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Years ago I visited this website after my husband had an emotional affair with a co worker (he was in the Army). He since got out and we moved away and things were ok. We had been working on things until I got a call from the former mistress that he had called her and told him to call her at work (2 years later!). I was so distraught over learning that he was still trying to cheat on me after I thought things were going better (AGAIN) that I moved out. He is now apologetic and agreed to work on his PTSD and alcohol problems. In the midst of this he disclosed that he had had two more sexual affairs with two different women before the third emotional affair. That's 5 years of lying to me (I had suspicion but no proof). We have been married 13 years and have three children. I am lost. Confused. Afraid to believe anything he says and don't feel like he has done enough work on himself or in resolving what went wrong in the first place for me to move back. I've been ostracized by my family for even talking to him after all this let alone the notion of reconciling. I don't want to be fooled by his manipulation any more. I couldn't find anything in the basics that can address my situation. All I ever hear is that his pattern of behavior is lack of good character. He has been to one individual counseling session in over a months time, hasn't made an appt for us to go to marriage counseling and attends two twelve step meetings a week if he isn't busy doing something else. These are things he said he would do to show me that he is a changed man. Am I being impatient? Is reconciliation possible? People tell me that we are just in denial about it being over. I don't know how to feel anything except afraid to trust and doubtful about my future with him. Any links or advice or whatever would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

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Originally Posted by MissLady
Years ago I visited this website after my husband had an emotional affair with a co worker (he was in the Army). He since got out and we moved away and things were ok. We had been working on things until I got a call from the former mistress that he had called her and told him to call her at work (2 years later!). I was so distraught over learning that he was still trying to cheat on me after I thought things were going better (AGAIN) that I moved out. He is now apologetic and agreed to work on his PTSD and alcohol problems. In the midst of this he disclosed that he had had two more sexual affairs with two different women before the third emotional affair. That's 5 years of lying to me (I had suspicion but no proof). We have been married 13 years and have three children. I am lost. Confused. Afraid to believe anything he says and don't feel like he has done enough work on himself or in resolving what went wrong in the first place for me to move back. I've been ostracized by my family for even talking to him after all this let alone the notion of reconciling. I don't want to be fooled by his manipulation any more. I couldn't find anything in the basics that can address my situation. All I ever hear is that his pattern of behavior is lack of good character. He has been to one individual counseling session in over a months time, hasn't made an appt for us to go to marriage counseling and attends two twelve step meetings a week if he isn't busy doing something else. These are things he said he would do to show me that he is a changed man. Am I being impatient? Is reconciliation possible? People tell me that we are just in denial about it being over. I don't know how to feel anything except afraid to trust and doubtful about my future with him. Any links or advice or whatever would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.
I'm so sorry to read about this. I've been through this situation, where the workplace enabled my H to continue contact with his whore for 5 years after he stopped travelling and meeting her in person. I went through too many D Days to count. I know how you feel to discover this now.

The only solution to your H's serial cheating - which he will continue whenever you cannot see what he is doing - is for him to stop working outside the home. In the end, it took my H's early retirement for me to know that contact with his whore had finally finished.

There is a poster here, SusieQ, whose H serially cheated, and his job as a hospital nurse was the environment that facilitated his secret second life. Even after doing the online MB course with the direct supervision of Dr H, he cheated for a fourth time. Dr H told the couple that the only way that recovery would be possible would be for him to leave the mixed-sex hospital environment altogether. He would not do that, and they are now divorced, because Susie could not take any more D Days.

With spouses like these, who take the opportunity of working outside the home to cheat, the only solution is for them not to work outside the home, or for the spouses to work together. For example, they could set up a business and run it together.

Is there any possibility of that kind of solution for you? If not, the reality is that he will do this again, and you need to protect yourself from that by divorcing.


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Did you ever expose his affair as was suggested a few years ago?

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Yes I did. It was a living nightmare. He was chaptered out of the army and we returned to our home of record. Things were fine for almost a year and then he got drunk one night and told me he missed her. So I gave him cash to go find and be with her and he refused to go. We went to see a marriage counselor and within another year she called me to roll me he called her and gave her his work number.

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Originally Posted by MissLady
Yes I did. It was a living nightmare. He was chaptered out of the army and we returned to our home of record. Things were fine for almost a year and then he got drunk one night and told me he missed her. So I gave him cash to go find and be with her and he refused to go. We went to see a marriage counselor and within another year she called me to roll me he called her and gave her his work number.
Do you have any responses to my post, or shall I leave you to it?


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Your husband is an alcoholic and serial cheat, who makes enough attempts to pacify you, but not change. Your family likely sees this, which is why they are upset. It is hard to see someone subject themselves to that.

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Yes. Sorry. I don't know how possible it is for him to work from home. He would have to switch careers entirely. I guess the answer to my own question is that I don't want to be married to someone I will forever have to watch over. I don't have to be watched over. Cheating has never crossed my mind. I just hate feeling insane like this. He says all these things and does all these things that make me think there is real change occurring but in the end I just end up the fool. I really would like to figure out what is wrong with me that I keep allowing this pattern to reoccur. That's what I really need answers to. I'm not a stupid woman but clearly there is something wrong.

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Originally Posted by MissLady
I really would like to figure out what is wrong with me that I keep allowing this pattern to reoccur. That's what I really need answers to. I'm not a stupid woman but clearly there is something wrong.
I don't see why you would conclude that there is anything wrong with you. The logical conclusion to be drawn from this history is that you are committed to your marriage and have taken steps to ensure that you haven't had an affair, whereas your husband hasn't. And since the first affair, you have put in maximum effort to try and rebuild your marriage, while your serial cheater husband hasn't. You have been a buyer in your marriage. Your husband hasn't. That does not imply that there is anything wrong with you, and trying to find answers to what is wrong with you is a fruitless and pointless exercise.

So now that you've answered your own question about watching over your husband, what are you going to do about your marriage?


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I am going to proceed with divorce. I don't want to live like I have been. I'm exhausted.

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Originally Posted by MissLady
I am going to proceed with divorce. I don't want to live like I have been. I'm exhausted.

If you proceed with divorce you should cut off all contact with your husband and dont tell him until you have met with a lawyer

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Won't that just piss him off and make things worse? We aren't fighting right now. We are mostly getting along.

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Originally Posted by MissLady
Won't that just piss him off and make things worse? We aren't fighting right now. We are mostly getting along.

Your goal shouldn't be to "not piss him off". That is not MB and the worst possible way to approach this problem you are facing.

It should be first to protect your health and well-being. And while you are feeling like you want to D, I would advise you (as I was advised by my MB friends/family) to go to Plan B, expose the affair and then give your WH a list of conditions for you to even CONSIDER a marriage with him (poly, change of jobs, etc). Don't worry about his job - that's HIS mess to clean up, not yours. Then you can relax in Plan B and pull yourself together and take your time to make a decision. This gives you the MOST options - marriage or divorce. You don't HAVE TO decide this now.

Under these current conditions, I am worried you are just going to continue co-existing with a wayward, enabling him, while at the same time draining away any possible chance for your M to truly recover and also hurting your health.


Ddays 2007 and 2011
Plan B 6/21/11
Divorced July 2012
2 kids
How to Plan B Correctly
Parallel Parenting in Plan B

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