I'm trying to figure out how this "never have contact with an ex-lover" rule Dr. Harley has works. My wife & I divorced a year ago ,because of her fling with her ex-husband. She claims she did it only because we were having conflicts with our blended family. I have two children and she has two children with him, and we have one together. The last 6 months we have been working on and considering reconciling, but there is a constant issue of her having to contact with her ex-husband in regards to their children, seems like a slap in my face at times - maybe I'm too sensitive. This week her daughter is turning 11 and her dad, the ex-husband/fling, is throwing her a birthday party at a gymnastics place. The daughter wants her mother their too, because most of her friends do not know her dad (he lives 4hrs away) and most likely will not come because of that reason. I can appreciate wanting both parents to be at a birthday party, so how would Dr. Harley's rule on no contact between an ex-lover work in a situation like this, or even ongoing where we reconcile, but there is still a cloud of resentment (still angry) from me because of what I can see to be unnecessary communication and excessive at times between her ex-husband and her?

Appreciate any advice you can give.
thanks

Welcome to MB.

Well you've learned first hand the danger of having contact with an ex-lover.

What Dr. Harley recommends is to have an IM(intermediary).

Is your XWW willing to live by EPs to protect your marriage?

Here Intermediary Training School

Also here Special/Important Events while in Plan B

Here are some good articles to read. Tell us what you think.

Should I Remarry My Ex-Spouse? If Not, How Can I Just Let Go? Letter #1
Should I Remarry My Ex-Spouse? If Not, How Can I Just Let Go? Letter #2

Now you see why it is so important to never have contact with an ex-lover. Your wife would need to agree to NEVER see or speak to her XH again. She does not EVER need to be in direct contact with him to properly parent those children.

Your marriage to her is hopeless unless she agrees to this. If not you are better off moving on, because she will have more affairs in the future and you will be perpetually triggered.

The children should have been told about the affair during exposure and it explained that no contact is a must.

Marriage is far more important than a party.

What was the reason for her first divorce? Did she have affairs in that marriage too?

How long was she divorced prior to you meeting her?

I'd boil everything down to this:


This is true, and if you and she don't agree on this, I'd say you shouldn't try to reconcile.

Bull's-eye, we have a winner .

I've proposed the rule of no contact to her, but her and her Pastor think that it is too much when you have an ex-spouse and trying raise children.

That is nonsense. And isn't is so easy to have such opinions when it is not their ox getting gored? Divorced people NEVER need to be in contact to raise their children. In fact, it usually causes more stress because the couple is not amicable. In this case, they are sexually attracted to each other and just want to keep that option open. You should not go along with that.

And keep in mind that the pastor has no earthly idea how to save a marriage. Dr. Bill Harley, clinical psychologist and founder of Marriage Builders DOES. And the truth is that there is NO HOPE for your marriage otherwise.

If she chooses her relationship with her XH over you, then that should tell you every thing you need to know and you should run for your life.

But this is not just an ex-spouse, which would be problematic enough, but an ex-affair partner, and your pastor does not know what he's talking about when it comes to affairs.

If your wife insists on sticking with this position, and if she'd rather do what the pastor advises, you should not consider reconciliation with her. You'd do best to move on.

If she won't end contact for life, then you can look forward to a resumption of her affair. This won't be the last time.

Ditto on all that has already posted to you. You will also be living in triggerfest hell if there was any contact between her and exH/OM.


Her reasoning is bull but since that is her reasoning...you will once again have a blended family if you reconcile so how exactly is that supposed to work even if exH/OM is out of the picture? If you two have conflicts with your blended family, she's going to cheat on you to get some comfort? I would not reconcile with someone who has this mentality.

That the POSOM is the father of her two children how are you going to keep him out of your house? I don't see those kids signing up for MB and never mentioning their dad's name, etc. The children she shares with him will keep bringing him into your life to some degree. Therefore, I wouldn't bother trying to reconcile.

Sorry

Many on here have ex-spouses with children and don't ever talk to them. She is Just trying to make excuses to continue talking with him. She wants him in her life.

Here is another tool for parents who have children with their ex-spouse.

Parallel Parenting

Can you answer this?

If she has a pattern of serial cheating, recovery with her is much more difficult and will require much more diligence to make sure she does not stray again. Since you are already divorced, you might want to know just how difficult recovery would be before you decide to go down that road.

I met her while separating from her ex-husband and both of them were cheating on each other. She had moved back to our town with her parents while he was living with another woman. She had a couple boyfriends before me then and didn't seem to want to let them go either. She says she gets along better with men than women, because she always feels like she can be herself around men, but other women don't seem to want to know who she is. I'd say that is common of men who want more than just a "friend" and feel they're getting somewhere when a women responds to them.

As far as her daughter's birthday party, she ended up going to greet the parents of the children and then she left afterward. She said her daughter was worried the kids wouldn't be able to stay if they didn't see her there (the parents don't know her ex). She said she told her daughter that she wouldn't be doing anything like that again when her ex is involved and then she told me she would be willing to try this marriage builder program. Her plan was to be remarried by the summer, but I'm not sure I'd be willing to do that quite yet.

She said that I have to do some changing too, which I think is fine. Her perspective is that I'm not a good leader and did start arguments over our blended family too much, as well as not back her up when it came to disciplining the kids. I'd say there is truth to that, but I just didn't like the type of discipline she used and was trying to find other ways to discipline children that wasn't so destructive.

thinking about all this and reading the comments on this blog is a little overwhelming and bit confusing on what to do next here...

Please read this and listen to the clips. Serial Cheaters

So you knew she had committed adultery with several men, including you, when you married her.

Did you think she'd stop that behaviour when she married you? If so, why?

You poignantly point out my ignorance here and I'll be the first to admit my mistake. I'm not quite sure where you're going with this... I can't go back and change all that in the past, but moving forward is what I'm asking about. If you have some advice in regards to that, please weigh in.
thanks