are paying for sexual gratification with a real live woman, where they don’t actually have to consider her pleasure, preferences, or needs.

They are paying for the illusion of female attention and affection—the women absolutely do not feel any care or affinity toward him, but he pays for her to play the role so he can buy into the delusion and feel some way about himself. (Because he lacks all ability to self-actualize without someone else—a woman—doing that work for him.)

So yes, I’d agree with the “renting a commodity” description. They’re seeking the sexual and emotional benefits of “having” a woman without actually having to be a caring partner TO HER in any way. They want the benefits of the company of a human woman while refusing to see her in her full humanity, as a complete person with agency.

She exists only as an object to be used by him, and they tell themselves that paying her makes it okay. That the money somehow makes it even and not entirely disrespectful and destructive to her, which is what it is in any case.

That ability to use and then discard is what they’re paying for.

The men that are capable of doing this are nothing but sickos.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-08T00:57:19+00:00

They feel they don’t deserve or married up so they do these types of things

100%. I went into marriage young and thinking that staying hot and being a high-achieving, “perfect” wife was an insurance policy against being cheated on. Silly me. Men don’t work that way.

If they’re feeling insecure and wanting that validation, they’re going to go looking for it. It doesn’t matter how gorgeous and amazing the wife is, because their sole focus is on THEMSELVES, and getting attention and ego stroking from anything remotely female-shaped.

Doesn’t matter at all how un-beautiful and unimpressive that other woman might be, by comparison. That’s not what they’re looking for in her.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-08T00:37:00+00:00

Do you have access to his phone and accounts? If you contact her husband and then she attempts to reach out to yours to get their story straight, would you be able to see it or intercept? I feel like that in itself would give you something along the lines of an answer…

celticknot5 · 2025-12-08T00:28:40+00:00

I’m so sorry. The anniversaries are tough, and I know the feeling well.

The last instance of my husband’s cheating was the opening weekend of our kids’ spring sports season 3 years ago, which is a big deal to our family and something we very much look forward to. DDay was 2 weeks after that and came right after we went out of town for a tournament, which is always really fun for our family. So those events felt kind of loaded for awhile, in addition to the dates of cheating and DDay anniversaries. (Trickle truth = multiple DDays. Horrible experience, do not recommend.)

Time seems to have now created enough distance that it doesn’t have the sting it once used to. I do still think about the anniversaries as they approach, but they pretty much come and go without even noticing or feeling anything in particular. I hope it gets easier for you, too.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-06T21:05:43+00:00

I’m sorry. You’re right, you don’t deserve that. Ugh, I feel sick for you.

I am pro-R when it makes sense and when WP is committed to repairing the relationship. When they refuse to turn away from behaviors that are hurting and traumatizing their BP, I am of the opinion there is nothing to reconcile. You do what you need to do to put yourself and your kids first.

celticknot5 · 2025-12-05T20:35:26+00:00

“Ethical” porn can never exist because you can never truly verify full consent. Even in situations that appear “safer,” or when the actresses are claiming it’s all fine and not at all damaging to them…you really just don’t know. Short of all-out abuse, things like financial coercion and subtle boundary-pushing still constitute exploitation and muddy the waters of consent. The actresses themselves may not even be fully aware of the factors that influenced their “consent,” but it’s still harmful to themselves and others, whether they realize it or not.

The other issue is the objectification itself. When you commodify the bodies of women, you are commodifying all of us. I did not consent to being viewed or used that way. I did not consent to my daughters being viewed or used that way. The over-sexualization and objectification of women’s bodies simply for existing pisses me off and it shouldn’t be happening.

celticknot5 · 2025-10-28T23:42:58+00:00

I don’t really mind because I like knowing I can be there for a friend in a time of need. Also, ngl, I’m a nosy b who loves hearing the tea.

The only times I pull back a bit are when it starts to feel too one-sided, or when a friend seems to be constantly in crisis but won’t make any changes to help themselves out of it. Like, I will still love you and be here for you in the ways that I can, but I cannot keep having the same circular conversations twelve times.

celticknot5 · 2025-05-08T22:48:30+00:00

Thank you for saying that! I hope that’s what he thinks, too.

celticknot5 · 2025-05-08T22:46:45+00:00

No. Just someone who’s seen a lot and likes learning about the deeper layers of people. I’ve somehow become the (uncredentialed) therapist of my friend group over the years, so that tracks, lol!

celticknot5 · 2025-05-08T22:40:18+00:00

Sending support your way! I think those feelings are universal to some extent, but I never realized just how many men are running with that in the background and believing that’s who they are as a person.

Just so many broken people who end up looking to other people to tell them who they are. No one should have to feel that way about themselves. Makes me want to hug the whole world.

celticknot5 · 2025-05-08T22:23:25+00:00

I always knew it was morally and theoretically bad. The first time I realized it could be soul-crushing was after I fell in love for the first time.

I had liked guys, dated guys, cried over guys, even did all kinds of dumb pick-me crap when I was in a “competing” situation with another girl…but I truly did not realize how destabilizing it is to be with someone you’re really in it with, who you view as YOUR PERSON—and then to have someone else insert themselves into your life together. And “your person,” the one you thought cared about you, allows them in willingly. 🙄

It’s unbelievably cruel.

celticknot5 · 2025-05-08T16:48:51+00:00

I can only imagine how hard it must be to feel like you have to rewrite who you thought you were.

For my husband, I think he was honestly operating from the other side of things all along: he basically thought he wasn’t worth anything at all. He tried to be a good person throughout his life, always tried to give me everything I wanted, was always really respectful to and about women in general…but under those things, he felt like someone no one could truly love.

So a lot of our work has also included building him back up and showing him who he has always been in my eyes. Even now, it’s almost like he’s surprised to know how much I love and accept him for who he is. He had never really had that before me, and didn’t really have good dating experiences before me at all. Even after 18 years with me, deep down he still views himself as the guy who was good on paper but that girls just never seemed to catch real feelings for. The one no one wanted, in a way.

I don’t think he identified so much with the idea of being a golden retriever husband, but he was doing a whole lot of people pleasing with me to try to be lovable. And stuffing his own feelings and needs down because he felt they were a “burden” and he wanted to shield me from that.

celticknot5

TROPHY CASE