First off, thanks to everyone who reads and contributes to the forum and posts. This is my first post to get someone else's opinion.

Married 22 yrs. with 2 daughters. My husband works out of town as a consultant Sunday-Thurs and has been for at least 16 yrs of our marriage at the same company. Several years ago I uncovered email and Facebook communications with female co-worker. There was apparently an emotional affair (so he says) that went on for several years. They had lunch together often, she visited him at his hotel, brought him medicine and soup when he was sick... When I found out, he agreed to cease all communications with the OW. He sent an email explaining that I found out about their relationship and that he feels horrible that it hurt me so bad. Supposedly she works at a different location and they never cross paths. I have no way to confirm either way without hiring a PI outside of accepting his word which is hard to trust. Assuming that is over and done with, I have continuously asked my H to find another job here in our hometown. He says he wants to come home, but does not want to deal with the stress of being a FT employee with less money, more hours, yada, yada... Two jobs have been posted recently that he has applied for here locally. Even though he has applied for the jobs, he has made negative comments about both jobs as in preparation for not getting them. Am I terrible for thinking that he is setting me up to accept the jobs are not an option?

To add to my distress over him being away every week all week in a hotel, he has a couple of male friends that he spends lots of free time with out of town (hotel guests and staff). They exchange vulgar pictures, texts and emails that is on the offensive side to me on a regular basis. He maintains that it is just "guy humor, that's what guys do." He does not seem to think there is anything wrong with his actions and is not interested in changing. It is very hurtful and I have told him many times when I come across something in his texts and email. It feels like I am being cheated on over and over and the man I love fails to see it as a problem at all.

There's more: He has told me in the past that one of the female hotel employees has performed "favors" for the male guests for a fee. Swears that he got no favors even though I have been on the phone when the female knocked on his door for a "free drink". I made an issue of that when it happened and he was adamant that I not call and get the girl fired (red flag). I didn't but apparently someone else did. This girl is a legend at the hotel because she would discuss her escapades with the male guests and employees. My H has seen naked pics and videos on her phone and even though she is supposedly not working there any more my husband and his buddies still talk about her and make offensive jokes. After these conversations, my husband has been saying lately "I am the best husband I have ever been" like that is a consolation prize that makes his actions okay.

My H and I clearly live independent lives (to our detriment in my opinion) but I really don't feel like he is interested in changing the situation. He gets to have his cake and eat it too. Why would he change? I am afraid nothing will change and my love bank will continue to be in the red. I feel very broken, alone and uncared for.

To add to the discussion, my H is active in maintaining his out-of-town friendships and has recently come back in contact with his dad & family. His dad is not a good person and did some despicable things early in our marriage and after our first child. It has been 15 years since he has been in our lives. My husband has made the effort to reconnect with that side of the family and working on those relationships really hard. No real effort is made for me and our marriage. When I say something about it, his response is "what am I going to do when you leave me? I won't have any one. So I need to reconnect." His dad has real anger issues, treats women bad and has been arrested for indecent exposure (even in his 60s). I don't want my girls to have any contact with his father at all and that is another stress to deal with. I don't want his father to have the slightest opportunity to say or do anything to harm my girls mental and physical well being. My husband argues that he will never leave them alone with him so I should not worry about it. The thought of being around my FIL makes me physically ill as it does my MIL. I refuse to put myself in that situation. I am sure my husband will push the issue for the girls to meet him in the near future. Not sure how I am going to deal with that.

I whole-heartedly admit that I have issues (trust being the biggest) and I have a hard time communicating with my H because I get so emotional and upset. No screaming or physical stuff. Lots of tears and accusations that he says are all in my mind. It does not help that my H is a consultant and gets paid for his opinions. He is always prepared for a response or comeback. I usually feel terrible and back down for a while.

Questions, comments, suggestions... thanks in advance for reading my lengthy post and for offering any advice. I don't want to give up on my marriage or family, but my husband does not make it easy. He says he is happy the way things are. It is me that is the problem.

Thanks again!

Welcome to Marriage builders. Sorry for your reason for being here.

You are reacting to the problems your husband is causing in the relationship. His continual refusal to take your feelings into account and show you real care is a big problem. You cannot control your feelings, and he is showing blatant disregard for you by continuing to do things that hurt you.

The vets will know better how to handle this Dr. Harley style, but I wanted to give some encouraging words until they are here.

Luna

Thanks very much Luna! I desperately want to stop feeling this way and move forward. Sometimes I wonder how I got to this place and why am I still here. Looking forward to the good advice from the MB pros.

Welcome to Marriage Builders, NeedToBeHeard,

I see a host of problems here. The first is that any job that takes a spouse out of the home overnight is an invitation to affairs. It's SO easy for a traveling spouse to conduct a very successful secret second life. I'd be highly surprised if he has not had sex with at least the one female co-worker. There are likely to have been others as well, simply because affairs are so tempting and your lifestyle has made affairs very easy to conduct.

Of course you should not trust his word about what he's doing when he's not with you. Trust is earned and he's done everything possible to destroy your trust. Hire a PI and find out what he's doing when he's not with you. Research ways to snoop electronically and don't tell him you are doing this. Don't tell him about MB either. Meanwhile read up on exposure.

Once you have the solid evidence, expose the affair(s) to your friends and family and ask for their support for your marriage.

Tell your husband that you can no longer tolerate him being away at nights, that you are very unhappy with this and ask him to return home for good with no more traveling.

Have you read the Basic Concepts on this site? The Policy of Joint Agreement is the foundation of a great marriage. The POJA states: never do anything without the enthusiastic agreement of your spouse. This applies to jobs, the way you raise your children, spend your money, and to the family and friends you each choose to have in your life. If you are not enthusiastic about his relationship with his scummy father, then following the POJA would dictate your husband avoid this relationship.

Work hard on relaxing instead of getting very emotional. Don't accuse. Don't argue. Get the evidence and state the facts calmly.

Regardless of what you find out, your husband has to leave that job immediately. There is no future for your marriage any other way. I would start planning for a separation. If he doesn't act to leave this job soon, you are going to have to be prepared to protect yourself. Enduring a situation like this can cause permanent damage to your long-term health.

Thank you very much for your thoughts. I have been trying for many years to get him to come home and stop the traveling. There may be an end in sight with another job opportunity here in our hometown. Keeping my fingers crossed and praying that it falls in to place. At times I get so fed up with feeling like I need to track his every move while he is away. That is not healthy for me or our marriage.

The problem I see with hiring a PI is that he and his out-of-town friends have built such a tight nit group that they would cover for one another. I have no proof that it would be the case, but it is in the back of my mind.

As for exposure, am I too late for that. At least for the one I know 100% happened back in 2008. I have email communications of that one. When I found out, he made the move to tell his best friend and kind of gloat at what a good guy he is for coming clean.

When I tell him how much I want him to come home and how unhappy I am, there is always a list of reasons why he should not. Less money, work longer hours, bring home stress that will make him a jerk, he loves his job...

I have read the Basic Concepts. The POJA sounds wonderful, but I honestly don't know if he would enthusiastically agree to it. He may agree, but since we have lead independent lives for so long I don't know if he would be willing to make a change. I would like to think he would, but....

As for the relationship with his dad, I don't know if he would be willing to give on that. He yearns to have a relationship with his dad even though he is not a good person. We have a very close relationship with my dad, but it does not fill that void for him. As a child of bad parent, I guess you can forgive and forget easier. In the past my FIL has done some very hateful things to me and unfortunately my husband never "manned" up and protected me and our marriage. That was 15 years ago and I don't know if I can trust that he would be strong enough to protect me and my kids. I imagine something rude being said or done at a family gathering with my kids around and I am the only one willing to leave the situation. I could see my husband and his family pushing back and there I would be all alone trying to escape the situation.

Relaxing is very hard. I am a big ball of emotions and easily unraveled. I can work on the accusations and arguing. I am a passive person and hate conflict so I am good at holding it in until something causes me to erupt.

Thanks again and I hope everyone has a good weekend.

I agree. One of his excuses not to leave the job is that he is afraid we will be miserable learning to live a normal life together. I have told him that is a risk I am willing to take. The way things are now, is not working for me. I have explained worst case is we realize we truly don't want to be together and move on. But the best case scenario is that we find that love again and build a strong marriage, move forward and live happily ever after.

You can't wait for him to do this. There are so many red flags that he is now a serial cheat - the original affair has flourished and new girls have been added.

He's not going to give up the job. It's now his happy hunting ground.

Your FiL will now have whatever access to the girls he likes because he is privy to your husbands guy secrets. They are now both serial cheats.

Don't sit on the tracks waiting for the train. Separate until the job situation and travelling changes. No one could live like this.

If you were snooping, you'd find a host of new affairs. More than just the stuff he lets you see.

However since the original affair continues unabated, you should just separate without snooping for more.

Did you expose his affair and to who?

Do your children know? Affairs can be caused in their future if their parents affair is covered up.

You should have spyware on everything.

It's only bad for you if it shows you bad things. The goal is for him to live an honourable life and for the spyware revelations to bore you.

I bet he goes on about trust a lot, huh?

I agree with the above comments. I want to add that I know plenty of consultants who are very successful. The ones who do a lot of travel are young. The older more experienced consultants with families manage to find positions condusive to their family lifestyle. It's a normal progression. Since your H hasn't done that progression, he is either not good at what he does, or prefers the travel. All the consultants I know, who have families, HATE the travel, even if it's a few times a year. It's a big RED FLAG if he likes it and prefers it to another position with little or no travel.

Regarding your father-in-law, the reconnection is not uncommon. My soon to be ex has also reconnected with his family. These men know they will need their support when they eventually destroy their family. Your H is setting himself up IMO. My H also told me he has been the best husband and father. These men try and validate themselves and they need justification for their actions. The next thing will be when you actually catch him cheating. He will feel entitlement and justification. He will say you didn't show appreciation for all he does as a wonderful husband and father. It's coming....trust me.

Need, it is not a risk, it is the solution. The only solution for your marriage. You don't have a marriage otherwise. The risk is continuing the travel, because it has pretty much destroyed your marriage. If you want your marriage to change, you will have to change that.

And I agree he probably won't do that, because he is having an affair. If he stops traveling, he would have to give up his affair and his independent lifestyle.

You have nothing to lose but everything to gain if you hire a PI and get the evidence of an affair. You can use this evidence to blow up his affair by exposing it. If you can ruin his affair, he may be motivated to come home and work on his marriage. Otherwise, there is nothing to save here and you should plan on separating. If he doesn't change, his treatment will cause you enormous emotional and physical problems. This is why Dr. Harley recommends that women separate in 3-4 weeks in these situations. They have nervous breakdowns from living this way.

I think you will need to be separated for quite a while and really let him stew in the gutter with these people. He is telling you with these words that he would rather you left him than lose his gutteral habits.


Reconnecting with bad dad is also a sign of an affair. People's personalities change when in affairs so they change their relationships too. Good people make them feel guilty. Bad people are safe.

If the addiction of the affair is broken, his personality would revert to what it was. But you will not get any help from him. The prospect of a 'normal life' to an addict IS miserable.

This must be absolutely heart breaking to his mother, watching history repeat itself. Does she knows about his affair?

A PI can get you the evidence easily by checking up on him at this infamous "hotel" (some would call it brothel) of his.

So is it normal and stupid to want to believe there is no one else? I can't confirm there have been other women. I can't swear that his actions are not open and transparent. At least as much as they can be living the way we do.

I believe that I will fight tooth and nail as it relates to my girls and FIL. Words and actions cannot be taken back and I don't want my girls to have to deal with people and issues that he would bring into their lives. I want to say maybe when they grow up, but they are 15 & 12. They would probably understand completely. But I don't believe my husband would tell the girls or let me tell the girls about the things FIL has done in his past. I have never been allowed to say disparaging things about him thus far.

You could probably say that I did not expose the affair. The only people that know are 3 or 4 close friends. Family has no idea. Kids definitely don't know about the affair. The affair was going on in 2008 and I did not figure it out until 2010. The OW married a year or so later and has had a couple of kids.

My husband is very technologically savvy so it would be really hard to do anything on the sly. It would have to be in his face and then yes, I would hear the trust talk. He would probably go along with it if I pressured him, but I think he would find a way around it.

I think my husband is tired of traveling, but he has such a great set up out of town. He stays in the same hotel (for cheap), same flights, has a car there, has a 5-10 minute commute to work, eats out every night, socializes with hotel staff and guests, can spend all his free time doing what he wants including countless hours online or playing games on his phone (he does that away and at home).

I gets LOTS of justification. That should be his middle name. And I am not witty or smart enough to call him out in the moment.

What I don't understand is his need/urge to repair a relationship with such a toxic person and put absolutely no effort into repairing our relationship.

He is a wayward, you'll never understand their thinking, so don't waste time. Find out if there is an affair currently and expose

I have the nervous break downs. Seems like they come every 3-6 months like clock work.

My H is home right now for another 2 weeks. Hopefully the job opportunity here will pan out. Last night he sounded a little more upbeat about the 2nd job he just heard about. I would like nothing more than for him to fly back to the consulting job, pack his stuff and come home for good. I think it will be difficult mainly for him to adjust to the married lifestyle all the time but it not something we cannot get past. I am still married, still trying to make it work... that says something about what I will put up with and endure.

Without evidence of a more recent affair actually happening, I don't know if I would feel justified in separating at this point. I know you are shaking your head and I would be too. It is amazing what you will actually put up with in a relationship. I use to think I would never put up with crap like this.

Just a word of thanks to everyone again for providing feedback. Since I have not exposed, it is hard not being able to talk about our issues and my concerns with others in my life. Just the quick responses last night helped me have a little better attitude when talking to H.

There is a fix for that problem. Walk through the guidance provided for you here and expose. If you have problems that make it difficult to expose, post them here and let people walk you through the solutions.

The posters here have expertly guided many people through the trauma that you are going through. Those who have listened and followed the advice have wound up much happier and healthier.