I'll first say that there was bad behavior by all parties, including myself.

His job made my life miserable... It was extremely low-paying and for 3.5 years, the company he worked for didn't even give him, or anyone, a single raise. He worked a ton of overtime, and was never home. But at such a low wage, the law of diminishing returns kicks in quick... you start bleeding that money out in other ways... going out to dinner because you're just too tired to cook (him from working so much, me from the kids)... and the A/C goes and you don't have enough money to fix it, so you buy window units and then you have HUGE ($650 a month) electric bills...

For a year and a half before this, he worked 1 month here, 2 months there and 3 months driving a cab (money and hours just as bad) so I do understand how that year and a half out of work, and the loss of his EMT license because we couldn't afford to renew it made him feel like "If you have a job you keep it... no matter what." But he also complained to me on a daily basis how much he hated that job. I pushed and prodded and pulled to get him to 'move forward,' but it was all in vain...

I had my own business, but because it was 'feast or famine,' he took the 'steady' job, and with all that OT, two kids, and one car, I couldn't get a job and was limited on what I could do for my business too.

I felt trapped in the house... he had other, better job opportunities fall into his lap, and he just ignored them.

I felt like our family and our future didn't matter to him at all...

I called him at work, all the time, screaming at him, because the kids and all the stress were driving me crazy.

Two and a half years in, he was offered another job that had 'school hours,' and his boss begged him to stay, promising to work with his schedule... he finally got a decent, set schedule, my income went up, and he obviously resented it(I only recently discovered). So he started engaging in an emotional affair with a woman who was hired to work there. Highly inappropriate text messages and Facebook messages. Her telling him, "I don't fool around with married men," but she continued to 'flirt' with him and started singing a song in his ear about "Oh, poor you, all the guys at work say if they had Shane's home life, they'd be grumpy all the time too."

When I found out, I confronted both of them and he told me he was choosing the kids and me.

He was then up for a promotion and told that he didn't get it because of his 'availability' and then later told that it was because I'd blogged about his job and what a terrible company they were to work for.

Shortly after that, she was promoted and became his boss.

A year later I found that he was still sending her highly inappropriate text messages and Facebook private messages.

We had a huge fight, I confronted her, and she threatened him, saying that "this drama causing behavior would affect her decision in any future promotions." [Textbook sexual harassment. I threatened to get them both fired].

He continued to insist that he loved me

A month later, she and the assistant manager both encouraged him to apply for another promotion, which would have him working directly with her, very long hours... I said "No." It was too much temptation.

He told me I had no right to a 'say' in it... and he took the job.

Immediately, he started working 14-16 hour days, coming home 3-4 hours late every night. I started calling him all day again, yelling at him that this was ridiculous for him to be working so much, that it wasn't fair to the kids and me. He blamed it on being understaffed and on the staff he did have being 'incompetent.' They called 'constantly,'for one problem or another. He was having to go 'grocery shopping' at 10pm-midnight, being out until 3:30 in the morning.

Then one day, he told me, "I think the marriage was over for me 2.5 years ago, I just hadn't accepted it yet."

Well that certainly was a convenient 'workaround' the entire year and a half that he was 'communicating' with this woman, refusing to cut ties, and taking that job... in fact, at one point, he even told me that he thinks he took the job because he knew it would end the marriage.

He said he would stay until February, when we got our tax return... but when I offered to go sleep on the couch, he told me, "I know you don't like sleeping in the bed alone without me, and I don't like sleeping in the bed alone without you."

Over the course of the next two months, he said "He didn't like himself with me. That he was afraid of himself with me. That he wanted to punch me in the face. That 'everyone' told him that if the person you're with is making you want to raise your hands to them then you shouldn't be with them... Then it was he didn't like me, didn't like who I was, didn't like my politics, didn't like the way I handle money, didn't like the way I feel about cops and the military, didn't like my parenting, and hadn't been happy with our sex life in a long time..."

He complained that my phone calls and my blogging about his company put his job in jeopardy, that I jeopardized his 'career.' (A job that hired him at $8.50 an hour, in 3.5 years, he didn't get a single raise and that abused him and our family with unreasonable scheduling demands...)

He said he didn't want to 'try.' Then he said he just wanted a separation.

I did manage to get him to marriage counseling and this horrible counselor just 'dismissed' all these mixed signals... he told her, "I don't want to try. I don't like her. I don't like who she is."

All she had to say was "Well, that's pretty clear."

When I mentioned how he said he didn't want to sleep in the bed without me, she ignored the opportunity to discuss that 'mixed signal/mixed emotion' and just said "Well it takes two, and I can't make him do anything...' Excuse me? You're supposed to be a counselor, you're supposed to offer 'insight,' and any idiot would have seen that opportunity to 'draw him out,' based on that alone...

When she asked him why he fell in love with me in the first place, he said he couldn't remember, "The best I could tell you is that they needed me."

When I told her what he said about wanting to punch me in the face, she asked him "Do you have anger issues?" and he said no. Ummm... what did you expect him to say?

Shortly after our first session, he went out one night and stayed out until 5am. Shortly after that night, we had a fight about his 'whore' of a boss, and he said "I'm not even talking to the whore anymore, I'm talking to someone else now." He told me her name was Erica and he met her in a bar that night he stayed out all night.

A few weeks later he brought her up, saying he was pretty sure she was interested in him, and then he told me, "But she's a black girl and I don't date black girls."

At one point, he told me he would make an 'honest effort,' then within 6 days, he did a complete 180... when I questioned him about this at the next counseling session, he said "I realized I was lying to myself." She never bothered to say, "Well if you can't tell when you're lying to yourself, how do you know you aren't now? You're obviously dealing with a lot of conflicting emotions and my suggestion is to maybe step back, take some time and think, keep coming to counseling, before you make any big decisions."

At one point, he told me he would have been happier with Liz, his boss.

One night, I tried to give him what he wanted sexually and afterwards, he told me that he felt no emotional connection to me.

Another night, I tried again, and he allowed me to 'meet his needs,' but wouldn't 'connect with ME' in any way, and told me, "I just want to degrade you." When I asked 'Why?' He said "It's the only way I can have sex without an emotional connection... (I would think that suggests that you have emotions and you're just trying to fight them, no doubt out of guilt about what you're doing with the other women).

Then another night he told me, "You know what turns me on, I'm not going to stop you because it feels good, but I can't reciprocate. I'm not there yet and I'm afraid that by the time I am, you won't be anymore."

A couple of months later he would tell me, "I stopped cuddling with you because I didn't want to touch you."

*During this time, he did make some teeny tiny efforts that I did sincerely appreciate, but they were always immediately followed by him doing something atrocious, like going out and staying out all night, or going out two nights before Christmas when we had only one present under the tree, claiming he was going to play cards and I would later find out that he was out with either Erica or his boss and her 'aunt' (who I would later be told is also "Erica's" aunt...)

We also had to buy a new vehicle in December, and the day we bought it, he told me he'd already been written up at work twice, once for bullying the staff, but "Liz" was 'fighting for him' because "She knows I just need to get my head straight about my home life."

I had NO ONE in MY corner, saying to him, "You're job isn't suffering because of your home life, your home life is suffering because of your job and you working with that woman is killing your marriage because your wife feels extremely insecure, as any woman would."

He wound up leaving two days after Christmas, when he'd come home from a 12 hour day at 10pm, while our youngest son and I had 104 degree fevers and didn't even ask how we were doing, instead just demanded the keys to the truck because he 'had to take care of something'... when I pressed 'what?' He said "I have to go do the grocery shopping for work." I told him that I was not staying home sick with the kids, and one of them sick, with no car, while he stayed out until all hours of the night with his whore...

That was the night he left. I saw him twice after that, in a car he allegedly 'borrowed'... and after about three weeks, I finally got the courage to drive by his boss's house and sure enough, there was that car in her front yard.

I confronted her... and she LIED to me. Told me that was her aunt's car and 'maybe' he borrowed it from her those two nights because they know each other after she had him, my husband, pick her up from the hospital. Why was this woman having MY husband pick her aunt up from the hospital? Then she told me that 'the staff' told her that he had a girlfriend named Erica.

Later that night, I got a call from some woman claiming to be Liz and Erica's aunt, telling me that Liz and Erica were cousins, that my husband and Erica were sleeping together and that Erica is a stripper, and has all kinds of money (but no car, because she's saving her money to buy a Mercedes), and weighs 98lbs. (My husband doesn't like skinny girls, he's afraid he'll break them.) Oh... and now Erica was not black, but white... but they have 'black in their family.'

For two days this woman pretended to be 'on my side', telling me she doesn't like my husband, that he's slow in the head, that he's lazy and that she wants him out of her house, but won't throw him out because she want's it to be "Erica's" decision...

And then she started saying things like he bought her earrings, and when I told her that I missed the man who used to say "Hi Beautiful" to me every morning, she made it a point to tell me that he said that to "Erica" every day... I was onto her game pretty quick.

At the end of those two days, I got a call from my mother telling me that he'd just called her and told her that he was shutting everything off here (electric, water, my cell phone, and taking 'his' tag off our truck.)

I responded to him that he had some nerve, considering that in 6 years of marriage he never bought me a single piece of jewelry but here he was spending the bill money buying this tramp earrings...

Then I got a call from the aunt again, telling me I had just screwed myself and now I'd get nothing...

That night, she called me at 4:30am and hung up.

*She's too ignorant to even know how to mark her number private, or too belligerent to care to.

The next morning, I woke up and my cell phone was turned off. I had to turn it on in my own name. At 10 am, this witch called it and said "Oh, you're phone is still on? Well it'll be off today. You have 30 days on the electric." Like this trailer park white trash witch was the 'judge' in my divorce case... She called again at 4:30 am in the morning, and hung up as soon as I picked up,

My husband is now surrounded by people who think it's acceptable for a married man to cheat on his wife, leave the kids he raised as his own for 6 years, who call him "Daddy", and just behave like your average Jerry Springer guest (when what he needs is a good dose of Dr. Phil).

Everything else aside this man chose to put ONE Christmas gift under the tree for our kids so he could go out with this tramp, and left us when we had a nasty flu and fevers at 104 F.

No one with any ethics or morals would condone that, or would make 'excuses' for it. But these people (including his own mother who abandoned him to an abusive father who then put him and his twin brother and sister into foster care) are all telling him that it's ok to do these things because I was such a mean wife who wouldn't let him have any 'space.'

HE "CHOSE" to work 70,80, and 90 hours a week for money that never once justified the amount of time we lost with him. For all that overtime he worked, we barely survived financially, always robbing Peter to pay Paul, always 2 months behind on every bill... and never having time to just BE a 'family.'

And then one day he said "I don't want the responsibility".

And with the example of a parent he has in his mother, it's no wonder he thinks a family is something you can just 'abandon' if you decide one day that you just don't want the responsibility of it anymore.

The last time I saw him was about two weeks ago, when he told me that he wanted $1,500 out of the tax return to keep my power on in his name for a week (he'd already ordered it disconnected.)

That day, he told me he was in a relationship with "Erica" (and now she's a black girl again) and she is a 98lb stripper. When I mentioned that he doesn't like skinny girls because he's afraid he'll break them, he said "Well I've lost 100lbs, I'm not afraid anymore and she's really flexible."

I don't believe the "Erica" story at all... If he is in a new relationship, I believe it's with his boss, (her cousin, a stripper, who just 'happens' to live in the same house... too hard to believe) and "Erica is just a 'cover story' because they're afraid that if I do turn them into corporate, they will both lose their jobs.)

If they honestly believed they'd done nothing wrong... why hide the fact that they're in a relationship and that he's living with her?

I'm not even 100% convinced that there even IS a relationship. It is possible that she let him come live with her because he had nowhere else to go, but told him he couldn't tell me because she feared for her job... and he's only telling me that he IS in another relationship because he thinks it will make me 'give up on him.' (And yes, a lot of people have told me that I should, but I took my vows and did and still do take them very seriously.) I remember the kind, comparing, compassionate man that I fell in love with... not this 'jerk'he's become ever since she started 'suggesting' to him that he had an unhappy home life.

Interestingly enough however, is the fact that the week before last, her FB status said "In a Relationship since 2013" and the last week was changed to 'single.'

So... now that I've told the story... here are some questions I would appreciate some feedback to:

1.) I've read on these boards and others like it that the affair should be exposed to friends and family. What about to his job?

2.) Would you believe the "Erica" story, or would you think he's definitely sleeping with his boss? Or that nothing he says is to be believed?

3.) I've read innumerable 'save your marriage,' 'get your ex back,' articles, blog posts, guides and forums... and most of them suggest to start with a "No Contact" period of at least 30 days, and then to send him a hand written letter telling him that I accept his decision to end the relationship that I realize it's probably for the best and that I have some great news, but I'll tell him about it some other time because right now we both need time and space (for boyfriends and girlfriends with no kids, I could see this, but with kids?...)

4.) con't from 3.... I did pay for one session with a marriage coach and it was terrible. She gave me nothing but the same generic advice I can get for free all over the Internet. "Be the best you that you can be so that he'd be crazy to leave you." Uhh... he's already left. And I need 'insight' based on what I've said about him, into what he might be thinking, what might motivate him to give our marriage a chance to get some real (pro-marriage) counseling... actually, even better insight or referrals as to how to get an actual counselor to reach out to him and 'persuade' him to give it a shot.

5.) What should I do next???

Summary: H having an affso with his boss for >1 year.moved out and stopped supporting the family, turned off her phone and utilities.
She wants to know what to do next.

L
Expose to his job. Read the Exposure101 thread For instructions.

See an attorney. File for support a nd for a restraining order so you can put this woman in jail the next time she calls.
Notify the mods so you can move

Welcome to MB.

I'm sorry but you will not get many, if any, responses to such a long post. It is very difficult to read such a long post on a screen, and it is very difficult to keep the details straight. We only need a short summary. We need to know:

What is the problem right now? Is your husband having an affair?

How long has this been going on, and what stage has it reached?

Has he left you? Is he living with OW? Is he giving you and the kids any money?

Who is this OW? Is she a colleague? Is she married?

How long have you been married? How old are your kids? Who among your close family and friends knows about the affair?

He had an emotional affair with about a year and a half ago, swore it was over. He maintained inappropriate (by my standards) contact with her.

She is his boss, and threatened any 'future promotions' because I confronted HER instead of him about the messages.

He has left, is now living at her house, but says he's sleeping with her cousin.

He paid the January electric bill and gave me $400 out of which he made me pay 2 other bills.

The kids are not his biological children. He has no obligation to pay child support.

The OW is his boss or her cousin, or no one... I can't tell. He's told me 7 or 8 different stories.

Married 6 years this April. Kids are 10 and 7. Both of our families know about the affair. We aren't close to either of our families, he only to his mother, who believes he did nothing wrong because "I am the bi**h".

Has either of you been married before? How did those marriages end?

I was married once before. For 9 years. I will never say a bad word about my first husband. I married way too young (21). I was immature and stupid and didn't know what a good man I had.

He had never been married before me.

It started as an EA. - She works with him, they flirted, she told him "I don't play with married men," but she continued to flirt with him and opined in his hear about "Oh you poor man, all the guys at work say what an unhappy home life you have." (And they probably did, but they didn't live in this house.)

He said nothing happened.
Admitted it was EA, but always said "My d**k never left my pants" whenever it came up.

We chose to stay together... I told him he needed to cut all ties with her, and find a new job. He did neither.

She then got promoted and became his boss...

About a year later, I discovered he was still sending her inappropriate text messages and Facebook messages.
I confronted her about why she didn't tell him to stop...
She told me she was 'ignoring junk behavior'... (I told her, "He's not your psych patient, he's your subordinate.)
She then told him that this 'drama causing behavior would affect her decision in any future promotion.)

He got angry with me, put a password on his phone, and told me it was because of my threats to 'expose' them, and that he had to be careful not to violate HIPPA.

Then he was up for a promotion that meant working long hours very closely with her, and I said no. I reminded him that he needed to cut all ties with her and find a new job and he had one lined up too... but he decided to take the promotion instead.

The war began...
Coming home late 3-4 hours every day.
Constantly being called in on his day off.
Everything I feared would happen, including me being insecure, wondering if it was true, or if he was meeting her.
A month after he took the job, he told me the marriage was over for him a long time ago and he wanted out.
Then he just wanted a separation.
He started going out and staying out all night.
We tried counseling, but it was futile.

He left right after Christmas.

A couple of weeks later, I found him at her house.

Him, her and some woman claiming to be her aunt, told me that he was sleeping with her 'cousin' (they all happen to live together.)

Almost NO ONE is buying the 'cousin' story... and my husband makes enough money that he doesn't have to be 'there' because he has nowhere else to go.

Everyone believes he is sleeping with his boss. Week before last, her Facebook status said she was in a relationship since 2013. Last week it was "Single."

Until I found him at her house, he was telling me he was living with a 55 year old woman. When I found him, I got the 'cousin' story...

At this point, I'm not sure that exposing him to his friends and family and job will amount to much of anything anyway...

His mommy is convinced that if he was having an affair it was my fault and he should leave me.

His co-workers have always thought I was a shrew of a wife who made his home life unhappy.

And his job... well, I've already threatened it so many times and never followed through, and if he does lose his job, which he probably would, how would he ever find another one after being fired for 'sexual misconduct' or something like that?

On the other hand, I also feel like "Well, he's not paying my bills, so why should I protect his job so he can pay HERS?"

And at the end of the day, my goal is to get him to come home, not to end up divorced.

We also have no legal separation in Florida. We have no real assets and the kids aren't his biological children, (though he is the only "Dad" they've ever known) so he has no obligation to pay child support.)

And the last time I saw him, he said "In 9 months when we get the divorce, we'll sort out the banking." I said "Why 9 months?" And he said "Because I'm still pissed!"

I don't know if that means he wants to get past being pissed before he makes his final decision and files, or if he was just shooting off his mouth, and I didn't press it because he is ADAMANT that we ARE getting divorced.

The proof that I have are screen shots of the inappropriate Facebook messages and a picture of the car he is driving in her driveway... but it was night time too, so you can't see the house or the address, and the FB message between her and I where she admits to saying 'this drama causing behavior will affect her decision in any future promotion."

So... is exposure a good idea at this stage of the game?

Threads merged. Please stick to one thread.

Ok.. I was told this one was too long and the questions are different now.

I don't see how I can 'institute' Plan B, when HE is the one who left... I'm not sure now if 'exposure' will bring him back or drive him even further away... especially considering that his 'social circle' approves of his behavior.

The only leverage I have is exposing them to their job, and hoping that once they're told they're being fired because their behavior is inappropriate, they'll realize that it is.

I don't want to file for divorce, and in Florida, there is no legal separation and no good lawyer is going to take my case on the basis that I want it to be a long separation.

FL2Boys, from what I gathered in reading around your posts, you've been married for six years. Your children are from your previous marriage. Your husband's affair has gone on for 1-1/2 to 2 years. Your husband has moved out.

Yes, if there is any chance of saving your marriage, exposure is the best hope that you have for killing the affair.

You won't have any marriage unless and until the affair is dead.

Were you divorced when you met your present husband?

Yes, I was divorced when I met my husband.

You need to expose far and wide, including to the HR Dept at his work.

You mentioned that you have inappropriate texts. The woman that he was texting with is the woman who he is having an affair with, irregardless of how he has tried to deflect and confuse you about who his girlfriend is.

Do you know that woman's name? Have you gone to her FB and copied all of her friends list? Also, you need to find out who her parents are and any siblings she may have so that you can expose to them.

Along with his work exposure, you need to also expose to his family...parents, siblings, his close friends, and to any clergy or other well regarded person in his life. And your family too.

Once you get an exposure list prepared, come back here and post a copy of your exposure letter (with names removed) so that we can help you to be sure that it is short and to the point.

Exposure needs to be done in one fell swoop so that it is most effective.

Can you work on this today?

I've started collecting names from FB, yes... but as I said, I don't think it's going to have any effect. His and her 'circles of influence' aren't exactly made up of people with a moral compass

First, I did everything Dr. Harley said NOT to do when I first found out about the affair, the 'you better stop or else I will make you sorry' kind of stuff...

So if I've already made those mistakes, do I still expose?

He's already moved out and says he wants a divorce, so it seems a bit amateurish for me to move on with Plan B with threatening divorce, when he's already left and said he wants one.

I'm just really unsure how to proceed from here.

FL2, yes all of your posts are now here on this same thread. You have made seven posts and they are all here.

You have enough proof to warrant exposure. Even IF you did not have the inappropriate text messages, or your husband's own words admitting to the affair, your husband is living with another woman AND you are still married.

Living with another person of the opposite sex while married is an affair.

I didn't mention anything in my above post about Plan A or Plan B.

I mentioned exposure and detailed what you need to do to prepare. Exposure is how you proceed from here.

Are you willing to do exposure?

Good job on collecting the names. Please work like a madwoman and get them all compiled today. Then write your exposure letter and come back here and post it (with names removed) for help.

Most of us (myself included) did not think that exposure would have effect when we were in your shoes. That is because we are thinking emotionally when in the thick of things.

You're right...it sounds like he is hanging around with some real losers. That's okay. Expose to them anyway. Exposure is going to bring the dirty deeds to the light of day. Mold dies in the sun, remember?

Oh dear, most of us can say the same thing! Most of us lovebusted like there was no tomorrow!

I botched everything, including exposure, by the time that I had found this website.

But then, with the help of everyone here, I started from scratch and did a true exposure. Exposure killed a 12 year affair dead.

YES, even after you've made mistakes, you STILL expose.

Ok, thanks Blindsighted. I just want to make sure I follow the plan correctly.

The reason I mentioned Plan A and Plan B is because Dr. Harley warns against the unintended consequences of exposing an workplace affair to the employer and suggests giving the WS 30 days notice that he needs to find a new job and end all communication with the OW... but since he's already left and living with her and refuses to talk to me, how can I give him this notice?

Also... he claims the reason he stopped paying the bills is because I was 'harassing his friends' (the OW, stripper cousin and the aunt, apparently) because the night I drove by and found him there, I called OW on the phone and confronted her... then the next two days, the aunt kept calling me to get 'my side' of the story (there may have been times when my phone dropped the call- it does that all the time- and I called her back, but not many).

So now he's going to accuse me of harassing his friends again.

And once the exposure is all said and done, where do I go from there?

I'm not sure I'm in Plan A or Plan B...

If I'm in Plan A, there are no letters or messages to give him, and if I'm in Plan B, the letters and messages demand no contact, that he move out and that I get a lawyer...

I'm completely unsure of what to do once the affair is exposed but I do know that without a job, he can't hire a lawyer, and he'll probably move up to South Dakota to be with his mommy...

Should I just expose to friends and family first?
Should I write a version of the Plan B letter for Plan A?
Once I start exposing them to their FB friends, I won't have any opportunity to talk to him to give him the 30 day warning about his job and cutting all ties with her...
But I'm also not supposed to forewarn him about exposing them to friends and family.
What do I do when their friends reply to me with either nasty remarks or tell me that I need to just accept that my marriage is over and the usual crap people tell me?
I am completely confused about the strategy here..

FL2 we are out right now and should be back in a couple of hours. I will be back with you then.

Thanks... while you're away, I'll post more questions I'm having as I read through the site...

Ok, so, my husband considers me to be mentally and verbally abusive. And I think maybe to an extent, I was.

On http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi8113_ab.html this page

Dr. Harley says - "In general, I recommend separation when at least one spouse cannot control destructive behavior. An ongoing affair, of course, is one of those situations. Hence, plan B. But other situations such as physical and verbal abuse, where one spouse's mental or physical safety is as risk, are also grounds for separation. As in the case of infidelity, if one spouse is abusive, I often recommend plan A first, where, through negotiation (without anger, disrespect or demands), an attempt is made to overcome the abuse without separating."

My husband is justifying his affair by saying that I am mentally and verbally abusive, and told me he doesn't want to try to save the marriage.

I am so confused right now... if I go through with this exposure, especially to his job, I think that will be the final nail in the coffin. On the other hand if I give him 'notice' about the job, he'll see it as a threat, and consider that me being 'abusive' again- especially since so many people have told him that I was wrong to threaten to report him in the first place, and our marriage counselor told us that I crossed a boundary when I brought other people into our marriage... and he's hung on to that like a drowning man holding on to a life raft.

Is my husband right? Was I physically and verbally abusive? If so, did that drive the affair? If it did, should I just let go and move on?...

Above all, right now, all I have to work with to 'reach' him, is the kids. He's still calling them, though he's making one excuse after the other not to see them. He called tonight to talk to them and our oldest begged him to come home, and he very sternly said "No" then said "You need to stop or I'm hanging up"... Is it foolish for me to think there is any hope of saving this marriage?

Should I just give up? I'm so tired. All I want to do is sleep.

You can't base your decisions on ANYTHING that a wayward says. Nothing. Your husband is spouting stuff just to keep you in your little box so that you won't interrupt AffairLand.

He stopped paying the bills because he could, and because he is in the Fog of his affair.

YOU did the right thing by confronting the other woman. It caused trouble between them obviously, and so he lashed out at you. This is a good thing! (except that we need to get you to the point where you don't buy into the FogSpeak)

When you expose, you won't be "harassing his friends", will you? You won't argue with them at all. You will be calm as a cucumber and will just state that you love your husband and that you wish for them to stop enabling the affair.

Until we can get you into Plan B, we can call you in Plan A, okay? If he happens to contact you again, be polite and upbeat. Do NOT talk about your relationship, and make it short and sweet.

More in a bit. We just got home and need to let doggies out here.

Exposure is really one of the Steps toward recovery that Dr. Harley states in his "narrow" plan for recovery after an affair.

Exposure really is separate from Plan A and Plan B and it should be done in ANY case after an affair (so that we can be certain that the affair is killed dead, or in the case of a continuing affair so that we have the best chance of killing it).

I believe that the 30 day reprieve from work exposure is for when the spouse is willing to end the affair and recover the marriage.

This is NOT a reason to wait for the rest of your exposure though. Have you compiled all of your names? Have you typed out your exposure letters (one for your and his family/friends, and one for the OWs family and friends)?

We will deal with the repercussions. HOPEFULLY he will be angry and we will help you through that. btw, you do know not to let him know anything about Marriage Builders yet, right? Keep this site your safe zone for now.

You are in Plan A. No you don't need to give him messages or letters. We are probably going to want you to go to Plan B asap, so we will focus on that right after exposure, okay?

BOY you sure have been studying! Great job!

When people reply in a less than marriage friendly way, then tell them that you are sorry that they feel that way. End of story. Those folks aren't going to be on your Christmas Card List anyway. Seriously, whether your marriage can recover or not, are you ever going to wish to speak with those people again?

The purpose for exposure is to kill the affair and get support for you. I promise you that you will find support in places that you least expect it. And you will also be surprised at certain folk's lack of support. But in any case, the strategy is to fight for your marriage and force the affair to have to become "self sustaining" in the light of day (which it can't, because affairs are built on lies).

PS - No, you should not write a version of the Plan B letter for Plan A

No, you should not give up. Remember we ALL made mistakes before we found this site. And we ALL made mistakes after we found Marriage Builders too.

I will reply to this post tomorrow, but I wanted to say that I totally remember the soul-tired all encompassing exhaustion that I felt when I was going through similar.

Can you drink a glass of water or milk now, and try to sleep?

Hi BlindSighted, thank you for all your help. I was asleep when you returned. (I'm an early to bed, early to rise person, up between 4:30-5:30 am most days).

I am still working on compiling the friends lists. Currently, I'm working on hers. Will work on his next.

I am terrified that if I do this, he will punish the kids for it. He's still calling them now, but refuses to see them and he keeps blaming his job, says he's working 16 hours a day every day... tells them he has no time or money to pick them up. How can you be working 16 hours a day and not have any money?

He told me he has this Thursday off though... I didn't tell the boys he said that.

He told them, "Maybe in a month"...

And when I asked why it was going to take 9 months to get divorced, he said "Because I'm still pissed"...

It's like there are little 'clues' that he's not sure what he wants right now, and I'm terrified of doing something that's going to drive him over the edge. Like I said, I think he'll just up and leave to go to South Dakota to be with his mommy, and then there will be no hope.

He's already started admitting to people now that there is another woman. He told my cousin on the phone, "I'll be honest with you, there is another woman but it's not who she thinks it is." Like that makes it ok?

Unfortunately, I have the worst support network in the world. Rather than tell my husband he should come home, my cousin and anyone else who said they would talk to him (and there were very few who were willing)'asked' him stuff like 'well what about the kids?' and then reported back to me "You just need to accept that your marriage is over."

I have two allies right now, his younger brother and sister (the twins)and my best friend who lives 400 miles away. But I haven't had them speak to him at all yet, because I don't want them to say the wrong things. And since everyone else has said and done the wrong things, I'm terrified that they will too.

And as I said, he claims I am mentally and verbally abusive... what if I am?

I have felt all alone through this. I have almost no support network, and of them, most of them have refused to assist when I asked them to, or botched it completely and bought his crap and then told me "I think you just need to accept that your marriage is over."

And because he's not the kids bio father, I can't even get the courts to force him to go to counseling...

And this exposure seems like it's rooted in logic and reason, but it also makes me feel like people are going to look at me like I'm desperate woman and then, won't blame my husband for leaving me for another woman.

All WH's. Your WH is lying all the time. This is why the OW went ape manure on him. Telling her you were separated and other kinds of things to keep her in the affair. You confronting her burst her bubble.

Stop dragging your feet and get exposure done today. Do not warn, tell, or threaten your WH that he is going to expose. You do not want your WH exposing against you with his lies. People always tend to believe who they hear from first.

You need your WH out of that job any way ASAP. Git'er done today. Today is the day that you are going to burst Wh's bubble.

TheRoad,
I hear you... and I'm working on the lists, it's taking a long time. It will probably be a few days before I have it all together, with both of their friends lists and then writing up the Google Doc where I can give people the link to the proof.

Then writing the exposure letters and returning here first to have the forum check them out.

There are some other things that are weighing on my mind right now...

My husband swore up and down for a year and a half that there was nothing going on between the two of them, and myself and everyone else believed him. Up until last summer when I discovered he was still having 'inappropriate' messages with her, the man adored me.

I was however, depressed, because of his job. I was trapped in this house, day and night, like a rat in a cage. Nothing to do but read Facebook all day. And it really got under my skin. I started lashing out at people and sometimes was just downright mean to them because something they said pissed me off. One of those people was his best friend's mother.

Then on top of that, I had to deal with HIS mother and her ignorance. My husband was supposed to go back to school and we had planned to use some of the student loan disbursement money to buy a car. She told him that we were 'idiots' for that... blamed me for not having a regular job and working 70 hours a week like he did (then who is raising the kids?)

This woman left her children with an abusive father, he put them in foster care, they were there for 2 years, then his grandparents adopted them, and eventually gave them back to her, she has been married three times, divorced twice and split with the 3rd in early 2010. My husband's sisters three kids were taken from her and given to my MIL by the state of KY, and my mother in law gets a check for 2 out of 3 of them. She moved to TN when she left current husband, was there for a year or two, then gave the one kid she doesn't get a check for back to his mother, and took the other two and moved to SD with them, and in her 50's decided to go to school to become a 'doctor', and elected not to work, but to live off the $980 a month she got from the kids money... and this woman is telling ME how to manage MY finances? (The student loan would have been taken regardless, because he was going to school, using some of that money on the possible lowest interest rate loan you can get, makes the MOST sense...)

*** I did work, I did freelance work and I actually made more than my husband did, hourly. But because I was stuck home with the kids, I couldn't commit to a lot of deadlines, so I did just enough to cover what he couldn't cover. With his schedule, two kids and one car, me having any job was a logistical impossibility. I kept waiting for him to fulfill his promises to get a different/better job, get into school, get us a 2nd car... so I could get out and work more... but he never did. I had two kids, the bills, and my own work to do.

I was the one always juggling the bills, chained to my computer looking for or doing freelance work, worried sick if we were going to make the electric bill that month.

I was a nervous wreck. All the time. I slipped into a deep, dark abyss of depression. I stopped taking care of myself. I'd go days without taking a shower or changing my clothes. I put on a lot of weight and started to suffer the physical issues of it, extreme sciatic nerve pain (couldn't stand up for 5 minutes, so I couldn't cook, clean, go to the grocery store...) At the end, when he said he wanted out, he told me that I was co-dependent and that he made me that way, that he didn't want to touch me anymore, that he didn't like 'who I was'.... And the first time I found out about her, I threatened to commit suicide... and then the second time I found out about her, I threatened to commit suicide.

He has used my depression and suicidal thoughts and me not taking care of myself as his excuse for his affair, and one thing is clear, there quite a few people that support his decision to 'leave that crazy, psycho b**ch'...

I feel as if I start exposing him, I end up exposing myself to him telling these people these things, and then they back him up for leaving me, and the exposure will have the reverse effect of what it's intended to have.

I feel like our counselor should have been the one to tell him, and me, to our faces, that I should have and still should, expose the affair.

He has told me and apparently 'the aunt', that he doesn't want the of taking care of me and the kids anymore... no doubt because OW is a 'psych student' right now and is psychoanalyzing me to him, and telling him that I'm 'broken' and he needs to leave me. They work in a group home for people with behavioral disorders so they think they are shrinks. And her studying psych in school, makes him think she's just so wonderful...

And she knew we weren't separated yet. All she knew was 'he had such an unhappy home life,' yet, never saw herself as being any cause of it at all because she 'told me, woman to woman a year and a half ago that she would not help him leave me and I should have believed her'.... so again, someone please tell me why MY husband was running HER 'personal' errand to pick her aunt up from the hospital? His excuse? They are 'friends'. My response- your history with her, the continued inappropriate messages and texts, now you're working with her 12-16 hours a day and now she's having you run her personal errands?

What woman wouldn't have accused you of having an affair? How uncommon would it be for a wife to have suicidal thoughts when she was already dealing with depression, all your lying and disappearing acts... more lying, staying out all night...

And not one single person in my 'support network' said to him, "Of course she thinks you're having an affair! ANY woman would think that with the things you're doing!"

No one said, "Well, her depression is understandable. She was trapped in the house, you were flirting with another woman over text, her home was falling apart around her and she did all she could do. She worked for over a year when you didn't, and went to school. She encouraged you to go to school when you weren't working and for the next 5 years, you wouldn't get the paperwork done. She had no car, no money, a house falling apart around here, and was too embarrassed by it's condition to invite anyone over so she had no friends! She was completely isolated. Of course she got depressed. And then you turn around and FINALLY get a promotion that means enough money that you'll be ok, and she has to STRUGGLE with the fact that you need the money, you aren't taking an even better job that you have 'in the bag' if you'd just go fill out the paperwork, but every day, you make an excuse not to go, you take this promotion, knowing how insecure it's going to make her, and then you start abusing her with the coming home late, telling her you want to go out at night with friends, staying out all night, ... and within a month of working with the other woman, you're telling your wife the marriage was over for you 2.5 years ago, that you just 'hadn't accepted it yet'.... do you really think there is ANYONE who wouldn't think you were having an affair? There isn't Except maybe your mother who clearly refuses to see the forest because there are too many trees in the way. And the OW who is the one that started feeding him the idea that he had an unhappy home life a year and a half ago.

On the one hand I feel like the 'hints' he's dropped (like 9 months to get divorced because he's still pissed) indicate a chance for recovery and if I do something like exposing him, I'll blow that chance.

On the other hand, I feel like he's ADAMANT that we ARE getting divorced so what do I have to lose?

Most of me doesn't want to open my private life up to strangers on the Internet... I just want to expose both of them to their job, let them both face being told, finally, by someone, that their actions were inappropriate, since as of yet, they both believe it was a 'mild flirtation'... Not to anyone I've discussed this with. To anyone I've discussed this with, flirting with a married man and telling him how 'everyone' says what an unhappy home life he has... is manipulation "Your wife is awful. You should leave her. Look at me, I'm flirting with you, you should come be with me."

But she says it was a 'mild flirtation' and she was a single woman, she enjoyed the attention...

Our marriage counselor agreed that her threatening his promotion was textbook sexual harassment, but she glossed over it, and moved on quickly, and my husband insisted on protecting her from it.

Ugh... I am in a state of emotional distress and I already did a million things wrong because of that state, I don't want to screw it up even worse, again.

I am 100% for protecting my kids. And they love and adore him and I do not want to kill any chance that they will have to keep him in their lives. If I do this and he moves to SD with Mommy, they'll never hear from him or see him again, because mommy condones his not having anything to do with the kids because her husband's don't call the grandchildren she has custody of.

And my mother is pretty much exactly like his mother. Low class and trashy. Both are abusive, but he is 'mommy's favorite'... it was the twins who dealt with her abuse.

Anyway, sorry to ramble. I just need to think through every possible outcome of this before deciding to go through with it... I am a big believer in do unto others... I was blindsided by his assertion that the marriage was over for him 2.5 years ago... I don't want to blindside him.

I feel like every move I make is a combative move, or will be seen as one...

You can't base your decisions on ANYTHING that a wayward says. Nothing. Your husband is spouting stuff just to keep you in your little box so that you won't interrupt AffairLand.

See me note above.

See my note above.

More of the same.

FL2, your husband is following the normal wayward script. There is nothing unique about this situation, sorry to say. We've ALL been through it to a certain degree.

Afterwards, former waywards report here that they don't even remember the bulk of the insanity that they spewed.

As a BS, you really must find the switch to TURN IT OFF in your mind for now. When we stew about things that plainly do not make any sense, it causes us to react emotionally rather than calm and logically. Do you see?

And THAT causes us to tire out and spend time worrying rather than proactively fighting the affair.

You are wasting valuable time. Time that needs to be spent attacking the affair.

Hi BlindSighted... Good morning.

I know I can't believe anything he says. I know he's being controlling too... right now he is loving the fact that he doesn't have to answer to me...

But I am concerned.

My main concern is that I don't feel that *I* am 'worth' this fight.

He said I was mentally and verbally abusive. Said I was co-dependent. Said I stopped taking care of myself. Said he didn't want to touch me. Even said he was disgusted by me. Said he doesn't like who I am. Doesn't like the way I feel about cops and the military. Doesn't like the way I handle money. Doesn't like the way I parent.

Add to that the our marriage counselor told him that me calling him at work all the time and blogging about his company was 'crossing boundaries'...

And I'm wondering, am I just a completely broken person that even the most pro-marriage of marriage counselors would say is 'unhealthy' for him, or anyone, to be married to?

Would say that his affairs were 'justified'... or worse, that he should have left 2.5 years ago...

FL2, most all of us were less than stellar spouses before we found MB. That is why we are here.

I used to lace nearly every conversation with selfish demands and disrespectful judgments as a norm.

I didn't realize this before working the MB program. Most all of us were in a horrible spot prior to finding this website.

BUT your previous words and actions are not the "reason" for your husband's affair. Your husband is in an affair because HE did not protect the marriage, and he allowed someone else to meet his emotional needs.

If you can kill the affair dead, then we will help the both of you to affair-proof your marriage, get rid of the lovebusters, and go on to make a passionate marriage together.

We can't get to square one though until the affair is over. (expose)

Again normal script here. Most BS feel the same way.

The wayward's gaslighting puts us on this wild goose chase to deflect all of their actions so that we spend our time falling all over ourselves to fix all of OUR "problems". That way we don't focus on what THEY are doing. Do you see?

Are you ready to get off of the crazy train yet? (expose)

NO FL2, you can't afford for this to take a few days. This needed to be done yesterday. We've all done it and so we know how long it takes.

Make a list now of key people on your side, your husband's side, the OWs side, the HR department and other key people at his work. That will take an hour tops.

Compose the letters, make your google doc. An hour or two.

Come here and post the letters for us to critique. Make them SHORT. Three paragraphs or so. That's it.

Then 2-3 hours on exposure.

You can get this done today.

TheRoad said everything. Please print this out and read it every single time that you doubt yourself.

Also, consider call a women's shelter. Him sending these people to harrass you is a real beat down.

Also, South Dakota takes adultery into consideration when making settlements. So don't be afraid of him moving there, necessarily. It will also take him away from his AP which could allow his mind to clear.

BlindSighted, I'm working today, and they both have a TON of people on their friends list. It's going to take time and it's not going to all get done today. I have kids, a home and work... I have to keep my priorities straight.

For one thing, I've already reached out to many of our mutual friends for help and as I said, they have all declined or botched the job.

For another, I still don't have clarification on whether or not to give him the 30 day notice regarding exposing him to his job... that's not something I want to put in writing, and if I start exposing him to friends and family I won't have any opportunity to say that to him face to face...

Plan A calls for me to give him 30 days to find a new job, make a graceful exit from his job and commit to working on the marriage.

Well he's moved out, refuses to work on the marriage at all and at this point, will see the 30 days notice as a threat.

So it seems to me that I either...

Move directly into Plan B, and without any notice, expose him to the job

OR

Modify Plan A to give him 30 days notice to quit the job, find a new one, move out of her house, and commit to working on the marriage.

Which he is not going to do. He 'might' quit the job. But that's about it.

But if he doesn't do anything, then they both get fired, that will just bring both of them closer together for one thing, plus, then I will have NO IDEA where he is working.

Do not give him 30 days. Expose to work today. 30 days is ONLY for spouse 100% willing to reconcile according the SAA checklist. He is actively carried on despite your protests for 1.5 years. His 30 days passed over a year ago. His work needs to know that this woman has opened them to severe liability by having an affair with a subordinate.

It will cause problems in the affair which is what you want. They should both lose their jobs. Plus that can only cause more trouble as they won't have as much money to play with, especially once you file for support.

I've been advised that I probably won't get any spousal support and the kids are not even his, so I won't get CS either.

I know the company should know about her, what a manipulator she is, how she sexually harassed my husband, threatening his promotion, making him feel like *I* was the one putting his job in jeopardy, instead of THEM putting their own jobs in jeopardy.

There is nothing I want more than to someone that is an 'authority' to them, to tell them, "No, you flirted with a married man and opined to him about how bad you felt for him because he had such an unhappy home life"... and then you allowed him to behave inappropriately with you via FB and text messages, and when the wife confronted you and told you that as his BOSS, you needed to tell him to stop because it opens the company up to a sexual harassment lawsuit, instead of telling him to stop, you threatened his 'future' promotion, putting the company at risk of a sexual harassment suit yourself and this is you and him, and ONLY you and him, jeopardized your jobs. She had every right to demand that it stop, and to threaten to report it to us if it didn't, and to report it to us once she found him living in your home."

But I don't think anyone is going to say that, and even if they do, I don't think it will ever sink in.

I'm investing so much time into trying to save my marriage that the rest of my life is falling apart. People are telling me that I'm obsessed and I need to let it go...

And I come from a very abusive mother, and I do believe that I was mentally and verbally abusive to some degree and that any counselor would suggest that I am indeed a toxic person and that he is right to get away from me, and that this 'exposure' is just out of vindictiveness and will only serve to build the case that I am abusive and will never change.

I want to be sure that I take a good, long hard look at myself, and figure out if maybe he isn't better off without me and my 'issues', before I do something that just builds his case to make me look 'crazy.'

I do not want to go to Plan B. I do not want to file for divorce. I cannot file for divorce, with an attorney, on the basis that it's going to be a long separation... attorney's are not going to agree to that. They want to get paid and get paid quickly, and I'm a single mother with no job and no assets to speak of.

Add to this that they've already concocted the "Erica" cover story... all they have to do is tell the company that he's not having an affair with "Liz", he's having the affair with Liz's cousin "Erica."

I could possibly circumnavigate that in the letter by mentioning the 'cover story' and stating that even if it were true, it does not excuse their behavior with the text messages, FB PM's, and threatening of his promotion... but people have a tendency to 'ignore' what they don't want to hear, and this is a pretty shady company to begin with.

FL2 I am working today also. So are many who post on this forum. I hear you about trying to keep normal routines for the children, but your priority needs to be getting the exposure done and getting into Plan B.

Exposure does seem to reveal who is and who is not a friend of marriage (our circle of friends diminished by at least 80% after we made it to recovery, because neither of us want to be around any of the people who condoned or did not fight against the affair).

Yes, I did give clarification about the 30 day notice regarding his job. I believe that what Dr. Harley has said about the 30 day notice is that it is for people who END their affair and wish to recover the marriage. I applaud you for wishing to stick exactly to Dr. Harley's plan. Hopefully others will respond here so that you will feel more confident that this is what Dr. Harley would say.

You don't know what he is going to do. None of us know what he is going to do. What we do know is that with Dr. Harley's 40+ years of helping people recover from affairs, he has found that exposure is the best weapon for killing an affair.

Have you read this? Exposure 101: Your Most Powerful Weapon

Again, you do not know what will happen.

How much time have you spent following Dr. Harley's plan though?

Of all of these people telling you to let it go, how many of them have successfully recovered from an affair?

This ^^^

Living like this is very destructive for women physically and mentally. Dr. Harley usually recommends that women try to Plan A for three weeks TOTAL...and then go to Plan B. You have already been at this for months and months.

Thank you all. Very much. This has gone on for so long, and I wish Dr. Harley could pick up his phone, call my husband and tell my husband that many of ours (and my) problems stemmed from the very beginning of the EA, and because it was a wrong that had never been righted, and that I now must do this exposure... I just don't want to be seen as being vindictive. I want to save my marriage. And Plan B seems to be all about filing for divorce. I've not put any of Dr. Harley's advice into practice. I just found the site two days ago. And I'm still reeling from all the emotional turmoil.

If you keep waiting to expose you are wasting valuable time.

You are feeling vulnerable and this has led to damaging delays in taking action. You need to collect child support from the father of your children immediately. These payments can be deducted from his pay check. Do that today along with exposure. The combination will be magic for empowering you.

You will get spousal support to get you onto your feet if you need to file for divorce. If you get in touch with a local women's shelter, they can help you navigate this.

You're welcome FL2.

There are many MANY stories on here where the woman went to Plan B and months later their husband showed up at the door on bended knee. Some of those women didn't want their husband back any more. But some did, and if you read the threads here you will find even some of those same (formerly) wayward husbands now posting to help other couples!

It all starts with exposure. The affair just may end with proper exposure (and it may not). But if you continue on paralyzed as a deer in the headlights, your marriage WILL end for certain.

Also, exposure setsthe record straight. People may choose to believe the lies, but at least the facts are out there - he has abused you for years to carry on an affair, putting you through extreme menatl anguish.

I'm not sure if I put this in my OP,

But during one fight last year, just before he told me he wanted to separate, he had tried to grab the key to the car out of my pocket, but I held on and he wound up ripping my shorts. (*A week or so before that he'd also poked me really hard in the forehead) And both times I said "That's a domestic violence charge right there."

When he first told me he wanted to leave, he had said he was afraid of himself with me and that 'everyone' was telling him, "If the person you are with is making you want to raise your hands to them, then you shouldn't be with that person."

I tried telling him that there were many occasions when I wanted to slap him, punch him in the face and just drop kick him, but I never did. I also told him that I can't 'make' him 'want' to raise his hands to me.

But then, one night on our way to marriage counseling, I used it against him when he was attempting to refuse to go and told him, "Well I need to go. I need to talk to her about your violence." That got him to go.

A few weeks ago, he called me on a Friday night telling me he needed to borrow the truck because the car he was borrowing broke down...

I said "What do I get?" And he said "I'll give you the W-2" I'd been needing that to file the taxes because he stopped paying the bills and wasn't giving me any money. I was in no frame of mind to do any freelance work at the time either.

I told him that I was willing to share the truck, but I had the weekend and two kids home for it, and had job interviews Monday and Tuesday, though I could borrow a friend's car for Monday.

But then I asked him something, I don't remember what, and he got pissed off and said "Nevermind, I'll just figure it out."

Then he called my mother and told her he was shutting everything off and taking HIS tag off the truck. I took it off myself and hid it in the house.

That Sunday morning, he showed up here with no phone call, no warning, demanding the truck and hollering "Where the F*** is my tag?"

When I told him I had to call the boys to find it (they'd spent the night at a friend's house)he told me, "Get your A** in there and do it." I went to the garage to get my phone, and he'd BARGED in to the house and into the bedroom and the bedroom closet and started taking tools.

I asked what he was doing and he said "I need my tools to fix my car." No way in Hell was I letting valuable tools go to the trailer park trash where I'd never see them again! I said "No, you're not." He started stomping his feet at me, screaming "I NEED MY TOOLS!" I said "Well when will you bring them back?" I didn't get an 'answer', I got "I need my tools." That was not an answer.

Anyway, I asked if he had the W-2 and he pulled it out of his back pocket. I was still trying to get hold of the kids, and went outside to walk over to their friend's house to get them, and he was still carrying the tools and followed me out to put them in the back of the truck. I refused to leave, and called my neighbor to come over and witness... she and her daughter came right over.

He started getting very abusive, telling me "Get your fat a** in there and file the taxes" and when I went to go inside, he tried to make a move for the truck. I got between him and it, and he pushed me and spit in my face.

He then left on foot, without giving me the W-2 of course.

I got the kids, they came home and found the tag, I drove down the road, found him, showed him the tag, but he just ignored me and was a rude, and mean and nasty...

Then, my neighbors told me to file a domestic violence injunction against him. And one of her daughters called him on his phone and told him I was going to file a DVI if he didn't give me that W-2.

Twenty minutes later, I got a call from my mother that he'd just dropped the W-2 off at her house.

So you see... he feels that I 'threaten' and 'emotionally blackmail' him into 'getting my way.' He's always felt that way before, when I threatened to expose them to their jobs in the beginning, the middle and the end,... and now he feels he is justified in doing whatever he wants, being as abusive as he wants to be, because of how many times I've let him off the hook on it, and now he is convinced, as are many, that the problem is that I 'make' him want to be violent.

I want to clarify, that I have NEVER been 'afraid' of him.

This is not the man I married. The man I married was a kind, gentle, caring and loving man, and doting husband and father.

But the constant stress in this house, drove him first to start bullying the kids, then me to calling him a bully then me telling him, "Don't you dare bully MY kids"... and now he says they're not his kids, because I 'broke him of that that thought" even though for 6 years he always said "Those are MY kids, they're MY sons. I love them."

I really don't think there's any hope left for this marriage. I don't even want to expose him now. I just want to let it go and try to pick up the pieces of my life.

I feel like I'm the abusive one and his affair was the result of it.

I'm not sure how you are the abusive one in that particular scenario. You should have called the police.

Thank you for your honesty FL2.

What you have detailed here is an extremely horrible case of one of you making a selfish demand, the other responding with a disrespectful judgment, and then both of you resorting to uncontrolled angry outbursts.

This is extremely dangerous and I am not making light of it. When he pushed you and spit in your face, yes you sure should have called the police. Dr. Harley states that when we have an angry outburst, we are "insane" during that time. It is not to be permitted EVER.

Both of you are resorting to lovebusters to attempt to solve marital conflicts. Many of us did similar.

Marriage Builders teaches us how to end all of that. We learn to resolve all of our conflicts through enthusiastic agreement. We learn to give each other extraordinary care. But that is for later.

You BOTH are being abusive. However this is still not the "reason" for his affair. His affair is on him.

You just told us in your previous post that you want to save your marriage. When it comes time to tell your husband that you are willing to work on your marriage, THEN you can apologize for your part in the problems, and express your willingness to make changes.

Right now, though, here it comes...you need to focus on exposure.

Your emotions are all over the place. Don't act on your emotions. And no, you are not responsible for his affair.

In this place, you get the best advice for your situation. Following the advice gives you the best opportunity to recover from the affair personally. At some moment, you choose wether or not this marriage is wordt fighting for. If you want to restore your marriage, you get the best plan right here. If not, you also get the best advice here.

Exposure is good for you and bad for the affair. The best way to pick up the pieces of your life is exposure. You don't need to decide yet wether or not to recover your marriage.

This is not the husband you knew, but an alien inside your husbands body. Exposure is like exorcism, your best chance to get the alien out as fast and effective as possible.

Read the exposure link in Mel's sig, study it, expose.

The alternative is suffer longer, regret you didn't expose today and expose in a few weeks.

There are radio shows that speak to the escalation of the LoveBusters like this, FL2. I'm on my way out, but maybe someone else can link a good one for you. Otherwise, I will check later.

Thank you all, again. I really need to think about this. I know I want to save this marriage, but I don't know if I want the heartache of failing...

He said, straight out, "I don't want to try." Back in November. I know that all his bs with working late, going out, staying out all night, was 'pushing' me for the reactions he knew he would get, and did, so that he could use those reactions to justify leaving me.

I told him already that I would go to counseling to change my behavior, but he said "You are 41 years old, you're set in your ways, you're never going to change."

He has said "He's done" to everyone that has tried to talk to him.

I don't see any point in exposing the affair if there is no hope for the marriage, and I really don't see any point in doing it if there is even a glimmer of hope for the marriage (which he swears there isn't).

He thinks my suicidal tendencies are emotional blackmail and doesn't comprehend that a lot of people feel this way at the end of a marriage (because little Miss Psych Student says so).

Honestly, I want to expose that tramp, but not him. And that's not even possible.

If I love him, shouldn't I want him to be happy and if she's what makes him happy, shouldn't I let him have her?

Yes, my emotions are all over the place. Almost NO ONE, friends, counselors, other forums, etc... advocate this kind of 'nuclear exposure'... and I have no 'insight' right now as to whether or not it's going to completely kill any shred of hope, or if it's going to get him home.

What I do know, is that I want him home and if I do this, and it does completely destroy the chance of that happening, if he calls me and says "I was considering it, but now you blew it completely", I will never be able to live with myself.

If most affairs end within 6 months - 2 years on their own, why not just wait it out and see what happens?

I am friends with a couple who survived an affair. He said that he said all the same things my husband is saying. When I asked him why he never left, he said it was because he had all his friends in his ear telling him, "Don't leave. Don't get divorced. Just wait. Wait and see what happens."

But none of our mutual friends will talk to him at all and of those who tried, like I said, they botched it, letting him 'lead' the conversation and then just reported back to me "I think you need to accept that your marriage is over."

They'll tell me that nothing justifies his affair or his behavior. They'll tell ME that he should have told me "I think our marriage is in trouble, and I think we should get some counseling"... but they won't tell HIM that...

He's surrounded by people who think it's perfectly ok to skip over the 'work' part of marriage, and perfectly ok to say "I don't want the respsonsibility" and there is no one looking at him like he's insane and asking him if he hears himself... no one telling him what this is doing to me and the kids.

What Dr. Harley is suggesting with exposure certainly does rely on 'peer pressure,' and I know that peer pressure can be very powerful, but I don't have any peers willing to put the pressure on, and even counselors don't do that. So what do I do?

I manipulate him out of a job and where he lives, and MAYBE he comes home, but most likely not, and then I pay $275 for a coaching session with another counselor who is going to say, "Well, he doesn't want to try and I can't make him,"...

I am exhausted from all this thinking.

How do you know no peers will help you? If you expose the affair, you will find allies from those you would not have expected. You will also find that some you thought would support you will turn out to be Enablers. That's what happened in my case.

Also, the pressure is not immediate. It could take weeks or months for it to sink into the WS. But if you put the truth out there they cannot argue against it.

I also want to add that part of my 'abusiveness' has to do with me calling him at work too much.

When we first met, I called him a lot. I was in a new strange city, had no friends there and no car and was bored at home with the kids.

It wasn't mean or anything at that time.

Then, when he was driving a cab, I called him a lot, and often screamed at him because again, I was stuck home all alone.

When he got THIS job... well... that is when the calling exploded. I called him all the time, screaming at him about one thing or another that was driving me crazy at home, usually the kids, sometimes about a bill that I had no idea how we were going to pay (like the electric) and how the kids wouldn't settle down so I could find some work... * he was working 60-90 hours a week until at least 10 pm every night... I never got a break.

Well, when he got the better, regular schedule, right before the affair started, the phone calls pretty much stopped. I started making more money and he was home by 5pm.

But when he took the promotion, the phone calls started again because I was insecure about him being there so much, with HER...

And... to add some insult to injury here, a friend of ours had gotten him a job that paid $4.00 more per hour than the promotion paid and it was a county job. All he had to do was put a name on the application and the job was his. He never would go down and fill it out, and there were what seemed to be valid reasons at the time...

For one thing, we didn't have a dependable car, so of course, you don't want to take a job like that, and your car breaks down and you can't get to work... actually that was the main reason. I busted my a** on freelance work to come up with the money to buy a car, and a month after we bought it, he still hadn't gone down there, and then we lost it in the floods here. (Last August).

It was September when he brought up the promotion, October when he got it, and November when he told me that the marriage was over for him 2.5 years ago...

And you know most of the rest of the story since then...

I guess I'm not ready to expose until I've talked out my own part in the demise of our marriage and determined whether or not it's even salvageable based on my abusive behavior... because if isn't, I should probably just let him go and be happy. As I said, he's not the man I married at all, and I'm struggling with thinking that my 'abusiveness' is what drove him to this and that if that's true, I need to just STOP.

The peers I've asked to help, haven't. And I cant' help but feel like I'm going to get attacked for sending FB PM's to their friends and family, telling me things like "No wonder he left you. You're a crazy psycho to be sending this to me, you don't even know me." And stuff like that. I don't want to open myself up to anymore of that.

I did FB exposure....expect all 3 of these:

1. Support
2. Hatred and loathing for exposing private matters
3. No comment

Do it and don't delay. What do you have to lose?

My last shred of hope.

If you love him don't you want what is best for him. Is losing his marriage and family over a little tramp what is best for him? Is giving up on your marriage what is best for him? When your children were little and wanted ice cream for breakfast did you say to yourself, shouldn't I let them do what they want since I love them?

You are in no way obligated to fight for this marriage. But if you really do want to try to save it, the above statement makes no sense.


But you do know that not doing it is not bringing him any closer to coming home. I believe almost NO ONE advocates for this exposure because they do not understand it. They assume it is vindictive, when it is the opposite of that. It is a statement that you are fighting for your marriage and requesting their help. They do not understand that the removal of secrecy kills the mystery/excitement of the affair, making it your best chance at saving your marriage.


Oh, rest assured, he will say all that and more. But you can read thread after thread in here where the WS went ballistic when exposed, and shortly thereafter the affair died, and then suddenly they came home.

There is no guarantee, but it sounds like he's not coming home now anyhow. What do you have to lose? And think of the self respect you might gain. You will also be letting him know that you are not some weak person willing to accept whatever crumbs he drops your way. No. He won't like it. But over time, he will respect you much more for it.


And then what? You sit around waiting and hoping. Maybe he eventually gets bored and comes back to you and what, you just take him back? Nothing changes? He has no consequences for what he did and he will do it again as soon as he feels like it. You will continue to feel desperate and insecure (with good reason) and you'll either start acting out on that again-calling, crying, screaming-or walk around on eggshells miserable inside, afraid to ask to have any of your needs met for fear of appearing needy.

The people in this forum can guide you through the steps that give you the best possible chance (no guarantees) to not just save your marriage but recover it and have a better marriage than before. And if your marriage does not recover, what you learn will along the way will make you stronger and better equipped to have a good relationship in the future.

BTW - I don't think of exposure as a "psycho" move. I think of it as a strong, confident, courageous move. It may turn out your friends are all degenerates who think an affair is no big deal, if so, find some new friends - you can see in here that many people do not accept affairs. And your husband would not try to keep it quiet if he believed it was okay. Having everyone know will force him to look at his actions through other people's eyes.

Best of luck to you.

Thank you AnyWife... in response to wanting what is best for him and the comparison to a child wanting ice cream.. he's not a child. Is it my place or my right to decide what's best for him? What about his sense of autonomy? (I am thinking the the answer is that he lost that right when his actions hurt others, but I'm not so sure there isn't a valid counter argument to that either.)

I'm his wife. Not his parent. *That said, I did tear into some blogger today who suggested that a CS has a 'right to choose their own life", and told her, "I don't get to 'choose' to leave my kids home alone at night while I go out and party at 1am... once we commit to marriage and a family, we do lose certain 'rights' to 'choose' certain things.

And as I said, if I really am 'abusive', then again, who am I to decide what's 'best' for him, or anyone for that matter?

If I am the abusive one, and he is in fact better off without me, shouldn't I simply just wish him well and work on myself?

I'm dealing with a lot of internal conflict right now, and I think he was as well... because he could be a bully sometimes to the kids, because he did keep 'standing still in life' and because he was truly wondering if he was the piece of s**t I called him when I found out about the EA and when I said it again when took the promotion after I'd said I didn't want him to...

I think that exposure should be carefully thought out before it's done, and I really think it depends on the couple. If a counselor was telling both of US that it needs to and should be done to end the pain, and I knew he knew I had back up for it, then that would be one thing... but he's going to see it as vindictive, and manipulative. Because he thinks I am manipulative.

And he's been allowed to get away with a lot of crap that no one has 'called him out on yet'.

So I'm just still unsure and I want to know if anyone feels that I was 'abusive' and that I am 'toxic' and there's no hope anyway.

Earlier today, a friend who refused to tell my husband what she thought of his behavior to his face, but would tell me, asserted that he told me that he was unhappy months ago and I had an opportunity to do something about it then, and I didn't.

She also said she thinks that if I really want my husband back I can get him back. But she also asked me if I really wanted a man who at 38 years old has to be told the difference between right and wrong?

And again, he was a GOOD man... did I drive him to this point?

NO. You did not make him choose to cheat. You're beating yourself up way too much based on what a WH is telling you in order for him to get you to back down while he goes on his merry way cheating. This was not your choice.

Did he give you the choice...honey can I go have an A? Heck no!

Take back YOUR power and self esteem and fight for your marriage. Exposure is the first step IF indeed you want your husband back. Only you can decide that.

These people are trying to help you...meanwhile you are wallowing in self pity and paralyzed by your own inaction and wasting valuable time.

Look how long it took me. Waaaay too long.

It's scary to expose. But the minute I did...it was a weight lifted off my shoulders. You can expose AND still be working on you.

You can do this!!!

Always, I appreciate your honesty. Thank you very much. Yes, I am walllowing right now. I know I'm not faultless in the destruction of my marriage. What I am having trouble with is trying to decide if his crimes are worse than mine?

And...of course, I'm wondering also, "Would I want to be exposed for all of mine?" What if he does this, and worse, right back to me...

I'm truly conflicted.

You're not exposing all his past crimes....JUST HIS AFFAIR!

The purpose of exposure is not to drag your dirty laundry out, but to kill the affair. Exposure is for the ACTIVE AFFAIR. So yes, if you are having an active affair we would encourage him to expose it. If he is having an affair you should expose it.

But I seriously doubt he considers his affair a "crime." All you are doing is spreading the good news. Nothing wrong with that.

FLW, here is the way that these things go:

I think that everything is hunky-dory and I can rely on my husband to help me with things. I'm a bit rattled today, so when H calls me to say hello during the day, instead of dropping everything and saying "Hi Honey!", I say "oh my Gosh, I'm so glad you called. The dog just jumped all over me with muddy paws as I walked out the door, I need for you to train this dog tonight!"

Selfish Demand

H was feeling all lovey-dovey to me prior to this, which prompted his call. But I hurt him by not acknowledging his care when he called, and instead I demanded that he take action on something that I need. So HIS response to me is "my Gosh! Is that all that I am to you is a slap-boy?"

Disrespectful Judgment

AND NOW we are off to the races!

So I respond with an escalated comment (angry outburst).
He responds with a volley angry outburst.
I respond again with my voice very raised and breathing fast.

...

This is COMMON. In fact, it is so very common that Dr. Harley wrote an entire BOOK on LoveBusters!

This is not the reason that your husband chose to have an affair. The reason that he is enmeshed within an affair is because he let his boundaries down and allowed someone else to meet his needs.

That is NOT to say that he wishes that YOU couldn't be meeting his needs!

This can all be fixed! If you are both willing to work your butts off together, and I just bet that you are both up to the challenge. But not until the affair is squashed dead.

Always and Meloday, again, thank you. I know I'm only exposing his affair, but there is nothing to stop him from exposing me right back for being this 'shrew of a wife'.

BlindSighted... thank you! That was soooo incredibly helpful for me.

He's ALREADY portraying you as a shrew to the OW and getting away with it. You are exposing an extra marital affair. Nothing more nothing less.

And most waywards portray their betrayed spouses as shrews. So what? It just makes them look desperate. You shouldn't concern yourself for 2 seconds about that.

Way-Speak for back off so that I can continue on unhindered. Don't rock the perfectly floating boat where I can cake eat from you and from her.

Way-Speak for get back in your box so that I can control your actions. So that you won't rock my perfectly floating boat.

Super Cruel Way-Speak, unfortunately all too common with the wayward gaslighting technique. The optimal result is convincing the BS that they are "crazy" so that they will shut up and not rock the boat.

FL2, you can tell by the many caring responses to your situation that none of us think that you are crazy. This ALL is normal Wayward Fog Behavior. We all point these things out because WE have been through it, and now we can see it for what it is. Your husband's various responses are not rational. They are the voice of an addict, truly. I promise you that he will allow this to go on for years if you allow it.

I don't know if this is "normal" per se, but the same thing happened to us. During my H's 12 year affair, he continually turned down one promotion after another.

I conceded due to his extreme gaslighting skill, and instead I just stepped up to the plate and learned how to work from the moment I awoke to the moment that I felt ill from exhaustion and had to fall into bed. Until I got cancer and I couldn't keep up the pace. (I am doing great now, but truly I did allow it to get that bad)

Worked perfectly for him! He is SICK about this now. In fact we aren't supposed to go back to the past and yet this is one of the things that still eats at him constantly.

I guess that I'm throwing a "love" card at you, but honestly FL2 you do not want your husband to have to go through that in the future. Exposing and ending this evil affair IS a loving thing to do.

Thank you all so much. Slightly off topic- my mother is extremely abusive to me and yesterday I had to sever all ties not just with her, but with all other members of my family who enable her... they are all abusive, codependent, or enablers in one way or another, and all masters at gaslighting. The first thought that went through my mind was "They just lost their Dad and now I'm going to take the rest of their family away from them too...?" But then I realized, I'm trying to fill a void with 'toxic people'??? How much sense does that make? And that's when I decided it was time for me to cut toxicity out of my life. (She is also the reason that I worry that I am abusive, because it does perpetuate, and I own everything I do, but I will stand my ground until I die when I'm right- so I just want to be sure I'm right.)

I'm going to sleep soon. I have a metric ton of work ahead of me tomorrow and Friday, and then I have the boys for the weekend. I think I am going to take until Monday to decide whether or not to expose. I know you all think I'm wasting time, but I need to think. I need some clarity. I'm going to try to go kayaking this weekend if it's warm enough. Being on the water (or in it) puts me at peace with myself and the universe. I need to get there before I do anything. I have a tendency to react when I should 'act', and when something feels 'reactionary' to me, I try to stop and think before I do something that results in unintended consequences.

I only just found this forum a couple of days ago, and I love it. But most other advice I've read has been not to do this... and I'm feeling like all I've done right now is something anyone with any research or debate skills can do... "find something to validate your argument."

I want to be sure that I'm not just finding the one source that validates the case I want to make.

I'm sorry if I am disappointing anyone. I am grateful for each and every one of you. And thrilled for those of you that it worked for.

But I'm analytical and I want to look at all sides of the coin before I flip it.

Most of us can relate to that. Most of us know now (after looking at all sides of the coin thoroughly) that Dr. Harley's approach is the best and most effective plan. I did my research and I know most, if not all of the concepts are based on or confirmed by scientific research. It is put together in a solid (dummy-proof) plan, all the shortcuts are removed. So don't think you can cut corners or change/improve the plan. Cherrypicking will not work.

You can do the research yourself, at some point in time conclude that this plan is the best indeed and then wish you implemented it today.

I hope I can convince you to trust the advice given to you and act on the advice, now. Every day you wait is delaying your personal recovery.

Thank you goody2shoes. I feel that right now, I am being ruled by my emotions and I can't trust any decisions I make in a state like this. That's why I'm holding back. I am doing some more research as well and would love to see any you might be able to link to, since trying to figure out the correct search phrase is proving difficult.

I'm really hoping it will be warm enough for me to get out on the water this weekend. That always clears my head.

*****edit****

Dr. Harley advises not to dwell on the past. To overcome the terrible emotions of the affair, he has a plan for your recovery. It seperates you from triggers to bad memories and bad emotions. It is the most effective way to kill an affair (exposure is the most effective weapon). If you wait 2 years for the affair to die a natural death, you wille have two years of terrible memories, accompanied by bad emotions.

If after the affair has died, you start to recover your marriage, it is far more difficult to overcome all the hurt if you just waited for the affair to die. In those two years you will be hurt every day and because of that, you will lose the remaining love for your spouse.

If you have a plan and act on that plan, your mind will not constantly think of the affair and hurt, but it will be occupied with a strategy (and the bad emotions will not be triggered so often). Every second you plan on your strategy, your mind cannot be occupied with thoughts of the affair.

At this moment, you think and rethink and think again of the affair, the conflicts and everything you did wrong. It will only cause you to hurt more and/or lead to depression.

Dr. Harley's plan is the result of 40 years of experience and research. The goal is to save your sanity, to minimize the hurt and to maximize the chance of recovering your marriage. With the affair going on, your marriage has no chance, zero. That's why exposure is so important. With the affair going on, you will get depressed. That's why exposure is so important.

Yes you can wait for the affair to die a natural death, but there will be so much more damage, recovery will be so difficult. The hurt is already so severe, don't take the long road. This really is your best chance and the sooner you start, the sooner you will recover.

People here have been in exactly the place you are in today. Alwayslookingup is urging you to expose. She was very reluctant to expose in the beginning, now she regrets not exposing sooner. She want to save you from making the same mistake. Read older threads like I did, I never read a single thead where the betrayed spouse regretted exposure. Lots of board members regret not exposing sooner.

Now the affair is in the dark (exiting), exposure shines a light on it and shows how ugly it really is.

So if the emotion he was feeling was rage, and every time he thinks about our marriage, what he feels is rage, then that emotion will never change?

That sounds like a statement of fact, without any indication that there is a strategy to overcome it... is that correct?

Let me add to my story-

The day he ripped my shorts off of me, he became 'afraid of himself.'

Shortly after that, he told me that 'everyone' was telling him that "if the person you're with is making you want to raise your hands to them, then you shouldn't be with that person."

The day he came to get the truck, he pushed me and spit in my face.

I feel that there is no counselor on Earth who is going to disagree with that statement, and honestly, I don't want to waste any more time on him, or with anyone, who can't overcome that limited way of thinking...

So unless I know that there is a counselor or coach or something out there, that can overcome that, I'm working on the assumption that he will continue to believe this to be true, and that he will be 'backed up'in that belief, even if he does come around and go to counseling... or that it will forever remain in the back of his mind because it was never addressed and with a strategy to fix it.

All that said I'm still leaning towards exposing him and her to their jobs, not necessarily their FB friends and family... mainly because I want to take my power and my control back.

For 4 months now, I've been his doormat. Waiting, crying, trying to show love and support, only to keep getting slapped in the face by him. And I want my children to learn by example that there are consequences to poor decisions, especially ones made selfishly.

He said "I told you my feelings many times." No, he started flirting with another woman, felt guilty, took all the blame himself, while complaining that I 'put everything on him' but never 'connected' those dots for me... never said let's go to counseling, but then later told me that the affair 'should have been a wake up call'???

I may not have been a perfect wife, and I may have made a lot of selfish demands and harsh judgments, but I NEVER rejected affection or intimacy, I NEVER was unfaithful, I never hid money, or abandoned the family even when I probably should have signed myself into a hospital for my depression... I never hid or withheld money or love...

He made this selfish choice. Maybe because like me, he didn't know any better, didn't know any other way, but I've offered to keep looking for the way with him, and all he has to say is "I don't want to be bothered and *F**k the kids"... (yea, he literally actually said that once) which is why I'm debating on whether or not it's even worth trying to save...

And then I remember the man I loved and think, "My selfish demands brought us here, I owe him at least what I think he owes me... to TRY"... He thinks he HAS tried, and refuses to accept that what he and I 'thought' was trying, wasn't.

And it would have taken a lot more than some half wit counselor like we had to figure out HOW to 'try'... She was just wasting our time... 4 sessions and no 'strategy' on how to 'cope' with 'love busters' no alternative to what we were doing... worrying about whether or not our kids picked up their room and telling us she was trying to get control over the chaos in our lives... our marriage was in CRISIS and she wasted an hour on 'housework,' instead of 'when you feel yourself getting angry about this, try doing this instead"...

But as I said, my experience with counseling has been dismal and I want to know if I will even be able to find a counselor that is going to straight up say, "Yes, you can overcome that problem of wanting to punch her in the face"...

Otherwise, I'm not sure I want to bother with any more attempts at reconciling anyway.

"Making you raise your hands to them" is blaming the victim.

The point I wanted to make, memory is followed by emotion. If you keep running those memories in your head, you will experience those emotions. That is how our brain works.

I will not discuss your post further, because of this. You should not be occupied crying over spilled milk. And his emotions are the least of your and mine problems, at this moment.

Your husband is having an affair, he is in the fog, he is incapable of coherent thoughts because of the affair. Don't be bothered with them.

As long as he is in the affair, don't pay attention to his fogbabble.

I was talking about your hurt, your emotion. You think back, you hurt. You keep your finger in the flame, you hurt, why keep your finger in a place you know hurts? Why stay in this hurtful situation any longer than nessecary?

Half hearted exposure is bad. You want it to be effective. You don't kill fire with a drop of water, you flood it.

And the counselor you are looking for, you already found him. His last name is Harley.His contact info is right on this site. You can make an appointment, that would be wonderful.

Making 'want' to raise his hands... he was very careful to say I make him 'want' to... But I agree and again, if things were that bad, why didn't he call a marriage counselor, or ask me to do it, instead of having an affair?

The counselor said that by not giving him the keys and not letting him leave, I crossed a boundary.

I was extremely reluctant to tell her about him ripping my shorts because she made it clear that she had to 'report' any domestic abuse and suicidal thoughts- so I didn't tell her about that.

But I did tell her what he said about wanting to punch me in the face, and she said "Do you have anger issues?" to him... He said no, and she let it go, and looked at me and said "Why do you want to be with someone who is so disrespectful of you?"

Passive/Aggressive twit.

How about the rest? Since I had an idiot counselor, if I do manage to win this war, are there counselor out there that I can 'trust' to tell him all the things you've all said to me?

For example- Yes, you can change that behavior. Or, "That is wayward spouse speak for don't rock my perfectly floating boat," etc, etc....

Not sure if I've said this before, but he's acting like he's on Jerry Springer when what he needs is a good dose of Dr. Phil.

But my experience with counselors hasn't revealed any "Dr. Phil" types... so....

Seriously... I can't tell you how much it HURTS that people in my life have said a lot of the same things you've all said in here, to me, to my face, but refused to say it to his face.

And the excuses they gave me for refusing to say it to him were "Well, he doesn't care."

Clearly, he's easily influenced, judging by how easy it was for the little slut to convince him he had such an unhappy home life that he should leave his wife and be with her... so let's use that to our advantage and apply the 'peer pressure'...

When everyone refused, it made me feel like they wanted to see my marriage come to an end.

Fl2, the source we rely upon here is Dr. Bill Harley, the author of Surviving an Affair. WE can help you follow his program but won't recommend any other path. WE are not recommending any steps that are based on emotions. WE are not emotional and neither is Dr Harley. [you are] The steps we recommended are based on years of clinical practice by Dr Harley. We are not going to recommend anything else because we know that is what works the best.

Every person on this forum who has saved their marriage attributes it to exposure and Dr Bill Harley, clinical psychologist, calls exposure the most effective weapon in saving a marriage. If anyone tells you otherwise, they are flat out giving you bad advice.

So I understand that your head is not clear, but the same does not apply to Dr. Bill Harley. His recommendations were made in a very clear headed manner, based on 40 years of clinical practice.

FL2, I don't have time to read an overly long post, but this just caught my eye. Your husband physically assaulted you and then blamed YOU. In that case, Dr. Harley would not recommend that you EVER reconcile with him unless and until he gets professional help for his anger problem. As it is now, he doesn't even believe the problem lies with him, but with you. As such, he is not safe and you are better off without him.

Even so, you should proceed with exposure and sending him a Plan B letter. The Plan B letter would specify that in order for you to EVER even consider reconciliation, he would have to end his affair, commit to a marriage recovery plan and go through an extensive anger management program.

I wanted to add something about the program and this forum. We are very action oriented and not blog oriented. There are a lot of posts on this thread that are more akin to blogging than establishing a plan of action. That's not really a good use of the forum.

I'm afraid he doesn't care, but that can change.

We certainly don't want to see your marriage come to an end, if that can be prevented. But the best way to prevent it is by following Dr. Harley's program here. To do that, you've got to do your part and set the bar high for him. That is what following the program means. The program doesn't work if it isn't followed. Focus on finding out what the program says you need to do, and on doing it!

And that Melody is what I fear. I get him to commit to saving the marriage, and I pay a fortune to a counselor, who still won't give him the straight talk that says, directly to him, "You have an anger issue and you need to get help" and "I don't suggest you stay married." I want a counselor who will say, "You CAN get help for that."

If you get to that point, do the coaching program through MB.

If you don't take the first step, you will never get to that final part of your marathon.

I am not sure why you want to go to counseling so badly at this crucial time. That is a distraction. Did you read my post? You don't need a counselor, you need to follow this program. And he either gets on board or you move on.

It costs you nothing to write a Plan B letter and send it. That is what is recommended. In your letter, you would give him the path back to you. He either takes it or he doesn't. *YOU* lay out the conditions in your letter.

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Keep in mind that a counselor has much LESS leverage than you. You are much more influential than any counselor. So if you raise the bar and say this is what it will take to come back, he either gets on board or you move on. [both are good outcomes] But unless he comes to you on bended knee, begging to come back, you should not even consider taking him back. He is not safe for you emotionally or physically as he is today.

FL2, peer pressure will happen with exposure. Whether you realize it or not. Whether it "feels" right or not. Peer pressure will happen.

Affairs are addictions, and people don't want to parade their vices in the light. Think of a crack house. Do you think that it would still be operational if they tore down the wall facing the street and installed a big picture window?

Irregardless of whether Joe Blow ever frequented that crack house before, once that big picture window is there for all to see inside, he's not going to have the same comfort zone afterward, is he?

BlindSighted, I believe that is true of some people... but I'm looking at the people that are involved in this... birds of a feather flock together. I've already had his own mother actually not just 'condone' his behavior but actually advocate for it... and my mother, and all of our friends, refuse to say to his face, what they say about me to my face.

I'm worried that her friends are the kinds of people who will call the 'authorities' on me and say that I'm 'emotionally unstable' for contacting strangers out of the blue... my kids don't need the police showing up here at 2am because they got a report that I'm 'suicidal'... and that is exactly the kinds of 'dregs of society' she is...

Adding to that is the fact that my husband is very easily influenced and very prone to suggestion... all it took for this woman to plant a grow a seed in his mind that he had an unhappy home life was a little flirting and the 'seemingly' off the cuff remark about how 'other people' (not her) say what an unhappy home life he has.

I do not want to end up recruiting for his team, even more people who are going to get 'in his ear' and back him up saying "Yea, your wife is a crazy psycho, you're right to leave her."

Especially since the friends I am tight with have already refused to be Jiminy Cricket on the other shoulder, balancing out those evil thoughts...

That said, I'm going to do a targeted exposure. Last night, I found his grandfather's phone number online and I'm going to try to call him today. I think he might have enough influence over my husband to get him to stop this affair immediately.

And I am going to expose to the key people who I think will be on MY side, but not to anyone that I might inadvertently add to "Team WS"...

...and definitely to his job. Though I am thinking that the exposure to his job is going to be coming from someone other than me... a former employee perhaps.

I'm still going to take the weekend to think about it, and it's nice out today, so I'm hoping tomorrow it will be warm enough for me to get out on the kayak for a few hours so I can think.

Don't go for tricke exposure. Do is once, do it right. First you select who to expose to, then you expose to all at the same time, within an hour or so. Your situation is not different from other betrayed spouses, your exposure doesn't require a different approach.

If you call his grandfather first and in a few days expose at his workspace and the rest of your list in a few days, you will regret it afterwards. It will give WH the time to put up his defenses and spin the story, so that you look like a raving lunatic. That will undermine your exposure.

You don't contact strangers out of the blue, you inform them your marriage is threatened by this horrible affair.

Who on OW's side are you exposing to?

We all had people who we (shouldn't have) kept in our lives and who were not healthy for us. After the trauma, most of us no longer have those people in our lives. This really has nothing to do with exposure.

Oh puleeze, are her friends really going to be willing to make false 911 calls? And if they are, so what? Someone called the police on me because I was crying in our way back yard after D-Day #1, the cops came, they cared about me, I explained what had happened, and they left. Are you afraid for the cops to come to your home?

Yes. The same as all of our wayward spouses. I posted pages back FL2 that this is not some "special" or unique situation. Every wayward follows the same script. Your husband didn't have boundaries up to protect the marriage. All it took for any of us was the right person to meet the right emotional needs. There is nothing different about your scenario. We all know that it hurts horribly (have you read any of our threads? we all said the same things!), but focusing on that hurt is paralyzing you. We need to get you to TAKE ACTION.

We HOPE that he/she WILL say that and lots more. We HOPE to majorly disrupt their affair! Are you WANTING to end this affair?

Or are you wanting to stay status quo? If that's the case, please let us know, but also please realize that you are prolonging the hurt that you are going through while you wait.

It's called trickle exposure, and it won't work.

Your husband's affair is ENMESHED. It is LONG TERM. He has a long history of GASLIGHTING you and you have a long history of accepting his non-sensical lies (not a cut down, I did it too).

Taking a little squirt gun to this fight is NOT going to do anything but poke at the bear.

You need to EXPOSE to everyone and then we'll prepare you to go straight to Plan B within a couple of days afterwards, in which case you are going to need to be the strongest you can be mentally for a few days while (HOPEFULLY) your husband is very angry about your excellent exposure!

So yes, go kayaking and clear your mind. That is a good choice. But then come back here on Monday with a full exposure list AND a letter to both sides, his and hers for our critique. PLEASE do not make your situation worse by attempting a trickle exposure.

It has nothing to do with having those people not in our lives anymore. It has everything to do with the fact that even the people that I believe to have good morals, just don't care. So strangers won't either.

And yes, it IS contacting strangers.

And yes, making false 9-1-1 calls and false CPS reports is very, very common with people from this kind of background. And cops showing up at 2-4 am is NOT something my kids need to see. Nor do I need CPS banging down my door, demanding I let them into my home.

I do not want to add any more people to the "Your wife is a crazy psycho" team.

I don't hope either of them will say that but more, I don't hope I add anyone else to his roster of people saying... there are already enough of them.

Yes, I want the affair to end. But only because I want him to come home to us... and I don't believe that destroying his life and placing a sexual harassment termination on his employment history is the right way to get him home, nor is it going to be any good for our financial future anyway.

Most of the things I've heard here so far are based on a lot of things that simply aren't accurate, for instance "You'll get spousal support," actually, that's going to be very hard for me to get because we've only been married 6 years, and in Florida, alimony is very difficult to get... at best I'd get maybe $250 per month for 6 months. The comment about me 'needing' to get child support from the kids bio father... the answer to that is absolutely not. He is a bad, bad guy and I do not want him in the children's lives at all (No, he's not my first husband, the good guy, he was the guy in between the two husbands.) He is not listed as the father on either boys' birth certificates and has no established legal rights... trying to get child support from him would establish those legal rights for him and that is not something that I am willing to do. Ever. Under any circumstances. He is a dangerous man, but without any 'proof' of that, no court in this state will deny him the right to see the kids, which he would get if he had parental rights...

I'm not legally ignorant. I've already spoken to lawyers and have even been advised that getting him fired would completely screw any chance I have at any alimony.

I believe my best chance at reconciliation is through intervention and/or making some kind of deal with him where I will give him what he wants if he will do one thing for me and that is go to a marriage saving workshop or coaching program.

After that, I will see to it that the OW is exposed to the company but the last thing in the world I'm going to do right now is create a situation in which he sees her as a victim he needs to protect because his 'meanie head wife' got her fired.

I do not believe that exposing him is even going to result in getting him 'shamed' enough to end the affair and come home, in fact, I don't believe that anyone is going to shame him at all. I think I will come out looking like the bad guy in all this.

Peer pressure is effective but you have to have the peers on YOUR side for their effect to have the effect you want it to have.

Lawyers no nothing about killing affairs. They are motivated to make their job easy "divorce" so they do as little as possible.

Traditionally it is the wives that get CPS involved, file false PD reports to get RO.

Alimony is based on what you WH's past history to earn. So he gets fired he will not be let off the hook financially. He has the skill set to earn the money he is making he will get another job for the same money.

This is not a blog. We have given you our advise
- tell everyone the truth. There is no law against the truth.

If you are not interested in Marriage Builders, you don't need to continue posting.

I understand that you are paralysed with fear but you are not thinking straight. If you go to a women's shelter in your town they will give you advice on how to do this in a way that protects you. There is a way to get the child support to which you are entitled without exposing your children to danger. You need to get advice on how.

Look at it this way; your children are being actively harmed every day that they witness your suffering. If they grow up thinking this is acceptable behaviour you are teaching your daughters to seek this in their own relationships and your sons to treat their wives this way. Isn't that even more dangerous?

I have just re-read this page - http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi8112_exposed.html

And I quote: - "When there is an affair in the workplace, my general advice is that the unfaithful spouse must quit the job and find another to avoid ever seeing or talking to the lover again. But while the affair is taking place and the unfaithful spouse is unwilling to resign, should a betrayed spouse expose the affair to the employer?

While I unhesitatingly recommend exposing the affair to friends, family, clergy, children and the lover's spouse, I'm not so quick to suggest exposing it to an employer. That's because such exposure could have unintended legal and economic consequences. For example, the affair might constitute grounds for a sexual harassment claim by the unfaithful spouse's lover. Or it might trigger the outright firing of the spouse, making it far more difficult for them to find another job.

So in those cases I usually advise the betrayed spouse to warn the unfaithful spouse he or she will expose the affair to the employer in a month if the unfaithful spouse is still working there, giving him or her time to make a graceful exit from the job to another. Even if a new job cannot be found in a month, I recommend waiting no longer to inform the employer, unless the unfaithful spouse has already resigned."

Dr. Harley's advice is crystal clear on this... even if he has refused to end the affair, the 30 day notice on the job still stands, and for the reasons Dr. Harley outlines.

I have not had the opportunity to give my husband this warning. And I have no idea how I can give him this warning.

Now... that said, I've had several friends who refused to 'use their influence' to get him to 'end his dangerous affair and work on the marriage', say to me, "Well I don't know how I could help."

There is no template or script I can give them for that, and the even fewer people who have tried to help, as I said, didn't follow the script I gave them, and they wound up asking him 'questions' which allowed him to lead the conversation, and all I got was a report back to me, "Well I think you just need to accept that your marriage is over."

I cannot go through anymore of that. All it does is piss me off that I have some really weak or really stupid friends who can't follow a script and stand firm.

If I'm going to put any pressure on him, it has to come from someone that he respects AND who is not going to cave in and let my husband lead the conversation.

And so far no one has been able to lead a conversation with him, and justify what I'm doing (reporting him) as the right thing for me to do... everyone will say to me that I should, but no one will say to him "Yes, she should and I back her up on it too." I can't even show him this forum for him to see it.

So no, I'm not willing to do that without some kind of back up.

I may expose to his job, but again, Dr. Harley's advice is clear, it's not for just when he's committed to ending the affair and saving the marriage, the 30 day notice still stands even if he insists on carrying on the affair.

So if you don't want to support me in figuring out how I can give him this 30 day notice, then fine. But I'm going to stick with exactly what Dr. Harley has written.

You gave him warning a year ago. Expose. If you think this advice is not in line with what Dr. Harley says, notify the mods or write Dr. Harley yourself.

I dont think you are helping yourself by ruminating so long. Do it or don't but make a choice.

You will feel better when you start to take action.

You have the absolute right to do as you think best. However, I would like to point out that you are misunderstanding Dr Harley's advice.

You have quoted from an article, but you have left out the context for which it is written. That article is written for a couple who are trying to keep their marriage together. It is not written for the situation in which the unfaithful spouse has left the home, is living with OW and has said he is never going back.

How do I know that? Because isn that article, he writes, in several places, about the couple still being together at the point where the BS is advised to expose. For example:

Whenever a betrayed spouse tells me that they've just discovered their spouses affair, my advice is almost always the same: Let others know about it. Tell your children, family, friends, clergy, and especially the lovers spouse, if they have one. And this is even to be done during what I call plan A (making an effort to make as many Love Bank deposits, and as few withdrawals as possible).

The problem some people have with that strategy is that it conflicts with the goal of plan A because it's likely to cause massive Love Bank withdrawals. An unfaithful spouse almost always considers such exposure to be a worse act of betrayal than their affair itself. But the alternative, helping the unfaithful spouse to keep the affair a secret, is enabling the addiction, prolonging the agony. In the long run, making the affair public knowledge without any forewarning, threats, or bartering (which by themselves can create massive withdrawals) actually reduces the number of Love Bank withdrawals made by the betrayed spouse.

That advice is not being given to a BS whose unfaithful spouse has already left, is living with OP, and is defiantly not coming back. In that situation, the discussion of Plan A would be redundant. And I would just point out that he is generally against warning the WS about exposure, because "warning, threats or bartering" cause massive love bank withdrawals.

In the section about exposure to the workplace, it is also clear that he is talking about a couple who are still together, where the WS is promising to end the affair and keeps giving reasons for not being able to do, or perhaps is lying about having ended the affair, but then bottom line is, he has not ended it. The point is that he is cake-eating, and the couple is still together:

Economic considerations

A divorce, and even separation, can have dire economic consequences for a betrayed spouse. Many wives of cheating husbands that I've counseled are economically dependent on him. If she exposes the affair, she fears that he will leave her, creating financial hardship. So in those cases, before exposing the affair, I generally encourage her to plan for that possibility.

Clearly he is talking there about a couple that is still living together. A wife cannot "fear that he will leave her" if he has already left her. And you'll note that Dr Harley does not say that the fear of financial hardship should stop the wife from exposing; he tells her to plan for this and still expose.

When there is an affair in the workplace, my general advice is that the unfaithful spouse must quit the job and find another to avoid ever seeing or talking to the lover again.

Again, clearly Dr H is talking about the couple that is still together. He is advising the unfaithful, who, by definition, must be on board with saving the marriage, if he is seeking advice from Dr Harley. This is not advice that is being given to the BS when the WS is living with OW.

But while the affair is taking place and the unfaithful spouse is unwilling to resign, should a betrayed spouse expose the affair to the employer?

Dr H has not stopped talking to the couple that is still together. He is discussing the situation where the WS claims to want to save the marriage, but carries on working with OW. Dr Harley knows where that will end; with WS and OW back in bed together, so his advice to the couple is always that the WS must leave the job. But what if the WS won't leave the job? What if he claims to be unable to afford to leave, or says that working with OW has nothing to do with continuing the affair, or puts up a half-hearted effort to look for another job? Bottom line: he is claiming to want to stay with his wife, but won't leave his job. That is where the rest of the statement - the section that you quoted - comes in:

While I unhesitatingly recommend exposing the affair to friends, family, clergy, children and the lover's spouse, I'm not so quick to suggest exposing it to an employer. That's because such exposure could have unintended legal and economic consequences. For example, the affair might constitute grounds for a sexual harassment claim by the unfaithful spouse's lover. Or it might trigger the outright firing of the spouse, making it far more difficult for them to find another job.

So in those cases I usually advise the betrayed spouse to warn the unfaithful spouse he or she will expose the affair to the employer in a month if the unfaithful spouse is still working there, giving him or her time to make a graceful exit from the job to another. Even if a new job cannot be found in a month, I recommend waiting no longer to inform the employer, unless the unfaithful spouse has already resigned.

The wife who warns her husband that she will expose the affair in a month is giving him time to "make a graceful exit from the job" if he is serious about saving his marriage. The only reason she warns him is because he claims to want to keep the marriage together. But if he keeps playing games with her, giving reasons why he can't find another job and refuses to resign while looking for one, she exposes after no longer than a month, because he is putting her at risk of the affair continuing.

The BW warns the WS when attempts are being made by the WS to keep the marriage together. If you warn your WS (leaving aside, for the moment, that you say you cannot), he will not resign from his job in order to keep his marriage together. He does not want to keep the marriage together, so he says. If you warn him, he might resign or find another job because he wants an unblemished employment record, but he won't be doing that to keep his marriage together. He won't go back to you as a result of resigning. All you will have achieved is that your WS will find another job. Finding another job will not end the affair, because he lives with OW right now.

Getting a WS out of the specific workplace is done so that he cannot see OW any more. This obviously applies to the WS who is still living with his wife, where the workplace is the main point of contact. If the WS is trying to save the marriage, then cutting off contact with OW is the first step, and getting him out of the job, along with changing contact details and possibly moving house, can do that. The job is their place of contact, so that avenue must be blocked.

Getting YOUR WS out of that workplace is not the issue. He lives with OW, and so he can find another job, and his affair will continue. The point of exposure in your case is ONLY this:

So when a betrayed spouse asks for my advice, I usually take the position that infidelity is the greatest betrayal of all. After an affair, trust, which is an essential ingredient in marriage, is dashed. If the unfaithful spouse is offended by being exposed, so be it. Exposure is very likely to end the affair, lifting the fog that has overcome the unfaithful spouse, helping him or her become truly repentant and willing to put energy and effort into a full marital recovery.

Dr Harley would never endorse the position that you have wilfully boxed yourself into, where you claim not to be able to warn your WH, and thus cannot complete the workplace exposure. Dr H is 100% pro exposure as a strategy to end an affair. Your case is not an exception.

You took his advice out of context. He is writing to the couple who is still together. The advanced warning is a good will gesture issued to give the WS the opportunity to gracefully leave the job.

If you don't want to take the advice here, then don't. But please don't waste time on the forum arguing about how you are not going to take the advice.

You nailed it here, in your post last Wednesday:

What made you back down from that, to the point where you do not want to expose because you think you will make things worse between you and your H?

So from what I'm reading, this fear of what people think of you is more important to you than your marriage.

I'm not judging or debating your fear. We all had that fear so I won't argue with you there.

It's just that...

ALL of us here who went before you...ALL of the BS here on the boards that have recovered our marriage and lived through the worst thing that ever happened to us...ALL of us somehow got to the point where we realized that If We Want to Save Our Marriage, We Have to Stop Putting on Fronts to Cover for Our Spouse.

You're not to that point obviously. I'm sorry FL2. You're dealing with the deck entirely stacked against you with this LONG TERM affair. There is no hope until you can get to the point where you care more about your marriage than what other people say or think of you.

Wonderful post SugarCane!

BlindSighted, no, I'm not concerned with what 'they' think of me, but with what they will 'support him' in believing about me.

He has 100 people on his side, saying I'm crazy.

No one on MY side saying "You are crazy."

This is a war and the numbers favor him already. I'm not going to recruit an even bigger army for him and his side.

You're missing the forest for the tree. It's not about numbers or "winning." It's about getting the truth out there. The truth will always melt away the lies.

The OW won't be able to "recruit an army" if you expose her to the employer. By not exposing you are ENABLING her and her army. Whose side are you on?

I am probably going to expose his boss for obvious ethical reasons, and tonight I told our kids about the affair. We all cried. My youngest called him a [censored] and my oldest said "What a piece of sh*t." (They both apologized for their language.) They were very upset, we all cried. They seem to be ok now, I'm anything but ok.

I am not going to PM any of their friends on FB.

Other than that, I don't know what to do next. I am teetering on the brink right now.

So who on OW's side will you be exposing to?

Her job and our state mental health board.

What about her parents and any siblings?

Your kids will be okay eventually.

It is best they know the truth.

It will give them clarity in life and trust in you.

She has no parents. No idea who were father was. Mother was a crackhead, she's dead. Aunt is the worthless POS who was calling me and harassing me. (Trailer park, white trash.) I have no idea what other family she has or doesn't have.

FL2 good job on being truthful to your children.

My wish is for you to reconsider and at least expose to her key friends on FB, as well as your husband's key friends. We want them both to think that "everyone" knows.

You only need to tell the simple truth and aks for help in 2-3 short paragraphs.

We encourage you get all of the rest of your exposure done today and then we will help you to get into Plan B.

I have no idea who her key friends would be, and I've already asked his key friends for help before I knew about the affair and they all refused. Said they 'didn't want to get involved.' As did all my own friends.

This is as far as I am going.

I'm not going to send him a letter telling him I don't want him to contact me when he's already said he doesn't want to talk to me at all.

He refuses to call anyone who even knows me to talk to the kids. He will only call them if I text him, or one of my friends texts him first.

He is under the impression that because he has no legal or financial obligations to the kids, he has no moral or emotional obligation to them either... and the last thing I'm going to do is 'push' him to stop all contact with them.

It isn't fair to them. I'm trying to get him to come around to seeing them, because right now, all they get are phone calls and lies.

And without anyone to 'push' him, 'whisper in his ear,' "You need to see your kids" and me not being able to send him texts about them, or pictures of them, they're going to just fade from his memory.

In fact, I think his refusal to see them is his way of trying to just 'fade away' slowly until they forget him (ain't gonna work, but try finding a counselor with the 'straight talk' cajones to tell him that, because nothing come from MY mouth is going to matter.) He's obviously deluding himself into thinking that the 'fade away slowly' approach is 'less painful' than just ripping the band aid of and disappearing or just outright telling them, "Look, I don't care about either of you, I'm not your father."

In fact, a couple of months ago, he even told them, "You know I'm not your father. I'm step father. And I've stepped up and done more than any step father is ever asked to do."

He is too far gone in his delusions for anything but an independent third party with some 'authority' on these matters stepping in and telling him, "You ARE hurting those kids."

And frankly, my only concern in the world right now is finding the 3rd party with the skills to do it, in spite of 'not knowing him.'

Did you have a question about the Marriage Builders program for the board? If you are not going to follow this program, there is no reason to keep this thread open.

What is your question for the board?

FL2, over one week in and you're still following Plan FL2 (your own plan) instead of following MB and Dr. Harley's plan for dealing with an affair. Your husband is not more special or "more wayward" than all of the rest who went before you.

All of the malarkey that you posted (again) two posts above is just more of his normal wayward FogSpeak, and it's keeping you paralyzed (still).

Spending hours each day analyzing FogTalk is getting you no where. If you won't take action FL2, then I have better things to do with my time. Please let me know when you are serious.