Welcome to the
Marriage Builders® Discussion Forum

This is a community where people come in search of marriage related support, answers, or encouragement. Also, information about the Marriage Builders principles can be found in the books available for sale in the Marriage Builders® Bookstore.
If you would like to join our guidance forum, please read the Announcement Forum for instructions, rules, & guidelines.
The members of this community are peers and not professionals. Professional coaching is available by clicking on the link titled Coaching Center at the top of this page.
We trust that you will find the Marriage Builders® Discussion Forum to be a helpful resource for you. We look forward to your participation.
Once you have reviewed all the FAQ, tech support and announcement information, if you still have problems that are not addressed, please e-mail the administrators at mbrestored@gmail.com
Previous Thread
Next Thread
Print Thread
Page 2 of 12 1 2 3 4 11 12
Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 64
B
BHFF Offline OP
Member
OP Offline
Member
B
Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 64
No anything you say is helpful and probably things I have kicked myself for. When I looked at myself and saw that lack of respect it was time to make the changes. I agree and nothing anyone says is going to be too harsh.


Me 34y/o BS
2BB 3 and 5 Y/O
"There is no higher praise to a man then 'He was a good man'"
Joined: Dec 2004
Posts: 613
I
Member
Offline
Member
I
Joined: Dec 2004
Posts: 613
Quote
The ball will be in her court.

Well it would help your wayward wife to know what court you will be playing on! The hardcourt or the softcourt. If you get my drift. Its easier to keep your head in the sand on the softcourt, where you just hope the affair and OM go away on its on. Then there's the hardcourt. Which do you think has the greater chance of success? You can bet the OM/Boyfriend hopes you stay on the softcourt, so the affair will continue.

Still reading you last couple of posts....it still appears that you will continue on the softcourt. What are you afraid of? You need to kill this affair now! The longer this continues the greater the chance that her feelings for him become entrenched.

Joined: Oct 2008
Posts: 221
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: Oct 2008
Posts: 221
Originally Posted by BHFF
But I realized I still love my wife and want this to work with all of my heart. The ball will be in her court.
then DO IT today....Confront her. And PLEASE stop MC when the A is still on. It is a joke.

Joined: May 2008
Posts: 2,589
A
Member
Offline
Member
A
Joined: May 2008
Posts: 2,589
So, if you have not already, "just do it". You aren't going to get anywhere by delaying.

AM


BW - 70
WH - 65
M - 35 years
D-day - 17 Apr 08
H broke contact 11/1/09
Back in love after the worst thing that every happened to us.
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
HEY BHFF,

Did you keep the commitment you made to yourself and family? Did you confront her? Or is it going to go 3 alarm before you get the courage to cut a fire break around the affair. You aren't gonna get out of this without getting your hair singed, so I hope you are manning up.

Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 21
M
Junior Member
Offline
Junior Member
M
Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 21
The panic attacks and weight loss are probably due to the fact that she knows you know and she is waiting out the calm before the storm. Let her have it and don't put it off. In the next counseling session when they tell you that say fine..."(Insert wife's name) I know you are having an affair and it stops NOW!" Sometimes, tough love it what they need most.


ME-23
DH-26
M-DATE-7/30/05
MARRIED-3 YRS.
TOGETHER- 7 YRS.
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
Hey BHFF,

I see you posting on other posts. Are you going to fill us in on your confronting your wife?

Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 64
B
BHFF Offline OP
Member
OP Offline
Member
B
Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 64
I apologize, we had a family issue that prevented us from talking last night. I worked today (till tomorrow AM), and am still dealing with the previous issue (we had to be with other members and I want to be alone with WS when we talk) but I know progress is being made with her. I started wearing my wedding band again (avoided it before because of fear of losing finger at work but better a finger then my wife) she gave me the smile that I remember the one that causes my heart to skip a beat. She is still conflicted I can tell but Thur is the night now gives us a chance for just us. I am still scared, I know it will be ugly. I am afraid she will say she is not good enough and not want to believe she is, she has just chosen the wrong path. This is going to be a long road isn't it. The support from people here is everything right now. I feel pretty isolated. The only people who know are here on this forum and my boss. I know that several above have been harsh and they are correct to be that way. Thank you for your support. Anyone who believes remember me in your prayers.


Me 34y/o BS
2BB 3 and 5 Y/O
"There is no higher praise to a man then 'He was a good man'"
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
We will keep your feet to the fire BHFF. LOL. When you confront her. do it in the car. Not in your bedroom. You want close proximity so that she will cling to you and not bolt to another room. You may even consider taking her to a hotel room to confront her. DO NOT TALK ABOUT FORGIVENESS. THIS ABOUT THE AFFAIR, NOT YOU TRYING TO RESTORE THE RELATIONSHIP IN 5 MINUTES TO FEEL BETTER.

Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 64
B
BHFF Offline OP
Member
OP Offline
Member
B
Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 64
Thank you. What I want to say to her-
Honey I know that you are struggling with something right now and I want you to know that I love you. I will always love you no matter what. I know about your A with XXXX. I am feeling so many emotions right now I cant even tell what I feel for sure. But I know that when you are ready to come back to our family I will accept you and love u the same. We can look at this as a chance to make this a strong beautiful marriage when you are ready. I know that there are things I did in our marriage for you to have gone somewhere else. When you come back to me we will never let that happen again. While you are making your decision I will be the same man that you married except I will not neglect you or your needs again. I want you to be able to come to me and talk to me at anytime. I will be a strong father for our boys, and a loving supportive husband.


Me 34y/o BS
2BB 3 and 5 Y/O
"There is no higher praise to a man then 'He was a good man'"
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
Originally Posted by BHFF
But I know that when you are ready to come back to our family I will accept you and love u the same.

Weak.

Originally Posted by BHFF
We can look at this as a chance to make this a strong beautiful marriage when you are ready.

Weaker.

Originally Posted by BHFF
While you are making your decision I will be the same man that you married except I will not neglect you or your needs again.

Weakest

These are incredibly weak. And will virtually guarantee her continuing her affair if she wants to. First off. You don not say "when you are ready". You tell her "You will stop all contact immediately" If you give her leeway to continue by leaving it up to her, you are going to help her destroy your family. YOU HAVE TO HAVE SOME RIGHTEOUS ANGER. SHE IS SCREWING ANOTHER MAN!

What if she is on the fence about her throwing her dumping you for him? Your kind of response will actually HELP her to remain on that fence and in that affair, until she is ready to decide to leave you.

YOU HAVE TO DRAW A LINE IN THE SAND. THIS IS NOT AN OPTION FOR HER.

Use my previous post.

First I want to tell you that I love you with all my heart. But I know that you are cheating on me with another man. I cannot explain how you have crushed me by this. You have betrayed our family, our love and our vows. I don't know how this was brought about. I felt that I was a loving, supportive and communicative husband. And that had you given me an indication that you were dissatisfied or that I was not meeting your emotional needs in some way, I would have moved heaven and earth to find out what those needs were and fill them. But instead of that you chose to defile our marriage by having sex with him, and you continue to do so now. Apparently our marriage was not important enough to you to concern yourself about my feelings. I have known about your affair for sometime, I was hoping and praying that you would come to me and confess. I guess your honesty is as bankrupt as your fidelity. Since you did not have either the honor or courage to confront the situation, you have left it up to me to expose this disgusting betrayal. Did you think I was an idiot? I will not allow you to cuckold me with this man.

As I told you I love you, and hope that we can reconcile our marriage, I am not naive about the depth of feelings you must have for the other man. So then I must put it to you plainly in my demands.

1. You WILL swear that you will never see him again.
2. You WILL tell me who he is.
3. You WILL write a no contact letter to him.
4. You WILL turnover to me all passwords to your phone and computer immediately.
5. You WILL live transparently, and honestly from now on. No more secrets.
6. We Will continue our marriage counseling.

IF you do not agree to these terms, and even though I love you. Do not think that I will just sit by and wait. I will divorce as soon as possible. Furthermore if we do reconcile, I am letting you know. That should I find out that you are ever unfaithful to me again, I will not hesitate, but will leave and divorce you immediately.

YOU HAVE ONE OPPORTUNITY TO SEND A STRONG MESSAGE. IF YOU BLOW IT BY BEING WEAK, AND BASICALLY TELLING HER "OH, YOU CAN SCREW THIS GUY UNTIL YOU ARE READY TO COME BACK TO ME"

DON'T BE A FOOL. IT IS NO "UNTIL YOU COME BACK TO ME"......ITS "IF" SHE COMES BACK TO YOU.


Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 6,058
M
Member
Offline
Member
M
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 6,058
3 pages to discuss confronting an active wayward...

BHFF, do you know who this guy is? Do you know if he is married? Do you have contact information for people that are close to him?

You will NOT talk your wife out of having an affair. You have to be prepared to fight for your marriage.

You don't need to confront via letter, you need to do it in person, up close and personal. You do not threaten or make promises to leave that you aren't willing to keep or any of that nonsense. You tell your wife you know she is having an affair.

She will tell you "We're just friends." She'll add, "Our problems have nothing to do with him."

She'll be lying like a rug...

BHFF, there are two sides to Plan A. The carrot side of the equation shows that you can and will meet her ENs and deal with the issues in yourself that destroy her love for you (Love Busters). But the stick side of the deal is to establish boundaries that are clearly marked and enforced with consequences.

Now before you run off demanding anything, understand that a boundary is not a way to manipulate her and coerce her into acting like you want.

Your boundary=No OM.

The consequences of OM=you put pressure on the affair.

You don't pressure HER, you pressure the affair itself. If you pressure her, she will cling to OM more tightly by the hour until it becomes them against you.

So you find out who he is, where he lives and who his wife is. Then you gather the evidence that you have and expose the affair to his wife/family, her family/friends, their employer if they work together etc.

By now you should have read the Basic Concepts. If you haven't already read the Q&A columns regarding infidelity, do that too. I would also suggest you get a copy of Surviving An Affair(SAA) and read it. Buy one, borrow one or get one from the library to read and do it quickly.

I also suggest that you move you thread to the GQII forum for more traffic.

Just so you know, it is very rare in deed that a WW will end her affair simply because you have confronted her. It will be even more rare if writing her a letter will have much of an affect on it. You will not educate her out of the affair.

Plan A, both sides, might bring her around. The carrot side by showing her what a great marriage with you might look like and the stick side showing her that you will not sit idly by while she destroys your family.

If you want to save your marriage, you need a plan and that plan has to be more than finding the right words to say to get her to stop with OM and hoping that it will be before your family is in shreds.

Hang on, it gets even more bumpy from here on.

Let me ask you this...

If your family were trapped in a fire, how relentless would you be in your efforts to save them?

THAT is how relentless you must be to save your marriage. But you must never go off acting like a chump and making demands with no plan of action if she doesn't bow to your will. Get a real plan in place first, then pull the trigger.

And you don't have weeks or even many days to get rolling, so study, get a plan together and start saving her.

If you have the money or can find it somewhere, call the coaching center for an appointment with Steve or Jennifer. Either of them can help you focus on the details of what you need to do.

When you roll up at a fire you would never just jump off the rig and run in the front door of a burning building with no idea of where you needed to go or how you would keep yourself safe. And you would never try to fight a fire alone. This is a conflagration. You need a plan and you need someone helping you and watching your back so that mistakes you make don't cost you everything...

But if you spend very long figuring out what to do, your house will burn down around your ears...

Mark

Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
Mark, The reason for the letter is not to send it to her. BHFF is pretty meek and he will forget what he is saying or just cave.

He needs the letter so he can read it to her. There is power behind the written word. He can remain focused on what he means instead of meandering or responding to her. He's not going to send it to her.

She may not stop the affair if he confronts her with the demands I wrote.

If he tells her what he wants to tell her. Hell, he's endorsing the affair.

Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 6,058
M
Member
Offline
Member
M
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 6,058
OTH,

I realize he needs to know what to say when he confronts her, but he needs to stop trying to find the right words and start acting pretty soon or she will make his decision for him. If she ends the affair based solely on what he says to her when he tells her he knows she is having an affair (which is all we're really talking about here) then he needs to write a book so the rest of us can read it to find out what we did wrong.

BHFF posted on Sunday. Today is Wednesday. No one has suggested SAA or calling Steve or Jennifer. No one has told him to get his evidence together and nobody has mentioned gathering enough intel to expose the affair.

The house is on fire and three days in we're discussing what we need to fight the fire..

BHFF, you tell her, I know about you and ____ and I want you to know that I will not sit by and watch as you destroy our family. Then you change the subject or leave the room. She will rant, rave, rage and scream loud enough to raise the roof. Count on it and know that it is absolutely according to script.

You have NO control over what she has done, is doing or ever will do. You only have control over YOU and YOUR actions.

Identify her ENs and begin to meet them. Identify your own Love Busters and get rid of them. Put pressure on the affair itself via exposure and refusal to finance it etc.

To do those things you need to know what her ENs are. You need to be able to tell what a love buster is and you need to know who to expose to and how to go about it.

If you use the wrong words when you confront her, you will not drive her away. If you use the right words when you confront her, you will not get her to agree to stop the affair. What you say when you confront hardly matters at all in the scheme of things. It will be your actions and how you conduct the battle against the fire that is consuming your wife that will matter.

I can tell you that NOBODY has ever had just the right words to confront a wayward spouse. There are no right words for something that is so wrong to begin with. But you need to get a plan together and begin to execute it soon or she will become more attached to OM by the hour.

Mark

Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
Originally Posted by Mark1952
OTH,



If you use the wrong words when you confront her, you will
I can tell you that NOBODY has ever had just the right words to confront a wayward spouse. There are no right words for something that is so wrong to begin with. But you need to get a plan together and begin to execute it soon or she will become more attached to OM by the hour.

Mark


I have to cal BS on this remark. NOBODY? No one has ever stopped an affair by exposing it. You would have to be omnitient to make a statement like that.

There may be no right words. But there are most certainly wrong words. And a weak statement, basically telling her to think about not screwing this guy anymore. But if she decides to continue doing it "I will wait". That is horse hockey.

No one has control of another. But if you are saying that no pressure can be put to bear on this situation, other then meeting her ENs, you're just plain wrong.

Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 6,058
M
Member
Offline
Member
M
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 6,058
My argument is not on whether or not to tell her to stop boinking the OM. My point is that he needs to get a plan into place and begin to do the steps that can lead to saving the marriage.

I will admit that using the word nobody is an absolute that I should not have used without the qualifier "almost" in front of it. But that is the case.

He needs to confront and not spend the next week trying to figure out just the right words. What are the right words to use when you challenge a wayward wife about her affair? Are there any?

If he is too soft, it will be harder to save his marriage than if he finds just the right words, but as long as the affair continues and nothing at all is being done or said, he stands NO chance to save his marriage unless he is willing to just allow it to go on until she ends it.

My suggestion is to simply tell her that he knows about it and then begin to act, based on evidence that he has gathered. And even that requires gathering that evidence as quickly as possible.

The threat to the marriage is the affair and not the lack of words to say to her when he confronts her.

Mark

Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
I concur. Confront now. Not later.

Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 64
B
BHFF Offline OP
Member
OP Offline
Member
B
Joined: Mar 2009
Posts: 64
Tonight if I can keep up the strength. I think the prozac is dragging me down. Either that or the stress. By the time the boys are in bed it is all I have left to keep moving. BTW-went to second marriage counselor session last night. The A**hole (excuse my language )couldn't find his notes, couldn't remember even which couple we were. He is out. He let me walk out without the copay I think I wont even give it to him. He spent 30 minutes talking about how much trouble he has with insurance companies! I was so pissed last night I couldn't even think. Today it was worse. Feel like I have wasted this last week. My fear- she says OK now that you know it is over and I lose my family, because this would have ran its course and would have been over. Course I could still lose my family that I know. Please everyone pray for my strength.


Me 34y/o BS
2BB 3 and 5 Y/O
"There is no higher praise to a man then 'He was a good man'"
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
O
Member
Offline
Member
O
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 843
Focus some of that anger on the woman who made it necessary to need a counselor. I hope that you read the letter I wrote (or something more direct and in your face then what you wrote. Good luck. We're all pulling for you. STAY STRONG.

Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 1,632
S
Member
Offline
Member
S
Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 1,632
BHFF,
Do realize that this A is a war? You're supposed the be the warior that kills the beast of this A!!
That is how you may have a chance to win your WW back into the M.

You don't sound up to the challenge. This is not going to be east BHFF, you're gonna have to roll up your sleves and get dirty here a bit.

Expose and confront the A immediately, unless you like the vision of your WW getting it on with someone else. A person, you claim to know!

Waffiling will find your WW and Om taking the A further undergroud, and she will sit on the fence and eat cake as long as you allow her to.

What would you do if you weren't afraid??????????

All Blessings,
Jerry



Page 2 of 12 1 2 3 4 11 12

Moderated by  Fordude 

Link Copied to Clipboard
Forum Search
Who's Online Now
0 members (), 1,116 guests, and 67 robots.
Key: Admin, Global Mod, Mod
Newest Members
Mike69, petercgeelan, Zorya, Reyna98, Nofoguy
71,829 Registered Users
Building Marriages That Last A Lifetime
Copyright © 1995-2019, Marriage Builders®. All Rights Reserved.
Site Navigation
Powered by UBB.threads™ PHP Forum Software 7.7.5