In my situation, we have just moved countries, and have very few friends. We were introduced to the OM through one of the very few people we know here. We almost always hung out as a group - my wife and I, our mutual friend and his girlfriend, and the OM. For convenience I'm referring to the mutual friend as MF from here on out. In fact, the OM was the MF's best friend of several years. Of course, eventually my WW and the OM started spending time alone together as well.

On D-Day the MF and his girlfriend dumped the OM immediately. They had one goodbye conversation where they told him that his behavior was beyond the pale, and that was it. Through the last 2 months of NC, as I've been struggling with the betrayal and my wife's withdrawal, this MF couple have been my best supporters. They called me almost every night, took me out, kept me distracted, etc. They loaned me money, and even housed me and fed me while I was too incoherent to do that properly myself.

Now that we're past D-Day, and through almost 2 months of NC, I'm really trying to make sure that every possible reminder is eliminated from our lives. I had a lengthy discussion in another thread about removing all the old photos from my WW's hard drive and facebook. We've moved apartments, changed jobs... really everything is clean slate. But this MF couple are still there, and frankly and important part of my emotional support network. When my WW returned from her month away with family (to help get through withdrawal), the MF couple invited us by for a board game. They are big supporters of us as a couple, and they wanted to show my WW that they still care about her and support our decision to work this out.

Well, it turns out that the MF's apartment, and the MF himself, are big reminders for her. She was OK for about a half hour, but afterwards sank into a real funk of guilt. At the time I thought she was going back into withdrawal (hence my other post), but when we talked about it she says no, it's just guilt for the betrayal to me and to the MF... and guilt that she gets to keep these wonderful friends and husband, while the OM's life has been destroyed. She feels that she made the same awful decision the OM did, so she's guilty that his life is destroyed while she gets the chance to rebuild hers. (the reality is that the OM was a complete sleaze, and had been shifty even before this instance... some people don't deserve second chances)

So I feel caught. On the one hand, If the MF couple and their environs cue my WW's guilt, I feel like I have to eliminate them from our life. On the other hand, the MF is really important to me... I don't have any other close friends in this country, and I don't think I know anyone else ANYWHERE who has supported me so much at any time in my life. It would be a big blow to my strength to recover if I had to end that supportive relationship... not to mention rude repayment to the MF for doing the right thing.

What have others done in this kind of situation? What do you do when one of your key supporters is also a guilt trigger for the WS? Is this the sort of thing that's helped by time, or just something my WS will have to deal with? Or do I really have to shoot out my own kneecaps here?

lostexpat, it might just be that apartment that triggers her, so you can try to meet up with them at your apartment or out at a restaurant.


This really concerns me that she has these kind of protective feelings for the OM and makes me think she is either in contact or is picture gazing. I would keep my eyes wide open. This is problematic that she still is this foggy. Her feelings are due to the FOG.

The OM has lost his friends because of his scummy actions. He slept with a married woman and almost wrecked your marriage. Your wife, on the other hand, has made amends for her crime.

I would not let your wife talk to you like this about this loser OM anymore. That is harmful to your marriage and it has the effect of feeding her pig pen fantasy when you don't express to her how VILE her sentiments are. You need to be helping to explode her pig pen fantasies. Tell her this is upsetting and inappropriate and that you don't want to hear her pining for some pig.

My big concern is that she is making such massive lovebank withdrawals when she brings up her feelings for this pig that you are facing years of resentment. Dont allow her to set you up for that. You won't forget the hurtful things she says about the OM and her filthy affair.

Telling her this is inappropriate will aide in injecting some reality into the pig pen. Her affair was a filthy rut in the pig pen, not a beautiful love affair.

ALL discussion of the affair should be dropped completely. When she talks about pigboy, it just brings it to the forefront. So when she is triggered, she needs to keep it to herself. Talking about it keeps it REAL.

lost, it sounds to me like your wife needs to re-establish her relationship with your friends. They sound very healthy for you marriage.

How about not meeting at their place anymore? I would normally say to cut off triggers, but I think it's more their place than the friends.

HUH? And she cares, WHY? He decided to screw a married woman and she's sad for him WHY?? Did she strap him to the bed against his wishes? ASK HER THIS.

Thanks for the advice to try meeting them out. They're out of town for the holidays, but we'll definitely try that when they get back.

MelodyLane, it's tricky with the fog. as you know from the other thread, we're only ~60 days since D-Day, so she still has times where she descends into totally irrational, emotionally charged gibberish. I am definitely keeping my eyes peeled, though.

I'm curious about the pig pen fantasy post though. I finally got full disclosure last Saturday. There may be more details that need to come out in the course of recovery, but I know everything I want to know. We don't talk about the affair since then, apart from heartfelt "I'm so sorry..." comments from her once or twice a day when I'm holding her or in a bad way myself. I can see a path forward there.

But part of what I'm trying to do is make her feel safe to tell me things, to be honest about even the thoughts and events she's most ashamed of. So even when she gave me full disclosure, I was careful to always express my reactions in terms of how it made me feel, rather than judging or verbally attacking her. I actually think I learned the importance of that from this site, but I can't find a link to back it up.

How do I reconcile creating a safe environment to be open and honest, with making her face the fact that he is a pig? She is open about the fact that he's not even 1% of me, that he's not exceptional and they didn't have love, they had lust. I think she even is starting to understand that he took advantage of her from day 1. But she still feels like 50% of the decision is hers, and that makes it unfair that she gets to redeem herself while he loses everything. And how can I drive home the point that he took advantage of her without rehashing the whole affair together?

She's right, by the way - regardless of how sleazily he behaved, she allowed it to happen and ultimately decided to go to bed with him. The sleaziness was in convincing her that she wanted it... but that doesn't change the fact that she wanted it and chose to do it. On some level, I don't know how to answer her question. I can't really answer for our MFs, but I choose to forgive her because I love her, I have a history with my own EA so I understand how this works from the other side, and because I still believe she and I can be fantastically happy together. I don't have any of those factors for the OM. But I feel like saying that would be missing her point.

To be honest, I don't know if it's that she's sad for him, or feeling guilty for her own windfall.

I had the impression you knew for 60 days now and that she was calling you and others when she thought of OM? And apparently she feels free to tell you how much she cares about the OM. That is inappropriate.


That is not something she should feel "safe" about sharing. It is not a "safe" thought. It is inappropriate. Fantasizing about pigboy and telling you about her caring feelings is not part of radical honesty. You don't use radical honesty to bludgeon your spouse for absolutely no good reason. It is not something that helps you or her. And allowing it only fuels her pig pen fantasies.


I am not telling you to attack her, but to tell her to stop talking about inappropriate things with you.


It is not safe for YOU to hear her fantasies about a pig, nor is it safe for her. She needs to stop talking about him and you need to stop pretending like it is ok.


Dont' drive home anything. Just tell her it is hurtful to hear about her sleazy affair and you prefer not to hear it anymore.


It will be much harder for you to forgive her in the future if she continues to extol her caring feelings about the OM. Part of EARNING forgiveness means she PROTECTS YOU. Yapping about pigboy does not protect you. So tell her this is inappropriate and you don't want to hear it.

As far as forgiveness, you should be willing to forgive her if she earns it, but you are a long way off from that point. Don't be so quick to hand out unwarranted forgiveness. Check this out: Can't We Just Forgive and Forget?

Of course. She was just as sleazy as him. I think we can all agree on that. [including your wife] I include her in the sleaze factor. But if she claims to have changed her ways and made amends, she would see that she is now different from him.

"It will be much harder for you to forgive her in the future if she continues to extol her caring feelings about the OM. Part of EARNING forgiveness means she PROTECTS YOU. Yapping about pigboy does not protect you. So tell her this is inappropriate and you don't want to hear it."

This makes good sense to me. Done.

Re: forgiveness... what I say to her is that I've made the decision to forgive her. Actually achieving that takes daily work, but I've decided that that's what I want to do if she's really willing to do "whatever it takes".

Let her know you are willing to do that in the future if she gives you just compensation. Go read that article I just posted, it has some amazing points in it that will really make sense to you...

You are doing great! Have you listened to Dr Harley's radio show? You can listen to it for free 24/7. I bet you would really like it! Click on the radio link at the top of the page.

Lostexpat,

If I have read the story correctly, the OM is a repeat offender and it sounds like his seduction of your WW went according to his scheme. Since he is a repeat offender the court of decency has less mercy on him, he tried to screw up two lives.

God Bless
Gamma

Hi Gamma - Actually he's not a repeat offender to my knowledge. But from the first day he met us, he hit on my wife. The second time we met, he got her drunk (staying sober himself), got her alone, and kissed her. She tried to force him into the "friend zone" (WHY do women do this?), and was very verbal with him that she wasn't interested in anything beyond a friendship. Over 4 weeks, he continued to make romantic advances on her. And he finally got what he wanted. D-day was about 10 days later.

There are many mis-steps on my wife's part (and mine!) in the development of this affair. But fundamentally, the OM met a married couple, and immediately made moves on the wife. When she protested, he persisted in his romantic advances. I can understand getting overwhelmed by chemistry and having an EA sneak up on you - they can be hard to spot coming when you don't know what to look for! - and frankly that's the basis of a lot of my understanding for my WW. But his is not the profile of someone overwhelmed by chemistry. It's just the profile of a sleazeball.

LostExPat,

I read that between the lines because you said something about your mutual friends dropping him quickly and siding with you. I inferred that they knew more about OMs past than you did.

God Bless
Gamma

Ah... no, the MF's girlfriend had always had a bad feeling about him, but that's about it. For the MF, it came down to 2 things:

1) The sheer awfulness of what the OM had done. Me aside, he lied to the MF as well, over the duration of the entire relationship. He used the MF as a way to get to another man's wife.

2) The feeling of "when's it my turn?" The MF has a beautiful, interesting and intelligent girlfriend. She had been telling him that she was uncomfortable with the OM's behavior towards her anyway. It made the MF feel like his relationship was a target, too.

"Hi Gamma - Actually he's not a repeat offender to my knowledge."


Actually whether he is or he is not does not matter.


"But from the first day he met us, he hit on my wife. The second time we met, he got her drunk (staying sober himself), got her alone, and kissed her."


Did you know about the first time as it happened? Second time? In short what did you know and when did you know?

If yes then why did you allow a second time for them to meet? Where were you during all this?


"She tried to force him into the "friend zone" (WHY do women do this?)"


Because WW loved the attention she was getting.


"and was very verbal with him that she wasn't interested in anything beyond a friendship. Over 4 weeks, he continued to make romantic advances on her. And he finally got what he wanted."


Your WW had standards. She did not want to appear easy. Her ego needed OM to work for it. Then WW hooked on attention went PA to keep the attention.


"There are many mis-steps on my wife's part (and mine!) in the development of this affair. But fundamentally, the OM met a married couple, and immediately made moves on the wife. When she protested, he persisted in his romantic advances. I can understand getting overwhelmed by chemistry and having an EA sneak up on you - they can be hard to spot coming when you don't know what to look for!"


Your WW knew what she was doing. She liked the flirting. She then took it to the next step to keep the adrenaline running.

The Road

Actually whether he is or he is not, a repeat offender, does not matter.

To some BH this does matter as it shows that this was not an affair of the heart, but a cold calculated crime. It changes the amount and type of retribution the BH needs to feel even. This is what I'm looking into with OM2 now.

God Bless
Gamma

I don't see how it matter's to lostexpats how many times the OM has had affairs with other women before the OM got to do lost's WW.

I can see it matter how many OM his WW has had. In this case there has only been one.

As they say thank god it could of been worse.

Or were you just being a Grammar Gestapo.

Since the OM was such a sleeze I do hope that you and your wife have been checked for STD's. These are just one of the many consequences of affairs. Good luck.

One other question needs to be addressed and that is why did your wife give herself permission to sleep with and betray you with the OM. Another question is that when the OM got your wife alone and kissed her, why did your wife not tell what he did? Something does not smell right here.