My husband and I tried for almost one year. And it hurts today just as much add it did 1 year ago. I would love nothing more then us to find our way back together. We have tried. I have hope for you. I hope you have an amazing story to tell me how you guys made it work. I would love to know the secret. My heart breaks everyday without him. He was my everything. I love him still. And probably always will.
I believe in you. I believe in love. Message me with how things are going.
Make sure you have a plan in order to for this to work out. A clear plan with a final goal for both of you. Keep me posted!

Thank you Jesin. I'm so sorry you are still hurting. I pray every day that we will find a way to make this work. He is my everything also. But I can and will go on without him if I have to. We are getting along great but have not discussed our relationship at all in a while. I have been sitting back and letting him have his space and hoping he is seeing what he is missing. Some days it seems like he is and some days not so much. But like I said i just have this gut feeling that it's just not over. I have a lot of people asking me how I can be so calm about all of this. And I guess that may be why. I really believe that we're not done yet. But if it does happen that we are I will survive.

I am a sucker for a happy ending and believe that they do exist. What signs are you seeing that tell you he's not checked out? Have you told him you would him you would like to try to reconcile?
My ex had his first affair about 4 years into our marriage, I gave him an ultimatum and we remained married for another 22 years. Unfortunately, because we never addressed the underlying issue of why the first affair occurred, I believe wholeheartedly that the lack of a candid and open discussion about the first affair when it occurred (we never talked about it) set the stage for the ultimate demise of my marriage.

My thought is that you want the happy ending but you also do not want the regret and falling back into the place that you are now and then having to start the healing process over again. Sure we all want the happy ending rather divorce or work it out , If you think that this time will be different and you want to work it out as well then sure go for it but do it in baby steps . Therapy is a good place to start with goals and plans . This is your life and you are the one to decide . Good luck to ya

I appreciate cleighs response. My issues with alcoholic husband have never really been resolved and it just gets harder. His behavior gets worse and worse almost to get me to respond.

We just talked first time since Christmas and I want there to be hope but I can't just let it go this time. He must get help and I must continue on my path as well.

I still have hope for my marriage.....sure, it's only been 8 days since he left, but I hope. The reason he left was because he didn't want to give me hope...but it's still there. He's suffering from depression, can't feel anything right now, feels guilty for the way he's been acting...so he left. He actually went to the dr last week, full work up, and goes again this week to discuss results. Hoping he gets the help he needs....what I can't do for him. He has apologized, saying he doesn't deserve me, told me he loves me...so there's that hope. And I got 2 amazing hugs from him on Saturday.

I guess i can post here. I still have a glommer of hope not to save my marriage.. i dont want to save my marriage one bit. I hate my marriage to be honest with you...

I love my wife more then my heart know how to handle it. I love.my kids more then anything in this world... so when i say i dont want to save my marriage i dont. I want to start fresh with my wife start over with my wife. Show her the man i really am. Show her that it tooks 5 years to get me to come out of my state of no affection and depression i would say i think more of worry. I want to prove to her everyday how much i love her and the kids i can out her and the kids forst over my selfish habbits... now as of now she doesnt dent tha fact that she wants to start fresh she even brings it up sometimes. Ya she doesnt tell me she loves me anymore she actually told me she not in love with me ok im fine with that if i was her i wouldnt love my butt either. But deep down now she does ahe has told me are soulmates and plenty of other people ahe still falls in love me with me all over again.. i can see where she comeing from hideong her emotions from me fer sure being distint from me.. we are seperated im liveing with family ahe lives in the home with the kids that i see on weekends.. but when i meet her in person to get the kids or drop off money to her for the kids. She changes i ask one question she opens up. I cacth her looking at me whole i walk away then turn her head real fast when i look at her. I cacth her cry when we talk. There alot of sogns that point to love if u ask me... i need to change for her and for my self to become the man i know i am inside... so there is still hope for me.. i see it but sometime i get caught up in the emotions instead of takeing deep breath relaxing and txting or talking to someone else i push her. Then that pushes her away more.. i have no clue where were going to go from her.. i really dont but i have a food feeling where it might go. That def not dicorce but if it does i will let her go cuz im learning to love her unconditonally and ahe is my soulmate... we will alway share a bond she was my first love and i was her first love.. and for the kids the bond we share no body can touch it... so there hope there glimmer are u man or women enough to make the right steps is the question and presitence is the key patient is crazy hard but has to be done...

My wife and I are trying. She had the affair and wanted out. But now we are still living together seeing if there is hope. We have a daughter and we are friends. But she isn't "in love" with me. That romantic feeling has been missing for a while. This is no success story...yet. I am being patient. I am trying to stay positive. But I have a hard time sleeping and get panic attacks. I'm not angry, I'm just in pain. I wish that one day, I'll be able to post on here that this has been a success story. I think that it is possible. Especially if I can manage the pain that I'm going through. It's not very attractive! But not being honest is equally worse. I'm also looking for good reconciliation stories.

Thanks guys :) It's nice to know that people do believe in happy endings. I don't expect it but I hope with all my heart for it. Cleigh you asked if I am seeing signs that he is not done yet. That's hard to explain. I know him better than anyone expect for maybe his best friend. When he is done with something he's done and it's quite clear. The last month or so we have been getting along very well. Talking a lot more, when he goes out he sends me pics or things he knows i like, and more kind of nonsense texts, kind of like he is looking for a reason to talk. I have been listening to my therapist who advised me to sit back and let it play out. If I feel a certain way it's ok to let him know but to go easy. I have not mentioned reconciling lately - he is aware I want that. I made it quite clear for a while. What I did was send him a text (his favorite communication) and just quite simply stated that I am thrilled that we can spend time together and talk without any weirdness but I did want him to know that I still love him with my whole heart and I still miss him terribly every day. Told him I was not fishing for a response but I just wanted to let him know how I felt. Left it at that. Did not get a response which is fine I did not expect one. Just something for him to think about. He does not do well with confrontation. So I make it a point not to push it. When I get to the point that I need to know where this is going I will. But right now I am happy that we are getting along better than we have in quite a while. Even before he left. I can;t remember the last time we just sat and talked. It's actually been kind of nice. Hoping and not expecting and seeing where it goes

My wife and I are working it out. But two years after D-day I still hurt. Break down at times. You have to remember, it never will be the same...Never. Memories will fade but never go away. You can make a good life. Maybe never great. My friend was cheated on 31 years ago. They are happy but he says it pops into his head once a week. Wayward spouses never understand the destruction they cause until it to late. A heart is like a vase. It can be smashed. It can be glued back together. But it will always be a broken vase. I hope for the best for everybody that wants to rebuild. It may sound strange, but my wife blamed me for her affair for a long time. She has changed her view since. But she blamed me to justify and make herself feel better about what she did. Made me feel like a loser. One day I said no more. I collected everything from those 25 years, my military awards, pictures of us from day one, everything, and burned it. I have nothing to remind me of our 25 years of marriage. My wife freaked out. Asked me what I was doing. I said you told me I was a loser for 25 years. Well I'm not. And I will not have anything around me to remind me of my sacrifices and love and hard work I put into those 25 years just to remind me how unapriciated I was. I'm starting out with no memories of the past. Well she remembers nothing but good times now. Talks about what a great husband I was and am. Something shocked her back to reality. Which is nice but the stuff still got burned. It helped me to dump that marrage and my life in it in the fire. It's gone.

I read a post today about missing our ex partners. We are in pain and see them through rose colored glasses. Claiming we miss them. Our perception of reality is skewed and we find ways to see them in a different light in order to continue on with the relationship rather than go through the pain of the break up. This would happen to the women I worked with in a DV shelter and we would do exercises to remind them why they left. I am applying it to my situation now- although it was not abusive and I remind myself why we separated. Just a thought, it may not apply to your situation but I know it had helped ground me in the reality of my situation. Instead of remembering the good moments I write the reasons we split down. This has helped me strengthen myself to keep the distance between us and do as your therapist suggests. Maybe this can help someone reading this post the way it has helped me.

Don't underestimate the power of denial. Remember the psychological stages of grief? Denial, anger, depression, bargaining.......acceptance. it's that last one that most of us get stuck on. Real life isn't a Disney story. The good guy doesn't always win, sometimes you do everything right and fail and happy endings are for shady massage parlours. Sorry to be so blunt and insensitive. I'm hurting alot too from my own devastating betrayal. Mother of my children out banging other dudes, I suspect more than one guy affairs going back over a year. I was and am loyal for 11. I'm not perfect but I always did this woman right and I promised to have her back for life and meant it. Its not our faults, sometimes we don't realize the people we've chosen to love aren't really who we made them out to be in our minds. Sometimes they're far more deeply flawed and selfish than we could have ever imagined. It's time for us to let go of the fantasy because that's what it was. It's painful and tragic but we can't keep beating ourselves up and that's what we're doing. They emotionally let us go already. This is a relationship of us and ourselves. Fixating on what's broken won't help. Think of it like this, after all the lies and disrespect do u really want them back? No. It's the fantastic people we made them out to be and the comfort we associated with them that we want, but these are all in our heads. It's not going to get better overnight. I'm struggling right now. It's 4:25am here I'm quasi-sleeping next to my kids and I'm hyper aware that this luxury won't be afforded me much longer. Luxury. Not right, as f-d up as it is, courts favor the moms, even is she's out banging other dudes as I speak. All I do is work and come home and love my family, play with my kids, help with homework, make dinner, do laundry and grocery shopping and made delicious lunch and dinners. I lived being a real husband and father and I still got a rusty blade thrust in my back, clear through my heart and sternum and out of my chest (metaphorically for now) my dad worries I'll get a frying pan to the head in the middle of the night. I live with a crazy person. I told my dad I'll be a martyr for my kids I won't let this selfish narcissistic bitch have total control over them, showing passive interest, impatience and she even occasionally slaps our autistic 7 year old when she's frustrated with him. HE CAN'T F-ING TALK, ALL YOU'RE TEACHING HIM IS TO FEAR YOU!!!! It's so hard to be strong but my life my health, my safety comes second to my boys. I know what real love is, it's putting yourself second. Stop holding out hope. The horse is already dead, stop beating it to go faster. There is no faster ever again. Or maybe u have hope but I don't. You'll just have to figure this out on your own. I can't let my kids see I'm crying again. I don't want to walk them up

Family guy....dead on. After 23 years I found out she was cheating. I can never go back after the trust is gone. Never. After, I found a woman, the love of my life. Everything I needed. It lasted 2.5 years until she just dumped me because i haven't divorced yet. I have a teen daughter that needs me and not a drunk, lieng cheater that doesnt pay for anything and stays away for a week or two at a time and is now jobless. Im on a pension and she will get half if i divorce. How do I survive on half a pension? Im looking for a job with benefits so i can move on. Yes, the Courts in Cook County, Ill are not kind to Dads. Plus its a $2500 retainer to start and you may lose it all. Sleepless nights here. Good luck and heres to whoever makes it work. I choose to move on.

Monsolo, your post could have been written by my husband. Very similar situation, including, regrettably, the affair. I care about my husband and am devastated that I hurt him and my kids. I don't want to hurt them any more. That's why I have left the affair and am back trying. But I wrestle with feeling so STUCK in our past patterns of behavior, including bad communication between us. It seems like no matter how hard we are both trying to move beyond them, we fall back into patterns so familiar but so destructive that I want to scream. The major point of attraction in my affair was the ability to talk without fear of the conversation going bad places. I loved that man for showing me that there was a different way to be.

My husband and I are going through lots of counseling and both really trying, but my biggest fear is that I will never have open, trust-based dialog with my spouse. It makes me want to flee. Not very admirable, I know. I do know that it is my responsibility to look those feelings in the face and work through them; to take responsibility for the ways I fail the relationship and improve it. But I'm having trouble embracing that with joy and energy. One thing I'm doing is trying to focus each day on the things I am grateful for about him, our relationship, our family. My heart might not be there, but I know what I need to do to have a chance of my heart moving back to the place it should be. Good luck to you. It's hard, hard work.

My therapist gave me that very advice, Go with your gut feeling. It usually knows. If your gut is telling you to try, Go for it :).. There is an awesome person on here that has a positive story.... LifeGoesOn is her name. She is bright, positive and has a happy story to tell.. cleigh is always good too!!!
Good luck kas2378!!!!!