Dear Chump Lady, Do you believe in affair fog?

Fog my arse! EVERYTHING they do is deliberate and systematic abuse. There is NO fog. They claim fog/confusion when their kibble source is threatened. IMO that’s the only reason.

I’m sorry you are joining us, but you have good souls here and a wealth of advice and comfort. We always think the best of our spouses, until we are proved wrong. This is your wake up call; please protect yourself and your children. Don’t wait – it’s not worth it and will only scar you. Blessings to you and many prayers!

Got a brain
What a fucker!

“At some point the fog will clear and he will have that “Oh my God, I fucked up” moment of clarity. He’ll return to his senses, return to his family, and be that person you fell in love with again.”

I used to believe this, but I think this is us projecting our thoughts and values onto our spouse. In hindsight, it was my biggest mistake that kept me in limbo for so long. I could never imagine being in the situations my wife put herself into and doing the things that she did, and like the letter writer, I thought at least she’d snap out of it eventually or have some type of self-reflective moment.

But no, that was never going to happen – not in a million years. You know what my first clue should have been – the fact that she still hung around with her AP after D-day. That your spouse would even consider hanging out with their AP, and after D-Day while watching you suffer so terribly, is a great window into how they really feel about you. They just don’t give a shit. If your spouse is doing that, then there’s definitely nothing left to salvage. I was an idiot for believing otherwise for so long.

It’s been a couple years since D-day for me now, we’re divorced, and the A didn’t work out for her. And sure, now she seems to exhibit at times that she feels bad about what happened, but now I know that it’s not about losing me or the marriage, it’s about losing what I have to offer her. No more safety net, no more financial stability, no more me running to her aid when she screws something up…..and no, the AP isn’t interested in doing any of this for her either (and never was to begin with).

So my thoughts on the “affair fog” are that, if you see any hint of this mysterious fog, then leave immediately. Staying around to see if it will lift is a complete waste of time. The fact that it’s even there, particularly after D-day, tells you loads about your spouse and the lack of respect that they have for you. It’s just another bullshit excuse.

Liz-

I know this is old but in case you haven’t figured it out yet, the “fog” doesn’t exist. What’s the saddest part about the fog? The RIC uses it like bait and hooks vulnerable chumps with it. Unfortunately far too many chumps not only believe it, they defend it and get angered with anyone who suggests it’s bunk.

You want to start a riot? Go to a RIC website and tell unicorn chasers that the fog doesn’t exist. It will make you glad that you are in cyberspace so the lynch mob doesn’t start chasing you. If no one has the guts to speak out, then they just hook more chumps with the fog nonsense.

If the “fog” exists, it only exists for the chump. They are so blindsided by their spouse they don’t know which end is up or what they should do next. Thank goodness for CL’s lighthouse to guide us all out of that fog. Those RIC sites just drive chumps further in. Hope you found your way out Liz.

My STBX did experience the affair fog but that is not what caused him to cheat in the first place. He wanted to cheat due to his dissatisfaction with life and feelings of entitlement. The hormone induced fog when he fell hard for Schmoopie 2.0 just made him act irrationally and do stupid things including attempting to be manipulative in ways that even a chump wouldn’t fall for. It also caused him to treat his kids terribly as he needed more excuses to leave the house. He truly thought that if he left me for her he could find happiness, That fog seems to have now receded because instead of stupid and irrational he is depressed (as he should be). He now knows that Schmoopie 2.0 is not the key to his happiness. He is also torn up about the damage he has caused, but not because he cares about me and the kids. He just doesn’t like what he has become and feels like a failure (so still all about him). He is remorseful enough to go along with the divorce and be generous in the settlement, but not remorseful enough to be willing to do the hard work that would be required to become a better person and try to reconcile his marriage. He does at least seem to be trying harder to have a decent relationship with his kids so at least that is something. Not quite what I had hoped for but better than what a lot of others on these boards have had to deal with.

“Seriously, what sort of woman could get involved with a man whose wife was pregnant?”

Having recently gone through a somewhat similar situation with my now ex-husband and his secret affair partner (while expecting our 4th baby), I have often wondered the same thing myself. The OW contacted me several times during the divorce process (my third trimester) to either ask me if my husband was cheating on her (seriously, it happened!) or to make fun of me. I remember her telling me how wonderful her friends and family felt about my spouse cheating on his pregnant wife with her. It was really sick. The OW is a divorce attorney many years older than me. She named herself as a witness in our at-fault divorce, hired an attorney to represent her, and participated in our high conflict divorce, with what felt to me like gleeful delight. What a nightmare! Thank heavens for CL and CN!

Before I found CL, my personal version of the fog was the light bulb. After DDay, I was sure that eventually the metaphorical light bulb would go on over his head, and he would suddenly “get it.” He would realize all the devastation he had caused in our marriage. We went to MC, and the MC said he needed to take responsibility and do the bulk of the rebuilding in our relationship. Did the light bulb go on at this point? Of course not. He was just pissed that “we” were ganging up on him. The only emotions he was capable of were anger that I “made” him have an affair, and entitlement to continue the affair. I kept waiting for remorse, but got nothing… It took a while, but eventually the light bulb went on for ME, and I realized that this man would never feel regret for what he did, and my kids and I deserved better than this.

Really most desperately wanted to believe in the fog, and that fleeting moment of clarity that CL so perfectly describes kept me there for far too long. I knew from the start that I would never, ever go back to the hellish paralysis of the few years prior to dday, but still actually believed he might somehow grab onto that rare moment of insight that the shock of discovery prompted and use it to build a better self. After all, for the first time ever, there he was looking pale and drawn and describing a little bit of what it is like to live in his skin: never contented, unable to love, always trying to shovel things (money, power, sex, porn, admiration) into the sucking black hole at his core, but never feeling even briefly satisfied. This was not a moment of love for me–did not look and listen and feel hope that there could be a marriage–but it was a moment of compassion, real dread, and some hope for him. How can anyone live like that? It was frightening to witness, but I thought it was at least possible that for him finally to speak these things out loud might mean that he could keep speaking them, excavate further, and maybe save himself eventually. I knew I could not save him, but I did offer to join him for counseling–not with any real hope or desire for reconciliation, but I guess because it seemed the humane thing not to leave someone adrift in that horrifying state.

But he turned me down, dropped out of individual counseling with lightning speed (too busy, not sure its really helpful, counselor not adequate, the usual), and very quickly put the mask back in place. I was clearly the problem. He needed a worthy companion, and I had never–not from moment one–fit the bill. He put all of the energy that I thought and hoped might go into self-examination into blaming me and constructing a socially acceptable story, instead. Affair continued throughout this period of what he called his “confusion and pain,” and the lying about it and hiding it continued, as well.

Very much agree with others here who have said that we are the ones in the fog. We think and hope we can make out the shapes of sorrow, remorse, maybe even redemption for our cheaters, but no. I did that for a very long time, and have been feeling the pain of my own idiocy, lately, but I also understand that good people expect others to behave in good people ways. Narcissists might be able to behave like good people in short bursts when it suits them to do so, but it’s a short-lived phenomenon, and there’s usually something a bit off about it, because they have to parrot and perform what they see others doing. It never comes from some genuine place within.

I also think the affair partners are in this fog, which may or may not lift for them over time. I know that no person who saw the mask so chillingly slip completely away as I did for those few moments would ever willingly join himself or herself to that. But I also know that she has seen it slip–both children have witnessed his cruelty toward her–and has responded so far exactly as I did: anxiously work to perfect the dancing pretty on eggshells routine. It’s a tough way to live, and I don’t envy her that. Some compassion, there, mixed in with the contempt for her choices.

Anyway, it actually is a foggy morning, here, and I kind of love real fog for its power briefly to transform the world into a deliciously creepy, romantic place–all of the edges obscured, light frayed into a soft glow, still bare trees looking haunting and painterly. Guess I’ll stick to real fog from now on, and never believe again that deliberately making highly detailed and ongoing unethical choices is somehow a temporary madness brought on by some transient combination of pheromones, alcohol, brain chemistry or whatever. Have glimpsed the real face of narcissism without the softening fog, and it is monstrous, heartbreaking, unfixable.