Rebuilding Marriage After Infidelity Community Group
A community for those who have been through the heartbreak of infidelity and decided to stay with their partner and try to re-build the relationship.
Perhaps some of you have found yourself doing this. You've had a great day or couple of days, maybe you've been doing great for weeks. There has been good communication, some good intimate time together, or just a fun day running errands or working on projects around the house. You are feeling very good about the marriage and those old hurts and resentments caused by the affair are far from your mind. However, close to your mind is how thankful you are for the progress you've made, the work your spouse has put into the Rebuilding, and the love you seem to be feeling once again.
So, you bring this up. You mention the affair, how far you've come, how good you feel about the future. Your motive is pure, but the mention of the affair just sucks the air right out of the room. Wow, you realize, that was stupid.
Another lesson learned. Some of those good feelings need to be kept to ourselves. At least kept for another time when the marriage and the problems are being talked about. Store up the good things, like building a bank account. Then when the hurt rushes in, you have something to draw on, something to encourage either yourself or your spouse with.
To clarify, I don't mean to never talk about the good stuff in the marriage. But it can be talked about without bringing up the damage and pain of the affair.
Yea, I felt really stupid after doing this on Sunday. But, I realized it and told my husband I didn't mean to keep dredging it up. He was glad I realized it and said as much. So I thought I would mention it here.
So, you bring this up. You mention the affair, how far you've come, how good you feel about the future. Your motive is pure, but the mention of the affair just sucks the air right out of the room. Wow, you realize, that was stupid.
Another lesson learned. Some of those good feelings need to be kept to ourselves. At least kept for another time when the marriage and the problems are being talked about. Store up the good things, like building a bank account. Then when the hurt rushes in, you have something to draw on, something to encourage either yourself or your spouse with.
To clarify, I don't mean to never talk about the good stuff in the marriage. But it can be talked about without bringing up the damage and pain of the affair.
Yea, I felt really stupid after doing this on Sunday. But, I realized it and told my husband I didn't mean to keep dredging it up. He was glad I realized it and said as much. So I thought I would mention it here.
I find it helpful that we can bring up the affair when we are happy and getting along and have it not change the good feeling between us. I do not want to feel like it has to be buried like a shameful dirty secret and never referred to (I don't mean to say that it wasn't shameful and wrong, but just that we have accepted that it happened). I leave it to my H to decide whether or not to bring it up and I have told him that he can bring it up forever if he needs to. My only request is that he try to refrain from bringing it up in anger over other things in our relationship.
I think the best thing, lovingagain, is that you and your H could discuss what it did when you brought it up and decide together that you both do not want to bring it up. It sounds like you both are after the same thing in your relationship and are willing to meet each other half-way. That is what is important.
I don't think he would have said anything if I hadn't mentioned it. After I said I regretted mentioning it, he said if it helped me, then it was fine, whatever I need to do, but he also felt that it could be detrimental to mention it too often, especially considering how longs it's been since Dday. But in this instant, it didn't help me, there was no benefit or anything to learn, it was just a wrong choice of words at the wrong time.
My H has been great about talking whenever I need to talk. 20+ months of talking. He has been there 110% the entire time, answered every question I've tossed his way. Over and over again.
This was a great day, we had had a wonderful week & weekend. We had a wonderful intimate time together on Sunday afternoon. Instead of focusing on how well we were doing, I brought up the A. I should have focused on how well we were doing, how nice the weekend had been etc.
He didn't react AT ALL, until I mentioned that I shouldn't have mentioned the A. He didn't frown or cringe at all. He echoed my thoughts about how much progress we had made. He said nothing at all about my mention of the A until I brought up that perhaps my timing was bad.
I am the one who realized my timing was wrong, not him. Me. Just me.
Back off ladies...I was trying to share how we as the betrayed, in the long term rebuilding process could pay attention to how we address the A. There has to come a time when it isn't such a horrible elephant in the room. We have to let it go at some point, especially when our spouses have worked so hard at rebuilding.
I'm tired of it taking up so much space in my brain and in our marriage. He has done nothing but work towards my trust and love for him.
I do not want to be one of those woman who constantly throws it up in his face. That will get us nowhere.
My H will also talk about it whenever I need to. The discussions are more benign and it comes up less and less. But I have to say that my H would have been silent and not mentioned anything in the way of it being detrimental... or how long it's been since d-day. He knows that this is the wrong way to approach it with me. It's would be kind of like blaming me for ruining a good day. But I have done this and a simple hug and kiss and reinforcement of the work you're both doing is a good way to recover.
But the truth of the matter is that it is with us through the good times and the bad times. The key is to live in the moment and build on the memories of your hard work.