Senn.

Why do you have such great memories of this house? how did your grandparents achieve that?

Can you and your W make the same memories here?

What will your children remember?

A house is just a house it is not a home.

Why isnt her boss a fan of spouses working together?

Call him up, sell him on the idea and offer it as a trial run.

Then make sure that trial run is a success.

Let me give you a quick rundown of your finances, I am a financial whiz when it comes to this!


You can be;

1) Married, and financially stable


OR


2) Divorced and BROKE.


That's pretty much it.


Divorce is EXPENSIVE. Child support is EXPENSIVE. Lawyers are EXPENSIVE.

There is a reason Dr. Harley does the "Million Dollar" scenario.

Get divorced, and you will have a minimum of 1 million dollars less in your lifetime.


OR, prioritize your marriage.


Figure it out...

Indie,

Answers to your Q's

This home was the center of my extended family. They were the side of my family (father's side) that were close knit. This is where we had our thanksgiving dinners and Christmas. The family that was raised in this house is now my 4 Aunts and Dad who I can only describe as the family that always made anyone feel welcome.

My Grandfather built on to the existing house and double the size of it when I was just a kid maybe 3 years old. I remember watching him and my dad working on it, probably one of my few first memories. I remember watching the news the night of President Regan's attempted assassination in the living room. I remember the first day of trout season, fishing out back and falling in the creek and all the fishermen laughing at me, I was about 7 years old and it was a cold April day. My oldest brother still reminds me of my April swim in the creek and jokes you going swimming this year, referring to fishing on the first day.

I wish I could put a picture here as it is as beautiful in life as it is in memories.

My mothers side is polar opposite, cold, not warm and always distant from each other.

My grandparents have both passed but the memories still surround this place not just through me but all of my cousins, brothers and family. This is all of what they and I call our home. I lived in Denver and always thought of this as home base, and know that is how most of my family feels. I know that is in the past, but I have a "family" obligation as well as a personal obligation to keep this property. We run into Great Aunts and Uncles and other extended family and they all say "I'm so glad that property stayed in the family". It's small town USA.

What will my children remember, I can only hope they get a little of what I got out of this place. I really hope they get a Mother in their memories with it. If things don't work out between us, their childhood memories will not be great if we're in a crappy apartment or here, but here is the better option IMO.

Can we make memories here? We've started making memories, some bad but not all bad, that can change. There are many stories sad and happy in family homes.

OK I got on here to give an update and started writing a book.

I'm feeling better, WW is really trying. She is starting to get her heart in the right place and is actually pulling me back in. After many discussions I think I am finding out she is in the tail end of the A fog. It never dawned on me that she could be dropping the ball b/c of the A fog. I was thinking she was just less than interested in saving her marriage, and I know I have been waivering on what I want. She is starting to put a plan together and starting to work on the MB material. I am getting back to it, I gave up for a little while, and now I am feeling the drive.

Is she still going to be working around men?

Can she spend 20 hours minimim UA time?

That's how your grandparents made the base for those memories

Indie,

Yes she is going to continue to work with men. I know there are a bunch here that will not continue to follow or post to us because of this, but I am not going to change this until the other house sells.

We have been spending a minimum of 20 hours per week. We started doing date nights over the past couple weekends and it is something we have been missing. Another thing we lost sight of.

Melody or HPB or indi and the rest of you.

I have a question for you if you bother to come and read this. Why are you all so focused on the issue of her workplace if that isn't the "condition that led to the affair"? I have read what Dr. Harley recommends over and over and feel we have done this.

My WW's condition that led to the A was an 8 year friendship with the OM that I accepted and even encouraged. There was lots of alone time for them to fill each others EN's, while OM's marriage has always been on the rocks, and I was pretty busy buying a house and MIA at the time. It was the perfect setup and atmosphere to brew up an A. Alcohol was also a major factor in the A, as well. Those conditions where eliminated. Beyond eliminating the conditions that led to her A, we have set up EPs and she is following them to a T. I even have her copying her time card and bringing it home.



You don't need to answer the question above, I know the answer. She is a Serial Cheater etc.

What my frustration is is I get the distinct feeling I am wasting my time posting here and shouldn't bother trying to move into recovery if I don't follow your advice on her changing jobs. I can't do that or allow that, but I do hold out hope we can save our marriage without losing my house as many suggest. Is this not possible? Can we not move on and, when we are able to, revisit the job issue?

We have decided to do a session with the Dr Harley. Its tax return time and we intend to set enough aside to do at least two or three sessions. I think it may get me more involved. I am a little discouraged, and to be honest, I get more discouraged coming here as it doesn't seem you all have much hope for us:(

Calling the Harley's directly is a GREAT idea.

However, be prepared to hear the same thing you have been hearing, as some of the members who have been advising you have been here working with this program for a decade - some of them have done the MB weekends, many often correspond with Dr. Harley in the private forums.

Senn,

Just a suggestion, but why not look into the Online or Home Study courses?

Great idea. Glad to see you making tracks Senn, I think you do need extra support and some motivation.

Good luck!

Yes you know the anwser but do not understand the answer.

You have been putting boundaries in place. But you refuse to admit that your WW has show 5 times that her panty's come off, fall down, get pushed to the side all to easy, all to often.

Do you know anything about AA? They get a person dry. They then tell him/her don't go anywhere alcohol is served. AA knows that temptation has to be kept away 24/7/365.

Having WW work in an environment with too much eye candy has not worked before. Odds are not in your favor that your WW is going to start wearing penis proof panties to work.

But being the both of you are going to counsel with the Harleys soon maybe the Harleys have away to get your WW to be able to work at the sausage factory. So sit tight till that phone session. Keep us posted on what guidance they give you during your phone session.

I guess the problem as we all see it Senn is not so much that the condition for an affair with her is the workplace so much as it is **men**. The confusion may come in that the workplace is a predominantly **male** workplace.

Also, I have trouble buying the "8 year relationship" line. Wasn't one of the affairs with her auto-mechanic? FWIW, My wife kept strict hours at work and maintained an affair there for 10 months. It only takes a few minutes in the parking lot before or after work, a lunch break, those types of things.

She had an eight year affair with your friend

This means she is at danger of having an eight year affair with a co-worker.

You did not see the danger of your friend being around her. YOu left a serial cheat to sit around late at night with a man on her own. You went to bed and slept soundlessly!

Now you are waving her off to work, where men and potential affairs, abound.

I just wnted to point out the link.

The conditions remain unchanged.

The problem is you dont feel there is a possible solution.

I am very optimistic that a session with the Harleys will make things seem a bit brighter for you.

Senn,

I think part of the problem is that you are in the emergency room and don't want to be. You want to be in the recovery room... But you aren't there yet. Still have that bullet lodged in your spine. It may not feel as bad as it did when you arrived here, but it's still there. The bullet is the conditions for the A. They haven't been removed yet. Till then, you are running a high risk of being paralyzed (in your M).

You gotta get the bullet removed before headed to recovery. I am optimistic that the bullet can be removed, but you gotta "give consent" or you're stuck with the bullet. This means getting on board with removing extra guys from her life so the bullet doesn't stay lodged.

One thing that was mentioned some time back and I cannot remember if it was her thread or yours was the guys she works with. She was able to describe them all... Newly married, Wesleyan, etc... It appears that she had taken inventory. That's not what people do. People don't take inventory of the "types" of people they work with in this way (whether they are affair material or not). It stood out as a HUGE for me

Road and CV,

I think I'm understanding what you all see in the work situation. I do understand the concern and have my own concerns in this area.

I think my post was more in line with this: I am coming back around in my thinking on where I want to go from here, been sitting on the fence for too long. I'm starting to lean over to get off the fence, but I get this nagging feeling our M can't be saved, and to be honest, I put to much weight in the response I get here as you all know and understand what it takes to save a marriage. When I continue to get the "you can't move on until this is resolved and your marriage will fail if you don't" messages it is very discouraging when it really is not possible at this point without destroying us financially. In the future, hopefully soon, it will be possible, but unless we win the lotto, her job must stay to keep us afloat. This is my reality, not excuses.

Indie,
Point taken. Not trying to correct you, but the A lasted 3 months, the friendship 8 years. No bounderies set by me or my WW allowed the frienship to turn into an A when we were at our most vulnerable ( his marriage sucked & I was buying our house).

CV,

The auto mechanic is honestly more of an issue in my mind than her A with my best friend. My friend was always at our house or vice-versa and we spent a lot of time with him and his family. It isn't to hard to see, looking back, how they could end up in an affair.

The auto mechanic had no background in our marriage and only gave her some attention while her car was in the shop. She was impressed by the fact that he remembered her name from last time her car was there, Good Lord is that all it takes? Sad thing is he looks very similar to me, if you din't know us and we were standing side by side, you would think we were brothers or twins even.

The only thing I see that gives me a glimmer of hope from this situation is she did take a step back and realized what she was doing and ended it before it really got started. She left out the honesty part. I would have been devistated to me but it could have saved us back then if she was honest and told me about it.

Senn you still look entirely too far into the past for clues as to how she will behave in the future. As though someone stamped WW on her at birth. She chose her poor boundaries as an adult. She can unchoose them as one. You can insist on that.

Looking into the past is supposed to be for the purpose of making changes NOW - not for predictions.

It is what she does TODAY that counts!

When is your session with the Harleys?

Indie,
Knowing what your saying is the truth, it is difficult to accept that this time around.
I totally agreed with your assessment 10 years ago. I heard many "once a cheater always a cheater" from friends back then, and I ignored them and defended her.
I'm really having a hard time with that this time as they were all exactly right, at least for my reality! I can't help but look at what type of crazy things she has done to destroy this marriage over the years and think of how to prevent that from happening again. As I have said many times, I cannot prevent her from straying, she has to do that - I can only encourage her.

Still sitting upon my perch on this sturdy little fence, Looking right and left. It sure seems no matter where I decide to jump off, I will still land in crap
Thanks everyone,

Ok... You got crap on both sides of the fence (I am guessing it is the reconciliation/divorce fence?)...

Either way you go you gotta walk through crap. Sitting on the fence will hurt you more in the long run. You'll cramp, fall off and hurt yourself.

Either way the field ends... The crap stops. It is true that as you walk through the fields of life you are bound to step in some...er.. truth. Either the truth of divorce or the one of real reconciliation.

once a cheater always a cheater is an outright lie. It never has to be that way. Once susceptible always susceptible may be closer to the truth... Hence the need to tighten things up.

CV

Yes.