Infidelity... and BPD?

[123Phoebe]

Hi Grey Kitty, I feel sad and confused over your situation, so have a hard time imagining what's going on for you way deep down inside. 

Have your values changed about open relationships?

She has lost my trust by doing this.

Especially because I know she's done this sort of thing three times before:

• 1st time was just an emotional affair, and neither one really acknowledged what was going on.



• 2nd time was without my consent, but we were thinking of changing things in our marriage, and didn't talk about it enough ahead of time. It went only to kissing and making out, but we ended up fighting over whether I would give the consent she demanded for a year.
  
  Curiously the EA of before had become an obsessive fantasy for her... .and the 2nd guy when talking with her about it said something questioning whether it was healthy for her to do or not... .and she just dropped that fantasy cold turkey right then. (It was all in her head--I didn't know about it until she told me she had quit!)



• 3rd time was when our r/s with the other couple started. I can chalk this one up to being more swept up in feelings than being cautious and wise.  What we both did was with discussion and consent... .but months or years later, she told me about when she started kissing him, and how significant it was to her... .and this was before any of those conversations about consent.
  
  I also did consent in advance badly at the start of that one. There was a LOT of messy emotional crap through the whole roller coaster ride of those relationships... .the other couple's marriage was ending, but ours was actually better for the things we both had worked through.

For better or for worse, I'm feeling willing to give my wife a chance to regain my trust:

That means I have to be vulnerable, knowing that she could do this to me again. If she does this again, I am through having a marriage where I expect fidelity (more specifically only extramarital involvement with my consent!) from her. I don't know how to transition to a marriage without this, so the end of our marriage is most likely.

Has a pattern already been established where she can't be trusted?  Do her actions show that she wants to regain your trust, that she truly values that?

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[Grey Kitty]

  Thanks, Phoebe! Good questions.

Have your values changed about open relationships?

Well--I never thought about any sort of open r/s when we first got together. I've changed from that.

I don't value strict monogamy for its own sake... .don't think I ever really considered that.

I feel that if either I or my wife get involved with another party romantically or sexually, all people involved (not just the two directly participating) must give consent first. (And as more people get involved, permutations grow... .) I do not think this value has changed for me.

I do recognize that my wife has failed to live up to it several times, in various ways.

I've given her a bit of a pass on it because we did such a bad job of directly negotiating this in the past.

Examining it more deeply... .I now believe that my wife goes through manic phases. (I don't mean it clinically... .I just don't have a better word for it) In some of these, she WANTS something with another guy, and gets carried away and loses connection to earth and ethics.

I think I was letting her put me in a BPD FOG about this issue of consent--every time we went through this, the argument went like "I wasn't doing anything--this isn't cheating" (refuted) "Well, it is OK in our marriage for me to do this" (refuted) "When you won't let me do this you are controlling me." I'm realizing that it feels like the same BPD-ish head-games she played before. Just with a different goal/target: Getting what she wants from somebody else, instead of getting what she needs by emotionally beating me up.

Has a pattern already been established where she can't be trusted?  Do her actions show that she wants to regain your trust, that she truly values that?

This is episode #4 in about a decade.

As of right now, her actions are very clear. She doesn't give a rats ass for my consent, or how much it hurts me.

She says she loves me, doesn't want to hurt me, etc. But this is clearly not as important to her.

However... .I'm nearly NC with her right now, until she flys out of town next week. I just don't want to hear from her, or feel safe sharing anything with her.  :'(

I expect I'll talk to her next week. Not feeling much desire to be in contact with her.

I know that I believe our marriage is based on me consenting for any other relationships she has. I don't know if she will agree to that or not.

She also asked me to fly into town with her immediately. I'm still NC, but I have no interest in that right now--I've got things I'm trying to do where I am. (Despite being soo distracted!) I know if I do fly into town with her I'll be unable to focus on myself and just focus on her/us completely. Not healthy for me right now.

[formflier]

 

GK,

You seem to be thinking through and expressing your values.

Do you think that you wife can go through a similar process? 

She has made choices... .and you have made choices. 

Right now you are making a choice to remain NC and not to fly back into town when she gets back in town.

Can you elaborate on what you are doing(where you are now)... .that you are choosing that above "working" on your r/s?  I'm not interested in others or me being able to pass judgement on that particular choice... .or any of your choices.

My main focus... .is that you clearly (as little FOG as possible) examine the choices you have made... .and ask yourself... .am I happy with those choices... .am I content with those choices... .am I conflicted with the choices I've made?

There may be other options... but I for one am very interested to know where GK sits on that spectrum of feelings bout the choices he has made.

[patientandclear]

Hiya GK.  (I have an actual grey kitty in my lap right now, appropriately enough.)

You say:

I know that I believe our marriage is based on me consenting for any other relationships she has. I don't know if she will agree to that or not.

That is unlike you  If one of us said that, you'd point out that you do know if she will agree with that or not.  She is not agreeing with it.  It's sort of like in Kramer vs. Kramer where Dustin Hoffman tells his kid who is eating ice cream without permission that if he takes ONE MORE BITE he's going to be in big trouble.  But because Dustin has already declined to stop what's going on, the kid knows it's a bluff, so he looks Dustin right in the eye and takes a giant bite of ice cream.

You said on another thread (Zinzitar's) that you're not sure what your wife is going to do when she finishes this episode.

Again if it were one of us and you were advising us, you'd say ... .what matters is, what are you going to do when she finishes this episode of cheating.

I am so familiar with the crappy place of wanting this person I love not to be doing what he was doing.  But knowing I couldn't control it.  Making sure I didn't try.  And wondering where all my other attractive options went ... .When it is behavior that alters our ability to trust, unfortunately, it isn't just a question of exiting for a few hours and promising to come back.  These are core issues of whether the other person cares to avoid hurting us and to make choices in favor of the relationship.

I found the choices in a similar dilemma very very hard, as you know.  My heart goes out to you.

[Grey Kitty]

FF, I've been avoiding saying much of what I'm actually doing here... .mostly out of some fear that it would compromise my anonymity if somebody saw it. Not realistic fears, so here goes:

We retired from paying work relatively young, in 2003. Now I'm working on a rebuild of a sailboat that my wife and I have owned since 2007. A year after that we moved aboard and started a bit of work on it... .found out the hard way that there was a lot more than "a bit" of work to do... .got distracted by our own control battles, dealing with her abuse, a year focused on other relationships over this, and a variety of things. My wife got really sick of boatyard work because it isn't her strength. I do much better at the work, but struggle at the planning/decision making aspect of it. We launched in 2010, finally, but not as a sailboat. I finished designing and sewing sails in 2012, and we did our first sailing then. At the beginning of summer 2013 we hauled our boat out of the water again. By this time my wife was clear that she didn't want to be working on boat projects, and I was OK with that. Fall 2013 my wife's lover died and she started to fall apart. This was just AFTER I started a big project which is half-way done, even now.

The boatyard I'm living in is a place where I don't have local friends... .I've been depressed and reclusive here much of the time. When my wife was here, she was even more depressed, anxious, and reclusive. I'm not planning to stay here long term, and don't think that rural SE US fits me well anyhow.

I'm struggling to find the discipline to work on my projects here. I know that if I accomplish things with my hands I'll feel better about myself. Today I just made a list of specific tasks in this project. Came up with 60 so far; some could take 5 minutes, some could take a couple days.

I know myself--going away from this and getting back into working out stuff with my wife then returning will result in me A) losing time from the project while I'm away, and B) losing energy and inertia--I come back here alone, and get depressed, low-energy, and am ineffective for a while every time. Typically about a week, although this time I'm two weeks into it and just barely getting going.

The job is mostly outdoors. I am pretty sure I will spend at least a month at this work, perhaps more. October's last two weeks have been great weather for working. November should be good as well. By December, it will be getting cold and daylight in much shorter supply.

I can't afford to spend Nov 3-24 away from this--The weather will cut productivity maximum in half for Jan-Feb, perhaps March. Of course my actual productivity is limited by things other than the weather!

[Grey Kitty]

I found the choices in a similar dilemma very very hard, as you know.  My heart goes out to you.

Thanks, P&C!

I'm finding my core issue and fear with it:

My values and version of marriage to my wife includes her asking me for consent on other r/s.

My wife's actions are not living up to this. (But she is improving on it in some ways) Most of the time she does, but she has these manic periods every couple years and fails at this.

Today I'm too hurt to want to discuss this with my wife, so I only have her past words to go by. I expect to try to negotiate a future with her later.

She may say she wants to live up to these values, but somehow keeps failing, and will work on it. I want to give her another chance in this case.

She may say that she feels that this is against her values, as she values her freedom more.  :'( That would be heartbreaking for me.

I've told others here that this sort of speculation isn't helping them. If I obsess on it, it won't help me either.

[ziniztar]

What is it that you want?

Given her past record, it is safe to assume you will have another 3 or 4 of these episodes in the upcoming 10 years.

What are your options?

 

[Grey Kitty]

  thanks for asking.

What is it that you want?

I want her to stop cheating on me was my first thought. And it is true.

But wanting it won't make it happen. In fact, she's probably still doing it today, and will for another four days.  

The next deeper level is I want some time and space to find what is important to me, and I want to be less dependent on her.

[ziniztar]

That makes sense  .

Let's make it more specific.

What do you want (to do) when she gets home?

[Grey Kitty]

She isn't quite coming home to me yet. I'm working on the boat (our home) in the SE. She's returning to the NW. In ~3 more weeks she's going to be in the midwest for some family medical support.

I expect we will get physically together again after that in late Nov/early Dec.

So the question is what do I want next week?

I'm LC with her now. I just can't face happy chatty crap while this is going on.

I expect to talk more with her then.

I want her to agree to cut all contact with this guy, with no expectation of me getting over it and letting her resume any sort of r/s with him.

I want to negotiate with her what the bounds of our marriage are in the future. (I'm not sure she can live up to her commitment... .but I do need to know if she is even willing to make it or not.)

hmmmmm... .that list is a mix of what I expect, and what seems "reasonable" and what she wants, with a bit of what I want... .

I'm trying to work through why I've put up with this sort of crap, why and how I let myself get as dependent on her as I am, and figure out what I want in my life (besides her), and start making that happen.

I want her to stay the f**k away from me long enough for me to work through that part!

[MissyM]

I'm trying to work through why I've put up with this sort of crap, why and how I let myself get as dependent on her as I am, and figure out what I want in my life (besides her), and start making that happen.

I want her to stay the f**k away from me long enough for me to work through that part!

Amen!  Yes, I have gone through that and found some suggestions very helpful.  I also liked the time alone (well not completely alone, I have children).

One of the things recommended to me was to figure out what my non-negotiables are.  Those are the things that I absolutely must have in a relationship.  After that I wrote out some wants, and those have been things I am wiling to compromise on.  The process was really healing for me. 

[allibaba]

One of the things recommended to me was to figure out what my non-negotiables are.  Those are the things that I absolutely must have in a relationship.  After that I wrote out some wants, and those have been things I am wiling to compromise on.  The process was really healing for me. 

I did the same thing.  Unfortunately my relationship ended as a result ... .but it was a great process to go through and very healing for me as well.

I'm trying to work through why I've put up with this sort of crap, why and how I let myself get as dependent on her as I am, and figure out what I want in my life (besides her), and start making that happen.

I want her to stay the f**k away from me long enough for me to work through that part!

Sorry but I just had to laugh... .the normally mild mannered kitty has his claws out!  Good for you... .

[ziniztar]

You go do that. Sounds like you know what you want but maybe are afraid or angry you have to find out? I'd say just make it happen, give yourself some room. You deserve it and have the right to ask that, especially after what did / is doing.

I feel sorry for you  . Keep up the introspection  .