HI NOW!!! i'm not sure i agree with you that a person cannot grow and learn on their own but it sure is nice to "see" you! Hope all is going well for you!

Hi to you too! I'm doin' great, thanks for asking!
Busy, though....but a "good" busy!

Yes, you CAN learn and grow on your own, but you can only go so far by yourself...it would be like having a bunch of book knowledge but not quite knowing how to apply it, not quite putting it into practice....what good is it that way?
AND, if you are trying to learn and grow to help your marriage, I don't see how that's possible without involving your spouse from the get-go....you could be barking up the wrong tree in the meanwhile. I mean, how do you know what to do without feedback from your spouse? We're talking about marriage, a TEAM...know what I mean?

Edited to add: How do you know if what you are "learning" is what is going to be best for your marriage unless you involve your spouse?

NOW

absolutely agree.

you can only go so far,

NOW, i am NOT at all abdocating not confessing, that was the start of applying what i was learning, and we all agree confessing is not barkign up the wrong tree. true?

the years between the early stuff and then what i did 15 yrs into the marriage, i totally belived it was not harmful to not confess. i truely believed i was being a good wife during those years.

that is why i had no constant guilt eating at me. i totally thought we could have a good marriage even though he did not know about these things.

if i had not come here and learned those things with the help of all those posts from JL and so many other here, that never would have changed.

FL, what it sounds like you are saying is that you are advocating waiting until you start some sort of personal recovery before confessing...I think that is what most of the participants of this thread are objecting to...and that's the point I'm trying to make....you should BEGIN recovery with your spouse, because having an affair is not just a "personal" problem.

then lets not call it, the time between stopping an A and confessing, recovery.

call it what you want but i know i absolutely had no chance at confessing until i learned what i learned here.

i recall JL saying something about how i would come to understand that what i did while engaged and 5yrs into the marriage so much worse/more damaging when i was seeing it the opposite way. he was absolutely right, i did come to understand exactly what he meant.

a person can do what they know.

i'm ok if no one else understands what i'm saying. but i am listening to others here, like yourself, to see if something sticks. so far, i'm still at the point i was yesterday, finally able to forgive myself for not confessing the day i registered here, because i stayed here and i did learn, nothing drove me away, and i was NOT handled with kid gloves either. but i kept coming back, i learned, i grew and then i finally confessed.

sure is better than the alternative of continuing to live my life the way i was living it.

so, that's it, bottomline i'm sharing my experience. if it does not fit even one other situation, so be it.

I'll have to chime in and simply say, I don't know what I would have preferred other than that my FWH hadn't had an affair to begin with.

I can't say personally if I would have felt any better or worse had he spent 4 months agonizing over how to tell me of his betrayal.

I think, but I don't really know, that even waiting four months, would have been better than me having to find out on my own. Certainly, on d-day, the affair was freshly ended and FWH was still a bit foggy on the seriousness of his betrayal.

He still felt sorry for OW which annoyed the crap out of me.

Perhaps it would have been easier had he had time to work thru everything emotionally himself and rid himself of any guilt or remorse wasted on the OW.

I suspect that I might have felt better if he could have focused more on my feelings than either his own or OW's.

Truth is, I dunno.

Who

I think I understand now what you were trying to say....that's it in a nutshell, isn't it?
Nothing more than that, nothing less.
So it may have taken you longer than some, but the fact remains, you DID confess, you never advocated anyone waiting to confess, you were just saying that it took some learning and growing to even get to that point....is that correct?



NOW

NOW, yes, that is correct. and i do realize i was very lucky DH did not discovery anything on his own. i am glad he was spared that pain. i see what another was saying about the risk. i did the best i could. i still am.

who, thanks for sharing.

i really got to get my butt in the car and into the lab now!!

Have a great day, FL!!!!!!!!!!!!

NOW, you may be long gone by now but just in case... you have a great day too.

This is how I took it also. Not as encouragement to others to continue to lie, but her own story of what she needed to do to gain the courage to confess and to help her BH with her whole heart in it.

I think waywards that come here looking for help are still in a very fragile mindset themselves and CAN be scared away (even with something less than "wild horses"). They take that first step and reach their hand out for help in taking the next one. "We" can take their hand and help guide the way, or we can slap the hand and knock them off balance.

While "we" are not wholly responsible for their fall, we certainly weren't helpful in getting them to the next step either.

I think the key here is that a heartfelt confession and remorse from someone who is trying to recover from being a wayward is different than a wayward who simply admits what they have done/are doing.

One wants to heal and assist their BS in healing, the other wants to ease their own guilt or cause pain to their BS.

If it takes four months to prepare to confess no harm if the WS has NC with the OM, using the time to study here.

WS has learned what the BS needs, will feel, and how to recover. That when WS confesses not to be brutal, but honest, not to trickle out the truth.

I was going to stay out of this thread because after posting on a debate board for many years I really don't have any desire to debate any longer.

As many of you know I waiting 15 months before I confessed. In those 15 months I went from the thinking I was going to "take the A to the grave" to fully understanding why I needed to confess.

I was working hard on changing our marriage, my DH was following right along and our marriage was improving. My DH will still admit had I not confessed he would have never known and I probably would have "gotten away with it".

I learned in those 15 months that if I didn't tell him we would not have a solid foundation to build our marriage on and it would have been built on deceit and lies. This is something I did not believe for a long time.

I will admit I was not going to tell and didn't all that time for selfish reasons and fear. I will also say had I not gotten my head on straight before I confessed our marriage probably would not have survived. It would have been the same had I been caught because I was very much like Lino's and Eyeofthestorm's WW's (not picking on you 2 just stating a fact). My entitlement would have driven me right out the door and I would not have focused on my DH.

In parts of this thread I see a lot of black and white thinking (something I use to be very guilty of until I went to therapy). The black and white of it is, Yes WS's should confess and they should do it right away, but the gray of it for me is I had to get my head on straight before I could even consider it.

I'm not saying the way I did it was the right way, but I did do it the way I thought I needed to. My DH and I have discussed this and we both know that had I not dealt with my personal issues and had my head on straight before my confession our marriage would not be what it is now.

Because I was able to deal with my issues before I confessed and truly understand why it was so important allowed me to put my baggage aside and do what I needed to do to help my DH.

I also know our recovery period didn't start until my confession and yes, it probably would have been better to start recovery sooner, but in the end it worked out for us.

FL, I know exactly what you are saying. It's not about continuing to lie, it's about getting to a place where you can confess.

WhoMe,

Your post pretty much says what I did, it just took me a long time to get to the point of being able to set my stuff aside.

LC

lc, this is the main issue as I see it. Recovery is impossible until the truth comes out. Honesty is the first step in recovery. A wayward has the same mentality as a addict, and honesty is always the first step towards recovery. Without honesty, recovery is simply impossible. Personal recovery and marital recovery. That is a simple true fact. Some might take longer to get to the treatment center than others, but recovery does not begin until they get there.

I suspect you would have recovered sooner if you HAD told your H the truth sooner rather than later.

My main concern is and will remain the best interest of the BS and the marriage. It is always in the best interest of the BS to find out at the earliest opportunity so he can protect himself. Every day the truth is withheld is another lie added to the mix. Nor does the marriage have a CHANCE until the truth is known. The truth is the solution to adultery, not more lies, not more deceit.

It is also in the best interest of the WS to confess the truth, because that is how recovery begins.

What scares me about FLTH's angle is she rationalizes that seeking "personal growth" [which is impossible without honesty] is an excuse to delay telling the truth to her victim. I know how a wayward mind works and telling waywards something like this is nothing more than handing them a license to deceive and betray. Even a half wit con artist can figure that out.

It could take years to achieve the right level of "personal growth" using such a standard. Or it may never happen! A wayward mind will look for anything to avoid facing the consequences.

Waywards are always looking for ways out of telling the truth and I view this tactic as more of the same.

The bottom line is that the BS deserves the truth regardless of the level of "personal growth" of the WS. It is the right thing to tell him without delay. His right to know supercedes the perceived "personal growth" of the wayward. While the WS is working on her "personal growth" the BS can work on protecting himself from her. That is his right.

No one has a right to take that away from him and deny him the facts of his own life when he is being harmed behind his back. I would also point out the fogged out WS is the LEAST QUALIFIED to determine what is in the best interest of the BS. They are the least objective, the least clear thinking and clearly do not have the best interests of the BS at heart. Only the BS is qualified to determine what is in his own best interest.

This is a forum that encourages and facilitates honesty and recovery. Continued lying to one's victim is in direct contradiction with that purpose. As Dr. Harley has stated: HONESTY IS THE SOLUTION TO ADULTERY, NOT MORE DECEIT.

Here is what stands out to me about this thread...

It isn't about the fact that most of us know that a WS will not usually confess right away...Most folks realize that a WS that does confess takes time to get to that point...

What I found off-putting is that it seemed [to ME] that FLTH was holding up her BAD behavior as a GOOD example...I don't see the point of doing that...

She is long past confessing to her husband, and so it appeared [to ME] to be an effort at stirring things up based on her feelings about Brooke's situation...She's clearly had a bone to pick for several days now-her multiple callouts of other board members, along with hostile posts on another thread have demonstrated that in my eyes...

Just callin' 'em like I sees 'em...

Mrs. W

IMO, this is true of ACTIVE waywards. But what about the ones just beginning to come out of the fog and beginning to realize what has happened around them?

Please don't get me wrong....I am not advocating lying. Just further delving into a subject that is not right/wrong or black/white.

I agree that true recovery cannot begin until the truth is shared. Often at the times of confession/admittance the wayward is not recommited to the marriage.

What would BS prefer to hear:

1) I was unfaithful and I'm not sure I want to continue the M, I don't know what I feel, I don't know if we can make it (confusion, hurt, defensiveness, withdrawal from OP, etc)

2) I was unfaithful and I am so sorry for what I have done to you. I want to commit to us, I want to love you. What I've done is a mistake, what can I do to make it up to you? (honest remorse, honest fears, honest hopes, honest commitment, honest care for the BS)

I don't know that a WS going off half-cocked just to get the confession off their chest is good for either the WS or the BS.

I believe that a WS cannot be completely honest with a BS until they are completely honest with themselves. There's no switch that says "wayward" and it goes off an on and when the switch is OFF they know exactly what to do.

Eye of the beholder, I guess. I didn't see that at all.

That's okay wildhorses, I've noticed that you and I rarely see things the same way...It's cool...

Mrs. W

I view a WS that hasn't told the TRUTH as an ACTIVE wayward...Kinda of like a "dry drunk" imo...

Mrs. W

I look at this from a slightly different angle. My advice to someone who is debating whether and when to confess is to do it, and do it now. While I certainly understand the moral side of this, I look at it from a more pragmatic view.

First, for any that chose to delay and it worked out for them, I believe that you caught a lucky break. Lucky that the delay didn't cause further withdrawal in your M, lucky that you used the time for personal growth, lucky that you maintained the resolve to confess, lucky that life circumstances didn't change to make the confession even harder, and heck, lucky that you weren't hit by a bus before you confessed. If one feels like luck played no part in the chain of events, then I think you may be fooling yourself. Having a tommorrow is never a certainty.

While it may have worked out for you, asking someone to take the same chance as you is, IMHO, reckless.

Second, the vast majority of the people making this decision are predisposed to delaying or avoiding it. Chances are, even the most influential among us isn't going to get them to speed up their timeline. But the least influential among us can easily get them to slow it down. See point 1 about slowing it down.