Hi everyone,

I have decided to post after a great deal of thought. I have seen how much good advice my WW has received from this forum. Here is the deal. D-day was about 2 weeks ago when I found an email and pictures my wife had sent to the OM. Just like in my heading I never thought she would ever cheat on me. Looking back now my head had to be about 5 feet in the dirt. When I found out we had been taking classes with Steve for over 5 weeks (again in the dirt)--I never new about the A while these classes were taking place--- she kept lying to me that there wasn't anyone else that she just lost the love for me and that she never really thought we were compatible. We are currently working with Steve again and I truly believe that if I hadn't been with him previously and had gotten educated on this there is no way I could give her a second chance. She has had NC for a week now and says it is going well. We are going through the 4 step process of healing with Steve right now and it has helped me out a great deal.
She never worked on her end during those 5 weeks and I understand that she was in the "fog". I however, absolutely loved meeting her needs during that time and became the husband that I truly have wanted to become (even without having any of my needs met)! Now I am unsure!! I know I haven't painted the best picture right now for anyone reading this but if I can get any advice and/or direction it would be greatly appreciated.
We have been married for 7 years and have two beautiful daughters.

Inner, I am so glad you are here and have been working with Steve. It sounds like you have learned a lot of the tools you need to have a great marriage. There is going to be a lot more learning, but stay with us (and with Steve), because seeing it through is worth it!

At only 2 weeks out, you are still on the most intense part of the roller coaster ride. Your emotions will be allll over the place for some time to come. You probably aren't eating or sleeping well, and that is contributing to the swinging emotions.

You have a long trek ahead of you. The good news is, we all did too, and look...we've made it! And many of us have better marriages than ever!

Keep reading here, keep posting, keep coaching with Steve. Force yourself to do what he tells you to do, even when it's hard. Come here and vent. Your W is here on the boards? What is her screenname?

Welcome to MB.

MF
Yes she is on the boards-strugglinaz-

Thank you for your post. You are right never in my life have I been on an emotional roller coaster like this. I don't eat or sleep much. My strength comes from knowing that the A could have been worse! I truly know my WW is a good person that just made horrific choices. I just hope that those choices can be replaced with the correct ones!

Inner, how many sessions have you had with Steve since D-Day? What has he got you working on, at this point?

IS,

I'm so sorry for the reason that brought you here, but in light of the circumstances, I am SO GLAD that you are here. I have been posting to your wife, and her attitude seems to have improved quite a bit, at least here, I pray that you have seen the same.

Is there something specific that you would like direction on?

If you haven't already done so, I would start by reading all the articles on the site. Here is a good place to start~~~> How to Survive Infidelity

Welcome to Marriage Builders!

Mrs. W

Markos-Just one, we have another one tomorrow morning. She has explained to me "Why" the A occurred, and then we did the time line last night. I think we are at the point that I have had my questions answered regarding the A and that if I have any further ones for her I am suppose to write them down and wait 3 hours before asking her. I know a majority of my questions will not help me in anyway whatsoever and I question myself asking them. I do find myself reinforcing it and then needing to ask more and I don't want that. So I am going to follow the 3 hour rule so I have time to decide if it really is a valid question/or do I really need to hear the answer. Then tomorrow we go over validation. (Don't know for sure what that's about)

The three hour rule sounds like a great protection.

Another thing I have seen people do here is ask here on this board if a certain question is a good idea or not. It helps them to think it over and decide if the question will really help.

Have you read through any of the stories of people on this forum?

Mrs. W

Thank-you so much for being a guiding light to my WW. I know for the past 8 months that she had yet to find somebody that understood what she was going through. I believe she totally felt unique and misunderstood to all that she confided in until you came into her life.
I would like to get direction on how I can become less absorbed with the feelings of betrayal? I don't forgive and forget easily and I know that this is a cornerstone I must have in order to forge ahead. I really want a wonderful marriage and I believe that I have proven to my wife in the past 5-6 weeks that I would put it as my highest priority. I know that she has been foggy for quite some time and during those weeks she didn't focus on my needs at all. I want to put the past in the past and with guidance I believe I can.

I'm not sure if it's what you're looking for or not, Strength, but this might help:

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi5042_qa.html
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi5042b_qa.html
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi5042c_qa.html

Markos-Thanks for that! I will definitely do that. Yes I have been reading threads on here for the past 2 months-odd enough I never thought they had any thing in common with my situation because my WW always told me that there was never OM! (My Head 5 feet in the dirt!!!) I never really understood why she came to MB from the get go since we not dealing with an A. Boy I was wrong and now am so thankful that she did!
Are there any you recommend?

Thanks for that info-Markos-much appreciated!!

Well, you know, Marriage Builders is not just about surviving an affair. It's about having a great marriage! Dr. Harley's concepts are based on studying what couples with a great marriage did naturally, and his discovery that if other people did these things, they would fall in love with each other and have a great marriage.

You don't have to go through an affair to see that this is a great idea.


One that really impressed me from last year was BTinTrouble:
http://forum.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/ubbthreads.php?ubb=userposts&id=59453

Round about Memorial Day last year, BT finally took the advice here and snooped around and discovered his wife was having an affair. It was a very dramatic weekend; I remember well my wife and I were on vacation and reading his story from a hotel room on a new laptop as it unfolded.

BT and his wife subsequently counseled with Dr. Jennifer Chalmers (Dr. Harley's daughter) and he still posts from time to time.

There's also Mr. and Mrs. Wondering.

One good thing to learn to do around here is to click on everything: clicking on the name of a poster brings up a menu that let's you pull up their complete history.

I do a lot of history research on Marriage Builders.

Ahhhh you are so welcome! People were here for me when I first arrived, and that ultimately meant they were here for our marriage...It's kind of a pay it forward deal around these parts!

I see that Markos has posted the "Why Can't We Just Forgive and Forget?" Just Compensation articles for you. I hope they allowed you to wrap your head around what it will take to get through this crisis and on to the best marriage you can possibly have. You are at a point now where I bet you are realizing that your old marriage is dead and you will have to build a new one. The new marriage HAS to be far better than the old one or you will feel resentment -- that is only natural. You must be "justly compensated" or it's simply not worth it.

I have great confidence that your new marriage will be all that you both want and really more than you had ever imagined possible. Why do I think so? Because you are both here and coaching with Steve Harley -- This indicates to me that you are both willing to learn and apply the MB Concepts in your marriage. If you guys learn and apply the program in it's entirety it is fail proof. In other words, "work the program and the program works"! Recovery is a narrow path, and Dr. Harley says he has found that even slight deviations from the program are disastrous, so take heed to that and I know you will be just fine...It's a tough road, but things that are worthwhile are never easy...

There are a ton of people on this site that are rooting for your marriage, IS...Glad you found us!

Mrs. W

Thanks a million Mrs. W. I agree 100 percent with you. I just read those articles and got a great deal of info out of them.

Strength, Steve encouraged us last year to do a lot of reading in Marriage Builders. If you can take the time to go through the entirety of this website, you will have a lot of great tools.

I suspect in your case the forum will also be very helpful.

Markos-I will do just that!

My suggested order of reading is:
Basic Concepts
Q&A columns
Articles

The truth is I got bogged down in Q&A columns somewhere...

There are also lots of great books, and a daily radio show.

Welcome Inner St.

Way back when I found myself in your position there wasn't a whole lot of advice being sought by me. I allowed my wife to post and get advice without my interference. It's very difficult for a betrayed husband to be in the "teaching" position. Your wife isn't in love with you right now (not completely that is and neither are you) so she's not prone to listening to you. Besides you can't teach someone....they have to learn on their own. That's what she is apparently doing on her thread. Yeah.

So what I did is I started helping others. Sometimes my wife would join in helping others while she at times posted about our situation. What worked was in helping others, Mrs. W and I got to discuss our problems very neutrally in OUR attempt to help others with theirs. In particular, in helping other BH's with their WW's she found herself getting upset and angry at their WW's which assisted her RE-developing empathy in our situation. She was always a very empathetic person until she wasn't for a few short months in 2005. Helping others helped her get that back quickly.

Other times...I found myself agreeing with things the posters were telling my wife on here but having to take my wife's side in disputes early on and give her the chance to process things. On her first thread when she got sorta ganged up...she was really upset. I supported her through that, ya know, on her team through it even though I really did agree with what was being said. I let the MB posters do the teaching, while I was the good time need meeting conversation having model husband at home.

Of course, I couldn't help myself at times pushing for serious conversations way more than I should have but hey, I'd never been in the situation before so I couldn't expect to do it all perfectly. Give yourself a break sometimes.

Markos already gave you the best advice. Get educated yourself. Your best thinking (BOTH of you) got you into this mess. Like us...you obviously didn't know what you were doing. So, now you learn from the mistakes and you'll know better. You really can have the best marriage out of all your friends. It's been 6 years now and we are closer than ever while ever month or so it seems we find out another old friend of ours is getting a divorce.

Good luck,

Mr. Wondering