Infidelity Support Group

Any relationship in which one partner engages willfully in sexual relations with another outside of the partnership is considered to have experienced infidelity. This breach of trust is often traumatizing for the faithful partner as well as the relationship, and support is often needed to heal emotionally and to decide whether or not the relationship should continue after...

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A Deep Desire

Jason21
Jason21
I with all of my being want to love my wife the way I used to. It seems like that is lost. I do love my wife but nothing like before the A, I just can not seem to get past the protecting of my heart. I never before the A was worried about keeping my guard up and being worried about what she was doing or who she was with. Now it just seems like I have walls around my heart that I can not seem to break down. She does everything that she is suppose to do in being transparent and loving to me, yet I just can not seem to be as loving to her as I used to be. I just can not seem to find the feelings that I used to have for her.
I want to really feel that I am in love with her again and it is a problem I just can not seem to get passed. I want to look to the future again knowing that everything will work out. I so wish there was not all of this doubt in my heart.
Hope is what keeps me pushing forward with a positive attitude and God keeps me working on my problems every day. My son brings me Joy that I used to get from us being a family. I am just scared to put my heart out there again to the very person that destroyed my faith in marriage.
I have to find a way to risk being hurt again in order to move on with a completely open heart. I know that I can Love and Trust her again I just have this struggle between my emotions and my logic. It is so difficult to work passed the fear of being hurt again.
pinkpony66
pinkpony66
If she is doing everything that she should to regain your trust and toy believe that she is, then, yes you need to risk "serious injury" to your heart to love her again. That's what you did the first time only you didn't realize the risk you were taking. When we give so much of ourselves over its an "assumed" risk.

Now it will be a conscious choice to risk the possibility of get pain to hopefully experience great joy.
Blindsidedagain
Blindsidedagain
Not sure how long it has been since discovery, but it usually takes a few years before things return to something resembling normal.
Hereistohoping
Hereistohoping
I think one (there are several) of the biggest things we have to overcome while trying to rebuild our marriage is that things will not be like they were before. No matter how hard you try it will not be the same, so stop trying to regain what was and try for what is and will be.

Our spouses have shown us another side and that side is not pretty. You can't live in fear though. I know the possibilities and with the pain of learning what my spouse is capable of also came some strength.

Since you have stated you all are trying to rebuild then you need to focus on that but there is nothing wrong with keeping the truth in the back of your mind. Being harmed by anyone causes some type of protection to come into place but you can't let that rule you. I don't think
deejo
deejo
Very well said Jason21. I could have written that whole thing myself. Yesterday it occurred to me that our sacred bond is broken, and that we can never get it back. We can rebuild, we can reconcile.. but our marriage promises are forever broken. I want to trust him, I want to push it down and make it all go away. but whenever he is a little bit late (or being very attentive to his phone like his is at this very moment) I wonder. He could be playing Angry Birds for all I know.. or not. It's all just such a big huge disappointment. I have a brick fortress around my soul and yet I can't stand not trusting someone. I am not a jealous person, and I feel like I have been pushed into this. I hope that for us and for you that time truly heals.

I think you are right and just in guarding your heart. Have you shared this with her? I think that it's important for the CS to know how deep and far reaching the hurt goes.. not so much to inflict guilt, because if you are rebuilding I'm sure there is plenty of that.. but so that the work and steps of the rebuilding process are taken and lived and thought through by both of you. I wish you well on your journey of rebuilding.
Cole50
Cole50
And that is why it is called rebuilding. It won't be the original relationship, and it will take months and years to get through this.

Love is felt by regular deposits into your "love bank" as Willard Harley describes it. Her having an affair made a huge withdraw, potentially putting the balance into the negative. Dealing with the aftermath of an affair can also make withdraws. Which is why so many rebuildings fail, because the couple has to intentionally make deposits to rebuild the love alongside the trust.

Read "His Needs, Her Needs" by Willard Harley for more info on that. It is a key in rebuilding success that tends to get ignored. But for most, until that love bank balance is rebuilt substantially, you will not tend to feel the love you know is internally there.

We're also currently reading his book, "Surviving an Affair" which so far is also good, though I disagree with him on one point so far.
Lenoire
Lenoire
Mending a broken heart is like restoring a masterpiece painting: it's time consuming and requires a great deal of delicate work, that often involves irreversible change to the original material.