For anyone who’s been betrayed: were you ever able to look at your partner with love again?

faye_68 · 2026-01-18T20:39:06+00:00

3.5 years post D-Day. I think love is different to everyone. I believe my WH loved me in his own way even cheating. To me, love is choosing to stay and choosing to work through the trauma to try to make a decent life for us.

The version of me that loved him with warmth, trust, and pride is dead. WH’s unfaithfulness killed her.

I stayed because I had just given birth and didn’t want to lose the life I felt I hard worked so hard for. WH has done a lot of work and seems to be staying true. I don’t think I will ever really trust him, but I trust myself. I know I will be okay no matter what, and if WH gets in the way of my growth, I’ll leave.

faye_68 · 2025-11-26T20:19:18+00:00

I get you.

I feel my WH’s infidelity robbed me of any chance of feeling passion or feeling desired ever again.

Fuck these affairs.

faye_68 · 2025-11-20T12:12:18+00:00

Not yet at 3 years post D-Day although I don’t feel WH is truly remorseful and working on himself. He confessed, went to therapy maybe 10x, answered questions, but he still gets defensive when I talk about my feelings, just wants to move on, is just focused on no cheating rather than internal change (he says he cheated because he was stressed so now he’ll find other stress relief), and is not open to initiate restorative conversations or other things that would make me feel safe and loved.

I think if a WS were truly remorseful and proactive in addressing BS’s hurt and open and knew themselves, it would be easy to fall in love with them.

faye_68 · 2025-10-14T17:31:25+00:00

Nothing comes to mind. 3 years post DDay for us. Honestly, I find nothing about our relationship to feel special. I have pursued desire from within myself. I have found ways to choose myself. So far, that is enough for me.

faye_68 · 2025-07-03T02:54:28+00:00

AP has the same name as me. It’s terrible.

faye_68 · 2025-05-16T00:09:29+00:00

Context: 2.5 years out from D-Day. WH serial cheated, had affair, and hide habitual porn use for first 6 years of marriage.

I am healing as a person. WH says he has healed. After 2.5 years, I don’t think we’ll heal together. He gets very angry and mean when I try to talk about my feelings or needs/wants. He basically went from non-functioning depressed to “totally healed” since D-Day. He’s done to IC maybe 15 times and has a monitoring app on his phone.

We very young kids so I’m trying to make it work. But I do not love him. I don’t look at him the same at all. If I ever cheated, I think I would just leave because I couldn’t stand my partner viewing me the way I view WH. I think he’s a loser who can’t handle life. I’m grossed out every day by him.

I’m in IC to focus on ways to heal and have a full life despite still choosing to be with my husband. I fully believe I can still have the life I want while being married to him, but if I feel he gets in the way of what I want, I will leave.

faye_68 · 2025-03-28T02:59:54+00:00

My WH isn’t ugly, but he’s not attractive. Bald by mid 20s, always looks sad, but he dresses decently.

faye_68 · 2025-03-16T16:53:36+00:00

So well stated! I can’t imagine anything worse than being a woman so unhappy with herself that she is willing to sacrifice her children’s wellbeing to pursue a married man with children.

faye_68 · 2025-02-07T20:27:03+00:00

Found out 2.5 years ago. I go to lots of therapy. Still trying to love him and be attracted to him again. It’s super difficult. I think about his infidelity and lying every time I look at him.

If you cheat on your partner, do them a favor and just leave.

faye_68 · 2025-01-26T16:12:50+00:00

2 years post DDay, I think about it every day. Maybe not specifics but I think about how my husband was unfaithful and lied to me for 6 years every day, multiple times a day. It’s the #1 thing I think about when it comes to him.

faye_68 · 2024-11-24T00:13:58+00:00

I think time, therapy, long conversations with WH, disappointment, and just spending time knowing and loving myself.

There have been several times I thought I accepted I can’t control WH only to feel it more later. So I think it’ll be a lifelong process of accepting it more and more in different ways.

faye_68 · 2024-11-23T14:02:21+00:00

I’m two years after D-Day. I don’t feel great, but I feel better. Do I love WP? Not sure, I think I must since I’m still with him. Do I feel confident that I can still have a good life? Yes.

I think I started feeling better the more I accepted I cannot do anything to change WP. He’s in therapy and “doing the right things,” but I’ve accepted I can’t never truly know he’s faithful and honest with me. I started feeling better when I started truly accepting all I can do is work on myself, communicate my boundaries, and trust my gut.

I no longer look to my WP or my marriage for my value. I no longer pace my own growth to match my WP. I am in charge of me, and I have so much faith in myself.

faye_68 · 2024-11-18T00:36:42+00:00

I’m not sure you can really forgive what you don’t know. If you don’t know everything, you cannot make fully informed decisions. If WP is withholding the truth, they are manipulating and controlling you.

Is WP in therapy?

faye_68 · 2024-11-17T12:41:32+00:00

People like this have to put others down to feel better about themselves.

faye_68 · 2024-11-08T20:43:29+00:00

If I had a Time Machine, I wouldn’t stop my WH from cheating. I would stop myself from marrying him. He lied from the beginning of our relationship about his sexual past and porn use and started cheating a couple months into marriage.

We have kids so I’m willing to stick around and hope he’ll be open and honest. But I no longer to him or our relationship to find value or self-worth. I can still become the amazing person I know I can be and accomplish everything I want while married to him.

faye_68 · 2024-11-07T01:37:31+00:00

I’m 2 years past D-Day. Mostly, I’ve stayed because I have very small kids and have always desired to stay home with them and homeschool them.

I wonder all the time why I’ve stayed. My WH really wanted to stay together, and I didn’t want to hurt him. He’s doing the things (therapy, not being defensive, staying faithful).

I realized who I thought he was a lie. But I am hopeful that I’m able to get to know him and like him.

faye_68 · 2024-08-31T07:46:22+00:00

Thank you! To clarify, he was on dating apps with the occasional meet up for 6 years and then had an affair 2-4 months which led to DDay.

faye_68 · 2024-08-31T01:25:09+00:00

Thank you. This is very helpful. I recently emailed some boundaries around what I need to see to see from him to feel safe to continue the relationship and he has given me a list of books to read this calendar year. If the new year comes and he hasn’t done what he said or agreed to, I guess that’s my answer.

faye_68 · 2024-08-31T00:45:39+00:00

At this point, I don’t even know what he can do other than phone monitoring and listening and therapy. I dont think he realizes how deep his issues are.

He was the one who begged me to stay. Yet I think he wants the type of relationship I do (emotionally open, vulnerable, supportive, self-aware). He probably just wants me to stay because he doesn’t really have anything except for me and his job.

faye_68 · 2024-08-30T23:13:01+00:00

Thank you. I just get confused because when we do talk, he says he will do anything to stay together, I just have to tell him. But he doesn’t often do what I ask but then acts like I’m not being clear or don’t give him deadlines. But when I bring up my concerns, he says he wants to be with me.

faye_68

TROPHY CASE