It makes perfect sense when you understand that she's lying about her marital past. This is call rewriting history. In her little, foggy wayward mind, she knows that she can't very well say "I'm perfectly happy in my M, so I'm having an A." She's got to change history to justify her A.

You and your dad are correct in your perceptions. Rewriting history is a classic wayward behavior. They do this in order to justify the unjustifiable. The loony logic goes something like this: "I have been unhappy for a long time, therefore, I am entitled to an affair." No sane person has figgered out that "logic" yet, but that is how it works in the mind of the wayward!

In Illinois, if there's divorce under irreconcilable differences, the court can order counseling if one party wants it

maybe i can tell her this and convince her to do a few telephone sessions with harley? anyone think this would work? i'd have to ask her nicely obviously...can't let it be a selfish demand love buster

There is no harm in recommending counselling and I do strongly advocate this to be with Dr Harley however as your wife is still in the affair any counselling is not going to help. Are you able to assess what is happening between her and the OM, if you are confident and I would say you should not be, then by all means speak to her about counselling. What may help you is to have one session yourself and explain your situation.

yeah i was thinking maybe a counseling session would convince her to stop the affair...i asked once last week but maybe if i phrase it as being required by the court then maybe...

also any suggestions of a good thread that maybe my WW can read on here that may help her come out of the "fog"...does that ever help?

At his stage it would do you more harm if your wife is on here, how do you know if the affair has stopped. Her being here let's her read the advice given to you to save your marriage, she in turn speaks to OM and they counter it.

If she speaks to Dr Harley soon then great this does not mean she will stop the affair. Verify first if she has stopped the affair

Do not tell your WW about MB. She won't be open to it, nothing she reads on here will help her in her fogged out state, and she will try to use the posts against you in a D.

So keep her out of here until she defogs some.

Get her the books and the surveys, but don't tell her about the forum.

abc098,

Counseling will do absolutely NO GOOD while she is in the affair. I would recommend that YOU call Steve Harley for help on what to do.

If she has indeed filed for divorce, do what I, along with others, have already recommended: COUNTERSUE on grounds of adultery, which will allow you to make the OM somewhat miserable...which will then cause a LOT of trouble within the affair. If your marriage ends in divorce, you can then file an AOA lawsuit against the OM with the reason for the divorce being on public record, which will help your AOA case.

You defintely SHOULD let the OM know that you WILL be filing suit against him.

If this is a workplace affair, you MUST inform HR and his bosses of the affair. Do not just send ONE letter. Send a letter to the head of HR and cc the owner, president, v-presidents,manager...whomever. The more people who get a copy of this letter, the less likely it is to be swept under the rug. So what if your wife gets fired? If you can put an end to the affair, she would have to no longer work with him anyway.

Plan A your wife, but do not forget the stick of Plan A.

Do NOT Plan A the OM (or enable the affair by tippytoe-ing around)...make his life as miserable as you can!

Also, DO NOT BRING YOUR WW to MB!! AFTER you bust up the affair and AFTER she is committed to recovering your marriage, THEN you can bring her here.

To bring her here now is to give her your entire battle plan.


So, STOP THINKING SO MUCH, or you'll be in bigger trouble than you are now! Pay attention to what people who have already been there and done that are trying to advise you!

And if you are going to go for the Divorce.

DO NOT WAIT to get phone records, texts, etc.

Cell companies are notorious for not keeping Text messages for longer than 2 weeks.

But, they won't just give them up either.

1) If you have a joint plan, or if its your plan, call them and request copies of all text messages for your wife's phone.

2) If they won't give them to you, consult with an attorney to get a subpoena for the phone company. Then, they are legally obligated to turn over the records, as much as they have (well, you may need to specify a date, but make it very, very broad).

Companies don't tend to ignore subpoenas.

If cell phone companies don't keep texts for more than 2 weeks, I'm screwed. She changed cell phone plans pretty much two weeks ago.

I've got the stick part down, but it's hard doing the carrot part when she doesn't live with me anymore, and we have no reason to see each other. I guess I can email and see if she wants to get coffee etc, but even then the last couple times I've seen her we both feel so awkward, I can't even think of stuff to talk about. It'd be better if we would do some activity together but that's definitely not gonna happen. Any suggestions?

Its not 100% confirmed, mind you. Thats just what they tell us normal folks. Some companies say its just days they keep them, some say weeks...nobody really seems to know, though.

Just took a closer look at the phone records....she didn't contact OM at all in september. End of september we took a trip to vegas for a work related conference where OM was there. They were texting at that time, however on the last night of the trip we had the worst fight of our relationship. She left the room that night and I saw text messages with OM till the AM, and continued texting many times a day everyday since then. She was pretty much distant since that fight, and we continued to fight a lot more in the next few weeks primarily cause she was distant in my opion. About 3 weeks after the initial fight is when she asked for counseling. She probably knew at that time what she was doing or about to do I guess.

Just sucks how fast life can change. I keep thinking if we hadn't had that fight how different things would be right now...

Not to say it justifies the affair, but she certainly could have been unhappy for a very long time before the affair started. There are many stories of people who are unhappy or unsatisified yet they stay married for years and years. Just take a look at the Marriage 101 forum on this very board. People don't necessarily jump into an affair as soon as they are unhappy.

Don't put too much weight into that Vegas fight. The fight didn't cause the affair, her poor boundaries did. If it hadn't been that OM after that fight, it would have been some other OM after some other event.

All she had to do was tell me she was unhappy and why...i actually needed to hear the words unhappy or something equivalent for whatever reason...i wish that had happened or that i had the self-awareness to realize

It is the rule, rather than the exception, that the WS "rewrites history" to greatly exaggerate the length and breadth of their "unhappiness." A 6 month spell of unhappiness suddenly turns into "I have never been happy our entire marriage" or "I have been unhappy for years" even though the BS will have evidence to the contrary.

It is because they are comparing their entire marital history to a new point of comparison based on a FANTASY: an affair. Plus, it sounds so much more dramatic to say "I have been unhappy for years" as a justification.

It is very typical that the BS will have actual evidence that the WS was happy just as abc describes. WS' are notorious liars who are looking for any justification possible.

abc, don't worry about it. As I described above, it is probably mostly lies. Waywards are notorious liars who typically manufacture justifications.

The past is not important, what matters is the future.

Hind-sight is always 20/20 my friend....

Whatever happens, though, you WILL be a better man for it.

You'll either be better in your current relationship..or..when you start a new one, you'll be a better partner for that person.

You have already gained some measure of wisdom from this.

Keep positive. And keep telling yourself

I will be ok, no matter what.
I am a better person, no matter what.

I seriously doubt a counselor would ask her to stop her affair. Why would they do that? Most counselors encourage their clients to basically follow their heart. If her "heart" is set on her affair and ending her marriage that is what they will help her do. Then it will be almost impossible to convince her to end her affair.

Rarely will you have a wayward give you an opportunity to head off an A. Many become unhappy only after the A starts. If she told you she was unhappy, then you would have the opportunity to fix things. But wait, then the A wouldn't have happened.

You, my friend, have been placed on "double secret probation," a line used in the movie Animal House that perfectly describes how a wayward puts your relationship on probation without even telling you.

i just realized i basically asked you guys how to speak to my wife...that's sad