SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

A question for both WS and BS - hysterical bonding - for WS's did you find yourself HB with your BS? And BS's, did you find your WS HB with you? I think both my WS and I are doing this to each other.

After dday 1, we did HB. It's common.

A word of caution..always make sure the both of you get tested for stds BEFORE you HB. That brief moment of closeness isn't worth contracting a disease. Even if they say it was an EA,and not a PA. Cheaters lie. All the time.

BS here.

Hysterical bonded for awhile then reality set in and then my shock waned where I despised him for what he did to me, my family, his job.

It's normal in the beginning to reclaim your spouse or SO.

Annab - I believe I am in the angry stage now, I break down, I cry gut wrenching sobs, I scream. It's been a little over 2 months since DDay for me.

HellFire - we have been tested.

After my affair, yes. And I would say we had two long rounds of it.

After his affair no. It took me a while to want to be intimate again and there was more of a feeling of rebuilding intimacy rather than a sexfest. But that is what was needed. So do whatever you need.

BS here.

Yes, I really do think we are in HB phase.

Both tested for STD and thankfully it was negative.

I don't like this feeling though and I know it won't last.

However, my WH is more into it and I keep telling him that we are going through HB and he doesn't believe me.

He said that it is "pure love". TBH, I got offended when he said that.

Oh well...

Wow. I though HB was pure taking; at least it was for me. Love has a giving aspect to it that HB lacked for me.

My W was always afraid of sex until d-day. She'd often waffle between 'yes' and 'no' before saying 'yes'. On d-day, she agreed to say 'yes' unless she really wanted to say 'no'. IOW she could say 'no' to sex any time she wanted to, but if she was ambivalent, she just said 'yes' without going back and forth analyzing her feelings at the time.

I hope that makes sense.

BS here. We had a lot of HB although I didn't know what that was until I found SI. It was very early on, I think I was still in shock. WS thought it meant we reconnected and that I was "taking him back." Then the anger set in...end of HB.

BS here. No HB. We never were on the same page with prioritizing 'alone time' to begin with. Historically, I always put a lot of energy into throwing sparks and fanning flames while my wife was EASILY derailed by various stressors. While those stressors impacted our love life, she 'coped' with them by cultivating rather emotionless sexually charged situations outside of our marriage. Knowing that made me feel like I'd been doing a never-ending and painstakingly choreographed pick me dance - for scraps. I never felt like I had to stake my claim, but also didn't feel any kind of 'eeeww' feelings. I still initiate - because I know the connection is important - but I now experience ZERO disappointment if it doesn't pan out. She initiates as often as I do - but so many years of feeling like I put way too much focus on sex has kind of trained me to not be 'on' all the time like I used to be, so many of those opportunities float right by. We're once or twice a month at best right now. There's also a little dysfunction happening this time around. (Oh how I look forward to starting that SI thread one of these days... )

I would say it is common. That said, I regret that it occurred with EXWH. It confused me into thinking he was committed to me. It also potentially exposed me to potentially life altering STDs (thankfully am negative/no symptoms). But the fact he lied about no PA is unforgivable to me. It was the lies that ended the marriage.

Yes, I'd say we had a good 4 months of HB before the shock wore off and anger set in.

I don't regret it, but I think it lulled us both into a false sense that reconciliation would run smoothly and quickly.

Wow. I though HB was pure taking; at least it was for me. Love has a giving aspect to it that HB lacked for me.

Same for me. It was more like I was experiencing HB. Unfortunately, looking back, I was not that concerned if my WW was very into it or not. I was very primal in my actions at that time, but to be clear, I never forced WW into sex. She may have felt obligated, and gave under those pretenses, but it didn't matter. It definitely felt like reclaiming from my side.

My answer is complicated and i mayvregret posting this.

Yes, we did HB right after Dday, but it was like an out of body experience for me. My rational brain was fully arware that my amygdala was driving my behaviour to reassert my sexual territory over my WW. At the same time I was fucking her, and make no mistake...it was just plain fucking, I found my Ww repulsive, so in a sense, I used her as a masturbatory object, whereas before, it was an act of deep love and affection. I hated myself for what I was doing, but at the same time felt she had it coming. Why should I treat the very woman who utterly destroyed me, with love and sensitivity?

I was following the advice I had been given, to fake it till you make it, and since it was desperate to save my M, I tried. Despite my best efforts, I had great difficulty finishing (see earlier repulsion), so I needed to mentally adapt. That came with fostering a fantasy life in my head. I would imagine that I was with someone ther than my WW. No one specific,just an imaginary person, much like an avatar. It helped,but only moderately.

Eventually, I realized that the HB would come to an end, and like the aftermath of a wild party, the lights would come on and I'd have to clean up. I knew the reality would hit, and my Ww would be the woman I would be shackled to. Had she been a quality human, we might have survived,but she just wasn't, and still isn't. So we didn't.

Had we R, I might look at HB as a cruel but necessarily transitory phase needed to build intimacy and reconnect, but alas we did not. So now I see it as a complicated time, where I was flailing about just trying to survive.

My answer is complicated and i may regret posting this.

Justsomeguy,

I too am a BH and can definitely relate to everything you said in your post. My wife drove the HB (I tend to think she was more "love bombing" me though). She had never really been one to initiate sex before D-Day and in fact when she was cheating, pretty much cut me off. There are things she did with them (oral) she rarely (if ever) did with me. She is also WAY better at it than I recall. So that became a trigger where I would close my eyes and imagine it was someone else like you said. I too had trouble finishing and had to use positions where we weren’t face to face.

There are also some things she never did with APs that have become more of my "go to" because of the need to have things "that are only for me". I too initially used this love bombing for "release" but I also made a conscious effort to "reconnect". My goal was to become more intimate and become "one" with my wife. Something we had never truly been before D-Day. Unfortunately, her unwillingness to be truly open and honest killed that. We are no longer HB or even "love bombing". But 14 months past D-Day I have still yet to initiate. That is still all on her.

We’re still together for now but I have a time limit if things don’t improve in the "doing the work" department. For now, I still have little to no attraction to my wife other than "basic needs".

So obviously we're only one week out from the most recent d-day. But I egged him on to tell me the truth and he did tell me more (maybe all, who knows the truth but him) on monday. By the end I really was craving reconnecting with him. He actually tried to question if it was smart and I said I didn't care. I still don't. I know I'm irrational and my brain isn't working correctly. I know he couldn't care less about boundaries and I was really horney for him. I know I'm broken and tired of playing a game he doesn't care for the rules. Regardless it was amazing given the fact that literally every nerve I have was stressed and could feel everything. But now I see that his "I never did anything with them" isn't true. 3 new APs that had sex with him in an oral way (him to them or them to him. Whatever). I have no clue what it felt like for him. Again, whatever.

BS here. We definitely were in HB, sort of still are 11 months later, although it has calmed down significantly (unfortunately ). I have to say I've loved it...I KNOW it's supposed to be sort of unhealthy? amygdala reaction stuff, but I have to say for us it's been healing, bonding and helping. We started working out together 4 times per week directly after DD as well and so we jokingly have said we have worked out and f*cked our way towards R It's been more from my side, especially lately when it's started to wane a bit I'm the one protesting that. This is due to the fact that it wasn't JUST HB for me, it was also a lot about reclaiming and making space for a side of myself I had missed and sort of shoved away for years.

We never had a sexless marriage, it was always pretty ok but since three kids and 20+ years together I guess it had become slightly monotone and further between, typical things, less prioritised I guess. I have, although I am the wife, always felt slightly frustrated over my WWH not being so sexual or what not? zero romantic and definitely not the type of person to send dirty texts etc that I would have enjoyed but just figured he wasn't the type and never had been, he can be quite awkward with stuff like that, so I shoved that part pf myself neatly away in storage.

Then I found his chats with OW....who IS this person? Give me some of that! So part of it was typical HB stuff, reclaiming him, us for myself (they never had intercourse so I haven't had to struggle with images of that in my head thankfully), but a big part of it was also I felt e sense of freedom to finally allow myself to explore a more frisky side of myself if you will. Now that I had seen he DID have that side to him, that he COULD be like that, and that meant he could handle me being like that, I decided I was no longer going to hold back to keep him comfortable (so I thought I had been doing, we were both thinking the same turns out). I have been very clear with him also that now that I know of this side to him, I am no longer happy going back to the way we were befor DD, this is one of the few positives that this shitstorm has brought our M. We are way more open and discuss things of this nature in a way we never could before. I do miss those early HB days, it was a lot of fun in the midst of all that angst. But it has definitely had a more permanent (11 months is early still I know) effect on us in a good way. So for us, HB has been 100% positive only. I have never felt it was wring, shameful, ugly or harmful in any way. The opposite in fact. I may still be in denial I guess.

For me it was like A sex. I’ve never had A sex but this is the closest I’ll ever get to it. It was like sex with someone I didn’t know, she was a stranger to me. I also had to remove her from my head to keep the mind movies from creeping in. I felt guilty after sex because I was using her like a sex doll, an AP basically. There were no true feelings there, I was projecting a fantasy or escape with this stranger in my life.

Eventually, I realized that the HB would come to an end, and like the aftermath of a wild party, the lights would come on and I'd have to clean up. I knew the reality would hit, and my Ww would be the woman I would be shackled to. Had she been a quality human, we might have survived,but she just wasn't, and still isn't. So we didn't.

Same experience here and I'm a woman It felt primal and definitely not intimate at all. It was confusing to me and I didn't like how I felt during that time. Thank god it ended and the true ugly was revealed to me. After HB I became repulsed and never regained my attraction or sexual attraction to my xWS again. He had also put me through False R, was not remorseful, and terribly emotionally abusive so there is that.

I also had the same experience as it sounds like many people had. I agree that it felt primal but also really intimate. I would always sob afterwards. Every day, often multiple times a day. It lasted about nine months both times (eight years ago and last year when I found out it was a PA). I didn’t feel like it was entirely bad, it was poignant. It was certainly the best sex I ever had in my life before or since. I think it was for him too. It ended and things just became lest frequent but still good. Now I am finally reaching the point others have described of disgust. The sense of disgust and disdain is still strongest when I think of the OW. But, now I feel apathetic about having sex with him. This is new to me and worries me a bit. I hope the apathy passes, I don’t know if he has really caught on yet that I feel this way. He has just made stray comments that I seem less interested.