Dear Chump Lady,
I am writing on behalf of us unicorns. We exist, those people who reconcile (who you say are as rare as unicorns). Look, you were with a serial cheater, but that’s not all cheaters. Clearly you have Issues. Yeah, people are broken, they fuck up, but you move on. Cheaters are not always doing all this Machievelian manipulation, scheming, and cake eating. Yes, cheating sucks, but you can overcome it.
Leave a cheater, gain a life? Why don’t you get a life — instead of bashing reconciliation. How can you be down on reconciliation when you haven’t tried it? You say you’re happily remarried, but yet you devote all this time and energy to a blog about your cheating ex. Get over it!
Signed,
Sparkles the Unicorn
Dear Sparkles,
Where to begin, Sparkles? For starters, I don’t need to blog about my ex. There’s a glowing profile about him over at Cheaterville posted by some other woman he cheated on after I divorced him.
The name of this blog is Chump Lady. Not Omnipotent Lady. Or Smug Lady. It’s CHUMP Lady. My experience and perspective comes from being played, from learning things from Chumpdom. I haven’t posted my story here (yet), so you have no idea whether or not I tried reconciling. I did try it — for over a year. But because it was not a “successful” reconciliation (I divorced him, as he just took his affair underground), you presume I don’t know about reconciliation.
You’re dismissive of my perspective because my ex was a serial cheater — a baddie, as compared to the more benign sorts of cheaters. I suppose those are the confused, mid-life crisis sort, or the “I accidentally fucked someone at a conference” sort. The better caliber of cheaters who are sorry and do the homework after they’ve been found out.
I’m not against reconciliation in theory (I live in hope of unicorn sightings) — I just think the odds of having a truly successful one are slim.
Let’s define “successful reconciliation.” I apparently didn’t have one, so I can’t judge it. But who’s to say it wasn’t successful by your standards? He fell off the wagon, but a lot of people work with that and stay. After a year of more cheating, I threw in the towel. But I’m sure a lot of “successful” reconciliations are from people who hung in there and endured.
But no, to be successful, you’d have endure and be closer. How likely is that if one or more of the following happens: Someone got pregnant. They blame shifted this crap to you. They said that they had “needs” that went unmet. They continued to lie. They gaslighted you. They didn’t immediately end it. It was a long-term affair. It was an affair with a best friend/coworker/family member. There was other addiction involved. You got an STD for life. Your children walked in/read the emails/need therapy. The affair partner is bat shit crazy and harasses you. They refuse to answers questions about what they did. They’re not transparent. They still work with the affair partner. They resent that you remember what they did and that you require reassurances. There’s reminders, like they slept in your bed, your house, your car. You had to threaten them with divorce to get them to commit to you.
So that leaves what? A one-night stand that someone immediately confessed to and wasn’t emotionally invested in. That’s not a lot of cheaters.
At the end of the day, reconciliation with one or more of those challenges is a relationship that is predicated on amnesia. I believe you that you are together, that your marriage endures, that you feel pretty okay most days. I do not believe that your relationship is happier or better for it. No one eats that many shit sandwiches and is better for it. So, at best Sparkles, you have an okay marriage, not a better one. It’s cracked. You’re drinking life out of a dribble glass instead of a full cup. And I’m not convinced that you aren’t mythical. Sorry.
Chump Lady,
Love your blog and love your pov! I’m still with my husband – the cheater, and all of the things I read here are true for me. He acts better now. He shows more attention now. Heck, I even have trust that he won’t cheat on me again – I think he learned his lesson. But, I learned mine, too. And that is that he is not the man I thought he is and that he is capable of hurting me in ways that I never imagined. That he could know my past (I won’t share that here) and still do what he did to me, well that is something that no amount of current good behavior can erase. That memory will never leave my mind. I may go periods of time where I don’t break down anymore, where I am not just overwhelmed with grief anymore, but not one day goes by that I am not somehow, in some way, reminded of what he did to me. What he did to his CHILDREN. Is our marrige better? Yes, I guess it seems that way – he seems to be happy. But never again can he be the man that I knew him to be, rather – thought him to be. This is not leaving the seat up or me finding out he might be interested in wearing my underwear, this is finding out the man who married me, who took vows with me, who made a family and home with me, was willing – for some period of time, no matter how brief – to throw that all away and risk all of that for a lay. For a promise from a whore. Forgiveable? Maybe. Forgettable? Never. And that alone makes my marriage less then it was before.
Thanks for the kind words BTDT. I feel like making you a T-shirt that reads: “He cheated… and all I got was the lousy seat down.” Really? That and not wearing your panties is his big concession to reconciliation? Okay, and not fucking around on you… (but he promised that when you got married, so I’m not including that.) You’re kinda proving my point… which is sad. Hope you and your kids have an awesome life regardless of what he does, did, or does again.
Haha! Love the shirt idea! I guess my post was a little unclear, my husband doesn’t wear my underwear…or put the seat down, lol! I just meant that in a marriage, that would be small beans to me, but cheating is THE biggest of the biggies. I can’t think of a worse thing he could have done to me. So yeah, from my perspective your point is really right on. It almost doesn’t matter that things are better now, because he’s already done the worst possible thing he could. Should I be thankful that I have a better marriage now that my husband is done sowing his wild oats?
No, it’s your husband who should be grateful. Grateful you didn’t divorce him and take half his stuff and make him pay you support. Grateful that you didn’t humiliate him the way he humiliated you. And, IMO, even if he is the most repentant creature imaginable (with no seat or underwear offenses), I think that dynamic is unsustainable for a cheater. To live in constant humility for doing something so selfish and destructive. It’s an imbalance of another sort, which again I don’t think makes for happy marriages. I’m the fuck up and you’re the suck up.
But no, you shouldn’t be “grateful” this is your marriage now — but IMO there is a lot of crap on the internet on “save your marriage” sites that does imply you should be happy you “won” the humiliating dance of pick me. (Have a post by that name.)
Despite my believe that successful reconciliations are as rare as unicorns, I *do* admire your strength to endure it all and navigate this crap you were dealt.
Thanks, Chump. And I admire you for leaving! I do some days doubt myself and ask if my motives for staying are true, or it’s really masked (by my desire to pretend it isn’t so!) co-dependency that’s keeping me here. Several months ago I probably would have said I think I will be with my husband forever. Now, I’m just not so sure. I wonder if once are children are grown and gone I won’t look at him and realize that now I’m left alone with this man and I don’t know if I really do want to “work it out.” I guess only time will tell.
Sparkles the same can be said for you. Since you don’t like this POV maybe you should stick to places where the reconciliation is celebrated and pushed. It’s the fucking internet. Get over yourself. I think that staying with someone while they continue to have one affair after another says you (if you stay) don’t value yourself or you aren’t willing to suffer and work to gain some sort of self worth. I’ve read people like you for the past few years and it is a joke. How many times have I read on SI and other places “Are we in R?” or “2yrs into R but it is a lie” or “after 5th dDay he/she swears no more” or “he/she promised a NC and tonight 1.5yr later I find them in contact again”. See……that’s my point.
So if I wanted to learn about a Ford I’d go to the ford website. If I want to reconcile I’d find a site that is nothing but about the precious “R”.
Thanks, Kay. Yeah… why are people who reconcile so vociferous about their POV? I created this site because I think there is 10,000 crappy sites like How to Affair-Proof Your Marriage… and Jesus Thinks You’re a Failure If You Divorce sites for every 1 Chump Lady, leave the jerk already site.
Maybe it’s a one world order unicorn domination conspiracy…. hmmm.
Well, I think there is a big difference between affair-proofing and wishing you’d done that…but uh oh too late. That was my frustration in the first days after Bomb Drop. I checked out aout 20 books from the library and the first few I read or skimmed were useless to me–at least it felt that way–because they were about prevention. They were about preventing an affair or simply keeping a marriage hapy before there are problems.
Why are people who reconcile so vociferous about their POV?
Well I can only speak for myself. At my own site that is obvious, as I’m trying to help others Stand, but why here…? Because it’s not as rare as unicorns. It’s not the majority–according to one survey 69% of marriages end after or due to infidelity. I don’t know the primary source for that, so I don’t know the parameters of the question or really anything–and thus it may not be a very credible stat. What I wish is that you would just acknowledge reconciliation as something that is possible and admit some people do reconcile. AND that when a person reports they have had a successful reconciliation just say thanks for the information and congratulate them. Some of those may not be true reconciliations according to how you (or even I) would define them. Some are not yet and will be someday. Some will completely fall apart. But you don’t know if Sparkles has an okay or better marriage. You just know what you assume and maybe you are right, but maybe you are wrong. But either way you have no proof.
If you really want to test it–and you probably don;t so I’m not saying you should–create a survey of questions to those who are reconciled. It would of course be biased (as is my MLC survey) because it would be limited to those who you attract to your site…unless you distrubute it some other way. But you could define reconciliation and target the questions so that you could determine if the respondents have a true reconciliation based on their answers. It might not meet my definition (so what) and it might not meet university research definitions–I don’t know what those are. But it would at least show you the data according to your definition. Right now you just have some anecdotal evidence and you are simply choosing to not believe it. You cna do that, but why are you doing it. Why are you dismissing what people are telling you? Hearing stories of reconciliation doesn’t mean it’s suddenly not rare, but why not just acknowledge that it does happen to those who are claiming it’s happened to them?
RCR, if someone tells me 20 years after the fact, when they began R, that they’re happy they stayed, okay. I’m inclined to believe them. Again, I think these cases are rare. We have to part ways on this one, because I’m just not convinced most people are healed and happy for R’ing. So many times I’ve seen the person back on the boards, in false reconciliation. Either the affair never ended, or they stopped cheating for a few years (months, days), but it starts back up again with someone new. And also, look at the people posting on my site (mind you, it’s a biased sample if someone’s inclined to read my site), who are in R and not terribly thrilled about it. Resigned, yes. Healed and happier? No.
Please don’t think I wish people misery or want them to be unhappy in their marriages — I think we both want happy relationships for people. That we have in common. I am of the opinion, however, that is very difficult to impossible to have that kind of fulfilling, trusting, cherished relationship with someone who cheated on you.
As for “preventing an affair” — I’ll be posting on that soon.
Oh, don’t worry, I don’t think you wish people misery! As you said, we both want happy relationships for people. That doesn’t mean you are a bitter old cat lady and it doesn’t mean I’m a doormat.
And I like your answer–I mean at least you give them credit after 20 years! And I completely understand as well. Like you, I see false reconciliations–premature returns. Sweetheart came home multiple times and the people at the board were very good to tell me that just because he was home did not mean we were in reconciliation–and I agreed with them wholeheartedly and that helped me to handle it when he left again.
A couple years ago–just before or around the time I started my own forum–someone showed up on the boards again. Her husband had been home 2 or 3 years and was expressing the desire to leave again–I don’t know if there was another affair (yet). I her story had wrapped up to neatly before and I had been skeptical, so her return did not surprise me–though I was saddened by it.
If 69% of people divorce after infidelity, that means that approx. 30% stay together (obviously need to allow some for alternate situations like separation). Of those 30% that stay, how many of those stay because of 1) finances 2) children 3) length of time they have been married/feel like they can’t start over 4) co-dependency 5) etc., etc.
I guess I would need to know what defines a sucessful R to know whether or not I agree that R is not a unicorn (I am inclined to believe that at this time). Does it just meant the M is better? Mine is. The A is over? Yup. Remorse? Sure. Is sucessful R in the eye of the beholder? If so, what say you to those that think they are sucessfuly R’d and then find themselves right back at another dday? I don’t know. I guess I’m just a skeptic post bomb drop.
Sure, I think successful R is in the eye of the beholder. But I also think we’re inclined to delude ourselves and spackle out of self interest. (See my post Five Things That Keep You Stuck with a Cheater).
A lot of people just don’t have the energy to be the marriage police and remain hyper vigilant forever. It’s natural to let your guard down, however twitchy you get sometimes, and settle into life’s routine. Cheaters either are actually repentant (I think a minority), or (the majority IMO) simply decide for now the drama and consequences outweigh the ego kibbles from cheating. And another segment IMO take the affair(s) underground and just get better at hiding it.
It’s risk management.
Seriosuly, someone shouldn’t come here because they have a different opinion and do’t like some of the content.
I think Chump Lady has a lot of good points in her articles, that doesn’t mean I’m going to agree with everything.
If I wanted to surround myself with people who think I’m wonderful and agree with me I’d hang out at my own forum and go nowhere else. But then I would not grow. I would not see and come to understand dissenting views and other circumstances. And just because Sparkles the unicorn read this post and maybe a few others does nt mean she hangs out here all that much. I don’t, but I’ve read a few of the posts.
Thanks RCR.
But Kay, Sparkles did not say anything about staying with someone while they continue to have one affair after another, did she? Beneath her angry tone it sounds like she really did over the betrayal (how? another post. Lots of *work*) and presumably healed and regained a lot of lost trust (no adult, even in near-perfect relationships, should fully trust their partner, right? we know that), and in that process she would have experienced MUCH suffering and work.
I think the internet has a lot to answer for! We women do CHOOSE to go online and pain-shop, nobody forces us to. We could choose not to, to quietly reflect and not overshare. So when we do, we do so at the risk of people disagreeing with us (whether we are on a R site or CL). I reckon 99% of us have been on both – if we self-identify as a Chump, it means we have probably been reading Mort Fertel et al. PRIOR to finding ChumpLady.
Love your blog! I’m still with my husband (my story is too long to go into) – i read the “Five Things not to do”, and all the other things you wrote on your blog and i found them all to be true for me.  It was like you knew me (the doormat that I was) and you gave the perfect description of my husband.  He is now acting like the husband i should have had along now. He is more attentive now.  Does anything for me.  But, i still don’t trust him… Oh, I trust that he won’t cheat on me again, but do i trust that he will always be honest, always protect me and always have my back– not so much!  I learned my lesson.  He was never the man I thought he was. I now know he has the capability of hurting me in ways that I never imagined.  That he could see my pain and still do what he did to me.  That memory will never leave my mind!  These are things that no amount of current good behavior can erase.  I still have periods of time where it will hit me and I am overwhelmed with grief again.  It has been years since D-Day and still not one day goes by that I am not reminded of what he did to me. Is our marrige better?  Yes, it is in many ways – he seems to be trying hard.  But never again can my marriage be just the two of is in the marriage.Â
This has profoundly changed me… Like one poster said, this is finding out the man who took vows to honor and cherish me, who made a family and home with me, was willing to throw that all away and risk it all for sexual encounters wherever he could find it. Forgivable? Not sure! Forgettable? Never! Â My marriage will always be less then it was before. Â It is what it is.
Still R’ing
I am trying to figure out whether or not you were mocking my comment? Am I just being too sensitive (entirely possible) or did I say something offensive? Just checkin’
I can’t speak for Bobbie, but it read to me like she is sympathizing with you and your situation is similar, so much so that she (perhaps inadvertently?) used identical language.
beentheredonethat, I am sympathizing with you. Â I totally get what you are saying… TOTALLY. Â In fact, I could of written your post word for word and it would be MY story. Â I have been at this R’ing for years and it has been brutal. Â Chump Lady, you pretty much have my number! Â I wish i had someone like you in my life 30 years ago… who would of brow beaten some sense into my head! Â
Bobbie, thanks for explaining. 🙂
Sorry to know that you can relate so closely with what I wrote. Sadly I think there are way too many of us who can relate. It seems like all of our stories are very similar at the core. Brutal was a good word choice. I think that about sums up some of the crap we are left dealing with in the wake of our parnters choices. I remember saying on dday “why, why, why? It can never be undone. You can never undo this. Why?” Even if we leave, it’s still part of our past and that sucks. Talk about a shit sandwhich. :/
Wishing for happier, less brutal days ahead for you-
Hi Bobbie, thanks for the kind words. I’m sorry your experience has been “brutal.” I hope your life is full in other ways, with other people (kids, friends, coworkers). Reconciliation is a such a gift, and it’s so hard to give, IMO cheaters should be full of humility and resolve and gratitude for that gift. But so often they aren’t. The entitlement is waaay too strong. ((Hugs))
Love your site and your no crap point of view.
I think if more would cut the crap and the hope for unicorns out there would be a lot less pain for everyone, (cheater included – trying to be something they’re not).
I am married (getting divorced) to someone who cheated the entire relationship from start to finish. He was always sorry and teary eyed, so I too hoped for unicorns and stayed with the devil that I knew. All that got me was wasted time.
Keep preaching the gospel Chump Lady, maybe you can save more people from wasting time on empty promises.
Thanks HTS! I’m sorry you got tangled up with a serial cheater. It’s soul sucking. Your point about the cheater trying to be something they’re not is interesting.
I wondered about that too… if you know you don’t want to be monogamous (or “can’t” be) — why not just own up to that?
I concluded that they like the advantage of them cheating and you being in the dark. The deceit is part of the high.
Here’s to your new beginning on the other side of the crazy! Congrats!
I may be misunderstanding, so I’m sorry if that is the case. Are you saying that your definition of reconciliation means the situation during infidelity—before reconciliation—must not have included those things in that list? Or are you simply saying that those things make it more difficult? Because it sounds like the former, but that doesn’t make sense—to me, I mean why not just add he cheated to the list! But I certainly agree those things can make it harder. Wouldn’t it be nice (well no it wouldn’t) if all cheaters only did it once—one single night—and then confessed, felt guilty and showed remorse, did the work to repair immediately… That sounds unicornish to me!
Sweetheart and I are closer now. We got through and it is so wonderful now that he sees us as US or WE rather than him and me, but he met a lot of those things on your list during his affair.
• Someone got pregnant.
No, but we’ll go into bat-shit crazy at that bullet point.
• They blame shifted this crap to you.
Surprisingly (to me at the time), he hardly did this—not at the rate I see others doing it. There might have been a few brief Monster episodes where he tried to incite me, but mostly he was about it all being about him.
• They said that they had “needs†that went unmet.
No, he didn’t say this, but there were probably other lines that meant the same things. But even those were rare. I admit that I had been neglectful before his affair—which does not make his affair my fault in any way. But he did comment about me not doing things activities with him. I changed that at Bomb Drop and he acknowledged it quickly. The person who asked about what needs the alienator was meeting that I wasn’t was a counselor. It’s a common counselor question that I find dangerous and inappropriate.
• They continued to lie.
Well yeah—what continuing cheater doesn’t lie? And if they aren’t lying why—are they instead trying torment their spouse?
• They gaslighted you.
No. There were at least two occasions that he told me I was crazy, but those were direct statements, not covert manipulations. And I laughed in his face and once responded by asking him if he thought he was going insane. That stopped him.
• They didn’t immediately end it.
Yup, got that one. His affair went on for 3.5 years.
• It was a long-term affair.
Yeah, 3.5 sure felt long-term to me.
• It was an affair with a best friend/coworker/family member.
No.
• There was other addiction involved.
Not unless you see it as an addiction to the alienator and the drama. There was no substance or (money) gambling addiction.
• You got an STD for life.
No—Thank God for that.
• Your children walked in/read the emails/need therapy.
No kids.
• The affair partner is bat shit crazy and harasses you.
Is the pope Catholic? Yeah, I think she has borderline personality disorder—seriously, I’m not just saying that to say hateful things about her. She doesn’t harass us now and she pretty much left me alone, but we did call the cops on her once—they had to remove her from our back yard when he left her and she did fake a pregnancy the first time he left her. She called and threatened to sleep in her car in front of our house when he left another time.
• They refuse to answers questions about what they did.
Now? No, he doesn’t refuse, but I don’t have a need to know. I don’t think I asked many questions during either—when he would come home and promised it was over. They had sex! I already knew that and the other $%^& was just part of it. And he has oral diarrhea, so he offered a lot of information without realizing he was doing it and sometimes he told me as part of trying to torment me—so he took her to our favorite getaway. I shrug that off because I’m not going to give power to her or that situation and let it ruin one of my favorite places—I shrugged it off then, not just now.
• They’re not transparent.
Then, well he wasn’t trying to be! But most of his lies certainly weren’t opaque, but that’s not what you mean by transparent. Now he is transparent. I don’t check up on him—though he says I can. But he works at Costco, so I do shop there while he’s working. His vehicle has been there any time I’ve needed to look for it—to exchange cars or get something out of it, and I’ve never not found him inside when I really needed to see him. I don’t always see him—but I don’t always need to and I could find him if necessary.
• They still work with the affair partner.
No—and that was a condition of reconciliation—no contact even if they worked for the same company—which they don’t.
• They resent that you remember what they did and that you require reassurances.
No, not at all.
• There’s reminders, like they slept in your bed, your house, your car.
I guess these could be reminders—I don’t think she slept in out bed, but I could be wrong. Yuck, but I have my power. But she did call one time—again after he left her—and talked to me. She was trying to get me upset and so she yelled out that she had sex on our couch and she was going to do it again. I laughed at her—and am laughing again now at the memory. It was such an obvious tactic to upset me that I wasn’t buying it and even if it were true I had always hated that couch—it was a hand-me-down. Laughing at her worked wonders, she quickly learned that she was not going to get a rise out of me.
• You had to threaten them with divorce to get them to commit to you.
Not technically, though I’m not against it if the person means it. I told him we would not live together in a marital relationship (and I would have no relationship other than a marital relationship with him) while he was having any sort of a relationship with her. That was at the end. He did need to fear he’d lose me. I said I would not divorce him legally, but we would certainly not seem married—emotional divorce as one counselor put it.
So my situation included a lot in your list. And yeah, those were additional challenges. Though I did find the bat-shit crazy part to be less challenging and more of a relief. What was so hard about her being crazy was that he still went back to her—which said a lot about him that was not positive. But we still got through that and we are reconciled now and things are better than before Bomb Drop. That’s true regardless of what you believe about it, but I say it again because it does get frustrating when people don’t believe it. I don’t have to be an amnesiac to have a healed and even improved marriage after infidelity. I refuse to forget.
RCR, I did mean it as those additional challenges make it exceptionally difficult for most people to reconcile. You’re clearly exceptional in your ability to do it. The bat shit crazy OW in your case does sound nuts. And I think often the dynamic there is the cheater likes the drama — ooh, OW needs me, I can “rescue her”… and if my wife finds out, hey, that’s two women to fight over me. It’s centrality. And I think they select for crazy, because face it, you’d have to be a bit unstable and nutty to be a mistress for 3.5 years (in my case, it was 20+ years and spanned three marriages, maybe four… I’m not sure since I left. ) Sane, healthy together people don’t go in for OW duties.
It just seems like that is a LOT to overcome. Kudos to you.
ChumpLady
Re batshit crazy OW – has anyone else besides me ever been betrayed by the 2 of them at once? I just typed the whole sorry story into the “Stupid Shit” page – how she was my friend and confidente and stayed over at our house most weekends (recovering from her breakup) sleeping in our spare room’s double bed with her 7 year old son. Yet stil managed to start screwing my husband under my very nose.
I have FORCED myself not to focus on her, as it gets him out of taking the blame. I don’t care WHAT she did, he agreed. I bet he even made the first move. I have trusted women all my life. I have been raised in a very woman-friendly society (not in a Scandinavian country, but similar), and now that trust is shattered. I knew men were flawed beings, but I though of women as somehow better. WRONG!
Sparkles got OWNED
Thanks JWolf.
Nd women who stay with multiple serial cheaters. That shawn the wife lady is one of them. I see their husbands as weak and cowardly & the wives of those serial cheaters are even worse. Co-dependent to the core & control is their number one goal. It’s the if I can’t have you no one will minus the homicide/suicide. I’d love to see STRONG women posting about IT IS OKAY TO LEAVE! IT IS OKAY TONOT BE TRAPPED! IT IS OK TO START A NEW LIFE AND DIVORCE IS A BEAUTIFUL THING! THAT IS CONTROL…THAT S POWER ~ Good on ya chump lady, you rock!
I love Chump Lady. She is the opitome of wits, smarts, guts & strong. That Shawn the Wife lady tries to come across with those qualities, but she is a faker. All bark no bite. In fact, I wish she would’ve experienced a loud mouth bunny boiler to shut her the eff up and put her in her place. Chump Lady is what most women should strive for in their life. People want to blame the OW’s for creating these messes, well how about the wives who stay with these serial cheaters? If the wives didn’t stay, the ass hats wouldn’t cheat.
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