SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I still have no peace in my heart. I function. I work, eat, sleep, hold a conversation, may even appear happy... but that is all a mask. I am dead inside. Like someone gutted me and just left an empty shell.

I know the drill - change your thoughts, change you mood. but I am having a hard time implementing this in my life. Like, I tell my self, today I am going ot have a good day, but I don't belive my words. Ok, fake it until you make it, right? I try to talk to my self positively but I do not believe what I am saying to myself, so I just get frustrated and get stuck in this contiuous loop of talking to my self and starting to feel worse. I have talked to couple of thereapists and they all say I need to practcite it every day.
It has been a year and I see no benefit of this exercise.

Anyone struggling with this, please share your experience.

I’m sorry you are here.
I’m 5.5 years out. It took 5 full years for me to get OK. That’s all I am, just OK.

I’m 2.5 years out and much better, but there are still hard times. At a year out I alternated between being a complete mess and feeling completely flat/zoned out.

It helped me to promise myself something much smaller and more concrete than "today I’m going to have a good day." I went with "today I’m going to take a walk," or "right now I’m going to look at the birds on my bird feeder," or "today i’m going to clean out one drawer in my kitchen." Do really small things and build from there.

In my experience the year mark to the two year mark was the worst in a lot of ways. Hugs. You’re going to make it, but it’s very hard. Im sorry.

What you are feeling is normal.

I'm 17 years out, took minimum five years to keep the A out of my head for most of the day.

First few years it was the first thing on my mind when I woke up and the last thing I thought of when I went to bed....and so many times in between.

For many of us, the second year is even harder than the first because the reality of the fallout from the A has really sunk in, and we are dealing with the aftermath of the devastation.

I was mostly non-functional the first year. After 16 months, I was beginning to realize that XWH wasn't doing the work.

We didn't R. About a year after living in my own place, I finally realized I was content and do much better off without the jerk.

I still deal with anxiety and getting through the PTSD of it all, but doing so much better. I would rather live alone than with a lying, cheating a-hole.

I ended up choosing to D, but while I was attempting to get over the trauma of Dday and attempting to R, my heart broke every day for 7 months. It was only after I got my own place that I really began to heal in earnest. I'm 5 years out and in a much better place. I can't say I'm happy, but content and have mostly good days. I get lonely sometimes, bug that usually passes quickly.

You might want to read Cheating in a Nutshell to help you work through your feelings. It helped me understand that the way I was feeling was completely natural. The basic thesis is that R is counter to our primal evolutionary programming. So while it may make sense to our big juicy prefrontal lobes, our amygdala just doesn't want to do it.

I agree with others that the first 2-3 years after Dday are the hardest.

Where do you get some positive things or validation outside of your marriage?

I always volunteered and was involved in my church, specifically with the youth. I always felt rewarded on that end.

I also had a side hustle that allowed me to receive a ton of compliments as well.

It’s easy to knock yourself down but harder to pull yourself up. Keep trying. Heal yourself.

11 years ago I was a wreck in the runup to our first antiversary.

If you're stifling yourself - and appearing happy when you're not in social sitches, well, OK. If you're hiding your unhappiness from your WS, though, probably not OK.

IMO, R requires being authentic with one's WS. If you can't bring yourself to be authentic, something is very wrong. What is it? Are you holding yourself back out of fear of exposing yourself to the person you supposedly love?Are you holding back because you see red flags from your WS?

If you can't be authentic with your WS, how is your M useful to you?

sisoon
I am not hiding my emotions from my WS. This is just in front of our children and other people. My WS gets to see the whole range of my emotions, every single raw emotion I have. It is not pretty most of the time, but he told me he is committed to R and is taking it all stoically so far. He is going to IC, we are in MC, I am in IC...he is doing everything that is required of him now to show remorse. The problem is that this is not the first time he did this (10 years ago) and I am completely shattered this time. I do not trust myself or my ability to make the right decision now. I am just trying to heal myself first and I feel after a year these flashbacks and intrusive thoughts would subside…

Thank you all for your kind words..

Thanks for the clarification.

It looks like you're doing the right things now (as opposed to 10 years ago). Alas, healing oneself is very painful, and it generally takes longer than a year. You have to really feel pain to process it out of your body, and that is not pleasant in any way at all.

It does end, though. You will eventually get through the pain to 'the other side', and you will start to feel better. I wish it were easier and faster - but it always feels worse and takes longer than anyone thinks it should.