SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I'm quite embarrassed about this but I find myself a year and a half out and still completely stuck on this.
For context, my partner had a ONS with a woman in her early twenties while working away. This was at the beginning of 2024.
He's doing the work and all that, things are okay.
However, I have to admit, I have become completely obsessed with the AP. I check her instagram multiple times a day. She's blocked me (I didn't do anything, we spoke for a moment afterwards but I was never mean or anything like that, she just didn't want anything to do with it and didn't want to answer any questions I had) so I use one of those websites where you can view instagram stories for public accounts. I also have a different account that I'm not blocked on to look at her instagram.

I think I've tried to convince myself the reasoning for this is normal and it has changed over the year and a half since dday.
I think at first it was obviously curiosity. Who is the woman that managed to turn my loyal for nearly two decades partner's head all of a sudden? What's so great about her?
Then it just became a habit. I went through a phase where I tried to use her instagram as motivation to get myself in shape (not that I'm overweight or anything). She's a 'gym girl', all into her fitness so she's in good shape. I tried to use it to motivate myself to work out and look after myself but then when I didn't follow through I hated myself for it. Then I went through a phase where I thought, actually she's not all that great? She's attractive but not like out of this world stunning, she's just a normal looking young woman, there's nothing special about her. Then I was starting to pick apart her pictures - that bit looks edited, her make up hasn't been done well, this bit of hair is out of place, she does her lipstick in a weird way and it makes her lips look really dry and awful.

This is probably the most embarrassing side effect of the infidelity I've experienced and I cannot stop.

I've realised it's probably a way to try to control the situation, maybe? Like I look at her instagram and I know she's still in a country thousands of miles away and nowhere physically near me or my WS. But it makes me spiral constantly. One day she posted a video of herself in a hotel lobby, going in the elevator up to a hotel room, and that took me out for a good week, it was triggering as hell (They slept together in his hotel room and I imagined them going up to the room together with her looking like she did in the video, laughing and flirting). If she posts a photo where she looks great, I'll hate myself. If she posts a photo and I can pick something bad about it, I'll feel better, but then hate myself for feeling that way.

Like I said, I check multiple times a day, whenever I think of the infidelity, which is a lot.

Has anyone else had an issue like this?
I don't know if it's related but my dr suspects I have OCD. Could this just be a part of that? Or is it 'normal'?
I really want to stop doing it but feel like I can't for some reason.

I don't want how my days go to be based on how good she might look in her insta stories that day
It makes me feel ridiculous.

It’s looping. Our brains sometimes have glitches. It’s like the old records that got scratched, the needle kept playing the same piece of the 78 over and over. I suggest EMDR.

[This message edited by Cooley2here at 2:38 PM, Sunday, June 8th]

TP,

Does your husband masturbate? Bet he does. More when he’s away from you than when you’re around. What do you suppose he’s thinking about when he does the deed? Is he thinking about you? Maybe. His high school girlfriend? Some hot actress? Your next door neighbor?

But why is he masturbating and thinking about whatever he’s thinking about.

Does he do that because you’re not pretty enough? Your body isn’t good enough? Your boobs aren’t the right size? If you could fix those things, would he stop masturbating?

Naah.

When he had his ONS, he was masturbating. He was getting himself off, just using a woman’s body to enhance the experience. A woman’s body certainly provides hugely pleasurable sensations he can’t do by himself.

Same question, then. If you could be prettier, etc., would it have prevented this?

Naah.

Somewhere along the line, he gave himself permission to find a woman to engage with. What she looked like wasn’t very important. Men (boys) have crude jokes about this. An unattractive woman is a one-bagger. You put a bag over her head so you don’t see her, and carry on. A very unattractive woman is a two-bagger, in case the first bag tears. How does a 5 turn herself into a 10? Put out. How does a man turn a 5 into a 10? Drink three beers.

My point about this? When it’s just sexual gratification being sought, looks don’t matter very much.

I think you’re making excuses for him. "Oh, she’s so much prettier than me; no wonder he did it. Any man would do Kendall Jenner, given the chance."

This is wrong. He gave himself permission to do this before he knew what he might end up with. This is your problem; not her looks.

Her looks weren’t what made her attractive; her availability was. You don’t need to be worried about pretty women; you need to be worried about all women.

I don’t think you trust, yet.

Often the affair happens because someone is available and willing to be a side piece. Not because the OW is smarter or funnier or prettier or richer or whatever.

In my case I was in my 50s when my H cheated. I didn’t look much different than I did in my 30s. I was as thin in my 50s as I was in my 20s & 30s. I had a good job and never complained while my H traveled all over the globe for his job.

The OW? Hmmmm……..she was cute enough but not in good shape. She was covered head to toe in tattoos and her best assets hung out of every shirt she owned. My H always claimed to dislike people either excessive tattoos but I guess he made an exception in her case.

She was nothing special except she was younger single & willing to be the OW. If she wasn’t the one he most likely would have found someone else if he wanted to cheat. Yes they had a common interest or two and worked together but they met, flirted and 💥 cue the start of the affair.

She could have been anyone who was willing to be flirty and accept advances from a married man.

She’s not the one to worry about. Trust me. She’s nothing special.

As Cooley said, your brain can get stuck in a loop and burn neural pathways to make looking almost obsessive. You need to train your brain to use different pathways. EMDR is good for this. Oddly, research shows that playing certain match games can help. While the articles I read mentioned match 3 (Candy Crush), I found another that helped me.

There is nothing special about her. It is more about his moral (lack of) character. Look at all the great looking Hollywood stars that have experienced infidelity. It wasn't anything you did or didn't do, said or didn't say, looked or didn't look.

Thank you for the replies.

Logically, I know all of this. I know she could have been anyone, I know it had nothing to do with me.
My WS even used the masturbation comparison when we spoke about how my feelings towards sex have changed since his infidelity, describing the kind of pleasure as that of masturbation and not in the same league of what we have.
I know that it doesn’t matter how pretty she is and that it’s nothing to do with how I look, think, feel, etc.

Which is why I’m confused by this. I would love to try EDMR but unfortunately I just can’t afford it right now. I keep saying I’ll stop but sometimes I do it before I even realise what I’m doing, like it’s automatic whenever I pick up my phone or think about it. And it leads to multiple spirals a week. Sometimes she changes her profile to private and I feel at peace in a way, while feeling a loss of control also?

I don’t know, this has all been such an eye opening experience. Obviously I knew being cheated on was bad, but this is so much worse than I had ever imagined. It’s pure hell.

I did this too with every AP I knew about especially the MOW. Eventually I blocked them myself so that I wouldn't do it and then it stopped my obsessing. It is a normal yet unhealthy curiosity and I'm sorry. Eventually they won't yield this kind of power over you. It will almost feel like burnout and you won't care anymore.

[This message edited by crazyblindsided at 4:49 PM, Tuesday, June 10th]

I’m sorry you are struggling with this. I did it too. Granted, my WH had a VLTA and I had years of social media posts to comb through. I found out on my own, and never had full disclosure so I was obsessed with learning all I could and trying to understand something that can’t be understood.

I am seven years from the end of the affair, still with my WH, and I still can’t stop myself from checking on her online, I don’t think I even care anymore, and it makes me feel small but also smug. Hard to explain. I used to be much worse, before she blocked me everywhere.

Don’t judge yourself - I bought boots and clothes from one of her fashion likes pins, and wore them on a date with my WH while in the chaos of early discovery and recovery. I told him they were her from her Pinterest board, and I told her I looked better in them than she ever would. I was the same age, but smarter, thinner and cuter than her. The only thing she had that I didn’t was a different body than mine and a willingness to do anything with it, as well as lie and sneak around for added thrills. I loathe her, I piled all my anger and resentment on her, and yet, I know in my heart and mind that she is pathetic, shallow, insecure and unworthy of my time. I laugh out loud at some of her sad selfies, her attempts to get likes and especially the lie of a life she represents with her cheated on husband. I am my pettiest self where she is concerned. But I think she deserves every bit of my petty judgement, and I have told her as much.

I know I am getting better because the urge and intensity of the itch to see what her life is like now is lessening. But I am not free of her yet, she is a ghost haunting me long after I killed their relationship. I have talked to two therapists about my inability to let it go. One kindly told me that detail oriented, answer seeking personality like mine has the hardest time letting go. He asked what I am gaining from continuing a behavior that I don’t want to do, that makes me feel bad about myself? I said maybe it’s the control of lurking in her life now, like she lurked in mine, when I was clueless. The second therapist told me I needed to decide to stop, and I hoped that EMDR would help me let that urge go. It did lessen the emotional impact everything was having on me, and gave me an understanding of my deeply ingrained thought processes and how they were echoing loudly as I tried to navigate this trauma. But it did not stop me fixating on the A details or the MOW.

Yes, there is an OCD component to my checking in on her social media. I am insanely curious by nature, which doesn’t help. There is also a trauma aspect to why my brain is stuck checking, and I think it is a desire for safety and control. It is not the correct remedy, but it is the one my brain keeps choosing. It helps me to understand that I have gotten myself stuck, and I am allowing myself to stay there, because this is a choice, to give the woman another second of my time when she isn’t worth it and it doesn’t serve me. I have had some success stopping unwanted thought spirals and redirecting, but I have not yet been able to let go of checking up on her online. I am doing it less and less, so that is something.

I think I am just not quite there yet, and I think a part of my being stuck is a lack of closure in my M regarding the A. We aren’t really recovered or reconciled, just moving forward as though this is normal. I am still angry and sad and I maybe always will be. I have thought about meds to help with the mental clutter, but beyond an occasional chill pill, I have not tried anything major medication wise. I just didn’t want another variable making me wonder what I am feeling or causing me more side effects.

I think only time and hard mental work can cure me and likely you of the obsession with our WH’s A partners. They get to go on with their lives and we are left in a pile of confusion wondering what happened and what happens next. I wish you the strength to spend your time in positive ways and let her go. Try to focus on here and now, not there and then. And don’t judge yourself or beat yourself up any more on this topic. You need to give all the love and grace and kindness you can muster to yourself as you heal. You may feel like a year and a half is a long time, but in betrayal time it is not. Best of luck to you.

[This message edited by whatisloveanyway at 5:27 PM, Tuesday, June 10th]