Hello,
I am looking for the way ahead to finally fix our marriage.
I do not want to shy away from the truth and my reality so please help me as I try now to start this journey through Marriage Builders.

Here is our Story...
My wife and I have been married for 12 years, going on 13 years and have 4 beautiful girls. Our marriage has been very rocky due to my selfish behavior. I have cheated on my wife once early in our marriage, and have continually lied to her about things here and there. The affair is and has been final for years.
A couple of years back, I involved myself in the theft of some money and moved my family to another state. The move was not because of the money, but I did change job locations on a false pretense for "bigger pay". Once we moved to the new location the truth of the money situation came out, and my wife found out. She was and is devastated over the continual lies and manipulation I have shown her. I could have went to jail for this, but did not. My wife stuck by me.

Since the money thing, I have continued to lie to her about the smallest situations and largest situations without regard to her feelings. I know I love this woman and love my girls very much. I do want nothing more than to make things right.

There are many other lies and my wife has continually taken me back time after time. I would play the role to keep the peace, but still telling lies about things. I could see that it was killing her, but looking back, I didn't care at the time.

Fast forward to now and we are still fighting. She is to the point where she doesn't know if she wants us anymore and does lash out with words that are very degrading. I honestly do not blame her because I know I am the cause of her hurt. She found MB and is now reading a lot of the Discussions on here.

This above doesn't cover all that I have done, but I assume you get the problem, lying, deceit, manipulation etc...

What my question is, what should I be doing to show her that I am serious? I am fully devoted to her and this program, but she feels like it is too late. I have given her passwords, put a tracker on my phone so she knows where I am and again trying to be transparent as possible though I lack in judgment at times. I am finally facing my reality and it is smacking me in the face.

I have not taken restoring our marriage seriously until now, but I feel it might be too late. She feels that I have said all this before (and I have) so she doesn't think I am serious nor care about her feelings at all.


Can anyone help or shed light into this situation?

Thank you

Has your wife posted here?

Does your wife have access to all your financial accounts?

What precautions have you given your wife?

What does your wife say she needs to feel safe in your marriage?

Thanks for your reply.

I do not believe she has posted on here.

She does and has had all means of Financial accounts to ensure the money is where it should be.

Precautions have included tracking app on phone (which we found out yesterday that there are some issues with it). Printing off surveys for MB for us to do them together and identify true concerns from my end. I have not communicated with her in the past in full truthfulness with the issues I have in our marriage. Before I only tried to smooth things over in the past. I do not want it to seem that I am asking her to fix my problems, but I feel if we identify them, it will give me a list to work on.

The main issue is the deception. She states that all of the good things I do are washed away do to lies. I have lied over and over again and she states that she shouldn't have to live like this checking and worrying about where I am or what I am doing.

I agree to this whole heartily, but for us to reconcile trust has to be established. That trust I feel can be established by actions on my end to focus on the hurt that I have caused her for years.

I hope that answers your questions and again, thanks.

Trust will be established, not by focusing on past hurts, but by making your life so transparent that it would be impossible to lie. For example, if you were together 24/7, you wouldn't be able to hide anything. If you are going to stay together, I would focus on creating that kind of lifestyle.

Have you read about the different types of liars? What would you say motivates you to lie?

Any tracking app that you know about is obviously worthless. Even the dumbest person knows how to get around that.

Ask yourself his question - Under what conditions would you trust yourself? You know about your own lies, so you know how transparent you are going to have to be to make further lying impossible. Without that degree of transparency, your wife would be foolish to trust you. You have proven yourself criminally untrustworthy. It is going to take an extraordinary effort on your part to turn that around. You could start by making amends to those you have wronged. As long as you use lies to secure gain for yourself when dealing with others, your wife has no reason to believe that you won't do the same with her.

All,

Thanks for your insight. I will look at the suggested topics you have suggested.

I do believe the motives to lie is not facing reality. In the past, I have thought that if I "act" good for awhile, then all of this would go away. Yes it sounds stupid, but I believe ignorant would be a better word.

Now I have come to grips with what I have done and the hurt I have caused the people I love the most. I want to focus my efforts to others and realize that this is a process that can and will be established over time. It is insight like MB provides that shows me just how wrong I have been and lay out the way ahead.

I just hope that it is not too late as my wife is making it seem. I do not want to force her into this, but it seems like she wavers day to day, situation to situation. Again, I do not blame her at all, I am taking full responsibility for all of this.

I would like some more perspectives on this. The more angles, the better

Thank you in advance.

We all strive to have the same perspective here: Dr. Harley's.

Brainhurts, Melodylane and MrEureka are three of the best as far as telling you what Dr. Harley would say. I'd trust their advice to you if I were you.

It's all Dr H's advice as per the forum rules.

As others have said: transparency and encourage her to snoop or track you in ways you aren't aware of. Perhaps offer to be polygraphed at any point in the future she needs you to be?

Just show there's nothing you won't do.

The perspective and angle we give here is Dr. Harely's. This is not an opinion blog.

I'd suggest emailing Dr Harley and asking him your questions for him to answer you on his radio show.

- an alcoholic is most motivated to stop after hist last drink, having a hangover. As soon as the results of your actions evaporate and fade away, your motivation to become this new person will dwindle and the seduction of a little white lie for the good of yourself will grow strong.
- How do you feel if your children lie to you? If they make mistakes or do something wrong, would you not rather want them to come to you and trust you? How do you think your actions make your wife feel? Try to feel how you would feel if it was the other way around.
- You can only change if YOU choose to. I used to throw in little white lies here and there, but decided to nevere lie to my husband and have since stopped in other situations too. So now, if I do something that I do not want my husband to know, I run to him rightaway and tell him then and there, so that I don't even have the chance to contemplate to hide it. If you get into the habit to be brutally honest and transparant, it will be easier and easier. Telling the truth will make life easier. You don't have to cover up for yourself and you can't be found out.
- most lies are useless anyway. If they are little lies, they are usually not worth the trouble. If they are big lies, you should solve the underlying problem, because that will come back to haunt you.
- Only cowards lie. If you are strong and courageous, what do you have to fear?
- your wife may or may not want to reconcile. But you will be a better person if you take the high road in the future regardless.
- People lie, because the truth does not seem good enough. But don't forget, that we compare our own truth to the facade of the lives of others. We know what is really going on in our own lives, but realize, that others have poblems too and if w would all tell the truth about our lives we would come to see that we are not so different after all.
- The only way to convince your wife that you are a whole new person is to become this person and walk the walk. Regardless if she takes you back. Trust comes on foot, but goes on horseback as they say around here.

I have emailed Joyce.

Thank you for your post. I guess the problem is that I have manipulated so much that it seems that she cannot believe a word I say or things that I do now are to cover up what I am truly doing. I again, do not blame her and understand why this is.

Here is your show.
Radio Clip of 1234qwer's show
Segment #2
Segment #3
Segment #4

Hello,

I would like to send an update on my current marriage situation. I was live on the show for the 10th of November 2014 and since receiving the "Love Busters" book we have since ordered the Romantic Love Workbook.

Here is the update and my questions will follow.

We have started the workbook with both agreeing that we need a change. We signed the agreement to stop Love Busters and deposit love units into each other's love bank. We have filled out portions of the book and I have asked my wife what 2 things she needed me to change. But the problem is that it doesn't seem like we are making any progress. My wife recently posted on the Forum (which I have not read), but she explained to me she struggles with deciding to stay or go.

We have been up and down each day it seems in the security of our marriage. My biggest problem was not telling her the truth and living a life of independent behavior which created selfishness and did not facilitate any type of recovery from the problems I created in our marriage. I have placed extraordinary precautions in my life and communicating my schedule with her to give just compensation as she asked.

I have not been perfect through trying to live the MB principles. I still struggle with certain things that she has asked to correct, These include to give space when conversations turn into arguments. I do not raise my voice at her nor put her down, but I try to explain why the problem is not what she thinks it is. I realize that I caused the problems and her "on edge" personality. This leads to over exaggerated words on my part that hurts her feelings. Gas lighting she has expressed as a big issue also.

My questions:

1. How do I overcome or negotiate the continued accusation of lies and deceit? Example: We will be doing well for a couple of days then she will accuse me about a situation or something that has come up. I will tell her the truth about it, but she will say that I am not telling her the truth. Then our "good" days will disappear with "its not worth it" etc..it will then be shown that I was telling the truth. This has happened since my devotion to the program.
(I do agree that I have shown myself dishonest in the past and I am trying so hard to show her by my continued truthfulness that I am serious about stopping my behavior).

.2. She has asked me to post on the MB forum in which I did initially. She has continued to ask to post on the forum, but I believe that if we have the guidance not only from the radio show, but also the workbook (which we have not committed to fully) those, not the forum would be our first start.
After reading Love Busters I am torn in regards to posting on the forum. I am not overly enthusiastic because again we have good products for our use and I feel we should start the program before we look for answers and struggles that couples have faced in the program.

Is this wrong of me to take this approach?

3. If she has stated that she is overly stressed out with me being in the same house as her and also feels that we have not made any progress, should I think about fulfilling this request? I struggle with it because I believe it is good when it is good and get the same feelings from her, but do want to make her happy. She states she wants it to work and says she will try, but then later she struggles with wanting me to leave.

Again should I leave or stay?

I hope to hear from you all soon. Insights are much appreciated.

Welcome back, 1234.

I only have limited time right now to spend on this post, but I will keep an eye on your thread, and give fuller answers later today if I have time. It's been very slow on the board this week, but I'm sure other posters will also post to you soon.

I'll not comment on the bulk of your post, but answer the questions for now:

1. "1. How do I overcome or negotiate the continued accusation of lies and deceit?"

This one is common sense, really. You took a long time to reach the stage where your wife does not know whether to believe you - or perhaps she knows better than to ever believe you - and it will take some time for you to demonstrate successfully that you never lie to her.

The way to overcome the accusation, which as far as I can see in an entirely reasonable one for her to make, is for you to consistently show your self to be telling the truth.

2. "After reading Love Busters I am torn in regards to posting on the forum. I am not overly enthusiastic because again we have good products for our use and I feel we should start the program before we look for answers and struggles that couples have faced in the program.

Is this wrong of me to take this approach?"

I don't think the question should be whether you are wrong, but whether you are helping your marriage, or hindering it, by taking that approach. If your goal is to win your wife back to the marriage, you need to do things that you think she wants you to do (and avoid doing things that she does not want you to do.)

What do you think she wants you to do?

Dr Harley is not in favour of spouses making reluctant agreements to anything, including doing the MB programme (and you could see posting on the forum as part of "doing the MB programme"). If a spouse makes a reluctant agreement, he will not do the task well, or perhaps might not do it at all, and if he does it, he might well feel resentful, and that will harm the marriage. Therefore, don't post here if you resent doing so and feel pressurised into doing so.

However, you could do a couple of things: first, try posting on a temporary basis, to see whether doing so helps or hinders you in your goal of changing your behaviour, negotiating and working through conflicts, avoiding love busters etc. You could try it for, say, a month. In that time, you would need to update your thread regularly, and ask questions, otherwise the thread will die and you will probably feel justified in saying that it did not help you.

Second, you could try exploring your wife's perspective further, to see why she feels your posting would be beneficial, and how much posting she would like to see. You would present your perspective to her at the same time. The goal would be to reach an enthusiastic agreement on whether to post, or not.

You have been "not posting" for 20 years, and it seems that your marriage is not really improving. I would think that keeping the status quo of not posting is not the best idea. In your shoes, I would give posting a try on a temporary basis.

If you are going to do that, though, it needs to be done with the best intentions - of really giving posting a fair chance.

3. "Again should I leave or stay?"

I recommend you read the thread of Remark (in this forum), to whom we have been posting for a while. He faces similar issues of a long marriage in which he has destroyed his wife's confidence in him, and has driven her into a state of withdrawal. Remark and his wife have been on the MB radio show, so make sure you listen to the clips that are posted on his thread. Remark's wife is also asking him to leave, which he does not want to do. Read his thread - not so much to see our advice, which is amateur, but to see Dr Harley's, which is given to Remark on a regular basis, up to and including this week.

One more thing: if you can encourage your wife to enrol in the online course, you'd make much more progress than you are making now. This is another issue that Remark has dealt with (unsuccessfully so far), on his thread.

One more thing for now:

You'll get the most from this forum if you make your post less about making life more tolerable for you, and more about what you can do to overcome your wife's complaints about the marriage, and win her back.

Your first question was really a complaint about the fact that your wife isn't treating you well.

It is true that in an MB marriage, a spouse would not make accusations against the other spouse - these are disrespectful judgements. However, my knowledge of what Dr Harley advises men in your situation - who have pushed their marriage into the ditch, over many years, suggests that those men should not focus AT ALL on what their wives are doing wrong, but micro-manage their own behaviour until all love busters are eliminated. When that is done, you will be able to make love bank deposits, and when you have made enough of those, your wife will not want to make disrespectful judgements of you - and if she does, you can respectfully ask her to stop.

You can't ask her to stop right now - you'll only alienate her further. So, don't do that at home, and don't post here to complain about her, either.

Your second question was also about your own comfort level, and in a way, so was your third. There was really nothing in your post about showing your wife extraordinary care and attention - but that needs to be at the forefront of your mind.

Thank you for your response.

It is very clear to me that there are many things that I need to change. I will be reading "Remarks" posts tonight to gain further knowledge into Dr. H's insight.
Originally I was scheduled to appear on the MB show this Thursday, but due to a work conflict I believe I will be on the show this Friday.

There were many things in your two responses that I would like to address:

First is posting. She has asked me to post and about posting many times and I admit that I have not posted as she has asked. So I see that it is important to her and I want nothing more than for her to be happy, my posting should continue. I will make sure that I stay at it.
I will ask her tonight on how much posting she would like see and why.

Second are my reactions to her. There are a lot of my comfort level coming out through my words. In the midst of a argument, I feel like there are many DJ going on but I can see that if I am talking about my comfort level I am definetly not having her falling in love with me.

There is nothing I want more than to make her happy and I believe that having the Workbook gives us a tremondous opportunity to stop Love Bank withdrawls.

Would you all recommend (I say starting like I started it, but didnt) starting the Workbook from Page 1? What if this cannot be accomplished?

I agree that we should do the online course and I hope that she would like to complete this with me.

I will be posting more frequently

You know what, qwer? I think you're full of bull. You posted here with a "poor me - I 'm trying so hard" attitude LAST THURSDAY, and you haven't even bothered coming back to respond to your replies. You managed to soft-soap me on a good day, and now today, having read your wife's desperate posts, you have come back here with weasel promises and apparent agreement with every word I say, just to keep your wife quiet for a few more days.

I dislike intensely having been manipulated into saying that your wife love busts you with her "unfounded accusations", only to find out that you continue to lie to her about Internet usage, and who knows what else.

I think your wife should write to Dr Harley before you get on the radio show, telling him what you do to distress her so much. I think Dr Harley will see right through you, and will tell her to give you your marching orders. You will then stir yourself to look busy saving your marriage.

I predict that any effort you make will last about 48 hours, before it dies.