When the Cheater Needs ‘More Time’ to Decide
It’s a common story: the cheater is on the fence and needs time to decide. (Cue “Torn between Two Lovers.”) How can they choose between Schmoopie and you?
Don’t rush the cake-eater!
One of the biggest mindfucks is that, gosh, they were going to be properly repentant, but you just didn’t give them enough time. They were coming around! But no, you dumped them before they got there. And won’t you be sorry! Because they’re going to be perfect for the next lucky person! All therapied up and sorry. They love you, but hey, they just couldn’t deal with your anger and impatience. Every time they summoned up the courage to share their soft, squishy brokenness with you, their vulnerable little underbelly, you were just too horrid. And so they couldn’t. These Things Take Time. Too bad you’re a quitter.
But now you’ll never know the true wonderfulness of them! You’ll never be one of those reconciliation success stories!
The maybe keeps you hanging on.
Spend any time on infidelity forums and you will see this mindfuck played over and over and over again. “No wait! They’re coming out of the fog! I think I see it clearing!”
Like a bunch of true believers waiting for the Great Pumpkin.
Here’s the deal — this is a ploy for CAKE. Sorry is as sorry does. Remorse is not a tender hot house flower that needs special care and only blooms once every hundred years if you mist it properly and plant it against a southern facing wall. It’s either exists or it doesn’t.
The cheater who “needs time” and turns their lack of remorse back on a chump’s impatience is blameshifting — well, I would’ve been sorry had it not been for your anger.
The problem is not what they did — it is your reaction to it.
See how that works?
The cheater keeps waiting and waiting for you to have the proper deference to them, if stars align and the winds are favorable, then maybe they’ll show that “remorse.” Keep you hooked a bit longer. Give you something to post on over there at the reconciliation forums. He sent me flowers! She had sex with me! He teared up and said he really hates living like this! She said she doesn’t want to lose her family!
Meanwhile they eat cake.
They’ll consent to be dragged off to therapy or read an article or two, or throw you a kibble if you really insist, if that’s what it takes to maintain cake. The only time they really get dramatic is when you’re acting truly done. What?! You’re leaving? But they were working so hard on the relationship! They read like an entire chapter of one those books you left lying around, on their nightstand, in their briefcase, shoved next to their breakfast cereal each morning. God, you’re expecting too much too soon! Did you wait the requisite 6 months/one year/eternity before making a decision to leave?
(What agent of Satan devises those timelines any way? Would we say this to people being physically abused? Oh just give it a year and see if he stops hitting you. But with cheating or, excuse me, “sex addiction,” just wait around and wait for an STD or two…)
This shit just tortures chumps. God, we question ourselves, our commitment, our resolve — and rarely turn it back on the cheater. HEY! This isn’t about MY lack of commitment — it’s about YOURS. I don’t owe you.
The problem is we don’t trust that they suck. Part of us believes that the minute we turn our backs and give up, is the same minute they’re going to morph into that sparkly person we miss, the mirage, the remorseful person, the committed person. And then, worse! They’re going to take that new and improved and expensively therapied self and give it to the AFFAIR PARTNER! NoooOOooo! All that investment, lost!
It was already lost, chumps. Remember — they suck.
Vagueness, lack of real effort, fleeting “remorse,” all means one thing, they’re not serious. Cheaters know exactly what they’re doing and why — they’re manipulating you for cake. The sooner you see that, the sooner the “fog” clears. Not the cheater’s “fog” — but yours.
Great article! Haha. Laugh out loud funny!
Great Pumpkin, indeed!!
Well said CL.. I am still angry that it took me two months to leave his ass after discovering his 3 year affair with a woman that 15 years his senior, mom of three kids. We double dated with her and her ex-husband 3 years ago.. They divorced 2.5 years ago. I foubd out after that this hobag moved a mile down the road from our family home… How did I find out about the affair?? Voice activated recorders do wonders! After confronting him, he wad “remorseful for about 24 hours..Told me affair was over. And he wantrd to save our family. As rine wenr on, it was all about what HE was feeling.. I got the “I am suicidal!” bit… “I need time to work on myself.” “I can’t deal with your anger, you are pushing me away.”
The next month and a half? I had three conditions for a possible R: 1) ind. counseling 2) std testing 3) he meet with parish priest.. He flunked all three conditions. During this time he said he needed time and that I needed to be patient. He would answer my questions about the affair but felt like he was being drilled…. He was VERY fragile. Are you kidding me??????? Damn straight MF.. I will drill you a new asshole!!!
Dday 2? June 3… Hacked into his phone records.. He never broke contact with OW.. Texting each other 60-70 times a day!!!! Plus talking over 2 hours everyday..
Shit hit the fan a second time… Scream, curse and told him to get his lying, cheating ass out. Came back later that evening w his mom.. Told me that he sent OW a text telling her it was over. Told him that three conditions are a start.. I want phone bill records, and no contact w OW. Any contact at all? I am to sit in on. If she contacted him that he tell me about it immediately. R was still not on the table but a possibility. He moved to his parents a couple miles away. Yes they are enablers…
Well… In the mean time I had already got myself tested. Thankfully all is clear. He did start IC and made apt with priest. Showed me phone record and answered questions… All begrudgingly I might add. I was infringing on his privacy!!! How dare I!!!! Well a week and a half in, caught him again in contact with OW. I broke it off then and there. I had had enough shit sandwiches to last me a lifetime.
He wanted an amicable divorce with one lawyer. Hell no! I am not ever being taken for a ride again.. Got my own. And surprise!!!! He filed our joint tax returns with my knowledge, consent, or approval… Acquired another company.. He told no one… And made incredible $$ while our daughter and I were living like paupers… What a shameless tool.
Cake eaters so NOT love you or care about your well being. They are selfish pigs that will do anything and say anything they can for their own benefit. At your expense. I was tortured during that time of 3 Ddays and time after. It is not worth sacrificing your health and well being for some selfish pig that would put you through such pain and not help you through it. Thanks for posting CL. I thank God I had the guts to leave his pathetic ass and not look back. I have a 7 year old daughter and NO WAY do I want her to think it is okay I stay with a person that is an abuser.
Oh and his enabler parents? They are furious with me that this whole disgusting mess got out… They have done ALot for me… And they wanted to be treated with respect from me as this whole thing is a HUGE embarrassment to his family.
He continues to con them too. Not surprising.
My husband wants an amicable divorce too and he generously said that I could use his lawyer and even set up a time for me to meet with him. Uh, I don’t effing think so! I might have been a chump but I’m not stupid. And I’m not sure if amicable is ever a possibility when you’ve been cheated on for a year and a half and made miserable for no reason when all you had to do was have enough balls to say – ‘I’m not happy in our marriage. Can we talk about it?’ Instead he chooses to lie to myself and our two young children week after week after week. I get angry just thinking about it!
What is it with the enabling parents? STBX has them as well and they barely speak to me because I’m ‘crazy’. Yes, crazy because I told the truth about what happened and oh dear that doesn’t make baby boy look very good. So I’m the crazy ‘woman scorned’ blah blah fuckety blah.
The enabling parents help create these assclowns: always making excuses for their shit behaviour and justifying their fuck ups and then,when someone has the AUDACITY to call them on their shit, that person is the fucked up one.
Whatever. I know what happened and I know who he is – who he really is – and it infuriates him that I no longer go along with the ‘it’s someone else’s fault’ game he and his family have been playing since time began. Oh well, tough shit for him that he got found out and can’t quite get that mask to fit as well as it used to.
Oh, and a couple of his friends also think I’m crazy. Because they don’t know the whole story of what happened. they think I just went nuts over an affair, not that he was cheating for years and I found out and then that he has behaved like a complete asshole ever since. But those who think that? They can suck it.
Erm, not that it’s acceptable for him to have “an affair” of any duration, Nord. WTH, anyway? Aw, did you lose your shit JUST because he was humping someone else and lying to you for a little while?
Yeah, you’re better off without people like that in your life. They have no principles. They are weak losers.
I don’t speak to my xMIL, either. In a way I can’t blame her for rushing to her son’s defense, after the way he portrayed me to her behind my back, but on the other hand, I was nothing but kind and helpful and gracious with her, am raising her three awesome grandchildren, was a good wife to her son who treated me like crap. And when I called her on some advice she gave my xH against our children’s security, she sent me a letter saying how much she loved me but that “it takes two” blah blah blah. And not once has she reached out to see if I’m ok, to see if I can lend some perspective on why her son has gone off the deep end. Not once has she said she is sorry for how her son treated me. Not that it’s her fault, but if it were my son, I’d be sorry. Hell, I’m sorry for all my friends who’ve been abandoned by cheating losers. I just feel that the matriarch needs to be a grown-up by her age and extend a hand and be a source of strength. Alas, she is some sort of victim in all this.
What’re you gonna do but be awesome, you know?
Awesomeness is the only way to go. My STBX MIL was great at the beginning but now I realise it was because STBX wasn’t telling her anything, so she needed a source of info. Once I saw a lawyer that all changed quite swiftly. She slowly drew back and now? Haven’t heard from her in awhile. And yes, she’s buying into the ‘it’s Nord’s fault somehow because he wasn’t getting enough kibbles and she should have taken care of her man better’ crap. She isn’t aware that he’s a serial cheat, just thinks he ‘fell’ for a girl and that was that. Oh, and she says I should never have thrown him out. It humiliated him. Boo fuckety hop.
Well said Rose! I’m sorry… I snorted at he’s “very FRAGILE.”
OMG. What a manipulative bastard.
Rose:
I loved it when you told the asshole, “I’ will drill you a new asshole”. That’s so funny.
I wish I had said that.
Hi Sara8!
Yes, I did! And now I let him know that everywhere he goes he is thought of as a total ass-hat. Friends and family have lost respect for him and they are completely disgusted.
And yet, in his own delusional mind, he will trick himself into believing that he is a pretty good guy. Hurl. The mind of a cheater is a terrible place to dwell.
Rose:
My STBX sees himself as a nice guy, too……..still.
Where’s the barf bag……never mind, hand me the drill.
The point is… When you have to spy in your spouse and things are as bad as hacking into phone records. There is no marriage… It is not salvageable in the aftermath of cheating.. The conditions were my way if having control of something when everything spin out if control. Deep down I knew the real him sucked. But I held onto hope that the mirage I believed in of gim would reappear and be real.
Listen ALWAYS listen to your instincts they are not wrong. YOU are the most important person to look after.. Not the schmuck who took your life and love and pissed on it. Only you will look after you. Seek out the people that have your back. Family and friends. Mine got me through the most horrible time in my life thus far. Scumbags are not worth nor deserving of R…. As CL says and I wholeheartedly agree: trust that they suck.. Pull the damn fork out if that cakeeater’s hand and walk away from the table. Good luck fellow chumps. The road to a new life can be long, lonely, and treacherous. But so worth it on the long run.
Ahem! Pardon the grammatical mistakes.. iPhone user and writing about a topic that gets me fired up… Bad combo!!! 😉
Ugh. I got that suicidal bit too… at first I believed it. And I still think *maybe* he meant it at first, but then it totally became clear he was trying to use it to manipulate me. Probably because it did work at getting my sympathy (and worry) at first. I mean, I freaking ordered suicide books from Amazon and everything (told you I was an Amazon Chump!). The most annoying thing was that it was always money talk that would drive him to say it. How he worked so hard and he was going to have “nothing” to show for it. It wasn’t the breaking up of his family or not seeing his kids as much that would make him say it. It was money. Actually it’s more sad and pathetic than annoying. Though still annoying because he is a freaking dentist who is going to do more than fine while I am a SAHM who needs to start over!
Actually for some reason we got into it again the other day… kinda a side effect of talking about divorce paperwork crap. Anyway, I guess it was actually the first time that I told him that the way he acted after DDay was basically a second betrayal that hurt me just as much the affair. He told me I was “wrong”. Not sure how feelings can BE wrong, but whatever. I mean, seriously, you at least expect that once you find out about something like this they will beg to stay with you and say they will do ANYTHING to save the marriage. And that then they will actually DO those things. You do not expect that after already being betrayed, you will then need to place conditions and timelines and have them fight you on it or placate you while also placating the other side and then failing at all of it.
Later I would actually say or think that it would make more sense to me if he did love her and left me to be with her. I think I weirdly wanted him to be idealistic about something. I guess I thought that would mean he actually had some kind of feelings and wasn’t just this selfish monster who was just attempting to use us both. I guess I’ve given up on him, though everytime we do get into it like the other day, it does still make me a little sad to realize that he still hasn’t learned anything, still hasn’t accepted any responsibility (this time he decided to blame “biology”) , still is completely selfish. It’s hard for me to accept that ANYONE can believe these things and have so few morals, let alone the person I was with for 14 years and who is the father of my two little boys.
I can’t really remember when he was sparkly, but I just wish he didn’t suck.
When I read some of these things, and the behavior that you all are describing — I just think it is so humiliating for them to expose themselves as such idiots. Jesus.
I really cannot tolerate people using “suicide” as a manipulation tactic. My mother used to do it to me when I was a kid right up until the year before she died. It was horrible and it was a lot of hot air. Obviously it caused me trouble when I was a child, but as I got older I kind of recognized it for what it was and would actually hand her a good mix of bottles from her pill case and would say: “this ought to do the trick, I’ll leave you to it now.” She hated that, and I was a horrible daughter for saying such things. Whatever.
My ex never threatened suicide. I never gave him a chance, really. I kicked him out immediately, I took a month to sort through my feelings on what had happened, I told him that I was done with the marriage. I didn’t give him any agency in what was a decision that I had to make for MYSELF. He made his choice, I made mine, and when he made the choice to cheat on me, he gave up any right to to interject himself into my decision making process because he did not have my best interests at heart.
One of my girlfriends, a BS, has used the suicide as manipulation tactic with her cheating husband. She threatened to kill herself and/or do harm to her children if he dared to leave her (which he actually was trying to do). I said to her: You have no intention of killing yourself or hurting your kids. Why on earth would you say such a thing? But she felt justified in doing whatever it took to make sure he wouldn’t leave her. because of course he was under the influence of fog and the other woman’s allure (nevermind that he’d been a chronic, low-level cheater even prior to their marriage). He was just a messed up pup.
I do not understand why people feel such a need to have control that they would use their own lives as leverage against others. That seems, at a distance, rather pathetic, actually. I mean, if all else fails, I’ll threaten to kill myself. What the hell? These are some really stupid people.
Even while he was saying that suicide stuff… I was like, what the hell? I’m the one that gets cheated on and completely emotionally fucked over multiple times while I waited to see if he would get rid of her (at work, the affair was over… at least temporarily… but they still work together)… then when it became clear it wasn’t going to happen, I decide to end it. And kicking your husband out isn’t all just fun and games for me. But then I also HAVE TO BE THERE FOR HIM?!? HE’s the victim?!!? It was ridiculous, but I did almost believe he would do it. The therapist thought it could be a possibility as well… since he was so unable to admit what he did or have anyone find out. His precious reputation meant so much to him. And so, because I was afraid he would do it, and I would be the one left picking up the pieces and I can’t imagine what that would do to the kids, I did try to be there for him. Like I said, I think he might have been legitimate at first, but after seeing how I had responded he did keep going back there to try to manipulate me and scare me/ guilt me later.
It is pathetic. I still don’t know whether he knowingly tries to manipulate me with this and other stuff (like your friend), or if it is subconscious. Not that one is much better than the other… At least it doesn’t really work anymore. We keep our relationship very superficial and acquaintance-like… 95% of the time. Working toward 100%
I got the “I’m just going to kill myself” bit too. At first I bought it and told him not to talk like that, after a few times, I would have handed him the bullets.
Oh brother, the bloody reputation they’re so desperate to protect. STBX STILL rants that I ‘ruined’ his reputation. How did I do that, you ask? I did that by telling people what happened: I found out he’s a serial cheat and is currently banging a young girl at the office. In his eyes this makes me a terrible person and he hates me to this day.
OMG Nord, every time I read any of your comments, I think you are me.
Why would you WANT someone who would drag you down to the point you would consider killing yourself? Seriously?
But as you point out, it’s not really about that. It’s about control. Okay, why would you WANT someone who doesn’t demonstrably WANT to be with you? Oh right… just going to hold a gun to their head until they come out of that “fog.” Because threats and intimidation really bring out the best in people.
I think this all comes down to an absolute terror about just LETTING GO. Let GO! Adapt! Redirect! Reinvent!
Great advice.but hard to do if or untill you know better 🙂
You’ve got one who changes his story, depending on which way the wind blows? I do as well. The latest is that I didn’t kick him out, he left me and that’s why I was pissed. Huh. The kids are like ‘erm, you kicked him out and told us right in front of him. How can he lie to our faces?’. I just tell them to let it go and know the truth. Incredible, some of this stuff.
STBX is ‘inlove’ with OW. Unfortunatley he is so in love that he was cheating on me with her AND with other OW in the weeks leading up to dday. And it appears he’s already sniffing around for a new sidepiece now that he’s ‘with’ her and brought her into his orbit. The idiot wouldn’t know love if it ran up his ass.
yeah, that’s true… even if he did claim to be “in love” with the OW and left me for her, it probably wouldn’t last because he doesn’t really know what love is. Also, it is actually much better that he’s not with her. This way my kids don’t have to see her. And I don’t either.
There is always that thing, that if he stays with her I have to deal with her cheating ass for the rest of my life. Yuck.
He sucks EPICALLY.
I do so very hope you are taking a note from Rose’s playbook above and drilling the dentist a new asshole.
Suicidal over the money… just says it all. I hope you take lots and lots of the money…
I got my fair share… I don’t think you’ll ever really be “happy” with what you get. Because no matter what, you’re worse off financially than you would be if you stayed together. But I am going back to graduate school and I’m pretty sure I can do well. I won’t be making his kind of money, but I should be fine. Luckily for me, money and material possessions are not the end-all be-all of my existence as they are for him. I just hope eventually I can take a few nice vacations.
You are cold, CL. Don’t you know that they are victims of dopamine and are mourning their loss of a soulmate?
Funny, I have been in love/limerance, and I am sure dopamine came into play. Yet, for some strange reason, I still never betrayed people and stabbed them in the back or lost all my morals. Guess I am just not evolved enough to have the serious dopamine rush that the soulmates get. My loss. Maybe next reincarnation, when I’ve reached that higher plane.
So Arnold, you’re saying cheating is like Reefer Madness or something?
Snort, well they want to brainwash us into believing it is like that totally bogus “reefer madness” propaganda film.
As arnold said, while married I often met someone who made me feel weak in the knees or whom I felt limerance with.
I enjoyed it in the brief moment and walked away immediately realizing I could be overstepping a boundary too easily.
A commitment is a commitment. When I married I committed to being monogamous.
I know It’s so old fashioned to honor your marriage vows.
I’m old fashioned as well. I was propositioned by the neighbour, hit on at parties, offered sex by one of his friends. How did I react? I laughed and walked away because while it was flattering to be hit on I was married, simple as. It never occurred to me to do anything else. Weird how un-evolved we all are and just not sophisticated enough to understand that banging people other than our spouses really doesn’t mean anything.
Boy, you really know all the plays in the book, don’t you CL?
I totally got the “All the things you say to me, the way you speak to me makes it really hard to be sorry or have any regret.” I got, “All we ever do is fight.” Meaning, of course, “You have an opinion about all this.”
Total mind fuck.
But, you know, I do believe his is completely depressed, and that his use of another woman is an attempt to alleviate his pain. I don’t thing well-adjusted happy people abandon their families; I think seriously damaged and empty people do it. I actually feel sorry for my ex. I don’t want anything to do with him, particularly since he still clings to the homewrecking whore he left his family for, but I do pity him when I’m not feeling sorry for myself. He’s not right in the head.
Anyway, I love this latest post. It reminds me not to take responsibility for exH’s actions and attitudes. And sometimes I need to be reminded, and sometimes I need all the examples to be pointed out to me–be reminded of each particular shit sandwich and reminded to not eat any of it.
You are an angel, CL.
You’re my Cheater/Abandoner Guru.
Yes, yes, I heard the ‘the way you behaved when you found out’ crap (I went APESHIT and do not feel any remorse for that at all) which was why he ‘couldn’t try to fix things’. Also, ‘you’ll hold this over me for the rest of my life and I can’t life that way’. YOu see the common thread there? It was still all about him. And it still is. These people are messed up. They think of themselves first, 2nd and 3rd and that’s what allows them to do what they do.
Heard this from mine WORD for WORD exactly!!
Yes, yes! You ARE me!
In my case, he’s right–I would have held it over his head for the rest of my life. I’m sure he could, with some imagination and moral fiber, find a way to make it up to me if he cared, and I know that if he’d tried hard enough, I could have let it go, maybe even seen it as a “rough patch” or a “necessary transformation into a better man” but we all know how that goes 99.99% of the time. And that will be his biggest regret. Because what I won’t do is eat shit sandwiches for the rest of MY life.
I’m not sure what I would have done because I didn’t think about it all that much. I was just PISSED OFF BEYOND WORDS. I suppose that means I would have either gone back to plan doormat or else become one rotten bitch to live with. Didn’t happen either way, so I’m not going to worry about it. Now I can deal with it and not have to shove it under the rug. He’s doing the shoving like mad but it doesn’t seem to be helping. Saw him recently and wow does he look like hell.
“I do believe he is completely depressed, and that his use of another woman is an attempt to alleviate his pain.”
–Steph, you’re not only 100% dead-on, but you’ve also described my ex to a “T.” He ran off with some uneducated, low-rent redneck whom he now clings to. In fact, everytime he and I fought about HE destroyed our relationship, the two of them got closer and closer. Funny how that works, huh?
But yes, even if our ex’s aren’t addicted to drugs and alcohol, they definitely emulate addicts, whereby The Problem’s Not The Problem, Talking About The Problem Is The Problem.
“The problem isn’t that that I fucked you over and ran off with this whorebag, Steph! The problem is you’re trying to hold me accountable for it!”
—See how that works?
The reason? The other man (in my case)/woman (in your case) is the painkiller! As painkillers they: 1) Make our ex’s feel good; 2) Show them a good time; and 3) Don’t hold them accountable for anything.
As a recovering addict I can say with full authority that those three things are EXACTLY what drugs do.
But like all drugs, eventually it’s going to stop working, and they’ll be stuck with an empty, self-destructive, fake-ass relationship. But only this time, The Problem Is Their Problem while you’re miles away from his “fuckupedness”.
Just know that you’re better and you’re gonna find better. If you were amazing before you met him, you’re probably just as amazing now. 🙂
Great points, Chris! Yes, don’t hold them accountable for anything. That’s why everyone is disposable. As soon as the BS or OP wises up and starts asking for things, they’re on to the next one. Rinse, repeat.
CL you are spot on about that! As soon as the BS or OP starts agitating to see their own needs met, the cheater in between bolts. Usually towards the one who will be easiest to manipulate, actually.
Indeed, if the cheater leaves for the other person, the BS should actually feel pretty good. Because the BS was the one who was idenitfied by the cheater as someone they could not control anymore. They are typically looking for the path of least resistance and the place where they will be made to feel the best about themselves.
Very true, Kristina. OP in my situation smells STBX’s farts and tells him it’s like sniffing apple blossoms. Or something along those lines. She absolutely worships him and I don’t. He values the worshiping more than anything else. Her issue now. Can’t wait until she does something ‘wrong’ like question something he does. He’ll see the writing on the wall and start lining up replacements.
Oh, Chris, you’re a love, aren’t you.
Yes, the high only lasts so long, then you cling because the withdrawals and shame are so painful. “Maybe I LIKE this one!” Not because you’ve got yourself a good one.
And, you’re right, I’m miles on down the road. He knows it. I bet he admits to people that this is the real reason we’ll never be together again. He knows that I wouldn’t touch that with a ten foot pole.
Too true. In the runup to dday (according to his FB and email) he was playing a lot of different ladies, asking on if she was ‘in love with anyone’ and saying he hadn’t fallen in love ‘since hte kids were born’. Another he was making plans with to hook up on a biz trip, another one, who lived far away, was exchanging ‘I miss you’ messages on a daily basis….it was unreal that he was trying to juggle so many, tellling me he loved me and making plans for our future while telling current OW that he loved her and promising her a future. But it’s all my fault because I didn’t give him enough attention and when he got found out he FREAKED. Because no more could he pretend to be this nice guy. Now he was exposed as a douchebag. And so he ran to current OW, is making super nice with her, sucking her into his crazy and she, being barely out of diapers, is all simpering ‘you’re hte greatest thing in the world’….despite knowing (via me) that he was banging other women while with her.
But they’re in love and I’m just the evil, bitter woman scorned. Hahahaha
“Part of us believes that the minute we turn our backs and give up, is the same minute they’re going to morph into that sparkly person we miss, the mirage, the remorseful person, the committed person. And then, worse! They’re going to take that new and improved and expensively therapied self and give it to the AFFAIR PARTNER! NoooOOooo! All that investment, lost!”
This above was exactly the main reason why I stayed so long. I have actually thought to myself, “I’ll be damned if I leave his ass and let him THEN become perfect husband for any of those whores”.
My first mind told me to run like the wind after the first DDay happened before our first wedding anniversary. But then the BS fog rolled in and I couldn’t bare to part with my investment. What about the wedding I just had? The house we just bought? The family and friends that just got used to us as a couple? What all those “for better or worse” vows I just said?
So I convinced my self that it was a one off indiscretion and continued on. He then treated me to more Ddays and I wasted more time.
Funny how the more time we waste with cheaters the more reluctant we are to leave. It’s like a vicious cycle. We don’t want our time put in to be for nothing, so we waste more time waiting for them to fix themselves for us – to get the reward we’re due, then they do it again after we waste more time, and rinse, repeat for years. Blech! I think I’ve learned the hard way that the right response to cheating nearly 100% of the time is to run.
It’s like gambling. The person on a loosing streak keeps picking up one more hand because if they don’t they’ll have wasted all the money they already lost. It’s this next roll of the dice that will win back everything. Just be patient, the next hand is sure to be a winner.
Sorry, the house always wins.
Thanks Kristina. I’m getting there. I had to see him the other day and he actually said that he doesn’t believe anything I say because I ‘act crazy’, meaning I tell people the truth and am not shy about saying I think he’s a bad person. This is, in his mind, crazy. Oh, and that I didn’t ‘get over it’ in a couple of months.
I think you’re spot on. I had one dday maybe 7 years earlier and it was a doozy (some I WORKED WITH). But we ‘got past it’ because I ‘understood’ that he wasn’t ‘getting enough attention’. turns out he was cheating right along and despite that little bump in the road and the fallout from it (I nearly left him and told him that was it, his one get out of jail free card) he was back screwing around within months. He even got caught in one situation and I never had a clue. I write this stuff and can’t even believe I was married to someone like that.
And thus I truly am QUEEN OF THE CHUMPS.
You’re in good company Nord. I’m so sorry he’s such a fucker.
It’s interesting to me how many of us had the exact same first instincts (run! don’t save this!) and then ignored or stuffed that down. Of course there is so much noise out there telling us to do exactly that (what was lacking in the marriage that MADE HIM cheat, etc.) and of course the noises from the cheaters themselves.
It takes a lot of guts to try. Don’t beat yourselves up too bad TG and Nord.
Yes, its the Slot Machine scenario isn’t it? The more coins you feed into it, the more reluctant you are to walk away and let the next idiot win the jackpot…with YOUR money!
“It’s interesting to me how many of us had the exact same first instincts (run! don’t save this!) and then ignored or stuffed that down.”
Wow, now that you point it out, that’s true. On D-day I was determined to kick her out, I had already called my therapist in full-on emergency and panic mode and told her, as well as my best friend, but… She knew what buttons to push to make me doubt my determination and my need for all that I thought was her.
I used to get pissed at myself, now I have a healthy respect for the fact that I did as well as I could with what I had, and that my old self is worthy of compassion. I’ve learned, and I’m stronger and greatly more self-respecting for it.
Nah, I gave it my best shot and then realised it was all kind of stupid and he was all kinds of fucked up. I’ll survive and thrive, as they say.
You will, Nord. Because you are smart and you are self reflective. You should be very proud of yourself and how you have managed this situation.
You are to be admired.
The strange thing about some of these folks that cheat a lot is that , in many cases, they are not all that in terms of attractiveness(although many traumatized betrayeds overestimate their partner’s looks and other qualities).
Nord’s comment about her XH’s level of activity brought this to mind. WTF is it with these folks that they think so many people are interested in having sex with them?
Arnold:
My STBX is handsome. He stays in shape and by all accounts is an attractive person.
Still, people who knew about the affair and who the woman was were shocked by his choice of affair partner.
She was so not his type, plump, prissy, thick legs, weather beaten, flashy looking, with too much makeup and jewelry, whiny, demanding, hated to hike or ski, or scuba dive or do anything active. Her main hobby was going to spas, shopping and getting her fat butt liposucked and transferring the fat to the wrinkles in her face.
The OW was the type my STBX claimed to hate.
Oh well.
STBX is, by any standard, a handsome and charming man. He’s funny and comes across as a great guy. Believe me, EVERYONE thought he was a really nice guy. It’s his mask.
But who cares, you know? He’s good looking and charming so that many women were willing to fuck him, despite him being married and having kids? That actually always blows my mind: one woman was messaging with him and ASKING HOW I WAS ADJUSTING TO MOVING! And asking about the kids! It’s absolutely incredible.
Arnold… that is so true. When people found out about STBX’s A, they literally said things like, “HE cheated on YOU?” They then proceeded to tell me that he had married up when he got me in terms of attractiveness.
I’m no supermodel by any means, but… yeah. Cheating is definitely not all about looks, that’s for damn sure.
As for “The Fog…” I feel like telling people that such a thing exists is a huge disservice. Oh, I experienced that fog, all right, for a few days. The fog I experienced, though, is the one that prevented me from seeing my STBX for who he was. I listened to him say things about how “he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do” and that he also had “feelings for her.” I can’t believe that I ever thought about giving him a second chance after he said shit like that to me. I can’t believe that any of us, ever, think that’s okay and that these asshats deserve even one second more of our time.
Why do we tolerate infidelity? We get so angry when people do terrible things to each other, and rightfully so, but infidelity gets some sort of weird pass. We shrug and say that it’s not our business, oh well, no wonder the cheater did it, the BS must have been a crummy spouse, etc. Bizarre.
Agree 100%. Thank God for this blog and the realisation that there are others out there who DO know exactly what its all about. NONE of the people in my non-internet life have got a fucking CLUE. Sorry for the fuck word.
No.
Actually
I’m not sorry.
Oh my god….my STBX said those very same things, Moving On! Exact same words! And I sat there and took it like a dumbass. I heard just the other day, from a sort of friend, something along the lines of ‘well, 2/3 of marriages do end in divorce’. I’m not sure what her point was but I responded ‘well, I don’t know many that end because the spouse finds out she married a serial cheater’. She didn’t respond. Sheesh.
That’s exactly true – Mike actually looks really old – when I first saw him after 20 years of absence, I was kinda taken aback at how he’d aged…. and a number of times I caught a view of him where I thought to myself, “wow, not so attractive….” isn’t that weird? I felt differently about it soon enough and then finally didn’t see it but, he hasn’t aged well – and yet, he really did obviously think he was “all that” – I can’t imagine thinking that way about myself – and frankly, I was put off and kinda puzzled about it at the same time.
So so true. I haven’t seen my cheating husband for almost 6 months and I saw a photo of him a week ago and I was all: WTF? He looks nothing like I remembered! Kinda hammered that last nail in the coffin for me, he’s not attractive to me anymore, so, why bother? Not that I was considering going back, cheating shows an immense lack of charachter. But, any lingerig doubts I had, washed away. That and he actually said that the cheating saved his life, something I ‘didn’t’ do. LOL. Delusional.
Thanks so much for the great Christmas gift that is this essay, CL!
And thanks for all the comments too, fellow Chumps!
“Trust that they suck” indeed!
Happy Holidays to all my dear fellow Chumps! God bless you all!
Great post!
I got the “I can’t believe you are destroying our family over something that meant nothing” speech at first. Then, when that didn’t work, he got all therapyfied and contrite. He was “working on himself” and on a “journey to become a better man.”
You know what? I hope he does become a better man. I hope his next serious relationship is a good one where no one is crushed by infidelity. I just don’t want it to be with me. His affair left an indelible black mark on our marriage. All the good deeds and love in the world would never have erased it. I would always know. I would always remember. The stain may have faded some over time, but it would always be there. I could not live with that.
Annabelle:
When my STBX said you are willing to destroy our marriage over something that meant nothing, that enraged me.
He was the one who was willing to destroy the marriage over something that meant nothing, and that was just as insulting as if he said he loved her.
Mine also gave me the “i want to prove to you I can be a better man”.
Well, his behavior post dday didn’t seem like he had changed into a better man.
Based on what I see in reconciling couples everywhere, I want to show you I can be a better person is code for: I want to get lots of attention from you as you beg me to stay and even if you are angry and fighting with me or crying and sad, it is still all about me. Then, when it goes back to normal and it is no longer all about me, I will cheat again so I can get more attention from the other person. Plus I know you will take me back, so if I get caught again, that just means more attention for me.” 🙂
They are actually pretty obnoxious in their remorse.
somethings i want to point out to everyone.
the kind of people who cheat and abuse have(lack of) empathy issues.
a total lack of empathy or any lack of empathy basically means “I REALLY DONT GIVE A FUCK ABOUT YOU!!!”.you or me or anyone else being hurt by something they do or did simply makes no sense to them.. most likely ,to them the world revolves around them and their image(what ever image they have decided to portray at the moment ) and as long as all their little satellites are revolving around them,in the orbit that they want, all is good with the world. . lack of empathy also usually comes along with things like a narcissistic craving to eat Ego kibbles and Cake at your expense …. one last thing i wanna point out:as long as we have any contact with these losers and we display anything but MEH ,they continue to greedily consume Ego Kibbles.
On the lack of empathy, I do think it is universal among cheaters.
Think back on interactions that were unrelated to the cheating and i bet many of us can recall multiple intances where our cheaters displayed a complete lack of empathy.
These are great touchstones to harken back to if you ever start feeling badly about the loss of the cheater. I have myriad examples that are shocking, especially in retrospect.
Yes, its amazing isn’t it how things that puzzled us maybe years earlier suddenly make sense?
When 16 children were massacred at Dunblane, I was in PIECES (we had a 2 year old at the time). He remained unmoved.
On 9/11 when I was distraught for all the people killed and their families, his only concern was how his work had been affected due to the overload on the Web crashing his computer.
?
yup
time and time again when i had had enuff my ex would say something like”im sorry illl change” or “im going to church now im gonna change” or even something about how her father told her to stop being abusive.a month or so after i found out about one of the affairs she showed me negative results for a vd test….its possible that they could have a sexual attraction to you or an emotional attachment but the truth is that they are incapable of truly loving .once they feel they have you wrapped around their finger ,there is always another conquest and another game.they are never content without such drama for very long.
Cripes, the requisite 6 months was 13 months for this chumpy (blushes furiously) and all the while, you were that fly on the wall, not waving but drowning..I mean not buzzing but screaming at me, “Get shut of the feckin’ eejit!”
Seriously, it is jaw-dropping how they all do and say the same things, like they’re reading from a script. Are they micro-chipped at birth by the F.Eejit Society?
My cheater pretended to be sorta sorry until I accepted his apology. Then suddenly I was too emotional and angry. My “I love you”s and “Ok, let’s give things another shot” were suddenly met with disinterest. Now I’ve gone NC on his ass. Maybe it’s revenge for now but I’m hoping it will slowly turn into a way of life once I get out of the fog of his bullshit.
That has been the ultimate mind fuck because it has me now going over where I went wrong, what I could have done to fix things with this POS. He was so ready to recommit until I wasn’t ready to fully forgive him and move forward without more work because — after two months since DDay — well, I was still suffering greatly and the DBag did nothing to alleviate my pain.
But it’s now all my fault for being so horrid in reaction to his horrid behaviour. How dare I ask questions and get mad? How dare I want to hold him accountable? I’m just a controlling bitch who put a gun to his head to force him into doing things he doesn’t want to do … like reconcile with the likes of me after he spent two months telling me he wants to reconcile with me. Holy fuck!
Even typing up what happened makes me realize that it’s just another technique to make me feel bad and sad and scared. Classic narcissism. And it works! I’ve been going over everything to see where I went wrong. I stopped blogging. I wrote him a love letter telling him I was ready to move forward and come home. Ugh. Sad sad sad. I just pray for some strength from the universe, God, whatever is out there to help me stay strong this time and get through this.
This is perfect!! This is from the content of one of the last texts I received from his highness before I finally opted out:
“Your anger consumes you. It has prevented us from working our relationship back to any chance of sustainability!”
Sustainability. Hmmmmm….
What more could a narcissist hope for? Never-ending kibbles!!