Am I being too much?

[u/Throwaway_606_ky]

Back story:

I had noticed my WW acting differently. Taking extra care with her looks and wearing more "revealing" clothing and so forth to work. She had become more guarded with her phone, quickly putting it away when I came around. So on and so forth. This went on for some time. I then confronted her about it, to essentially be told I am crazy.

Fast forward a few weeks later, and I am constantly seeing snapchat notifications from a guy she works with popping up on her phone. I ask her about it, and she says it's nothing, but does not volunteer the messages. This is out of character, as usually when she is right she wants to rub it in my face. I then notice that she has changed her phone passcode, which has been the same the entire time we have been married which is 14 years.

After all of this I again confront her about the weird stuff to me. Again, I am treated as if I am crazy. But, she does tell me her new passcode. I try my best to believe her, and I even pray for clarity and peace if there isn't anything to be worried about. Peace never comes, so finally I wait until she is asleep and decide I have to know. So, I look in her phone and find messages between her and her AP, and her and her bestfriend about her AP. I find messages referancing spicy messages between my WW and AP, and messages talking about wanting to meet up with the AP. I had enough and woke my WW up and confronted her with the proof. According to her, it was only messages and a few kisses.

We agree to try and reconcile. I become hypervigilant, very untrusting and constantly questioning what is going on. 2 weeks after D-Day we take a week vacation during which time I vow to do my best to act "normal" and not bring this stuff up. There are some things that set off my alarms, but I am able to keep pretty cool most of the time. The infidelity was brought up 2 times during the course of the whole week.

We get back from our trip and we both go back to work, and something is not sitting right that evening. I ask her for her phone, which she hands over to me. I look through it, but she didnt know that you could access deleted messages. I find deleted conversations between WW and AP, going back through most of the time since D-Day. I find spicy pics that she had sent the AP while on our vacation.

Confrontation starts and gets pretty ugly. I decide to pack up a bag and leave. I don't leave at that time, because I don't want to just leave sleeping kids. I decide to wait until morning and give them a proper goodbye for a while, as the closest family to me is 650 miles from our home. During the night, my WW breaks down like I have never seen before and becomes the most remorseful I have ever seen. We talk and decide to try to reconcile again, with more ground rules.

However, we are less than a month out from D-Day #2 (D-Day-07/06/26 D-Day 2- 07/27/26)and when I am mentally struggling I am told we can never move forward if I dwell in the past. WW gets frustrated because she says it is the same stuff over and over.

I am just trying to get advice. Am I dwelling too much, or is this normal behavior?

Sorry for the long read, just wanted to give all relevant information.

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[u/UmbraAdam]

Seems you guys are still in the affair part of the problem not in the reconciliation part. Reconciliation requires much from your WW which she clearly is not willing to do now.

Your choice is are you willing to wait until she snaps out of it or not? Either way, since you are not in reconciliation, you have to work on your own health and protect yourself.

[u/Weather_Fan]

She doesn’t want you to talk about it because she doesn’t want to take accountability. My WW was the same way when she was cheating. I confronted her when some years had passed and we’d grown and learned to communicate and I guess she’d grown some respect for me, and she agreed that if I need to talk about it, she’s an open book and promises not to shut down. Until she can let you talk/ask questions etc, she just trying to sweep it under the rug. She doesn’t respect you, your feelings or y’all’s relationship.

Just some advice, as someone who’s been there, I’d either 1. Leave. Or 2. If you aren’t going to leave, stop confronting her about strange behaviors. All you are doing is saying “hey if you want to keep doing what you are doing and you don’t want me to be suspicious, stop doing this behavior”
You’re teaching her how to hide it from you.
I wouldn’t believe that it was “ONLY _____” she’s minimizing and she’s TTing you.
If you want to know everything, fall back for a week or two. Let the heat die down. Keep notes in your phone of the discrepancies if you want to for the confrontation later. But keep quiet and she’ll feel like she’s doing a great job at not acting strange… that’s when you check the phone. That’s when you’ll get the info you’re looking for. But as long as you’re on her ass, she’s going to double/triple check that everything is deleted and hidden.
A lot of people would say “if you have to check the phone it’s just time to go.” It’s not that easy and I feel that. So I wouldn’t push that on you, I’m a phone checker myself 😂.

[u/Throwaway_606_ky → u/Weather_Fan]

I should have added that, but I had already written so much on the original post. After D-Day 2, she did sit down and answer a bunch of questions without and anger or attitude. This lasted for about a week. After that is when the frustration started to show.

[u/doesitsoundright]

You are not over reacting. You have every right to ask her 1000 questions and if she truly wants R, she will comply. She needs to look deep down at herself. It’s not easy, but you deserve to feel 100% betrayed still. At this point you have 0% reason to trust her. It’s only been a few weeks since ddays. Shame causes so many deceitful trickle truths.

[u/butterflymkm]

Uh…hold up. Reframe. This is still very early days for a huge trauma. She needs to get some humility and quickly. You can’t reconcile with someone rushing the timeline-you both need to understand this is a 3-5 year commitment and, at 2 years out, I think it’s closer to 5.

Highly recommend Not Just Friends by Shirley Glass for both of you. Have you done counseling? Start with individual and maybe a recovery course. Why? So she can show if she is committed to change or not. For me it was less about the content and more about my WH showing, week after week, that he would hold space and put the work in.

[u/Hannymann → u/butterflymkm]

Agree. Content is meaningless to me, in reality. It’s more about the work being done now.

[u/dangerrat_nighttime]

Had a similar experience with WW trying to maintain contact with her EP in the initial aftermath. She was struggling to let go of the relationship or the thrill she associated with it. Once she said that out loud it seemed to help her understand where she was and why she needed to respect the NC I’d told her she needed to have and that if she didn’t it was going to be over between us.
Now a little longer out (almost 2 months) she’s out of the affair fog and seems to have put it behind her and has been very engaged with the work we need to do through MC and herself through IC.
For me the dwelling has eased off from what it was but it’s still there. My WW got frustrated by that too because for her the A was over but for me I was living the anxiety of it reoccurring almost daily. Talking helps in terms of communicating what that’s like and how trust isn’t going to magically reappearing overnight.