SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

To continue the conversation without further TJing Gemmy's thread...

DRSOOLERS:

See, the problem we have here is a massive contradiction: we are essentially being told, "Don't trust my words or actions from when I was privately discussing my actual thoughts, wants, and feelings. Instead, only trust my statements now that I've been caught out and proven to be a liar."

​So, when waywards are caught texting their APs, claiming they are masturbating over thoughts of how amazing their sex was—are we supposed to believe those were all lies? Or were they actually self-pleasing, but somehow only doing it for the "validation"? Sexting is extraordinarily common in affairs. If it really is all just about validation, are we honestly expected to believe they never truly self-pleased? Or can we be serious adults and admit the organs... The sex... Ahs somewhat of a role. At least often.

I understand what you're saying, and I can see why you would have a hard time trusting the words of a caught WS...

One thing I think is pertinent is that there's a difference between being turned on by another person (finding them sexy/reactive libido,) being turned on by being found/feeling sexy (which a lot of women need to even experience a desire for sex), and just being turned on in general (spontaneous libido)... What you hear often on SI is "the AP could have been anyone," and that applies here too. I think it's quite easy for WS to idealize the AP in their minds-- really make them into someone they're not-- because it's all fantasy. It's often not the AP themselves, but the idea that the WS has of them in their heads, and the way that idealized person makes the WS feel.

So, in some scenarios it's that the WS is given validation and "thinks of England" during the sex, which they have to keep the validation coming. In others, it's that the AP makes them feel sexually validate/sexy, and they experience reactive libido, and the AP just becomes an outlet for it. In others... The WS values both the sex and the validation, or just the sex.

Nuance.

Please feel free to let this thread wander away from the topic at hand as the conversation naturally progresses, as I'm not here looking for support but interested in pursuing potentially useful discussions and furthering understanding.

[This message edited by GotTheMorbs at 8:15 PM, Wednesday, July 1st]

It’s an interesting topic.

My only comment so far is this:

being turned on by being found/feeling sexy (which a lot of women need to even experience a desire for sex)

I mostly only experience this kind of arousal. It can come from feeling loved or appreciated but this is what I respond sexually to. I also am turned on by knowing what my husband likes and being the provider of it or slipping in surprises and seeing his reaction but mostly it’s all about me, my performance, etc. I think Esther Pearl wrote about this? I don’t agree with everything that she says but this combined with "wanting to meet a different version of oneself" as a motivator for an affair both hit the nail for me.

The validation for me was that someone was believing my version, after all it’s like you said people who have affairs often project things onto each other. I liked the feeling of being someone different. The fantasy for me was about me.

I'll move my post over here because it was a bit of a thread jack and will likely get lost in the sea of replies happening over in Gemmy's thread. This topic is hard on my mind because my wife and I had a discussion about this just the other day and it's been stuck in my craw.

My wife admitted that she wanted the sex as much as the validation. Maybe even more than the validation. Which makes logical sense because we had been going through a pretty long dry spell. The SSRI I was on not only killed my libido, but as an added bonus gave me anorgasmia (raises hand as a male who's faked orgasms).

I'm still trying to figure out which "reason" hurts more, or if it even matters. What really kills me is, I could have researched and found out much sooner that the SSRI was causing my issues instead of aging and gotten off of it much sooner. My wife also went through menopause at around the same time and never once complained about the lack of sex. As far as I knew, she'd lost interest as many women do when going through that. I had chalked it all up to "I guess this is what happens when some couples get older."

Boy, was I wrong. Menopause had the opposite effect on my wife. Her libido was supercharged while mine disappeared. She was/is craving it constantly. Meanwhile, I was suffering from well documented (but hardly ever mentioned by prescribing Dr's) side effects of SSRIs. Some real great communication we had, huh?

It took a couple of years for some of the more persistent side effects of the SSRI to go away, and some of it still lingers. Yes, years. Look up PSSD. My libido is finally back, but the anorgasmia only started letting up within the last year, and that's gone from not being able to climax at all to just taking a long time, which has actually kind of turned into a superpower.

Anyway, I'm not so sure how much the reason really matters. What really pisses me off is that we had such a serious lack of communication. I should have known. I should have known it meant that much to her. She should have talked to me about it instead of going to someone else. Maybe I should have just plain known she felt like she was in a sexual desert. I should have cared enough to ask her. I feel such a swirl of emotions and hurt over this. It's not like our sex life sucks now. It's daily, and we don't do quickies. I'm a generous lover. We got ot bed an hour and a half earlier than we need to just to budget time for it now.

I was stripped of my desire by a drug, and blamed it on getting older or low T or something, and she never really blinked an eye. I never turned her down or said "no," but I had always initiated. I just slowly kind of stopped initiating, and she never really reacted to it. At least not with me, but she jumped on the first guy who came along and started tossing compliments her way.

It's been over a year, and by every metric pretty much everything has improved between us, especially sex, but goddamnit if I can't get it out of my head that my wife, who was a virgin when we met, let another man pleasure her. It fucking kills me sometimes.

Well done, Morbs. Thank you.

Pogre,

It's easy to get caught up in the "should haves," and I feel your pain there. (Mine looks like, "I should have considered what might be affecting his libido and not taken personally...I should have asked him about it. I should have been more persistent.I should have known he knew about the A and that was causing him to withdarw further.").. As always, it's not your fault, and I'm sorry you're hurting. It will probably just take you some time to accept the "didn'ts," if that makes any sense, but I think it helps to focus on what you know now and what will be different going forward.

Experience can be such a cruel teacher.

[This message edited by GotTheMorbs at 10:11 PM, Wednesday, July 1st]

No one is stopping their affair at secret meetings for afternoon tea.

I agree Pogre I am not sure it really matters what was gotten from it. Especially since so much more was lost than gained. I hear you.

I have been accused here of only believing that we fall under my specific pattern. I do not think that at all. I do think I speak about my story and experience which is specific, but telling about my experiences doesn’t mean I only believe that the validation piece or the losing yourself piece exists.

What I do believe is that a large portion of ws have similiar traits to varying degrees of extreme. We are avoidant, we lack communication skills, we lack self awareness, we are either overly selfish or overly unselfish, we tend to be insecure, sometimes codependent, and we do not self regulate well.

I want to clarify something from the other thread foreverlabeled explained this recently in a way I have failed to…

I do not think I had an affair because I was broken. I had an affair because I was underdeveloped. In many skills. In values. I never have seen myself as broken, just exhausted of circumstances that I willingly and fully admit were mostly self created.

And I think there is a distinct pattern for anyone to heal whether you are a bs or a ws.

That ingredient is self compassion. And sometimes being as far out as I am my own self compassion being reflected in other ws could understandably be triggering for some. I am not sure what to do with that because I like coming here to hopefully help someone.

And typically the main ingredient in healing a marriage is compassion for each other. That’s why that first year is hardly ever reconciliation. Both people have to heal using the self compassion first because that’s when they will have it for each other.

So yes, I do believe in similarities and patterns. But I do know not every ws is going to do the work, and maybe further from redeeming themselves, if they ever even do. But one thing is for sure, there is a chance of that happening. Only the bs themselves can decide to take that risk. Another good reason to delay the idea of reconciliation—-to assess the risk you must first observe the data for a long period of time.

I think over time, either you will come to understand and accept or you won’t, and you will have someone who has gained the skills and sense of values that you can rebuild with or you won’t. Neither divorce or reconciliation is a wrong answer.

I think this reads as accurate to me, Morbs. I think you've offered here an expansion on my point rather than contradicting it; Perhaps a deeper clarification of what I was trying to say. You are providing the exact psychological framework that explains why the "validation only" script is such a dishonest rewrite of history in many cases. (I'll take your advice and keep adding in these sorts of clarifiers)

Your point about reactive libido is particularly deep. If a person needs to feel intensely desired in order to experience sexual desire, then the validation and the sex are completely inseparable. The validation is the friction required to spark the fire. But here is the crucial distinction: once that fire is lit, they are still actively participating in, pursuing, and enjoying the heat.

I also want to touch on your observation that "the AP could have been anyone." While it's true that in a fantasy-driven affair, the specific partner is often interchangeable—an objectified canvas for the wayward partner's ego—that interchangeability doesn't minimize the physical enjoyment. Just because the sex could have been with anyone clearly doesn't mean they aren't loving the sex they are having with this person. The fact that the partner is an idealized prop doesn't magically make the orgasms or the physical pleasure fake. Again I presume many of us when single have had this experience. We've ended up back at someone's place and had a great night of sex, it didn't really matter who with.

To me it's clear that too often When a caught wayward partner uses the post-D-Day script—"It wasn't about the sex, it was just validation"—they are attempting to retroactively extinguish the fire. They want their betrayed spouse to believe they were just standing in the room passively while the match was struck. They try to isolate the validation as a bloodless, emotional transaction so they don't have to look in the mirror and face the hedonistic selfishness of the physical reality.

As you noted, there is a massive difference between passive compliance where they "think of England" just to keep the validation coming, and an active, immersive fantasy where validation unlocks a reactive libido, resulting in intense physical pleasure, sexting, and orgasms.

The forum scripts almost always claim the former, while the evidence—the graphic texts, the atypical acts, the sheer frequency—almost always points to the latter.

You’re completely right that it comes down to nuance. Sex can be a vehicle for validation, and validation can be a trigger for sex. But we can be serious adults and admit that once the bedroom door closes, the physical pleasure is a massive part of the equation. To claim otherwise isn't historical accuracy; it's just a psychological shield against shame.

All of this said and I want to reiterate, I'm certain their will be individual cases where a wayward truly did hate or put up with the sex for compliments alone. But we see this used as an excuse all to often when the evidence points directly in the opposite direction.

On @Unhinged / Wider reference to threadjacking

If you cannot see how analyzing the validity of a wayward partner's psychological defense mechanism is pertinent to a thread explicitly written about that defense mechanism, then maybe this forum is not for you (to borrow your phrasing). Discussing the exact core topic raised by a member is the entire purpose of a support forum, not threadjacking.

Gemmy opened this thread by detailing a direct conversation with his wife. She explicitly claimed: "It wasn't about the sex, I just needed to give them that to keep them making me feel validated." He then logically deconstructed that claim, concluding that this defense transforms sex into a degrading, marketplace transaction.

My posts directly addressed that exact premise. I am analyzing whether the "validation only / sex as a transactional payment" script is a historically accurate reflection of human behavior, or if it is a psychological shield designed to mask hedonistic selfishness and avoid intense shame.

We see this type of analytical dissection on this forum every single day. For example, when a wayward partner claims they were "deeply in love with the AP," the community regularly debates the validity of that claim versus the reality of the "affair fog." Challenging a wayward partner's post-D-Day narrative isn't a distraction; it is a vital step in helping a betrayed spouse process what actually happened.

If I were to raise a topic, I would actively want poster to debate the topic I raised. Seeing both sides of an argument is precisely how one clarifies their thoughts. What would you rather. Just a ton of people responding: 'I'm sorry to hear that, stay strong' - whilst that sort of response has it's merit, it's certainly not going to help anyone in the long term.

You are entirely free to dislike my opinions or disagree with my analysis. I can accept that. If you think my reasoning is pointing Gemmy in the wrong direction, I urge you to state that emphatically. But I'd rather not have people hide behind the false accusation that my posts are irrelevant or "threadjacking" when they are explicitly tied to the exact words the original poster's wife used to justify her actions.

[This message edited by DRSOOLERS at 8:41 AM, Thursday, July 2nd]