In limbo after dday, how long do I wait until I know what to do?
Update: thank you to everyone. I'm sorry, I don't have enough energy to respond to every comment at the moment but your responses are appreciated and read thoroughly nevertheless. I know that what I need most is time and space, it's just a hard pill to swallow when I'm still in the middle of crisis. Thankfully I have been able to get into both individual and a couple's therapist to help navigate the next steps and provide more clarity as time goes on. The fact that healing, and decision making, is probably something that takes at least months, if not years, is difficult but necessary to hear. Thank you.
Hi everyone. Like so many others, I never thought I would be in this situation. My husband and I have been together for 20 years. We have two kids together, we have never fought, we have been through thick and thin together including the death of his brother, sickness in both him and myself. The works. We have always been open communicators and even previously discussed things like open relationships, agreeing we would always approach each other if we felt we needed something else. Out of respect for each other. Well… that didn’t happen.
I have never, ever been a jealous person. I’ve never checked his phone looking for evidence, never snooped on anything. Three weeks ago I needed to borrow his phone for a 2-factor authentication to sign into our credit card account, and the texts were right there when I opened it. Talking about the fuck they had just had earlier that day when he got home late, saying I love you. All that.
It turns out this has been going on for almost a year, since just after our second honeymoon trip that I had planned and executed for us, and thought we had had a great time reconnecting together after so many years of scraping by and focusing on the kids. Not so, I guess, because two weeks after that he is kissing another woman ten years younger than us.
He’s broken it off with her and after a week of kicking him out, I let him back in the house because the kids were getting upset and confused why he was gone so long. It’s been three and a half weeks now.
He’s agreed to go to both individual and couples therapy because he doesn’t like who he has become, but… he also admitted he didn’t know if he still loved me anymore. He said he wanted to “find” the better man he used to be who did love me. It’s a second devastation to be living with someone who isn’t even sure if they love you when a few weeks ago, I thought everything was fine and good as it ever was.
It’s a cold comfort. It’s hard for me to just turn off loving him, even though I know that sounds stupid after such an enormous betrayal. But I feel like I can’t even begin to heal because I don’t even know what ground I’m standing on anymore. If he doesn’t love me, the decision is easy. I don’t want any part of a loveless marriage. If he does, and had just lost his way, I could see a future in which forgiveness is possible if he does the work, takes responsibility, and fixes himself.
But god, is it painful. And lonely. Part of me thinks it would be easier just to give up, divorce, move on with my life and hope someone else will find it in themselves to love me the way I know I deserve but am starting to think I no longer believe I can have. I don’t know how long someone is supposed to wait until knowing for sure divorce is the right option. Everyone says I should take my time, but sitting on my thumbs waiting to hear if my husband loves me or not is excruciating. How long is enough? How long do I wait? Do I even bother with the painful conversations of couples therapy and hearing all the reasons why our relationship wasn’t enough, just to end up in the same place and alone at the end? How much trauma must I endure for his sake?
My therapist says it’s not unusual for the affair-haver to have ambiguous feelings after being found out, and it’s a good thing he is being honest, but I don’t know. I don’t know if I’m just waiting around in terrible pain and dragging this out long enough for him to get the courage to say he no longer loves me for good. I don’t know what to do, and all I want to do is cry and cry and cry. I am barely eating, not sleeping. I have been the world’s worst employee since finding out as I am a zombie most of the day. My life is a mess.
Tl:dr husband had an affair, doesn’t know if he still loves me even though he wants to work on himself and the relationship. how long should I wait before giving up?