Wife is a sex addict and divorcing me - 08/31/15 03:04 PM
New thread!
After married 3 years (a 1 year old son), I discover my wife has been having 2 affairs, starting barely after we were married. She has been doing this for 10 years with others. She now is diagnosed as a sex addict, and is doing tremendous very hard work in a 12 step group and with an individual counselor; I believe she will recover strong.
That was 6 months ago. Only problem is I got angry. Not throwing dishes angry, but really, we all know words cut deep. So she moved out 6 weeks ago, and filed for divorce! Now I am turning inwards and am very ashamed of how I handled the discovery, and even how I was not a empathetic husband the whole marriage. The only thing I can work on is myself. As is common, my wife filing for divorce was my wake up call.
**here is a key part. She believes (and reinforced by therapists, books) that she now needs to work on establishing boundaries, because lack of boundaries caused her to seek affairs. From my perspective I am getting kicked while I am down, but I am now trying to be supportive (how to support divorce in order to reconcile???)
There are resources (forums, in person groups, etc) for men who cheat, for women who got cheated on, and for people who are losing marriages. But there are NO resources for men whose wives are sex addicts, and not much for anyone who gets cheated on then dumped but not dumped for another partner. So I am at a loss. I figure much of the divorce-stopping literature applies, such as working on my shortcomings etc.
But here is a specific question: do I do "NC" (no contact") like advocated by Dobson and Marriage Busting, or do I do gentle reminders and "talk charges" (leave a voicemail, leave a card) like advocated by Marriage Fitness??? They seem like opposite strategies but perhaps it is situation specific.
Most recently she filed for divorce last week, and asked me to not contact her except with information about our son, or about the divorce, or during our twice weekly custody handoffs. I tried leaving cards in the diaper bag but even that could work for or against me?
Thoughts?
--Blanca (not my real name of course)
After married 3 years (a 1 year old son), I discover my wife has been having 2 affairs, starting barely after we were married. She has been doing this for 10 years with others. She now is diagnosed as a sex addict, and is doing tremendous very hard work in a 12 step group and with an individual counselor; I believe she will recover strong.
That was 6 months ago. Only problem is I got angry. Not throwing dishes angry, but really, we all know words cut deep. So she moved out 6 weeks ago, and filed for divorce! Now I am turning inwards and am very ashamed of how I handled the discovery, and even how I was not a empathetic husband the whole marriage. The only thing I can work on is myself. As is common, my wife filing for divorce was my wake up call.
**here is a key part. She believes (and reinforced by therapists, books) that she now needs to work on establishing boundaries, because lack of boundaries caused her to seek affairs. From my perspective I am getting kicked while I am down, but I am now trying to be supportive (how to support divorce in order to reconcile???)
There are resources (forums, in person groups, etc) for men who cheat, for women who got cheated on, and for people who are losing marriages. But there are NO resources for men whose wives are sex addicts, and not much for anyone who gets cheated on then dumped but not dumped for another partner. So I am at a loss. I figure much of the divorce-stopping literature applies, such as working on my shortcomings etc.
But here is a specific question: do I do "NC" (no contact") like advocated by Dobson and Marriage Busting, or do I do gentle reminders and "talk charges" (leave a voicemail, leave a card) like advocated by Marriage Fitness??? They seem like opposite strategies but perhaps it is situation specific.
Most recently she filed for divorce last week, and asked me to not contact her except with information about our son, or about the divorce, or during our twice weekly custody handoffs. I tried leaving cards in the diaper bag but even that could work for or against me?
Thoughts?
--Blanca (not my real name of course)