SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Is there a way to change or I am looking in the wrong area in my profile?
I am seriously considering getting my wife to read some of the posts on here before I start questioning her on the affair she had 25 years ago that we just rug swept. We didn't even talk about it, just sort of drifted back together.
I was fine for years but over the last few years it is starting to consume me and even more now that my oldest son left his wife for a co-worker. It is constantly on my mind now and I think the only way forward for my mental health is to ask some hard questions.
She is blaming my daughter-in-law for my son's affair and gets upset when this poor girl pushes back so you can see what I am up against. So many times, I have had to bite my tongue, so I don't explode.
There is so much I never knew or possibly ever asked and I know there are things that happened but forgotten details due to PTSD from the whole situation.
If I do, my username will be recognizable, I think. At this stage I would rather her not identify me.
I am hoping if she has a good look here it may help with her lack of empathy.
She is a very hard person to talk to and takes any type of criticism as a personal attack. Her coping mechanism is to lash out verbally then shut down.

https://survivinginfidelity.com/topics/471651/premium-access/

This thread explains the process to change your username

Thanks, so you have to pay to change it. That's okay but unfortunately, we have joint credit cards so she will see the transition.

If there is no other way if I disable my profile will that remove my posts?

If anyone knows of any readings online (free obviously because of the credit card situation) that I could ask my wife to read that would or may help a cheater with absolutely no empathy or understanding how painful and hard to heal from infidelity is and the long-term effects from it through resweeping would be helpful.

I don't want to drop my feelings on her before I give her the chance to learn more on this.

Once I have given her that chance to at least try to understand then I will drop all this on her.

If I don't get any remorse and get some hard questions answered, then I am out of this 42-year-old marriage. I have to put my mental health first. I cannot live the rest of my life with this in my head every day.

I hope beyond all hope she comes round. Our life is good now and we get along better than ever now all the kids have gone and with both of us nearing retirement. I love her so much, but I can no longer live with this pain in my head.

[This message edited by fhtshop at 6:35 PM, Saturday, September 13th]

I recommend that you keep SI to yourself, because we all need a safe haven, and once you show your wife, this stops being a place of safety for you.

Instead, if you think she's open to it, point her at the SupportforWaywards subreddit, or have her watch some of the videos on YouTube by the Affair Recovery people. The book "How to Help Your Spouse Heal from an Affair" is often helpful, too.

That said, I wasn't able to convince my WS to read anything that painted him in a negative light for a very long time. Until your wife is willing to take an honest look at herself, she's not going to receive any of these suggestions with an open heart.

Your son’s behavior has brought all that pain up. You never healed because of your wife’s reactions.

You can’t change her behavior. That is who she is. Since you have been married over 40 years your son is probably late 30s, early 40s. His behavior has put the spotlight on your ws. She wants nothing to do with anything that puts her in the wrong.

This is your reality. You are married to someone you allowed to rug sweep. It means you have had a life built on unsteady ground. If you proceed with divorce look at needing a support system, things to keep you occupied, access to good medical care.

I don’t think having her read here is going to change the needle one bit. You need IC. So does she.

It'll show up as a payment, not as a payment for name change. (to si,com, IIRC). Since you want to bring her onboard, I can't see a problem.

You can delete your posts, but they'll be restored. One guideline is not deleting one's posts, although you can edit them.

What do you hope would come from your W's reading here? Whatever that may be, ask your W directly to do that. Reading leads to various outcomes, many of which are the opposite of what one may want. My reco is to ask specifically for the one one wants.

For what it’s worth...
I scanned your previous posts and really don’t see anything that a truly repentant former wayward spouse committed to reconciling would find damaging for reconciliation. If anything they should appreciate the honesty.

To me the question would rather be: Based on my fear about her possible reaction to what I have shared – is she reconciliation material?

Not trying to tell you what to do here, but if I were you, I'd be asking....why am I staying with this woman? Do I really want to spend the rest of the time I have here on Earth with this person. I think you ate the entire shit sandwich for 25 years and went back for seconds and thirds. Maybe you need to stop and start doing what YOU really want in your heart, once you think of what that is. Instead of letting life flow over you, maybe grab it by the nads and decide how you want to spend the rest of it. You don't have to live like this in silent acceptance of something that wasn't acceptable. If it takes 25 years to come to that realization, that's what it takes. But you still have life left, you don't have to live like this, you can make choices and try to mold the time that's left. You can't control or change other people - I don't believe most people change. They can, but they don't. So this is what you have. WHAT DO YOU WANT ULTIMATELY? YOU. Don't live for other people, they're all adults now, don't think about the marital assets, or reputation, or other people's feelings, etc. If you have the means to make an independent life, then you have options. EXPLORE THEM.

As for your son....unfortunately he takes after his mother. I think a lot of life IS genetics, far more than we want to admit, including personality aspects. There's nothing you can do about his behavior except tell him what you think of it - which I would - and decide to what extent you want to deal with him and the thing he's involved with. That again is YOUR decision. Not his, not your wife's not anyone else's. I want to see YOU become empowered again. It's never too late.

Honestly, this is your safe space. I'd keep it that way.

My W does not come here, this is my space. She knows about SI but doesn’t know my username.

sisoon

Sorry I don't know how you highlight text here so to answer the question below.

"What do you hope would come from your W's reading here? Whatever that may be, ask your W directly to do that"

Maybe some Empathy for a betrayed partner.

Empathy is something my wife lacks big time I think more than likely from a difficult childhood with an emotionally/ physically abusive controlling mother. Here is an example of how controlling her mother was.

My wife desperately wanted to be a lawyer, but her mother pushed her into teaching and music degrees at university just to be like her mother’s two sisters so even at the age of 17 her mother controlled her life

Here is an example of my wife's empathy.

My son and daughter-in-law, you know the one that he dumped for his married co-worker that also has children and are a lot younger than his decided on 50/50 custody 4 nights at his place and 4 nights with their rejected spouses.

The very first night my youngest grandson was to spend at my son and his new partner's house he refused to go and stayed with his mother instead

On hearing of this my wife’s response was. "He needs to get over himself'

You see no empathy not even a little bit she has not taken any thought for how hard it is on a child dealing with a marriage break up. She just looks at it black and white mom and dad are no longer together just move on.

As for changing my username.

I think a few replies have stated to keep her away from this site and keep it for myself which I may need.

I had a look at the " SupportforWaywards subreddit" and that should be enough for her to get it. If not, I am going to tell her to get some counseling on her childhood issues.

Thanks everyone for your thoughts and replies and I hope the spelling and grammar don’t make it too hard to read.

[This message edited by fhtshop at 2:01 PM, Monday, September 15th]

If you want empathy, you need to ask for empathy. Reading SI is no guarantee that she'll find what you're looking for. Also, I wonder if you want sympathy more than empathy.

You're right to consider the risk in your user name, if you think your W would recognize it. Unless a couple fully agrees on to work for R, anything posted can be used by one partner against the other. Since lack of empathy is a barrier for you, you can't be sure yet that you and your W are truly working to reach the same outcome.

I understand you want your W to understand your pain and your grandson's (and others', too, I'm sure). I just think the method you hope will do the trick probably won't. It's entirely possible for an unremorseful WS to learn how to better fake remorse by reading SI.

Is lack of empathy (or sympathy) a deal killer for you? If so, adopting The1stWife's or Bigger's method (both of which is, essentially, to give your W a choice between changing and D) are much more likely to succeed. You want your W to give up her established way of reacting to the world. That's a very big - and entirely reasonable - ask. But people don't make changes that big except for something they want very much.

Unless a couple fully agrees on to work for R, anything posted can be used by one partner against the other.

True.
But... If your wife were to come to this site and then start berating you because of your post on if mid-life crisis is real (or any other post for that matter) then she’s sending you a strong message:
She isn’t reconciling.

That basically leaves you with two options: Remaining in an unreconciled marriage with a spouse that isn’t willing to work things out, or divorce.
In neither situations do I really see how any shared content here can impact the outcome of either those situations.

I do see some positives if a spouse willing to reconcile can come to this site, read the other spouses posts while understanding that they were written from a position of pain, vulnerability and the freedom of internet anonymity and valued the posts for their honesty, rather than see them as a threat or weapons to be used on the poster.

I'm not sure her gaining empathy from reading here is achievable. You describe her as having a general lack of empathy, not just a lack of knowledge about SI topics that would help activate empathy in that topic area. A general lack of empathy is not something that would develop from passive activities like reading. She would have to identify she has a problem and want to take action to improve herself, likely through some therapeutic process.

If you are set in changing your username, you could just go buy a prepaid Visa card and use that.

OhItsYou

Thanks for the idea but I won't be asking her to come and read here as some of the replies have stated it probably best kept for myself if needed. I will use the sub-reddit forums when the next opportunity comes.

To others, I put more than 50% of my situation on me. I let her back into my life with no consequences or even hard discussions.

I would not call her unremorseful. I know she is deeply shamed by her actions and humiliated for letting herself be used in that way which is probably not helping in talking to her about it. It's a part of her life she would rather not talk about because of her shame.

Her AP had finished using her about the same time she lost the place she was staying at.

I let her back into our home and she went into the guest room.

This is where my memory gets a bit foggy but we just sort of drifted back together. I can't even remember the night or day or even how we ended up being intimate and in the same bed again but then again there is so much I have trouble remembering from that time, I think it's a form of PTSD.

We ended up having another son. He is 22 now so life just moved forward.

Back then there was nothing like this site for advice that I knew of, so I just bumbled it alone and ended up like I am now.

Strangely enough the affair had hardly any real effects on me for many years, and it’s really only been about the last5 or less years that it has been in my head again. The main trigger was a co-worker that I thought was making a play for my wife. My stomach just dropped and all I could think of was here we go again turns out I was totally wrong.

I had it mostly under control with the help of sites like this and having a marriage that was great. We sold the house and bought a few acres out in the country (lifestyle property). Life is really good. I love her and we get on great. Shame my son went and ruined it with his affair because now I think of the parts multiple times a day they are just stuck in my head.

Why did I let her come home and stay in the house in the first place? I don't know why, but I still loved her after all the crap she had diched out to me, I even felt a bit sorry for her to be used like a street worker. I tried to explain at the start that this guy wasn't inserted in a long-term relationship with a mother with 3 children. The day she came back with her stuff she said to me on the front steps you were right that's the closest thing I can remember of an apology for the hurt she caused then it was the boy's I never wanted to be a part time dad if she found someone else or even worse have another father figgier in their lives, next I could not afford to pay her out of the house so I would have lost 1/2 of everything I worked hard for and end up renting which would have made it extremely hard to save enough to buy another house for a very long time.

[This message edited by fhtshop at 3:48 PM, Tuesday, September 16th]