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Those are all very understandable feelings, Bulwark. There is a tremendous amount of pain and grief that come with this kind of betrayal. It's a huge trauma and loss, and society doesn't give us the space to grieve the way it does with more typical bereavement. Keeping a straight face through the rest of your day - for work, for your kids - is a huge feat. You're doing really well under the circumstances.

I functioned so poorly the first several months that I had to ask for a six month extension on a major deadline for my work. In the end, I had to tell the person in charge what I was going through, and that was super awkward, but they were (thankfully) understanding. If your situation isn't so flexible, can you call out sick for a few days? Unfortunately there's no way out but through. Hang in there!

Bulwark,

Do NOT beat yourself up over those feelings. That are so natural. What your wife is doing is cruel and harmful beyond understanding.

Allow yourself to feel. Get a trusted family member or friend to talk those things out. Or a good Betrayal Trauma Specialist.

She is not a friend to you. She is like an entrenched enemy, shooting missiles your way. With this sort of offensive, out in the open disrespect...I really think you should get your lawyer to expedite things. It will be good for your mental health.

I am so sorry for this horrible experience.🙏

I cannot understand someone who takes a loving, faithful, capable partner. One whom she openly admits attraction to, still says she loves, and enjoyed sex with; and then devastates them in such a fashion.

This gave me a flashback to when I was melting down one day over my wife still talking to her AP. I accused her of being in love with him. She looked at me and said "No. We're just friends... with benefits."

All that while telling me that she she still loved me, was attracted to me and wanted to stay married.

What an awful experience. I'm so sorry you're dealing with this man. Just stay strong and stick to your guns.

She's coming back tonight, around midnight. Not going to stir anything up. Mostly just going to say "Hey, kids are asleep, we'll discuss this tomorrow."

In the interim burying my head in side projects, work, and kids.

I'm kind of dreading the entire upcoming encounter.
I guess I'll play it by ear come Wednesday when we actually have to hash it out.
Objectively I want her out by the end of the month. I don't to try to 'call my bluff' because if I have to go nuclear, it means everything gets blown up for the kids. So it's not a bluff so much as a 'don't make me do this'. But at the end of the day, this needs to come to a close. We're a full on year since dday, almost. I mean I suspected before that, but the proof - actual proof. It's a 1 year anniv. at this point.

So yeah. Not really spiraling, mostly just kind of keeping to myself with this nagging itch of a feeling of 'oh great, the witch is coming back to oz.'

Sending strength, brother.

Anticipating those kinds of tough conversations is really stressful. I would have such a hard time focusing on anything else on days like that! Know that your kids will be okay, even if things get rough for a little while. A few months or even a year is a blip in their lifetime.

Keeping my fingers crossed that she doesn't make this harder for you and the kids!

You got this. Don’t let her get you emotional or angry, just stay calm, state facts that her affair and then continuing her affair and flying to see her AP for 2 weeks is disrespectful and cruel to you and the children and she has 1 month to move out.

SB, I don't know about your kid's age but how much do they actually know? What did you tell them about their mother's trip? If you made up some innocent story ("business") they might still sense something is wrong.

I was betrayed by my first husband when our kids were 13 and 15. It turned out that the key message they needed to hear over and over again was that it is possible and okay to love more than one person at a time. (I know, that may sound cynical on this forum.) But for my kids it was a huge relief to get 'permission' to continue loving their father AND their mother. And later on when I entered a new relationship with my now-husband they needed to hear that it is okay for them to love their father AND to like the new man in their mother's life (which they did). And they wanted to know that I loved them AND my new partner.

Looking back, this was key to helping my kids cope with the situation. Building on that, relocation and everything else was not that much of an issue.

Wishing you all the best!

[This message edited by 7m46s at 1:55 PM, Wednesday, October 28th]

SB

Terminating a 20 year marriage isn’t easy. It’s not simply deciding that she get’s six dishes out of the 12 place setting you guys bought 8 years ago, you get the GMC and she get’s the BMW. It’s a lot more difficult and complex.
You give your location as Missouri. That state – like all of them – has laws and regulations on how to proceed. It states things like if you can demand she leaves the family home, how to process the family home, custody, support… the works.

Like your present situation where you have long-since decided to divorce but still cohabit. I’m guessing that’s because you have decided but not yet implemented. Sort-of like my decision in January to go to the gym, but still haven’t gotten to it…
Your present plans of demanding she leaves in the next 30 days… Something tells me its not that simple. Like… who pays the mortgage if she leaves and who pays her rent at her new place? Are they even amounts? Out of marital income? What about the kids?
These are things an attorney can guide you two through. Divorce doesn’t have to be two attorneys arguing over each and every spoon, but legal representation can explain how either of you needs to move out and/or if either of you can keep the family home, how to move the deed and the mortgage to said person, what the other gets and all that.

What I fear is that when you finally tell her to move out nothing happens. She refuses, you demand, she refuses, you demand… and three years from now it’s the same situation.

One knows the full story, the others (10 and 7) don't. There was some .. discussion about telling them before hand, but unfortunately lost that battle. I understood her reasoning and conceded her point. She didn't want them thinking she was leaving and never coming back.

So we're going to tell them later. But for now I have to survive today (Work is heavy AF) and then I need to schedule a 30 min convo about 'so when are you leaving, and when are we telling the kids?'

Pretty much drowning out the 'reunion giggles' from the other room with very heavy music and headphones at this point.
I don't want to hear anything. I'm furious she gets to run off and play pretend in another country, leave me with the mess, and then pretend to be some kind of hero with gifts.

If nothing else, it fuels my desire to get her out asap.

Oh man, that really sucks. Try and focus on yourself. Leave the house when you can. Go for a walk or to the gym. Breathe.

Even this day will be over at some point.