I would contact his father personally and have a discussion with him. Sure, he might endorse adultery, but you won't know until you speak to him.

I only have an address for where the Dad lives and no phone number. Since I believe the OM also lives there, I'm not inclined to make a visit there. In addition, the neighborhood there is a bit on the rough side.

Can you go and take a big friend?

Thanks for the thought, but I'm not sure if the reward will outweigh the risk in this case.

But, you don't know that until you try. We have had many cases where notifying a parent spelled the end of the affair or caused great conflict in it. You can't afford to miss exposure to the OM's parent. That is a KEY exposure target. Don't talk yourself out of these steps with unknown hypotheticals. Sure, it may amount to nothing, but it may also reap great rewards. You just don't' know..

Please don't skip exposure targets because you don't think they'll work. That's not the point. The point is to try everything in the hopes that something might work. I skipped the cheaterville suggestion early on for precisely that reason: I didn't think it would work. Now I've done it, and it had an impact, but I'm afraid I might have been too late. If you want to save your marriage, do everything. Don't have regrets later.

Thanks for providing greater clarity to your suggestions. I will try to see if I can contact the father. I did contact a prior associate of the OM today and was told that she had contracted with him to perform some home repairs and paid him for the materials upfront. The OM never performed the repairs nor refunded the upfront money, so she took him to court and won a judgement against him. She also stated that he was a drug user during that time frame.

Have you tried sitting your wife down and asking her all your questions? If you can remain cool and calm, she won't feel threatened. Try to find out legnth of affair, what she felt was missing in the marriage, etc. You need to know! If the OM is a loser (and it sounds like he is), she may come out of the fog sooner than later. It bothers me that this is her 2nd affair. Why?

I have tried talking to WW, however, she is very defensive and threatening divorce while maintaining her affair, so she is very hesitant to make self-incriminating statements. She feels that I have not fulfilled her emotional needs. Unfortunately, she has not fulfilled my needs either and I have worked very hard for many years to support our household as the primary breadwinner. I'm really trying to rectify this issue as I close in on retirement, but find it virtually impossible to do while the affair continues.

Does your WW pay her own cell bill?

LMG,
I too am worried that is not your wife's first rodeo. But I also sense that neither of you have met each other's emotional needs during the long course of your marriage. If you both learned to do this--and she learns to put up boundaries around men--you could have a happy marriage.

Your wife found someone who is meeting those needs, and she is not going to give that up easily. It's wrong, but that is what you are facing.

Someone close to your wife needs to let her know that she is headed down a path of destruction. Her best option is to end contact for life with this loser and go through counseling with a someone who takes Dr. Harley's approach. Steve Harley is a real option for you. I wonder if you might be able to hire Steve, do a session with him and then get your wife to speak with him at another time. I've heard that he is very persuasive.

But first things, first. Kill the affair.

No, I pay our joint cell phone bill, in addition to almost every other household bill. I currently continue to pay it, so that I can keep an eye on usage, now that I'm aware of the affair. For years, I had no access to the cell bills/usage records, since WW was the cell plan originator. I just paid the bill since my phone was included on the plan. After the affair was discovered this summer, I insisted that I be granted full access to the see the bills/usage report data, which has been granted. WW recently started working again, which was one of the needs that were not being met for me, however, I believe WW is working towards gaining the financial resources to divorce in time, while maintaining her affair.

I have let all of WW's family know of the affair and many have spoken with her on multiple occasions to end it. Unfortunately, the one sibling closest to her passed away earlier this year, so she grew even more wayward after that. I'd really like to have sessions with someone who embraces Dr. Harley's approach locally in my area with the two of us. Does anyone have a city/state list of these resources?

As you mentioned, I'm now working very hard to terminate the affair.

Listen to the clips in here. There's a clip at the end on how to find a good counselor.

Beware of Bad Counselors

Since you're the primary bread winner have you cut all avenues that she is using to facilitate her affair?

I suggest calling MB coaching center and set up an appointment with Steve Harley. The MB coaching is just as well received and more workable than local resources.

If you are in a financial hardship, email the Harley's at MB Radio and speak to Dr Harley. These resources will be much more concise and save you time and resources in the long haul.

Also, I hope you are monitoring your health. I hope you are getting tested for STD's. Also suggest your wife do the same. She is at significant risk for a number of blood borne pathogens including Hepatitis and Aides.

It appears your wife is cake walking. You are keeping a roof over her head, keeping her in food, clothing, sundries beyond her own means. This OM is providing seeming intimate support and B*&@* S^#!(. Before she gains more momentum, it seems your going to need to indicate she'll need to leave by a certain deadline if she has not ended the affair. You can plan A from afar but you can no longer support her affair. Don't threaten, just do it.

This would place more stress on herself and the OM. Under additional stressors you might start looking like the better option.

I've cut down on the bulk of the avenues. The cell phone is the current path that is tedious. Since WW has it in her name and I'm tied to it, if I cut off the funding for it, I loose access to monitoring and WW will likely just get a prepaid phone that I will know nothing about.

Yes, absolutely WW is cake walking. I've been cutting off as much support as I can to WW. I must take care in setting arbitrary deadlines, as we jointly own the house, so I can't legally demand that she leave.

Dr Harley would not suggest a man in Plan A ask his WW to leave the marital home. It is much more difficult to Plan A from afar than it is when you are together. There is sometimes a fine line between supporting the A and Plan A, meaning you do not want to support the affair and do want to have boundaries, but you also want to show amazing care to your wife to 'win her back' and be the better option, and sometimes one can seem like a contradiction to the other. Many posters currently posting here are having to walk this line and can give you great advice on this.

Also, you can email Dr Harley himself and ask about your specific situation and how to proceed.

This is exactly the position that I'm currently in. WW is cake walking me and is being emotionally supported and coached by the OM. I'm trying to win her back without running her off and set some affair boundaries, in addition to staying legal, which is a very fine line. I will e-mail Dr. Harley for additional guidance. Do you happen to have his e-mail address that you can share?