ME: BH
HER: FWW
many kids now, 1 then
DDAY: anniversary

"Reconciled" (whatever that means)
Sometimes still have hard days, but getting by. Still dealing with feelings I buried, trying to get them out. She won't talk about it, s

When is this actually over?

I feel like I am supposed to be a success story. My FWW blindsided me with this on our anniversary in 1989. I had been deployed while in the service, and she was having an affair with her boss at the time. We were only 22.

Years went by after that - which I chose to suppress at first - and then we moved back to that same neck of the woods, about 20 years ago, and I can't shake it away anymore. Every year around December I can't manage life. It is less so at other times of the year but never gone. We have so much, including more kids otherwise. I can't talk about it or she threatens divorce. I've gone to therapists, and she gets angered and says I am NOT the "victim".

When it happened, she confessed it was her idea, and that she wanted it. Now (in the rare case it comes up argumentatively) she says it wasn't and she was part of "me too". I asked this explicitly when it happened, and it weighs heavily on me). She wanted it and I still wanted to pretend it never happened - what a loser.

I go through this over and over. I'm not even sure why I am writing this. I am a bit drunk right now. Maybe I am just reaching out for support, IDK. I feel like a first-prize chump: my wife says she has been cheating, that she wanted to, but wanted to come back (because she had nowhere else to go), and I just folded and say yes. Later, as I try to actually process, the story changes, and I am not a victim, I can't seek treatment, and this really is in the past.

Now it seems like she hates me for it. Like I am responsible. The whole historical thing keeps being mitigated, and I feel like the same chump year after year. I think at this point it is all fiction. I get more and more deeply depressed.

I hate Christmastime. I hate my anniversary. I hate myself. I hate a lot of things now.

Sorry to vent in an otherwise happy time. Thanks for reading.

22 comments posted: Saturday, December 24th, 2022