Enter Drawing for Harboring Hope for Free

I have been married for 34 years. I discovered my husband had a six year affair during years 12-18 of our marriage. He ended it in 2007. This tore me and our family of 5 apart. We attempted to work through the pain and reconciliation through counseling which was attended by me for years and my spouse sporadically. I tried to fix the situation which was all I knew how to do at the time. I became controlling over my 3 children ages 9, 6 and 5. My husband and I had some good years and some ugly years during this time. I felt the past 2 years were better and was looking forward to being empty nester's and reconnecting with my husband.

To my surprise on Mother's Day 2020 my husband informed me he was moving out and filing for divorce. It came out of no where. I lost control and hit rock bottom. Our kids, friends and family were as shocked as I was. He would not talk to me, no counseling, nothing he was done.

He moved out in June of 2020. I continued with counseling and finally reconnected with my faith that helped me while growing up and in college. I allowed life, work and marriage take priority in the early years of our marriage and let my faith go.

My spouse continued to reach out and tried to get me to spend time together but I set solid boundaries and worked on healing myself with my counselor. I believe in the commitment of marriage and felt that we should work on the marriage.

In February 2021, 8 months after moving out, my husband asked to meet with me and shared he wanted to work on our marriage. We started meeting with a Christian counselor within the same group as my counselor.

We have been in counseling since 2021 regularly. We make strides and then have some set backs. The biggest issue continues to be my husband not able to connect emotionally and share who he is.

To my dismay, on July 27th of this year, I found charges on his personal bank statements which he did share with me totally about $4,800. Charges were for hotels, restaurants and spa treatments over a 3 month period April-June 2023. His response was It's not what you think.

He has been supporting another woman for 3 years. He claims they are only friends. The charges all occurred when he was away for work. I have uncovered so many lies. He claims this was not an affair but rather he was wrong for lying to me about the money and he was taken advantage of.

We have had 3 counseling sessions and each time his story changes. I have asked for full disclosure and honesty. He has shut down.

I am in a much better place this time. I have not shared with anyone other than God, my counselor and our couples counselor about the 2nd affair. God has brought me full circle to where I was in 2007. I need help and would truly like to connect with others that have experienced this. I want to heal from this not just muttle my way through. My healing from the first affair took almost 6 years. I don't want those feelings to consume me again. I found your site and have started the boot camp this past week. I believe this is the right program for me.

I've had 2 D-days in my 22 year marriage. The first was almost 5 years ago. Although my husband has always been sweet and affectionate, something was different with him and I suspected he was having an affair. I caught him red handed at another woman's house. Apparently, he had known her for years, and the affair had been active for several months. At that time, I committed myself to being a better wife and just "more" in general. I struggled to trust him but he seemed committed to our marriage. Then a year and a half ago, when I was just beginning to trust again, my life was shattered. I was contacted out of the blue by another woman whom he had recently had an affair with. She sent me photos and texts messages of their conversations. She didn't even know he was married and they had been seeing each other for a year. When I confronted my husband he did not deny it. On a whim, I also asked if he had something going on with his ex- wife. I had always been suspicious. Turns out that YES, he has had ongoing sexual relations with her on and off our entire marriage. The reason I need this course, is because I feel that anyone in their right mind would leave. I was in total shock for the first 6 months to year. I need to have leave but he keeps drawing back in with his charm. I want to believe him, yet at the same time I have no trust in him or in men in general. I'm in the process of setting up a separate residence yet remaining married. I've been seeing a therapist for over a year and believe I have PTSD and codependency issues. I'm now coming back to life and trying to focus on myself and heal. My husband claims to have seen the light and is now committed to our marriage but I do not believe it. I know that I must be happy with myself before I can give anything to another person.

It’s been 6 years! I found out a few months after we got married. We were friends for 10 years before that. It’s been a roller coaster since to say the least! I’ve done all of the research. Found a marriage intensive we went to. I went to the all women’s one after that hit things didn’t change. He wasn’t trying. There were walls and I felt so alone. I was depressed. Why was my husband so cold to me all of the time. He hated who I was. I changed a lot to please him. Got pregnant a year in and that kept me from leaving at the time. Fast forward to a year ago after going to free counseling because he didn’t want to pay for it…he was falling asleep in the meetings…I went back to another women’s retreat to get help in healing trauma and then we went to a private meeting with the leader of the retreat’s and oh did he use her words against me. He went to an all men’s retreat and came back different (for a month). The things that drive him crazy y before started bothering him again. He gaslights me. He had narc tendencies. I went back to another women’s retreat to work on daddy issues and I felt so free from all the failures from my childhood. Things were great for 6 months. This past April I told him I wanted a divorce. I couldn’t handle the emotional and verbal abuse any longer. We met with our pastor that morning and he said if I couldn’t forgive him then I wasn’t saved. So I went to small group that night after telling him how certain I was on being done that there was no hope for us and God told me to wait. I told my husband and the next few weeks things were great! Jesus did some work in both of us. I can say I don’t feel the same way about my husband as I used to but I’m still angry. Sometimes I think it’s because I wasn’t a virgin when we got married and he was and he’s tying to pay me back or something…seems silly. Like he’s justifying watching porn because I’m not clean either? Idk. Anyway he gave me the silent treatment threes ago and old habits and cycles were coming to the surface. He started getting agitated with me easily so we sat down two nights ago to “air some things out” his words and low and behold he watched porn again while he isolating himself from me and his two boys. Oh we also have baby #3 on the way! So I lost it. Because sex with him has been hurting so bad so I had wondered what if’s but like I feel to mad right now because he says our sin is the same. My sin is selfishness. He asked me if I thought that any of my actions lead him to wanted to go do that and I said NO! Your actions are 100% your own responsibility. It is not my fault you choose to sin. So this is where we are currently. Stuck in old habbits. Gaining new traumas! All while trying to be a stag at home mom who is “supposed to do her job in the house”. I’m dead inside. I don’t hate him and I do forgive him but this has to STOP. We both need to learn to love. Oh also he says he blames my dad solely on my behaviors and lack of confidence. He says I’m trying to compensate for something and that I have low self esteem. He’s definitely groomed me in to who I am today. He says he can’t get to know the real me because I’m a hard person to learn. I tried showing him my genuine self in the beginning and he hates who I was. I have to continually change a lot to please him. I haven’t lost hope but if things keep progressing and he doesn’t keep help then I don’t see ya lasting another 6 years!

I never knew the amount of emotional and physical pain a person could endure until the discovery of his affair. Even now, I question whether I'm actually living or if the person I've grown into has died and been lost forever. I'm thankful for a single second or minute where my mind isn't flooded with visions of his infidelity or searching for answers or filling in the missing pieces to his story but it doesn't take long though before I am consumed by the reality that is now my life, forever, and the world as I knew it shatters all over again. I don't know how to cope, I don't know how to survive or function, I don't know how to heal from the extensive damage that has been caused. I have become someone I don't even recognize and fear that life will never be the same. I used to believe everything happens for a reason but not any more. There is no reason for someone to have to feel and live in this much pain. There is no escape from this nightmare. I pray that I am wrong, I pray there is light at the end of this twisted never ending road and that I can come out stronger than before, but for now I can't see it.

My husband and I are “newlyweds,” approaching our one year wedding anniversary. I have been unfaithful to him and we spent the last 6 months apart. We are in couples counseling now while trying to repair from this heartbreak and an additional previous infidelity 5 years ago (on my end as well). We are so desperate to reconnect and build back. The last 9.5 years together has been the best years of my life but I stupidly act in a way that is unbecoming and disrespectful to our marriage. I am trying extremely hard to repair this and he wants to but very hard for us to get over each hurdle. We need Affair Recovery.

I’ve been through emotional abuse, sexual addiction, deviant behavior, and betrayals, by my husband of 39 years. He has not put forth the effort and I find it very unsafe relationally to abide with him. I cannot heal in an environment where I am continually harmed. I haven’t any more tolerance. I haven’t the means by which to make it on my own at present because of the decline of my health due to the stress and refusal of healthcare in a timely manner. I need healing and to be whole.
Sherry

My husband of 14 years had a 3 year affair. The first 1.5 years were physical/emotional and the second 1.5 years were emotional (at least that is what is what I am told). Today marks 8 months past D-day but I don’t feel like I am moving forward. In the beginning he did all the right things but I believe his shame/guilt are becoming a problem and I feel like we have stalled. We no longer talk like we used to and when we do or if I get triggered by something he sits there stoically. He will respond with I’m sorry and I love you but we don’t really discuss it and sometimes he will get defensive or angry. We haven’t had a real conversation outside of therapy (and even there I feel like we fake it) in months. I know he loves me and we both want this to work but not being able to talk to him is wearing on me. When I brought it up in counseling he said can’t talk to me because he is afraid the things he wants to say will push me away. He also said he hates himself and sometimes wishes he were dead. How do I deal with that? Now I feel that if I try to talk about my needs/issues I will just push him away or over the edge. No one knows what is going on and although my husband and I work out of the same office, so does the AP so I attend anything then I see her regularly at office meetings and work/industry social events. This dynamic is making it harder for me to move forward and making us both withdraw from our social circle. I am hoping that the harboring hope course will help me process some issues on my own and maybe help us move forward again.

The amount of pain I have sufferred since finding out what she did is unbearable. She left and I have the kids and I have to get better for them at the very least. I wish she would wake up, but she already said she's done after such a short period of time thinking about what she wanted. She's already living as if we were divorced and I don't even know if I can pay all the bills.

My husband had a yer long online emotional and sexual affair with a woman whom he knew in high school 35 years ago. She contacted my husband out of the blue in the summer of 2021 while I was away from home with our 3 children. She flirted and flattered him like mad at the very moment he had lost an important job and his self esteem was crumbling. She became his constant sounding board for all the difficulties he was going though and an escape from tensions at home. I never knew about the affair the entire time even though he was phone and texting her all year, but she eventually realized he was never going to leave me and the kids and she ended it. So I was spared having to force it to end through accidental discovery. When my husband finally told me I was in complete shock of course as I never ever would have guessed he could be drawn into such a thing, but the compassion and love I felt for him outweighed any anger or betrayal feelings at that moment and our marriage is like a brand new relationship with amazing sex and much better communication and mutual caring. We are in EMS online now and we need to continue this valuable work with AR. I would be ecstatic to be offered a place on a Harboring Hope course! I am suffering from a kind of delayed trauma reaction which is devastating me and our marriage even as we try to move forward and heal. Thank you, Aimee

Hi, I've been married 29 1/2 years to my high school sweetheart. We both come from difficult families of origin. In January of this year my husband confessed to ongoing sexual sin including an emotional affair from 15 years ago. In the weeks prior to his confession, I had been dealing with multiple trials on top of our marriage struggles, including the rejection of my mom and being completely cut off from her, and rejection from our adopted child who graduated high school and said she wants nothing more to do with us. Then a month ago we caught our teen son seeking pornography and discovered this has been going on for a year. My husband also recently lost his job of 25 years. He has had counseling, mens groups, and workshops and is on a good path of healing. I have not had any real support and I feel desperate for community and guidance.

My husband and I have been married for 22 years. During that time we have separted three times over his relationship with the same woman (the first time in 2010). I have had multiple discovery days when I found evidence of communication between them, but he has never disclosed or been completely open and honest about what transpired. I have blindly trusted him when he said there was no physical relationship and that it was just a friendship that became "inappropriate". It's like there has been this solid wall in my heart and mind that just would not let me go there. The last time we were separated, the separation lasted for a year and a half, and we were literally a signature away from divorce. I could not bring myself to finalize the divorce. I felt I needed absolute proof of the sexual relationship in order to know I was making the right decision about ending the marriage. His denials and saying he did not want a divorce led me to doubt myself. I desperately wanted to place him in a situation he could not deny. I knew they were at a hotel together, and I confronted him there in the parking lot. When I left there, I felt crazily vindicated and was certain I would divorce him, but then this intense physical and emotional pain took over. I really did not believe or had been unwilling to believe even after all these years that is was an actual physical affair. Obviously, we reconciled again. There was a break-in in our home and our teenage son with Asperger's was home. He was not harmed, but robbed and threatened. It shook our world and opened doors of communication. We have been back together now for over a year. I so want to believe his assurances that the affair is really over, but I just cannot shake this feeling that he is still lying. Even though we have been in counseling, he will not talk about the affair. He still has yet to come clean about when the sexual relationship really started. After we reconciled this last time in 2022, I found cards and letters from her in his apartment and office. I now know that he kissed her in 2009 (from a letter she wrote). With the cards and letters, he also had kept an old Victoria's Secret magazine from 2010 with her address on it where she had circled items she liked and made notes to him personally. He STILL will not admit that their physical relationship started before this last separation in 2021. He says he loves me and wants our marriage. I don't understand any of this. I don't understand why I stay; why I so stupidly want to believe him; why he wants to stay; and why he keeps lying. My gut tells me it is not over, and the fear is overwhelming. What am i doing? Why do I still love this man? I am humiliated and disillusioned. I have a Masters' degree, so does he. How can two seemingly well educated people be so stupid? What is wrong with me?

It’s been 5 months since I discovered my husband’s second affair. The first one was 8 years ago and took us almost a year to reconcile. I had not yet found affair recovery and wish I had done so many things differently now. I was never able to convince to do an EMS weekend with me before even though I knew we needed it. And in the end he had another affair that lasted twice as long as the first. We work together and both of his affair partners have also worked with us which makes for a very unbearable work experience. I’m still unsure if I want to end our marriage even though we have been separated and living apart for 5 months. He swears he will do anything to fix our relationship this time. At the moment I’m primarily interested in fixing myself and I hope that Harboring Hope can be a good start.

I have a somewhat unique situation and am so grateful that the answer to my midnight prayers came when scrolling infidelity topics late last night and I came across your Affair Recovery website.

My betrayal was over 10 years ago and it ended my marriage (my decision) and although the details surrounding my betrayal were never fully exposed, I live in fear that one day they will. Since that time, I have made amends with my ex, my kids, and the family members and friends that were hurt. The after-shock and ramifications of my decision and the details of the betrayal continue to haunt me and I think keep me from truly moving forward as I am stuck in feelings of unworthiness, shame, disdain, embarrassment and fear of ever having to truly own this or explain it.

Had I found your program back then, maybe things would have turned out the same, or different. Unfortunately I was so eager to move on from the secrecy of the betrayal that I avoided opening the door to any healing that needed to be done. Instead, I buried the feelings beneath a new relationship and for 7+ years I stuffed it down and covered it up so I didn’t have to look at what I had caused.

Years later, I am finding that you can’t run from your shame, your regret or your feelings of failure. They follow you into everywhere and now into another relationship that deserved honesty that I just didn’t know how to give because owning your mistakes can sometimes feel like it will destroy you.

My reluctance to “own” my past, truly forgive myself, and make as much peace with it – to myself – as I can – is a journey I should have taken long ago. Now, older and hopefully wiser and guided by God, I feel the need to finally ask myself what led this “good girl”, to be a “bad” girl, and then return to a good girl with a past she never likes to talk about.

Even though I would be entering the course with my marital fate already decided, my hope is that Harbouring Hope would give me a new foundation to unbox the past, understand it, allow me to own it fully, learn from it, and be a more complete person that is unafraid of her shadow as I keep becoming the woman and partner I was meant to be.

I discovered my husband in a chat room 3 1/2 years ago. At that point we had been married nearly 40 years. He lied to me and manipulated me throughout our relationship. I fell in love with my husband at the age of 18 and have loved him with my whole heart, my entire adult life. He came into the marriage addicted to pornography, and I had no idea. As a military pilot, we were often apart. In the fourth year of our marriage, he visited a prostitute and broke the covenant of our marriage. My husband came back from that deployment, convincingly acting sad and shocked that the other wives in the squadron had no idea what their husbands were doing on deployment. I was crushed to hear that this was going on, and so thankful that my husband was faithful. A version of this played out over many years, especially when he flew internationally as a commercial pilot. He engaged prostitutes at his hotels, got many massages with “happy endings,” visited strip clubs, and on it went for 40 years. He would not touch alcohol at home because “Christians don’t drink” but was falling down drunk overseas and spending thousands of dollars buying rounds for the bars. I told all my friends how blessed I was to be married to this wonderful man, not realizing that was just the image he wore at home. When we met for full disclosure, the behaviors had escalated in ways I never would have even imagined in my nightmares. I had hope for our relationship because I believed that deep down inside, this is not the man my husband was, and is. But now, as he has been through various therapists and inpatient and outpatient programs, he absolutely cannot, or will not show any empathy for my pain. I think he is done with me and doesn’t want to deal with that. He participates in 12 step groups, and one of his favorite lines is that the best thing he can do to help me heal is to heal himself. And then he says that I am responsible for my own healing, and he cannot heal me . My response is that that is true but he can make it easier or harder for me to heal and all it has been is devastatingly hard. I have asked him for empathy and patience and compassion even when I am triggered. He thought he was so far lost That he could never come back. And when I tell him that his healing and mine do not occur in two different vacuums, but have an effect on each other, he is very dismissive. We are starting divorce process and selling our dream home but I am broken. This has been 40+ years that I didn’t understand his physical and emotional withdrawal from me. For decades, I have felt the distance. I carry a heavy weight in my heart and tears right below the surface 24 hours a day, yes, even in my sleep. I know I need help. I have worked with a few therapists, and been to some intensives that helped me see that I am not alone and get support from other women. But I wonder if it’s even possible for me to heal if he refuses to enter my pain and show real compassion. I feel old; I gave up my career to stay home with the kids and here I am after living my entire adult life in a lie with lost dreams, an altered past, wondering what’s wrong with ME.

It's been 3 1/2 long years since I found out the devastating truth that my husband was having an affair. In all of that time and through all of our conversations (not even - they were more like me asking questions and him either deflecting or just not answering), he claimed to want to save the marriage. I later discovered he had never stopped with his affair partner and is with her to this day. They have been together now for 5 1/2 years. Every chance he got over the last 3.5 years after I found out, he ended up choosing her, i.e. going right back to her, while telling me he had no contact at all with "this person." He protected her identity and would still be doing so, had I not tracked them down in December 2022 and was able to meet and speak with her myself. Turns out he had been lying to both of us through the years. In our case, he pretended everything was fine. In her case, he led her to believe that he wanted out of the marriage so he could marry her. Instead what he wanted was both to continue with her and to keep his marriage, because of the comfortable life he had become accustomed to, with me as the primary breadwinner.
I am divorcing him but the hurt and the pain are with me constantly. I am using the Affair Recovery resources to move forward with my life and to stop dwelling on a past that cannot change.

I could see the trouble coming a thousand miles away but couldn’t stop it. It’s been a year but I am still shook and so angry. I don’t want to be angry anymore.

Harboring is a holding onto of something safe and secure.
Hope is the expectation or belief that the future is full of good things.
I need both of these as I walk this journey from being betrayed to becoming the woman God designed me to be and with the man He chose to walk with me.

the d-day was on oct 2022.

It was devastating and it felt like my life has crashed.

Desperate for answers, i kept googling and read one after another articles. It was during the search that i discovered this website. What was mentioned in the articles on this website, i am able to resonate with it. The articles was detailed and covers a wide range of questions that i have in mind.

After going through the free 7 days of bootcamp and weeks of pondering, i deciding to take the plunge and sign up for the betrayed partner workshop. I do hope it helps me with the healing as i want to move on with life. Life goes on as long as one is alive.

I would like to feel heard and understood without our world coming crashing down more than it already has...

My husband's betrayal has changed me. I was a securely attached, creative, fun-loving, independent woman. I didn't worry all the time and I was mentally stable.
Now I'm so anxious. I question things I never questioned before. What he's doing, where he's going, what he's thinking. I question who I am. I'm anxious about our future together or our future apart. I'm anxious about how this is all affecting our adult children. I'm worried about money.
I'm so uncreative. That really bothers me. I used to bake, and sew, and knit, and build furniture, and upholstery, and create games. I just can't bring myself to do anything like that anymore. Plus I'm isolated. Moving away from all of my friends. Not that I have shared anything with them.
For now I'm concentrating on finding community. I need to feel more like myself. I need to talk more about it. I need to find people that understand.

My husband and I have been married for 35 years and I recently found out that he has been lying to me for our entire marriage. He finally admitted it 3 weeks ago, told me he had disclosed everything, only to find out again tonight that he was keeping details of an affair hidden from me. I am completely devastated and at a loss as to how to move forward. I did not see this coming at all and feel like I don't know who my husband is. I need Harboring Hope for guidance, camaraderie with other women who know what I'm experiencing, and to see a light at the end of the tunnel. I honestly don't know if my husband is capable of telling the truth or if our marriage is salvageable.

I got definitive evidence of my husband of nearly 30 years' full relationship affair with his 20 year younger coworker in 14 months ago. I say definitive evidence because until that day he vehemently denied everything. In fact, the day I saw his texts between his girlfriend (because that IS officially what she was) he still denied it, even when he and I were sitting next to each other looking at their text conversation on his phone. I am still finding evidence of how entwined they actually were. Unfortunately, just prior to finding out definitively that he had been as unfaithful as a spouse could get, I had agreed to reconcile with him. As I was in such a messed up state and didn't want to further disappoint our child (who was happy that we were reconciling), I went along with our planned reconciliation. Our child is much happier and settled now and he is being nice and sending me loving messages every day. So on the outside our family would look ok. But I am not. I have resigned myself to living in this life so our child has a stable family life. We are not fighting. We spend quality time together as a family. But on the inside, I am wandering aimlessly. He attended therapy for just 3 sessions. I've been through a full course of therapy, wanting to do more but finances just don't allow it. Reaching out on so many different platforms but not really getting any support. Is this all I can hope for? Is there any hope that I might actually feel like I love living my life one day? I don't even really feel that comfortable in my home. I share his bed but can't bring myself to move my clothes into the room. I have a few things in my bedside table in case I need to get dressed before leaving the bedroom but everything else is in "my room" that I stayed in during our separation. I don't think he even realises or is it that he doesn't care? He's never brought it up. Then again, he never brings anything up. Even when I'm noticeably affected he doesn't show any acknowledgement. Or am I just that good at covering up when I feel affected by things? I spent 12 months trying to tell him what I needed and I can't be bothered any more. I need to see that he seeks out what he needs to do. I need to see that I'm important enough to make an effort. I don't even hold out hope that I'll win this draw. I guess it's just that I have no other option than to at least try this. Something has to give.

D-day was 9/27/23, 2 days after our 7th wedding anniversary. I am just as lost now as I was then with the constant lies, truth dripping, pain, confusion, and the constant how and why that play over in my head? After 10 years together and 2 amazing little boys to bless our family - is it all over? Is the life I envisioned and sacrificed for gone? I am hopeful but lost.

I a missionary mom and wife with two kids. I got my citizenship way back but is currently working overseas. The reason I want to have joined on this free draw for this program is because I want healing in order to be more effective in doing God’s work no matter what will happen to my marriage. I am on the side of the betrayed, I am hoping God will help me change thru this program, and someday too will have a chance too to be able to help with my husband’s. We are still married but living separately. He is not planning a divorce but he is settled to live separately because he thinks my stress of too much for his health. He had his heart attack several years ago as a consequence of his affair and now he is living in guilt plus him witnessing my devastation. He said he couldn’t handle all the drama. It hurts but somehow I need to let go with the pain and move on for my healing. I am putting all these things in God’s hands that somehow I will be chosen if it’s His will for me to be on this program. If don’t, I will still try to save so I can really get help from you guys. I depend on a meager stipend and I am hoping I can be choosen. Just praying. Thank you