All Comments on 'The Aftermath'

EVERYBODY has them. But if the person they trust and have faith in more than anyone else doesn't do anything that brings them to the surface, it's pretty much the same as if they don't exist. And once out, they can't just be stuffed back in again.

Her claim that her love for him was unconditional was just laughably delusional. Because putting a time limit on his forgiveness and expecting it to be free of bumps was very much conditional.

But yes, ultimately she did do the right thing by him, because he will be better off not having to worry about whether she will again succumb to whatever irresistible urge led her to cheat (which she claims not to understand but either does and won't tell him what it is or doesn't and won't make an effort to find out what it is). Whether he will ever be able to trust another woman is a different matter. Because whether she recognizes it or not, he's a broken man and she's the one who broke him.

Best comment of the day. You got it.

If you have any memory of SJ's stories, how many comments does he have to make on his own stories to explain them? He must be a really vague writer. No one else on the site makes as many comments on their own stories or has to explain them. The most misunderstood writer in the history of Literotica. Could it be that he just writes badly?

If no one understands the story, that just tells you how bad the writer is, and SJ is evidently one of the worst. Even his worshippers, Javmor, Luedon and Carolinadreamer have to help him explain, and still no one gets it, at least according to him. He may have created the characters, but they seem to be so muddled that no one except him and the enlightened few can understand.

Her arrogance: 1) having the one night stand that she could have walked away from 2) thinking for her husband and expecting his decisions to match hers 3) not understanding his feelings and continually not understanding the depths of her deceit 4) not getting help from a licensed professional that maybe would have made it apparent to her that she was still dreaming....

In case you haven't noticed, I'm here for the comments. I enjoy the back-and-forth. I enjoy the interactions between readers and writers. It's my entire point of sharing my stories here, as there are other (far more encouraging and lucrative) sites for that.

Sorry my free story upset you so much. Oh, wait. Not sorry.

Your goal was to write from a woman's point of view, and with her in the end putting the blame on her husband for the end of the marriage, you got the female perspective spot-on. She wouldn't have held herself so accountable at the beginning, though. She might have felt a little guilt, but a woman typically will try to rationalize and justify her behavior almost immediately. A woman typically would also tell her girlfriends right away and have some laughs about it.

Typical stupid useless cunt trying to pass responsibility her bad choices on everyone else.

In my writing universe, this backstabbing bitch would be BTB'd bigtime.

You even showed it all the way to the end saying how the cheating spouse still loved her husband unconditionally. Which is impossible for her to do since she cheated on him. I like that they broke up for multiple reasons. 1. Husband was not mature enough to seek help for his issues his wife caused. 2. The wife was not mature enough to be married.

Best quote of the day ! You get it .

let her ass figure it out. she went looking its her cross to bear .

" ultimately she did do the right thing by him, because he will be better off not having to worry about whether she will again succumb to whatever irresistible urge led her to cheat "

OK, here is why I don't agree. She chose not to help him through the process of healing from the damage to the relationship she caused. You said in an earlier post that there are only two outcomes to her giving details. I think you miss, the extremes that a betrayed person's imagination can take them too. Maybe you should read up on mind movies for someone who has been cheated on.

Relationships are hard at times. There are a many ways to do them right and many ways to screw them up. The ego of a lot of commenters reject to see anything but the way they would do it. In this story she only saw her way and not what he needed.

I said before that this story is very true to life. My guess is you are not totally monogamous. I think you write well, but I think you and most of the authors in LW would benefit from reading on relationship forums on other sites. I think it would help for realism and you might even find some story ideas.

In the immortal words of George Costanza, "Remember Jerry, it isn't a lie if you believe it." Many of these stories are much like the cheating wives in them. They are filled with lies, including lies of self-deception. If you value your relationship, if you are of average intelligence, and you are in the range of "psychologically normal" - then you would realize what you are risking when you cheat and the impact on your family and friends WHEN that cheating is discovered. The normal human reaction to cheating is tremendous anger and hurt. This has been well documented in literature and history over thousands of years. It is documented everyday in the news as love triangles end in murder/suicides daily. So, while twisting the truth may work for some cheating wives and some Lit authors, it does not make for a good marriage or a good plot.

another cocksucking fag posting dumb cuck SHIT.

If you want to do a cheating wife story - try making it real. There is plenty of drama in a realistic story about a spouse who has busted their ass trying to make a marriage work with a partner who is unwilling or unable to do their share. This happens everyday all over the place. These marriages eventually end in divorce. Some out of raw anger and some using the excuse of cheating. I have known women that admitted to cheating because they wanted to kill the marriage. They wanted to make sure it was dead and there was no way back. It wasn't out of pure anger that they cheated. It wasn't out of love for another man. It was because they knew the effect that cheating would have on their husbands and their marriages. The exit affair is really a marriage execution. It happens all the time, when a woman wants out of a marriage to a man that is unwilling to work with them as a partner and meet their needs as a person. Most often this has nothing to do with the sexual relationship. It is more about the lack of love and respect in the marriage long before the cheating occurred.

moral of the story is you have to learn that fucking around isn't so bad.

and then this asshole 'writer' bashes other authors because they always write the same thing.

pathetic. 1*

"Brian seemed to realize all of the damage his decision had caused."

"With a heavy heart, he asked if he could move back in with me and Haley."

NEGATIVE stars.

I have rarely, if ever, seen anyone use the Commandments to condemn the cheater.

What I HAVE seen, is people referencing the vow "to forsake all others," ONLY after a defender of the cheater supporters try to use "for better or for worse!"

Here are my problems, You say you would do anything for the marriage. Unfortunately that is a flat out lie. You wanted him to fight on your terms not on terms of what fighting really means. You didn't fight for your marriage when you let yourself be with another man. Yes you felt guilt and shame but the fact remains you didn't fight. Further you say you wanted to fight but your actions proved completely otherwise. Or the story proved completely otherwise. When you had the affair in all appearances it look like you gave up on the marriage. In reality you didn't you gave up on it when you were the one who gave up fighting for it. He never gave up, he went through his hurt which is completely understandable. Because you were the one that betrayed his trust. However He is the one who fought for you He humbled himself to the point of wanting it to work. Yet you again betrayed him and proved your untrustworthyness. You want to say his bad desission had something to do with it but in the end He really didnt make one YOU made both and both times you betrayed his trust. If you can't see that then you are blind. He forgave you and wanted to work on it but it was not in the timing you wanted. You wanted to control when and how he would be over the morning of the betrayal. Yes your first bad choice was forgivable but you are not the one who is in control when it is forgiven or how long it will take to forgive you. You are the one that made both bad decisions. Regardless if this is a true story or not your thinking of this in the manner is completely clueless. Yet it was fascinating

reading.

You say "It happens all the time, when a woman wants out of a marriage to a man that is unwilling to work with them as a partner and meet their needs as a person."

As well as that you cite cases of "a partner who is unwilling or unable to do their share. This happens everyday all over the place."

All the time and all over the place everyday we have these awful wives doing unspeakable things. No wonder the world is going to hell in a handbasket.

Or is it just that you have a jaundiced view of the world of marriage relationships?

Lue

I didn't MISS the point, I just disagree with it.

HE was the injured party, he wanted the details, she OWED him the details.

I'll take her own answers and make them easier to take, but still truthful'

Her answers: "Was the sex good? Hell, yeah, it was. Did I cum? Multiple times. Did he have a big dick? Big enough."

What she could have said: "Was the sex good? Yes, it was. Did I cum? Yes. Did he have a big dick? Big enough." If he asks, "Was it better?" she can use the old stand-by, "It was different."

What he internalizes because she won't tell him: "Was the sex good? Fantastic! The best ever! Did I cum? Multiple times. Gallons, I even squirted! Did he have a big dick? Huge, especially next to your little weenie!"

You're right, Joe, they're your characters, and you know them better than we do.

But I, personally don't believe that Brian had these issues before she CHEATED on him!

It's a minor point, and I know it's needed for the plot, but why did they BOTH have to travel? I assume he's already moved to his new location, and since he's doing them a favor they're not asking him to travel, but wouldn't he have his own place? Or is he still "in transition" and doesn't have a place yet?

Also, nothing was said about his comment that they have sex one day a week. That seems awfully low for a young, healthy, loving couple! Was she frustrated by the lack of sex, and that led to the fling? It was never mentioned in any way, not even in her thoughts.

...and that means there's about 4 billion DIFFERENT stories to tell. And guess what, folks? You aren't going to like some of the content of them! You're going to claim that "No one would do that in real life! No one is that stupid or self-centered!" Well, guess what: they are!!!! When you judge a story, it should NOT be about whether YOU personally think that a person would think or act that way, because in the author's twisted imagination, they did. Remember: 4 billion chances to get it right. Judge instead on the author's ability to convey the emotions the thought processes of the characters. Yes, grammar and punctuation can detract from a good story as well, but should be a more minor consideration. I've read many well-written stories here that I couldn't stomach the subject matter to the point where I had to quit reading part way through, but did I jump to the end and rant like a spoiled child about the particular "kink"? No. I just chose another story.

Now I'm done with my childish rant, I'll comment on this tale. I agree that the characters probably did marry too young and had some growing up to do, but that's an integral part of the story. If they had been "perfect" (she hadn't had a "moment of weakness" and he hadn't been so insecure and stubborn), there wouldn't have been a story, would there? I believe the author did a great job of getting inside his characters and bringing their thoughts out for our scrutiny. Five big ones, Joe--you earned it here. :-)

Re. Why did they both need to travel? I based that on similar business trips I've taken where I've had to travel to the home office to train others. I don't think it's that uncommon. Besides, if they weren't staying at the same hotel there wouldn't be a story to tell!

Re. Sex once a week, I understand that is the national average for married couples. Which would mean they have a "healthy" sex life. It isn't about the quantity, but the quality. In full disclosure, my wife and I probably average once a week, and I consider us to have a very healthy sex life.

Re. Brian's insecurity, Ashley never noticed it until she cheated. That doesn't mean it didn't exist. As she later stated, adversity reveals character.

Re. Spillling the beans on the details, sure, she could have sugarcoated it as you suggested, but what would be the point? What is gained by it from either side? From Brian's side, he would get confirmation that she enjoyed it, which would only fuel his paranoia and insecurity. From Ashley's side, she would know she wasn't being completely truthful, which would negate the whole reason she told Brian in the first place.

It's worth noting the double-standard at play here. If I had reversed the roles, and Brian had cheated on Ashley, then it would be assumed that he enjoyed it. She wouldn't need to ask for that level of detail. But if a woman cheats, heaven forbid that she enjoy it. If she didn't, maybe -- maybe -- she could be forgiven. But if she enjoyed it, she's a cheating tramp who can no longer be trusted.

You wrote> Did I jump to the end and rant and rave. Yes, you just did. No further comment necessary.

You hit the nail right on the head. One of the best evaluations I've read on this story.

No need to bother with my two cents worth into this.

She has the affair, then insists Brian get over it, like a click of the fingers, which of course, he is unable. It takes time to recover from the ultimate betrayal, and when he does, she decides she doesn't want to be "married to someone who would be constantly on the lookout for betrayal and deceit". Her view is quite unrealistic.

Our girl Ashley feels like she's entitled to forgiveness and since Brian didn't work hard enough at forgiving her then he is equally responsible for the loss of this marriage ? I DOESN'T WORK THAT WAY !

"IF YOU CAN'T DO THE TIME, THEN DON'T DO THE CRIME" !!!

Forgiveness and trust are earned. They are not automatically given just because someone thinks they've apologized or somehow made amends enough to balance out the damage done to a loved one's psyche.

I don't believe I have read any of your stories before save that ridiculous Fifty or One Hundred thing.

What did I think of this one?

Not much to say. I understand (albeit don't agree) with her point. I get her point of view. How well or poorly you wrote from a female perspective, I can't say since I am not a woman.

Subject-Verb Object seemed to follow, one from another. A touch repetitive at places.

This was a 'meh'. It covered no new ground and had no artistry in the writing that one might find in UNO's work. There was no 'trick' in the writing like HDK. What it did was offer an unpleasant point of view for many of the readers and said 'So there!', which isn't all that different from that of your normal comments.

She is allowed her own point of view.

I have to say, that her analysis of the character of her husband was essentially flawed. His inflexibility and insecurity that she didn't detect did not necessarily pre-exist. It is like a woman shooting her husband in the leg and then wondering why she never noticed he had a limp before. Simply maddening at it's obtuseness.

As Xiamand noted and I have noted in quite a few stories: "I'd do anything" generally means 'I'd do what I want to do.'

-She could have gone to therapy on her own.

-She could have provided her own constant verification of where she went and what she did.

- She could have come back to be a stay at home mom.

-She could have given him the blow by blow accounting that he ACTUALLY DEMANDED...SEVERAL TIMES! But no, she refused to tell him what he wanted to know...and then added meaningful context to soften the blow. She blatantly looked like she was hiding something.

And when offered that olive branch...did she grab it with both hands desperately as you TRIED to characterize her as wanting?

Why...no. She didn't. She felt (as so many people feel) that she had paid in full measure and more...so too low, too slow, buh bye, cutey pie! Despite being fiscally desperate. Despite the agony inflicted on her daughter. Despite the additional agony inflicted on the husband BY HER OWN ACTIONS. You know...the one she claimed to love unconditionally?

She decided to cut off her nose to spite her face.

This is not a likable character beyond the infidelity.

So 'did she do whatever was necessary to get them over it'? You asked the question and you had your protagonist answer...in the negative.

I remember a dreadfully well written and tragic story about a woman cheated on by a man. She was single and semi divorced and her child was going through the same agonies...and her ex returned. Even though she had met what she felt was her soul mate. Even though she had good reason to be wary. She went back to her very flawed husband because...well, because it seemed like the right thing to do. Beyond just her personal happiness. Beyond a supposed magical 'ting'.

SHE, and not Ashley, gets my vote for 'doing whatever is necessary to get over this'.

Yes, her husband should perhaps been a bit more and a bit quicker...but he DID come back and she smacked him in the face.

Well...good luck with your dating prospects as a single mother with a damaged daughter madam. You deserve that kind of dating fun.

I didn't mind the story. I just didn't like the character.

So what if it was always there?

As someone else said, what's the difference between it no being there, and nothing happening to bring it out?

And you never REALLY addressed her not telling details, besides brushing aside my attempt to tell the truth in a kind way, you ignored my description of what he might imagine if not told, which was FAR worse than even the unvarnished truth!

Someone mentioned that the Titanic had survivors. Yes, but the SHIP sank. As with this marriage. The all survive, but the ship that was their marriage and family sank.

Probably a lot of realism here buuut. She didnt do everyting she could, she never answered all tjat he wanted. Maybe it wouldnt hade had an effect on the outcome but she still failed to explain. Jer judgement of him not being able to foegive falls back to her when he asks to return home and now it is she who cant forgive his actions ... what about that? Only the wife could dracture her mans ego/pride ... oy she can rebuild it ... she didnt.

So, you believe it would have been easier for Brian to hear all the gory details of his wife's multi-orgasmic experience with another man than to merely imagine how it might have happened?

I chose to write a story about a woman who accepts the consequences of her actions, realizes how selfish she has been, and becomes less selfish by giving her husband the tools he needs in order to move on. If she had given him all the gory details it would've been a crushing blow to his ego.

Re. Brian's insecurity, again, it was Ashley's infidelity that revealed it -- to her. Maybe it was always present. Maybe she caused it. Regardless, it was the first time she noticed it. Which is why she decided not to give him the details he wanted. Had he been more self-assured of his own abilities to please her, she could have shared those details without causing any further damage to his ego.

FD45, thanks for the comment. I could have sworn that you comment on most of my stories, but maybe I'm confusing you with someone else. Regardless, it's disappointingly that the only other story of mine that you've read is one that I quickly jotted down for fun. I usually put more thought and effort into my stories.

After "claiming" that she would do whatever necessary to overcome his loss of trust in her betrayal, she still comes up with reasons why he doesn't forgive her. As she makes her claims of love and says she will "do whatever" it takes to "rebuild" she then "finds" unworthy characteristics (brought out by her own selfish actions - that probably didn't exist before she cheated, so they are her own fault in the end) that she can't live with any longer.

The bitch is a spoiled little shit that refuses to take responsibility for her own actions. Just telling someone you did wrong does nothing. You need to pay the penance, and she was unwilling to to "whatever it took" to keep her family together. It is very indicative of this self absorbed society we find ourselves. You see the young people focused on their phones and the imaginative lives they have built up in the cyber-life. True character is something that totally eludes them, because it is not something you can get from the "I-store". Character and similarly redemption are not apps you can purchase, but intangible things that need to be built (like trust and love...) through time and responsible ownership of the TRUTH.

The HONOR in this is lost. It is a terrible price to pay, but the social fabric we see unraveling is situational in this story.

I figured it out, you are actually a pissed off lesbian. Awful story and very biased you never gave husband a chance.

As usual Joe, you cherry pick my comments to bolster YOUR argument! I gave you a perfect example of how she could tell him the truth WITHOUT giving him all the "gory" details!

She HARDLY gave him "all the tools," and it seems to me his ego was pretty well crushed, probably because he imagined something similar to what I described because she refused to answer his questions!

Did she believe she could change to become something besides a selfish cheater?

She was treating her husband like a child.

So she can be a slut, destroy her marriage, endanger her child's future as well as hers and that of her husband's, but he can't be given the chance to grow through his insecurities by hearing the details?

She allowed herself far more leeway than her husband who did not inflict the damage.

I have dealt with infidelity a lot, counseling, and some people need the details to either help recover in the marriage or to move on.

It really wasn't up to her to determine and manipulate his outcome.

She comes off as a less than remorseful cheater who will not relinquish controlling the situation for their desired outcome.

She is still a very weak and insecure woman by the end of the story.

She couldn't get the exact results from her husband that she wanted so she ended it.

She apparently can casually fuck everything up but can't allow her husband to deal with it on his own terms.

No man should look to mate with this pathetic woman.

I understand the points you were trying to go for but the writing did not illustrate the point you were going for very well.

Your cheater is extremely unlikeable throughout and at the end of the story as well.

I have sympathy for Brian and Haley who were both victimized by her cheating and subsequent, controlling and very conditional attitude towards her husband afterwards in the aftermath.

She alone determined the fate of her marriage. She wouldn't allow her husband any freedom to go beyond what she chose.

She would even offer him a revenge affair, something she apparently chose she could live with, but not what he requested because she would not give him the opportunity to deal with his insecurities by learning the truth of her adulterous sex.

She stopped the progress. If she was so goddamned brilliant, she wouldn't have fucked around. Don't think she comes off as being able to determine what her husband can or cannot take. The outcome should have been up to him anyway.

He could take it or not.

She jumped the gun without letting her husband have the chance to work through his issues.

She is a very one sided, narrow minded and selfish character throughout this story.

We seem to be going around in circles, my friend. As I already pointed out in response to your suggestion that she could have sugarcoated the details, it would have been dishonest, which would have entirely negated her reason for coming clean in the first place. The point was for him to know she cheated -- not to know every detail of how she cheated. The details should have been irrelevant. (And frankly, all the guys screaming at her for not revealing the details here baffle me. Why would you all want to know??)

Regardless of that, let's say she took your advice and sugarcoated the details. Do you really think Brian would have accepted her responses without asking follow-up questions?

"Did you cum?"

"Yes."

You don't think the next question would be "how many times?" or "how hard?" or something equally ridiculous?

"Did he have a big dick?"

"Big enough."

You don't think the next question would be: "how big is big enough?" or "bigger than mine?" or something equally ridiculous?

Again, I don't understand this need to know the details -- UNLESS you get off on it. Then it makes total sense. But if you're already jealous and insecure, why add to it? What is possibly gained from it?

I think the answer is obvious: you (aka Brain) are hoping that she didn't enjoy it. Which brings me back to my original statement about the double standard between men and women who cheat. Women aren't supposed to enjoy it. And that's one of the things that makes the readers of this story uncomfortable.

I have to say, I do not mean to pile on to you.

However your explanation of her motives and the ordering of the story did not come across as an unselfish thing AT ALL with what you considered 'my selfless act of hiding my fornication from my husband'.

First, the emphasis did not come across that way. It seemed partly to spare him pain...but also to not derail her efforts toward reconciliation which is a selfish thing.

Second, her 'sparing his feelings' explanation came BEFORE her reconciliation failed. Ergo, she can claim that reasoning now...but it is certainly ex post facto. I much more bought the 'I would rather he had a GOOD relationship than my damaged one.' That idea has both merit and literary support, albeit still could be argued as rationalizing she was just tired of his shit.

I am sure you intended to put write it as you described, but the message did not come across as well as you might have wanted. I find that specifics help with fixing writing.

And as an objective observer, force writing the man as an insecure wimp...yeah...not exactly a good PR move to your mostly male audience and I say this as the guy who wrote 'I Stop Losing'

Yes, I guess you're right about that.

To ME, it still comes down to not giving him what he asked for. Would he have pressed for more details? Who knows? Maybe he would have accepted the, I prefer "watered down," not "sugar-coated," version (I don't think there's any way to "sugar-coat" this!), maybe not. She never gave him the chance!

Meanwhile, because SHE decided he didn't need to know, despite his pleas and demands, he likely imagined far worse, thereby producing the result she claims to have been trying to avoid! At least by telling him there was a CHANCE>

Remember, this story was told from her POV, so nobody (not even YOU, Joe) knows what was in his head!

Maybe she should have "fought" for her marriage BEFORE she fucked a coworker?????

What a stupid bitch. He reacted like any man with a shred of self respect would react. Their marriage ended the night she screwed another man. She alone destroyed both of their lives.

If she had provided full disclosure, he would have left instantly. He probably should have left at once. The only way to justify her silence is to assume the sex was great, she came many times, and his cock was big enough to get her off many times. I would have been gone the next day

In Joe's story she made a decision about what she would tell her husband, just as we all make decisions about what we will say to our significant other.

There are all sorts of things we take into account when we decide what we will say and how we will say it. Hopefully, we give it some thought before we say it, but often it just bubbles out.

One of the things we often get wrong is how what we say will affect the other person. With perhaps the best will in the world, hoping to not hurt the other person more than she already had, she made her decision. We may disagree with that decision, but that was what Joe as author had her doing.

It's an interesting discussion, though, about our underlying beliefs regarding what is the right way to cope with a situation where you have already done something you know to have been wrong.

Lue

A sad little tale. Simply said, if she didn't want out, she certainly wanted a change in the relationship. She cheats and then feels that she must confess, no preparation for what's to come, no feeling out the possible reaction/response. Just the brutal truth - but not the whole truth...evidently with her marriage clearly on the line, only her sister deserves the truth. Hubby...not so much. So we don't go BTB or RAAC, instead we get a variation on classic Trumpism...BTV, Blame The Victim.

Self serving blame the victim BS.

"My love for him was unconditional " ...but she has sex with another man.

Her loving husband becomes tarred and feathered because he tries to maintain the relationship for over a year and can't get over his feelings of betrayal by an unfaithful wife.

The coup de gras at the end is that the whole sad tale is the husbands fault because he cannot forgive her betrayal. He becomes the bad guy and she becomes the victim.

Awful!!

The only good thing about the story is that she didn't explain the cheating in some cuckold way to the husband. I always hate those scenes.

If you don't get them, your imagination will fill in the blanks. And refusing to give you the details when you ask for them is like telling you to not think about a purple elephant. The elephants in your head just keep getting bigger and more purple.

Hearing all the details would have been like pulling a band aid off. It probably would have hurt a lot. But then maybe he might have been able to start getting over it. Not hearing the actual details meant that all the imagined ones would be worse, and would never stop invading his thoughts. They'll probably haunt him for the rest of his life now, especially any time he thinks about the possibility of trusting another woman.

I think its ok to not get why someone needs something. Try to understand that some people need different things than you might and not necessarily for the reasons you think they do.

If you go to survivinginfidelity.com and do some reading on the wayward side forum you will see this discussion repeated many times. Many new waywards have the same questions about why the betrayed spouse needs to ask these things that you do. You will find that some betrayeds have a need to ask the same question many times over. If a cheater wants to get past their affair and claim that they will do anything to do so at some point that claim will be tested.

I think you write well. In the comments you sound closed off to other points of view. It seems that if it isn't a point of view you share you want to call it out as not valid. Try and keep in mind that what you see as acceptable behavior may be different than what the next person may think. After you post your story you can't control how others will interpret it. You can explain what you meant to get across but the readers are going to interpret it based on their own experience and beliefs.

I would like to ask if you were in this situation would you refuse to discuss details? Would you feel you had done everything you could to save the marriage if you didn't answer the questions? From reading your stories it seems you are someone who is very open to talking things through with your SO.

It is very interesting such story, where the husband does a reconciliation for sake of the kids (not only 1 child) and after 10 years the this husband leaves the excheater wife for another woman, this story line is not written at all!

BTW This storyline would be the most interesting long term effect of a cheating wife...

Being in Brian's shoes I fully understand his reaction. How could he forgive and move on. His wive says she has no idea why she cheated. This also happened to me. I told my wive if she didn't know whey she cheated it was obviously going to happen again. She told now she realized how much it hurt me she would never do it again.

Really... An educated adult women married 9 years with a child doesn't realize how much pain an affair is going to cause. Give me a break. I got divorced.

It's amazing how this story ends painting the wive as the victim. I wish swingerjoe writes another story with Brians's point of view.

If I was in Ashley's situation I would undoubtedly have handled the situation differently. That's the great thing about humanity, we're all different. I'm not sure I would have handled it better, though. It was an extremely difficult situation, trying to judge how much Brian really wanted to know vs what might be so painful that it would only make the situation worse.

'Lue' in my story was lucky. In 'Don' she had a husband who had developed a belief system that granted her freedom to experiment, even though she didn't ask permission. He was very secure in his self-image, unlike Brian in this story who felt betrayed and wasn't coping with that feeling. 'Don' realised that 'Lue' was just experimenting and that he would always come out OK in any comparison. He always stayed in charge of the situation. Brian could never have said, as 'Don' did "I don't need to win, but I don't intend to lose, either."

Lue

...My, my so well written, that it is hard to come down on either side of this sad story. This was a well crafted tale with the comments attached to it longer than the story itself. Thank you for sharing. 4*

Part of your comment troubles me: "He was very secure in his self-image, unlike Brian in this story who felt betrayed and wasn't coping with that feeling."

So only insecure men want truthful answers to their questions, even if the answers might hurt them? I happen to be VERY secure in my self-image, and I would have wanted answers to ANY question I might have, maybe not the same questions Brian had, but I wouldn't accept my wife deciding what I needed to know!

Frankly, in this particular story, where I happen to believe that she is sincere in her belief that this was a one-time slip, that she should have just lived with the guilt as her penance, and not dump the pile of cow dung on Brian!

I have no idea how you came to that conclusion from what I said.

Lue

It was 'Lue' who said 'Don' felt secure within his own skin. If 'Don' had said it, one might suspect bravado or lack of self awareness. Behaviour indicating personal 'security' is something observed by others. A person may claim to feel secure, but his or her behaviour may demonstrate to others that this person is anything but 'secure'.

Ashley was sure Brian felt insecure and acted accordingly. Whether or not Brian thought so was not explained in Joe's story.

Lue

You said very specifically that he was secure in his self-image, unlike Brian, implying to ME, at least, that only men who are insecure can't handle this situation.

If I misinterpreted, I apologize.

Even after your second response, I'm confused!

It did seem to me as if you were saying that Don's reaction vs Brian's in the aftermath of their wives' infidelity meant that Don was inherently more secure in himself.

However, comparing the two stories, by the time Lue had her affair, Don and Lue had already gone through a months-long period of turmoil in their marriage that resulted in Don developing his "seagull philosophy," while Brian didn't seem to have any idea that there was trouble in paradise until Ashley dropped her affair on him out of the blue. Don may have been more self-secure when he learned of Lue's affair, but he had a considerable head start over Brian in getting there.

Yes, it did come as a shock to Brian, while 'Don' had a fair idea what was going on. That does make a considerable difference. Brian had no time to prepare himself for the grand confession. 'Don' did. Who knows what the result may have been if those two situations had been reversed?

That's what makes human interactions the most interesting field for study and entertainment. Life would be very dull without people.

Lue

I have read on here for a long while. I have respected your posts in the comments for your ability to see things from many angles. I think relationships can be complex and there is no one answer to any situation. Too much depends on the people involved and their behavior and wants during whatever crisis they are in. Many of the people who make comments can't see beyond what they would want or need. So as someone who has read who has read thousands of comments and posted a handful. Thank you for bringing some sanity to the comments section of LW.

In hopes of adding perspective without fanning the flames of disagreement between the author and several of his readers, I would like to try to add a comment based on real life experience not conjecture.

My wife and I had a long and full marriage (35 + years) before she passed away.

We were married very young and within the first two years my wife had "buyers remorse" (I guess) and began an affair with an old boyfriend. We had had our first child and my wife was being a stay at home mom at that point. I was young,clueless, working hard at my job and totally self absorbed in trying to be a husband.

Like Brian in this story I was completely stunned and devastated when she dropped her affair on me. Shock, anger, sorrow, more anger, more sorrow followed. She said at the time that it was over and "wasn't serious and hadn't gone too far" . She said she had "stopped it before it did become serious". She said she hadn't been able to live with her guilt and had to tell me.

To be honest I didn't demand much detail at the time (thank God) because the betrayal alone was painful enough and the sordid details would only inflame my anger. I knew it would probably lead to violence against the guy, a divorce and loss of my daughter. Since she swore that it hadn't "gone too far" I decided to try to believe her, control my anger and see if I had any capability tor forgiveness.

After a brief separation and counseling we resumed our marriage.

Did she ever regain my complete trust (?) - NO

Was she ever able to explain why she did it (?) - NOT REALLY, only in the usual convoluted way cheaters (male and female) try to rationalize themselves.

Could she ever explain why she even told me about it since she had gotten away with it ? - NO

Did she ever cheat again ? - NOT TO MY KNOWLEDGE

Did her infidelity change my love for her ? - YES (for many years thereafter)

Was she a good wife, mother & grandmother ? - YES (she worked hard to be the best)

Do I still love her ? ABSOLUTELY & ALWAYS

IN CONCLUSION: It's Brian's choice how he deals with it. Not Ashley's !!

You don't know till you've been there.

I have not read the other comments on thus - at least not yet, so forgive me if I repeat anything anyone else says.

Joe, I'm not used to reading something like a character study from you, so first Kudos there to you for this attempt, as incomplete and undeveloped as it is. It almost seems like you intended for this to be a relationship failure from the beginning so you could, as a writer, say "see? This is what happens when people try to be honest with each other about issues of infidelity."

Sorry, but if that was the premise of your story, then you missed several vitally important things along the way. First, if she were really willing to go to the mat and really fight for their marriage, family, and relationship, then SHE WOULD HAVE SOUGHT COUNSELLING FOR HERSELF, ALONE...and she didn't. How could she answer the "why" questions to _his_ satisfaction if she could not even answer them for herself to her own satisfaction? Leaving that part of the story unexplored is a significant character failure on HER part (leaving the infidelity itself aside for the moment). So, her lack of self-aware curiosity in not seeking her own answers on that rather pivotal questions seems...amiss, for starters.

Next however, you draw the husband as some kind of inflexible ball of neurotic energy seething with self doubt, and driven to emotionally marriage-suicidal self-doubt about his wife's straying. Wow, has the man no strengths of character to turn to? That too seems to defy logic. After all, how would he have attracted her in the first place if this was all there were to his character? He was just written as so poorly one-dimensional a character that his responses were un-believable...and I mean that in the suspension-of-disbelief sense that all readers must be able to achieve in order to find a story truly engaging.

So, in sum, Joe, I have to say that while I appreciate this attempt on your part to reach into areas of emotional depth to which you seem obvious unaccustomed, I have to say that you missed the most significant parts of the nature of a character study - doing the actual _study_ part; as in , having your characters explore their emotional situations with their full and complete awareness of who and what they are - and having them struggle to understand their own internal why's for how they are reacting to their situation as they are.

Lastly, neither one of your characters answered the eternal, essential questions of choice: Do I continue to react emotionally as I have to all this, or do I choose to overcome myself and my reactions and reach for something better (or just different) where I can again achieve happiness despite all this? This is the essential question from which character studies derive their sense of drama, and without this, no character study like this can really succeed.

But only a study of the wife. Because everyone else in the story is seen through her eyes.

Cheatsheet for cheaters -- I cheated on you. It was meaningless. Please forgive me. I love only you. It is now up to you.

You said adversity reveals our character.

Well it reveals yours. You said you were weak. But, because your husbnd had a time forgiving you, you called him weak, and refused to have him back.

You said your husband wasn't willing to work on your marriage. He came back, didn't he ??

I would have forgive him if the situation was reversed ???

I called bullshit.

THIS STORY IS SELF JUSTIFICATION OF A SELFISH CHEATING WIFE'S ACTION.

I to would never be able to see past it. I think it was a good real life story but I can't agree it is both their faults. It was her actions and decisions to not be able to live with herself that lead to her confession. She never gave the details like he wanted and that would also make him think all the worst possible case scenarios. I feel it all is her fault . How would she expect him to believe that it was the first or last time. If she ever went away again how could she convince him she didn't fuck that same guy or someone else. She actually destroyed him and the live of all involved especially her daughter, immediate family and her husband and his self confidence and ego . She could've told him he was 15 years older smaller and although it felt good as it was happening it was nowhere near how it feels with him and how dirty you felt and disgusted by your drunk actions. That wouldn't be enough for me but maybe him. I would also need to know names and his family life and where he lived. In reality and I hope I'm not disrespecting anyone but I feel she is a cheating selfish arrogant cunt. The only quality that I commend is that she felt she owed it to hubby to come clean even though guilt was part of it. Fucking someone is not a mistake you have to put effort into build up , going somewhere to do it , undressing, dropping to your knees to grab a strangers cock to suck or your tongue on her pussy. To let him in your pussy ass mouth or to put your dick in those places so cheating is an effort in itself. I feel even the emonitional build up is cheating enough for trust to be broken. Sorry for rant on this character in a good story

My comment will not be to popular for anybody at all.

It is not difficult to look at this story as a simple example for such cheater women who are not serial cheaters. They had a sort time (from 1 event case to 1-2 months time) "adventure" and the husband and aquantances (collegues, relatives, neighbores and friends) do not know anything about it. The cheating has not any consequence as DNA test negative kid or STDs. Should the wife reveal the once happened cheating to the clueless husband, if the wife wants her marriage with husband to be intact for the sake of the kid(s) and she will not cheat more (This is important the majority of the serial cheaters can not hide their daliance for a long time (some exceptions only).)

1. According to the freedom POV, the cheater wife stole the freedom of the husband to decide about his future, if she does not tell the truth. Because the husband lost some decision possibilities about his past and future.

1.1. What does the past mean for the husband? The husband was faithful and he did not look for extramarital activity not to know about his wife's cheating. (I think this idea is not too popular here, but this could be a consequence of the freedom POV!)

What does the future mean for the husband?

1.2. Divorce (sometime after 10 years).

1.3. Reconcilation.

2. According to Swinger Joe the answer is simple NO, NO, NO!!!! THE FREEDOM IS DANGEROUSE!

Good story to think of the cheating question again!

So we don't know what was really going on in Brian's head. We only know what Ashley SAYS was going on in Brian's head.

We don't know if Brian would rather not have known about a one-time, never-to-be-repeated failure on Ashley's part.

We don't know if his reason for not wanting to see a therapist really was that he would be viewed badly; could be he just figured that if Ashley wasn't going to be honest with him she wouldn't be any better with a therapist.

And most of all, we don't know if Brian really couldn't have eventually forgiven Ashley and come to trust her again, though I tend to think she's right on this one point because she was still insisting on withholding the answers to Brian's questions.

In my opinion, it's TRUST. Once you break it, it's very difficult to get it back. Can one survive a marriage once trust is gone? Yes, but it's going to take some work and time, a year or more, maybe forever. Communication is going to be a major factor in survival, because without it, there will always be doubt.

I'll probably get creamed for saying this, but she would have been better off, never ever mentioned her indiscretion. I wonder why that observation hasn't ever been explored here.It's been over a decade since I put words on paper, maybe just maybe I'll give it a shot exploring that issue. Swingerjoe, you wrote an entertaining story and I thank you for it. Not going to bash anything about it, the issues are being well covered by others.Thank you for the entertainment. (signed ML)

The problem with Ashley keeping her secret to herself is that it isn't much of a story. I actually wrote a story (Getting Even) where a wife kept her infidelity a secret, but the husband found out about it after she died. I thought about writing the prequel to that story, but everyone would know how it would end. I like to keep readers guessing.

Thanks, as always, for your comment.

Like this story, it would all be taking place inside Ashley's head. An unknowing Brian cruising through life in what he thinks is a happy, monogamous marriage, but anytime something happens, like Brian commenting on one of their neighbors divorcing a spouse for cheating or some politician's affair being outed on TV, a guilty Ashley worries that this is the day he will start to get suspicious and her secret will come out. Sort of the reverse of a story in which the cheated on husband is constantly worrying about whether his wife is cheating on him again.

An ironic ending might be Ashley, unable to contain her guilt any longer, having a "telltale heart" kind of emotional explosion, only to learn that Brian had known about the affair all along and had chosen to "go along" with her decision to keep it to herself and had remained silent about it because he knew she had ended it and hadn't strayed again.

Joe's story here has done something genuinely worthwhile, beyond the usual thrust and parry entertainment of Loving Wives commentaries. It has drawn out a few commenters who have given real-life examples of their own reactions to being in Brian's situation.

The most recent is the Anonymous comment 'Twisted Logic (Again)' explaining the pain and long-term effect of that feeling of 'betrayal'. The fact is that, no matter what approach is taken by the two partners, the relationship is changed forever.

I would hope the relationship could be changed for the better by both partners having a learning experience. But that is rarely the case. As the recent Anonymous comment makes clear, trust destroyed takes a long time to recover.

Thank you Anonymous for that contribution.

Lue

Very well written. Well told, but I just feel empty. I guess that it is really good, for regardless of the type of emotion, the story pulled the emotion of sadness out of me.

She made two: she cheated and she refused to take him back. He found himself in a place where he couldn't live with her, but decided to try in the end. She found herself in the same place, but she decided to give up.

It's a thinly veiled attempt to convince the reader that the husband's inability to deal with the wife's infidelity is a fatal character flaw. How he reacts to her betrayal is portrayed as being worse than the original act. She vows unconditional love and then decides to ditch him because he can't seem to get over what she did. Her hypocrisy knows no bounds . . .

That cheaters are delusional thinkers. Not that I really needed to be convinced.

The husband does indeed seem to have psychological issues to be dealt with . . . but even if it was the author's intent to make these pre-existing traits, in reality, it would be tough to know if an insecurity, stubbornness, or other trait was pre-existing or not if they surface after a major trauma.

Let me give a couple of examples:

1) Someone you know is out hiking and gets attacked by a wild or rabid dog, and escapes but is severely injured and in the hospital for a while. Now after your friend is out, he suddenly seems to have a fear of dogs, and is hesitant to walk alone. Would you say something like, "Before the incident he loved animals, especially dogs, but apparently a fear of them that we'd never seen before started to emerge." or "Before he was confident and seemed to be very secure in hiking alone. Now apparently old insecurities were brought forth."

WRONG!!! You don't say these things because with a lick of common sense, you'd realize that these weren't necessarily old fears and insecurities you'd never seen before . . . they were just as likely new fears and insecurities resulting from the traumatic event.

2) A woman while jogging is grabbed by three men and thrown into the trunk of a car and driven around for over and hour. She manages to escape and get help, but there is some psychological damage. What would would you say to someone who claimed, "You know, she used to love spelunking, and had no trouble with tight spaces, but I guess deep down she must have had some claustrophobia that was now resurfacing, because now she hates caving and any enclosed spaces."

Don't you want to scream, "No, you moron, it was the kidnapping that brought this on!! She was in a trunk for over a hour!!"

What would you think in either of these cases if, a year later, the man in the first case still had his fear of dogs, and the woman in the second case was still claustrophobic, and both were insecure about being alone, but both wanted to deal with their fears . . . Would you say, "Hey, it's been a year, you should have gotten over it earlier!! It's too late to get help." Hopefully not.

But this is what Ashley does, she decides the timeline for his 'recovery'. If he doesn't meet that timeline, then she decides his trauma is to deep, and that he had pre-existing insecurities. No reasonable, decent person can make those determinations.

Now, swingerjoe is a pretty good and creative writer in my opinion. Good enough that I think something really neat has happened (and this does happen to creative writers) . . . his creations may have usurped his intent a bit. He wanted to write from a woman's viewpoint, and I believe he was trying to make her out to be loving, fair, relatively patient, and reasonable, but a woman who'd made a terrible decision . . . and the husband was to be seen as having pre-existing hidden insecurities, as well as a (perhaps) stubborn streak . . . but as written, the characters are not necessarily like that.

If the cheating was as traumatic to the husband as it was written to be, then it is presumptuous to assume old insecurities and stubborn streaks that she didn't know about were now surfacing. Further, to then say 'It's too late.' when he finally starts to get a grip and offers reconciliation, is, in my mind, as bad or worse than her earlier betrayal (and she thinks he's stubborn???).

What was left out, IF she'd been reasonable, was a very simple response to his offer. Ashley could have said something like, "Nothing would make me happier, but we both need to get some therapy. Me to find out how I could do such a thing, and you to help your realize it was my fault, not yours, and that we both may now have issues THAT DID NOT EXIST BEFORE that we have to work on. If you are now ready to try this, maybe somehow we can save this love and this family. I don't think it's possible unless we get help, first individually, and later together."

Chances are, over the year that had gone by, that he had done some research, and started to realize that these things happen, and that there's nothing wrong in getting help. But no, he didn't meet Ashley's timeline for 'getting over it' and her blame-shift was that he had all these (undesirable) 'traits' surfacing that she'd never realized he'd had.

Ashley did a clever end-around on her creator in this case, making what should have been a sensitive, loving, deeply wanting-her-family-but-almost-despairing "woman's" viewpoint, and turning it into an insensitive, cruel, blame-shifting, judgmental view, before swingerjoe realized what she'd done! Further, her husband, as written, sort of helped pull this off. (At least, that's how it seems to me!)

Excellent comment!

A couple of minor things. In HIS case, at least, it doesn't really matter whether his insecurities were already there or not! Even if they WERE there, they were apparently buried far enough that they weren't noticeable until her actions brought them out.

As you say, it may have been her POV, but the story as written would have been a mild BTB if written from the husband's POV. A quick outline:

I thought we had a happy marriage.

Ashley went on a business trip.

A few weeks later she told me she fucked the guy she was meeting with.

I was crushed, I thought we had the perfect marriage!

I asked her to tell me about it. She refused, said that "I didn't need to know, it wasn't important."

How the fuck can SHE know what I need to know, what's important to ME"

She wants us to get "counseling!" Yeah., I know those counselors work. By the time they get through they'll have me begging her to do it again. No thank you very much!

Now she wants us to separate. I have some "character flaws!" I guess it's a character flaw to not be able to accept your wife's infidelity! She actually compared her cheating to my driving home drunk one time!

God I miss Haley, even Ashley.

This separation was a big financial drain on both of us and I know Ashley is stressed by caring for Haley all by herself.

I made a decision. I was going to try to work things out.

What doe the bitch do? She told me that SHE could no longer live with ME and wants a divorce!

She says that her "love" for me was unconditional, and she would have forgiven me if the situation was reversed. What a laugh! How can she possibly know what she would do? She can't even forgive my failure to forgive HER infidelity, so how could she possibly forgive an actual infidelity?

I'm probably going to get screwed by the courts, but I'm going to fight with everything I have for Haley and me.

Obviously, if I was actually writing this I would have to figure out the ending: Would they somehow reconcile? How bitter would the divorce be? Etc.

BTW, I had missed THIS gem! - "After several months had passed, Brian seemed to realize all of the damage his decision had caused" - HIS decision?? Not her CHEATING???

I think you two have convinced me that you understand these characters better than I do!

Sbrooks, your story from Brian's perspective is spot-on. The problem is that I've read that story already. 1,001 times. It's the story about the flawless husband married to the selfish and amoral bitch who can't be trusted to keep her legs together. Been there, read that.

I wanted to finally give a voice to all the cheating wives in this category who often never get a single line of dialog to explain themselves. That's why I wrote it from her perspective. Those who commented that we're only seeing one side of the story are right. That's done on purpose.

This story is also a response to those who shout "divorce her ass!" the moment infidelity occurs. There are consequences to that knee-jerk reaction just as there are consequences to infidelity. Ashley gave Brian more than a year to come to grips with it and learn to begin to trust her again. She begged him to go to counseling. She offered to give up all her passwords and track herself by GPS. She did everything she could to keep her family together.

By the time Brian finally begrudgingly offered to give her a second chance it was too late. He had already proven that he could never trust her again. He didn't want to return for her or to restart their marriage. He was returning because he was lonely and going broke.

There are so many interesting comments on this story, it is sparking ideas for several other stories!

Seriously. We've seen numerous accounts of it taking years.

Amazing❗ Quite a few had interesting and valid points.

@sdc97230... I believe OHIO actually wrote that story. The husband knew about his wife having and ending the affair. He continued the story as the years passed and focused on it's effect. An entertaining story.

Swingerjoe, the wife impressed me by her actions(disastrous, wrong). She cheated, then refused to explain, refused to give details. Then she blamed the husband for taking time to reconcile her acts and their marriage. I thought it was an obviously one-sided story, against the wife.

Thank you again for the drama, I liked it alot😄😭.

AMerryman

I think the problem is, you wrote it from the wife's POV, but you STILL managed to write her as at LEAST selfish if not amoral.

I think you were fine up to her confession.

But then, you should have shown her as more compassionate and sensitive to his feelings. When he asked for details, take the risk and tell him, ideally the softened version that I used. Maybe he still wants more, maybe he still can't handle it. That's on him.

As for counseling, she could have suggested that HE choose the counselor, Maybe he has divorced friends who can suggest a man-friendly, or at least non anti-man counselor.

I don't think you needed to show him as having problems, just because she's not evil!

So, I should have had her provide all of the details, convince Brian to go to counseling together, have her come to fully understand why she cheated, throw herself upon the mercy of the court, and eventually regain at least some of Brian's lost trust and love over the course of 10-15 years?

BO-RING!

Ha. I like my ending better. But hey, if you want to pick up the ball and run with it from here, you have my blessing.

I have friends who have told me what their counseling sessions have been like, and it always sounds to me like people sitting around and rehashing the obvious. Because the reason why people need counseling is usually that they can't see what should be obvious.

Swinger, before you get mad realize I gave this story a 4 and consider it good. I do have a few comments on the wife's inconsistent attitude.

Quote: "I don't know what more I can do, but I'm willing to do whatever it takes to fight for this marriage and keep our family together." No she wouldn't. She would not tell him about the cheating, the one thing he asked her to do. Realistically, if she told the truth it may have been worse. But she could have lied to spare the husband. It still may not have made a difference. But she is lying here saying she will do anything to save the marriage but refusing to try.

Quote: "You have all the power to make that decision." She had the same decision(s): Not cheat - She did. Not tell husband - She did. Be honest and respectful enough to answer questions fully - She would not.

Quote: "Now the ball is in your court. Now the fate of our marriage rests in your hands. I'll do whatever it takes to regain your trust." Just another lie.

Quote: "His decision not to fight for our family made me realize that our priorities were drastically different. My love for him was unconditional, and I would have done whatever it took to forgive him if the situation were reversed." Not true - It was conditional. H and W could have grown old together. They were married 9 years and H's personality was not a problem to W and only became so when she cheated on him and was too weak not to have to tell him about it. She loved him conditionally. He even came back and wanted to try for the sake of the child but W's love was so conditional she refused.

In reality, telling H the truth of how good W's cheating was would not have been helpful but it is being pointed out to show how selfish and inconsistent W was in her behavior and attitude. At the end, coming clean would not have made the situation worse. It couldn't get worse.

anon.1

I gave Joe a 4 for this because I thought it captured the selfish rationalizing of a cheater well. If we could score the characters, I'd give Brian a 3 because he was the innocent party but missed obvious opportunities to resolve things decisively and ultimately ended up letting Ashley's​ bad decisions determine the outcome. Ashley would get the one bombs, for cheating, dumping the burden on Brian and being willing to do nothing that Brian needed her to do after promising to do anything. Her telling of this story is . nothing but one lie after another, both to her husband and to the reader.

I thought the story was well written but an unfortunate look on the way divorce works in our society. I thought the character of the wife was self centered and self serving. I felt her attitude was more intolerant than his and yet she made him share the blame for their failed marriage when it never would have happened except for the wife's infidelity. If the authors vision was to make you hate the wife, he did a great job! All her final decision does is confirm everything the husband felt! She was never really that serious about their marriage!

I'm not saying that there should be a reconciliation. Just that the attempt to show her as a more sympathetic character than the norm fell short, in my most humble opinion.

So it's a character study of a self-serving, delusional character.

Expecting Ashley's story told from her POV to make her more sympathetic would be like reading Hannibal Lector's autobiography and expecting it to convince you he was innocent of all his murders.

I agree, SB, it was her viewpoint explaining not only what she did, but also her guilt at having done it. Joe's story gave little or no explanation of why she committed adultery, only making the point that it was out of character.

As you and I have discussed before, there is a qualitative difference between an explanation and an excuse. However, I can't recall an occasion on which I have seen you try to understand an explanation of something like what Ashley did, and there's no way you would ever accept an excuse for it.

To me, it was a story of a woman failing to explain to her husband her regret and her wish to make amends. Picking up her words saying "I'll do anything" and then demonstrating that she didn't merely shows that the husband-wife relationship was so poor that they couldn't negotiate an "anything" that both could accept.

Lue

As far as explanations and excuses go, there can be explanations that excuse, most of them involving date rape drugs or mental illness. But in the absence of such influences, when one commits a serious breach of faith or trust, the thing to do afterwards is not to seek excuses, but ways to make amends.

In Ashley's case, it's impossible to even try to understand her explanation, since she herself doesn't seem to even know what it is.

My error, I wrongly addressed the comment. Then I confused the past comments as well. My apologies to you both.

Lue

I just saw your comment that your prior one was misdirected, but I still feel that this is pertinent!

I freely admit to an extremely low tolerance for cheating.

But the question to ME isn't whether I would have accepted her reasons/explanation but whether I felt that she made a good faith effort to get BRIAN to accept them!

By refusing to answer his questions because SHE deemed them unimportant she failed in that regard. Now, it's true that Brian may not have accepted her answers, or demanded more and more detail until she told him something that he couldn't recover from; but MAYBE he would have, and that might have been the opening to recover their marriage. She never gave them that chance.

Similarly with the counseling. She COULD have offered to go to counseling for herself, to see if she can discover WHY she cheated, and hopefully be able to show how it couldn't/wouldn't happen again. If she still feels that THEY need counseling she can encourage HIM to find a counselor that he feels will be fair to him.

@sdc97230 - No, not innocent, she obviously cheated, but my understanding was that Joe wanted to create a more sympathetic character than we usually see in the male POV stories, and I think he largely succeeded until her confession, at which point she became very self-centered and UNsympathetic, about the way she would have been portrayed if the story was told from Brian's point of view.

Well, swingerjoe, we can only judge based on the personalities as presented throughout the story and at the end point. At the end, about one year later, several judgements have been made that struck me as premature for only the first year. Such judgements on her part smack of impatience and blame-shifting.

Now, if after 3 years and some therapy, the husband's attitude still hadn't changed, then Ashley's position is tenable. We could understand her viewpoint. After just a year it comes off as whiny, selfish, blame-shifting, and even a bit cruel.

Now, the husband is your character, of course, but your statement that he would never trust her again isn't something Ashley (or anyone in your story) could know after only one year. (Hey, depending upon your mood or future experience, even you might not know this for sure . . . if you were to write more about his next two years, . . . he might surprise you!!)

Sbrooks - you wrote: "A couple of minor things. In HIS case, at least, it doesn't really matter whether his insecurities were already there or not!"

You're right, in HIS case it doesn't . . . but I was hoping to point to her (apparent) belief (about 'insecurities' in her husband that had been 'hidden' before) to question HER conclusions . . . conclusions made under stress, prematurely, and without the benefit of therapy. Her assumptions regarding his feelings, motives, and traits now surfacing would serve to lessen her responsibilities in her mind (not alleviate, but lessen). This is the first step in allowing HER to give up on the marriage when he's finally ready to make a go of it again. This, to me, was how she managed to present as sad, regretful, and borderline despairing feelings that were actually impatient and even perhaps somewhat vindictive, while attempting to avoid full responsibility by subtly casting a little blame on his supposedly stubborn attitude. This is why I claimed she may have fooled her creator, swingerjoe, a bit.

My son is a writer, and has mentioned times in a story when characters he created surprised him. I can't help thinking Ashley and her husband may have done this, maybe just a little, to swingerjoe. Watch your creations carefully, swinger . . . as written, I'm not sure you can trust either of 'em!!

I agree, her refusing to give him details was shitty. and probably made things worse. That's the kind of thing where had she gone (or if she goes) to the right therapist she might realize could be critical to his healing, and actually help him regain a very, very small measure of trust.

We just don't know whose thinking it is.

If swingerjoe had written the story from a third person omniscient point of view or from different points of view (Brian's as well as Ashley's), it would probably be labeled as a Matt Moreau cuck story and one-bombed when Brian wants to come back and give the marriage another try. But because he wrote it all from Ashley's point of view only, we don't know if anything Ashley tells us Brian said or did actually happened the way she says it did, and we certainly don't know if anything she tells us Brian thought or felt was real or just her projecting her own rationalizations onto him.

And then, to top it all off, he tells us that maybe some of us understand Ashley better then he does, so now we don't know if he really meant for Ashley to be a sympathetic character at all.

Shifting the blame. The old if you love me you will forgive me ploy. Attack his character for not forgiving.

Over 200 comments. Impressive. Now, I resent the fact that in the end it was his fault. Nothing else to say.

I realize this story might not appeal to everyone. I feel it was insightful and well written and deserved a higher score so I give it a four. Though noble, confessing this one-time indiscretion was a mistake. Because you can't handle the guilt you unload it on your mate but expect him to be able to bear the burden. On top of that you ultimately come to the conclusion that it is his fault and not yours that the marriage failed. You were right about one thing...he is better off without you.

and if she ended up on survivinginfidelity.com a truly repentant cheater would have kicked her ass.

It is a good story, but only one bad decision ruined the8r marriage, hers. She broke it, it would be up to Brian to decide if he wanted to try and repair it.

Since she's not willing to do the hard, painful work to figure out why she cheated, he's better off without her. She's likely to cheat again.

Another plug for survivinginfidelity.com, it's a terrible place to have to go to, but it can really help cheaters and the cheated on.

A very difficult situation. Choosing to use the woman's point of view made her arguments sound very self-serving at the end of the story. BUT, if the facts are as she made them out to be, then it is Brian that's to blame for his daughter not growing up with two parents.

His concern about what other people will think should not be the priority when considering his daughter's future happiness.

Though I typically am for honesty, in this case swallowing her guilt and vowing to never repeat her error would have been better.

once a cheater always a cheater