SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I've requested my WH provide me with a timeline of his affair. Places, dates and money spent. It's been five months and the story keeps changing or truth trickling occurs. Every new revelation sets me back to the D1 shock. I'm so tired of it and just want to move on with my life and process all the emotions and anxiety without the constant changing and destabilising stories.

He does seem to be struggling emotionally with the task of going through texts and bank statements. He is in therapy dealing with his personal issues but doesn't seem to have dealt with anything around the affair. Part of me feels guilty for requesting he face his actions and the fallout. And the other part feels angry that he gets to hide behind poor mental health and drug use while I received the full impact of his affair and gaslighting including dealing with his mistress.

I appreciate any thoughts as always.

What happens after D-day can tremendously influence the choice to R or D. I really wanted to R. But a steady stream of trickle truth, lies, defensiveness, you know, all the regular wayward bullshit, it accumulated and broke me down. That stuff is so toxic, the Surgeon General should issue a warning. It’s not a deficiency in you that you feel the way you feel in the face of these continued insults and injuries. If this is his best, you have to make a choice on whether that is enough for you, and it’s ok to say it’s not.

I've found the return and the way he tried to come back under a cover of misinformation as damaging as the affair to be honest. That has felt as manipulative as his behaviour during the affair.

I just want something concrete I can point to instead of the constant swirling and changing story that feels like manipulation in itself.

The affair kills the relationship.

Trickle truths are sabotaging the resuscitation process while the relationship is in the icu.

It’s a common tendency, maybe you could confront him and tell him that.
Might be more constructive to work on him being able to come clean fully instead of rushing and hurting you even worse.

Think about it, cause if the WS doesn’t get how bad trickle truths are, you are doomed right away. You better split today.

Have you told him this?
Does he know of the consequences of not giving you what you need?

He does. I haven't even framed it as potential reconciliation. The anxiety and panic attacks have got worse since the latest version of the night they got together. It was the first night of a school reunion. It's gone from a few hours from meeting to maybe a couple of hours to the introduction of " there was cocaine about, I don't know who's " to " she gave me the cocaine " to now essentially probably about an hour from starting to speak to being together.
I've said I need a timeline and the trickle truth to stop. Not because I have any inclination of getting back together at this point but because it's so destabilising.

His response is that it's very hard for him to think about that time because his behaviour is not defendable and he wasn't in his right mind. He won't leave the family home, I have no legal recourse to kick him out. I just feel the whole return, his admission he would never have told me a quarter of it if the mistress didn't get in touch and no reason why he ended it with her is just damaging me now. I just need it to stop and he knows.

Only suggestion I can give you from what I sense you are feeling is this:

Tell him to get his story together with zero trickle truths. Give him a timeline for getting clean or getting divorced.

That is when you will be talking to him again.

Then hard 180 his ass and start the timer.

I say this because I feel the exposure for you is toxic, damaging and he is still messing around and trying to protect his ego rather than to look at the irradiated wasteland that was your relationship after he nuked it.

Panic attacks and co are no good, signs of Ptsd .
You need to put yourself first girl, protect your emotions and not expect he will be of any help until he proves otherwise beyond any reasonable doubt.

180 and iron boundaries, he knows what you need, the truth. It’s a simple task, the only way he could fuck it up is if he doesn’t care and doesn’t want to repair as much as to excuse his choices to preserve his ego.

You are worthy a lot more.
Big hugs

Thanks for the replies.

I've reaffirmed I need that timeline. Ignored the mention that it's had to cause him to have an extra therapy session to cope with it. Told him his emotions are his to deal with and to date the affair and return have all been done on his terms by playing the mental health card. That this timeline is a respect he can show me after being dragged along in his mess without my consent.

And just carrying on with what I need now.

Trickle truth is death by a thousand cuts. Every new detail or change of story is a reboot of the terrible trauma you and I and all of us have suffered. It is piling on and piling on. About 70% of people whose spouse committed adultery have PTSD. Dennis Ortman wrote a book called Transcending Post-Infidelity Stress Disorder (PISD). He wasn't trying to offer a new psychological symptom but to indicate that suffering the trauma of infidelity causes PTSD just like other severe traumas.

It sounds like the situation is still that your husband is still all about him. Selfish. I, too, never got a timeline. I provided my x-wife with all of the telephone records, bank records, charge card records, work time sheets, travel records of her 4-year adultery with a co-worker. One she supervised. I asked her repeatedly over months and months to fill in the blanks and tell me the story about it all. What I gave her was just facts. She needed to provide the rest. She never did.

I don't come back to SI much anymore, so I don't know if this book has been recommended. I highly recommend "How to Help Your Spouse Heal From Your Affair" by Linda J. MacDonald. Linda is a counselor who has had a real-life experience of a spouse committing adultery. She also has written an essay called "The Cheater Meter" which you could probably find by googling the name or her name.

To me full disclosure was very important. Anything less indicated my x-wife was protecting herself. It was still all about her. After far too long we separated and the divorce was completed 2 and a half years later.

I'm so sorry you are facing this trauma. It is, arguably, the most traumatic or, at least, one of the most traumatic experiences one can experience. I gave my x-wife a very short list of things I needed from her, one being the full, complete timeline with feelings and emotions. I got none of them. After far too long we divorced.

That is going to be the tombstone of the Reconciliation.

Got infidelity, already killed the relationship.
Want to build a new one?

Tickle truth = keep being a liar = you are still the cheater

No relationship can ever be built on lies.

Is that simple, but the ego is often stronger, you can keep it as the main red flag if to Reconcile or not.
A very useful meter

You don’t realise just how very damaging trickle truth is until later, inform your H to drop the lies and sit in the truth of what he has done.

Trickle truth is the surest way to set whatever is left of your relationship on fire to ensure there’s nothing left.

You need everything, EVERYTHING and all in one go, only then can you even start to think about R.

I experienced trickle truth, it’s a cowards way, definitely for cowards.

He made a big show of buying " How to help your spouse heal from your affair ". Clearly hasn't read one word of it. Apparently is only getting it now that he shouldn't manage what truth I am shown because his therapist said so. Not because I said so.
Honestly at this point I feel like I'm just wasting precious days, weeks and months of my life while he figures out how to be a decent human being. The interactions are all so fake, self serving and toxic and life is too short to put up with this bs.

Hcg, you can’t fix him, but you can see him for who he is today.

The kind of frustration and anger I sense (you come across quite pissed off), it’s an emotional compass.
You are reestablishing the hierarchy of value in your relationship.

His behavior today is basically the exam where you will see him for who he really is for the first time.

And until now he seems to be failing the admissions tests pretty badly.

Doesn’t matter, what matters is that you are recognizing your own value and setting up your own standards and boundaries for what you want in a relationship.
This is a step into the path of healing.

I know it sucks and is infuriating, but keep going girl, you got this.

Backfromthestorm
Yes I'm pretty pissed off. He thinks it's the same status quo of what he needs above everyone else. The affair, the return, his emotional state before all others, everything is on his terms and his voice drowns out everyone else's. Nobody understands what he has been through.

You're right. I've seen him now for what he is. Child maintenance is after him for the month he was away and I've refused to retract it. He needs a dose of consequence. God knows I've been carrying the consequences of his actions since the start and I'm done.

The affair, the return, his emotional state before all others, everything is on his terms and his voice drowns out everyone else's.

This really stood out to me and you sound very clear here about the pattern and I think that clarity matters.
I am in the process of trying to make sense of some of this myself, and there was something about the way you put this that helped me too.
You sound as though you are seeing things much more clearly now even if it has come at a painful cost.

I've reaffirmed I need that timeline.

Do you really though? Maybe it's time to reframe that thought and your words around it. You will heal and move on with or without it and/or him. It will be more difficult without the full truth, but you will find a way. He needs to start telling the truth if he plans on healing his marriage and his character issues. You're not the one lying and hiding behind excuses of mental health and drug issues.

I hope that doesn't sound glib. I'm empathetic to the pain you are feeling and how crazy-making all the truth trickling is. The fact is you can move on with your life without the full truth though.

Butterflyinprogress - I'm glad if it helps you in any way. Hindsight is always the best sight I guess. Just wish I'd taken a step back a while ago and seen the pattern then. Might have saved a lot of pain.

Thank you. What you said about hindsight and finally seeing the pattern really stayed with me.

I am still in the process of making sense of some of this mysel and having records shift the timeline in a much more painful direction changed everything for me too.

I think that is part of what makes it so hard — not just what happened, but realising how much was hidden while you were living inside a completely different version of things.

Your words helped me so thank you again....stay strong

KitchenDepth5551 - I completely hear you. Part of me is even wondering how I will read the timeline. I guess for me it's a way of making him face what he has done. Five months on and it's been all about his journey. But 99.9% of the facts of the affair has come from his mistress and from the neighbour he told about what he was doing. He can't say the words " I cheated " or " I abandoned you and the kids " or " I was sleeping with her the night your dad was in ICU ".
In his mind he is in therapy, he's got some meds and it's time to rebuild his life and let's all move on. When he hasn't faced me. Or realised how traumatised the kids and I are and that everytime he drops a little fact or confuses something about his mistress with me he causes a lot of pain.
So I guess it's partly about the timeline because I know there are gaping holes in the story. And it's partly about getting him to face what he has done, not on what the reasons were or his future personal growth. He's blanked over the bit in the middle where he had another partner and played happy families while leaving his actual family bewildered by his actions and lies.

Butterflyinprogress - you stay strong too.
I don't think they realise how destabilising finding out is. You begin to question absolutely everything. Was anything of the relationship actually real. Were the times I had a gut instinct but shook it off, was something actually happening then and I was too easily discouraged to question.
At the end of the day we don't make marriage vows expecting to have to have eyes on the back of our heads.
I just keep repeating to myself I was honest in a dishonest situation and I acted properly within the confines of the information he had to lie to give me. It helps calm the racing thoughts.