Hi, I’m brand new here and I hope I’m not creating a new thread redundantly. I haven’t seen what I am looking for yet, so here goes...

In April, I found out my husband was having an affair with a married friend of ours. It was a double betrayal that started on a drunken night while I was out of town working for a few months. The details (which are worthy of a lifetime movie script) aren’t so important for this thread, but I will say that he got himself into a fatal attraction situation, police had to get involved and we even moved to another state entirely and were even in hiding for a bit. Whatever the case, I am 100% sure that the affair is over. This woman ended up being evil personified. We found out after the fact that she was on her 3rd husband, she stole all her husbands from their wives and she’s was trying to have mine be number 4. The evil tactics she used have left me with nightmares. She threatened my life and all kinds of stuff like that. So here is my main issue right now. I am struggling with feeling a sense of evil all around me AND when I try to be intimate with my husband, I feel like she’s in bed with us. I feel like she’s in his skin, all over his body, and when we try to be intimate it feels like she’s right there, invading my mind and my body. I get flashes of her face and can hear her voice all day long, because remember, she was my ‘friend’. I know her very well. Does anyone have any idea how to deal with this? How do I feel like his body is cleansed of her? My husband and I truly want to rebuild our marriage, and everyone can see he is authentically remorseful and doing everything he can to make things right. The affair started in January and ended in April. It ended 6 months ago. I know this is all very short in relation to so many affairs that go on forever. Does anyone have any advice on how to get through this part of it? Thank you

rl333, welcome to Marriage Builders. You have done a super job setting up your marriage for success and are on the right track. While this trauma is very fresh right now, it will fade away *IF* you create a romantic marriage and completely affair proof your marriage. The reason is two fold. If your marriage is affair proofed and this woman is completely out of your lives and he has taken extraordinary precautions to prevent another affair, you won't be perpetually triggered. If you create a happy marriage, your mind won't wander to the past.

You sense evil because evil has touched your marriage but you can overcome that. The steps to create a romantic marriage are in the book Surviving an Affair. I would pick that up and follow those steps. The check list for extraordinary precautions is here:

From Surviving an Affair, pg 66-67

The extraordinary precautions do more than end marriage-threatening affairs; they help a couple form the kind of relationship they always wanted.

These recommendations may seem rigid, unnecessarily confining, and even paranoid to those who have not been the victim of infidelity. But people like Sue and Jon, who have suffered unimaginable pain as a result of an affair that spun out of control, can easily see their value. For the inconvenience of following my advice, Sue would have spared herself and Jon the very worst experience of their lives.


Checklist for How Affairs Should End

_____The unfaithful spouse should reveal information about the affair to the betrayed spouse.

_____The unfaithful spouse should make a commitment to the betrayed spouse to never see or talk to the lover OP again.

_____The unfaithful spouse should write a letter to the lover OP ending the relationship and send it with the approval of the betrayed spouse.

_____The unfaithful spouse should take extraordinary precautions to guarantee total separation from the lover OP:

_____Block potential communication with the lover OP (change e-mail address and home and cell phone numbers, and close all social networking accounts; have voice messages and mail monitored by the betrayed spouse).

_____Account for time (betrayed spouse and wayward spouse give each other a twenty-four-hour daily schedule with locations and telephone numbers).

_____Account for money (betrayed spouse and wayward spouse give each other a complete account of all money spent).

_____Spend leisure time together.

_____Change jobs and relocate if necessary.

_____Avoid overnight separation.

_____Allow technical accountability.

_____ Expose affair to family members, clergy, and/or friends.