SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Haven't posted in a while. 15 months out of DDay.

My WW seems to be doing "the work" and our M has been improving. But it seems every month or so I get anger that just explodes, and I cannot contain it. And it's sabotaging our progress as a couple.

Latest example, we were out of town for my convention/vacation. We were intimate throughout the trip and on the last night we had too much to drink and proceeded to get into the act. She was asking for me to be "harder" in which I replied "one minute". I was drunk - having a hard time performing, and needed to slow the tempo. It also kinda fucked with my brain thinking if that was her command or whatever with her AP. The night didn't end good at all - and we got into an argument over it. Which I exploded saying "if you want to get fucked harder - call your AP. He can fuck you hard in a parking lot like you want!". That made things worse - but I expressed that her actions is what is causing this. We had 5 long hours in the hotel room until we could proceed to the airport.

I'm getting mean - and I'm not sure if I'm subconsciously sabotaging our progress.

I will say sometimes our weekly chats lack in substance. I know she understands my pain and trauma. But it's like I want to make her feel pain. But I'm missing something to truly be able to put this out of forefront of my head.

It feels like I'm the one messing everything up. But I was the one that was hurt. I was the one blindsided by her contempt and unhappiness of our M. Why do I keep walking on eggshells around her - when she should be the one walking on them.

Something is missing - any thoughts would be appreciated.

I really don't have much to add, other than this was normal for me too. It would seem that things would be going great....I'd let my guard down a bit....and then the anger would come rushing in. Something minor would set me off and I'd get absolutely flooded.

I did wrestle with wanting him to feel the pain I was feeling just so that he could understand somehow. Our MC had to point out that if I wasn't deeply devastated by the A....it probably wasn't a relationship worth working on. Eventually, I moved through wanting to somehow punish him (a bit) for his shitty choices. At the end of the day, he has/had to live with the consequences of them. Those consequences took years.

It is so unfair that you have to heal from this and also be a part of healing the marriage....but it is the reality of the situation you're in. It helped me to know that I could choose to tap out of the marriage anytime. I didn't have to stay and work on things if it became too much. I'm now 6+ years out and our marriage is so much better than it was. I'm sorry you're here.

Anger, to me, is healthy to a point and needs to be processed — not buried.

It’s a hard earned, righteous anger.

When I got tired of being sad and depressed, that’s when my anger surfaced in a big way.

This is kind of the part where I figured things out.

Infidelity is as painful as and unfair as about anything I have dealt with before, and I had to decide whether I could make peace with the person who caused the emotional trauma.

But first, feel the anger, explain it to your wife the best you can, it always helped me to talk about WHY I needed to vent it out.

It’s not a blame thing at this stage, everyone knows who did what. It is just an another step toward healing, regardless of what path you end up taking.

Just know, this isn’t sabotage — this is pain that needs to be heard and shared.

It isn’t easy for any partner to see it, but they kind of need to approach it the same way when they reach out knowing you are sad.

I really needed to vent all my anger, and once I did get it all out, I was able to handle my triggers and flashbacks better.

Once I knew my wife would never completely KNOW my pain, I stopped trying to even the scales of justice or injustice.

That’s kind of when I accepted that I will always, always hate the A.

Then I started to allow my wife the room to be better and do better, without calling her out for those horrible choices on a routine basis.

You’ll get there or not, but nothing wrong with sharing your anger. I think it is far better than burying it, that becomes resentment pretty fast.

[This message edited by Oldwounds at 5:37 PM, Monday, July 7th]

Anger is part of the process. It’s a stage of grief that can’t be skipped over. It can be managed to a certain degree, but it’s a necessary part of the healing stage.

Anger can get stuck, because it’s a "stronger" stance" or a "higher frequency" emotion than sadness. But I do not think you were saying this earlier so I am just assuming this is naturally the phase you are in. It will cycle through like the other phases- just know healing isn’t linear and it will come and go and stay for shorter periods, becoming less intense in time.

While it can derail a fun time it is also helpful for her to learn triggers. Making sexual requests that can be construed as criticism should be one she should be able to anticipate, but she didn’t. It’s insensitive given the circumstances.

However, with alcohol involved it may have been more of a profound event than otherwise. As a recovering ws I found I had to give up alcohol, and I pretty much have kept it that way because I like myself better without it. You two may find it helpful to forego for some period of time because it does sometimes escalate situations. Other than that, my advice would be to feel it. That’s how it will process.

[This message edited by hikingout at 5:48 PM, Monday, July 7th]

I'm guessing my issue is expressing the anger and pain that isn't personal. On my side, I can't continue to attack her if R is going to be successful.

I'm guessing my issue is expressing the anger and pain that isn't personal. On my side, I can't continue to attack her if R is going to be successful.

Unless I am misunderstanding — it is all personal.

Are you asking are their healthier ways to share it?

Yes, but it shouldn’t include you walking on eggshells.

If you haven’t vented it out, it will boil over. It just does.

It sounds like you want to take the edge out of your anger, and that can be done, once you feel heard.

We do eventually tend to get the relationship we aim for.

You don’t have to ‘attack’ to balance the scales, but it sounds like this is what you want to work on for you.

Just keep your wife in the loop, it would be good for her to know why you are struggling with the anger.