My husband had an affair for almost 3 years. I never knew. He revealed it to me recently. I thought we had a great marriage, a few bumps along the way but a loving, affectionate, happy marriage. I was stunned and it truly almost killed me. He says he always loved me but lived a double life. He saw her average 2-3 times per month but they spoke daily on the phone.
Does anyone think we can recover from this? We are in counselling separately and together, he says he loves me but is this too long of a betrayal?

Dear Getreal9

Welcome to MB! There's lots of wisdom here,and hopefully some of the senior members will show up soon. Don't worry if it's quiet at first, as weekends are slow on the board.

Is 3 years too long? I hope not - my H had four affairs over the last seven years. The most recent lasted for two years, and was intense and serious. It was still going strong when he broke down and told me.

Like your husband, my H lived a double life, which gradually became harder and more exhausting to maintain. He managed to hide everything from me, and worked very hard to convince me that he was entirely happy with our life. Dday was seven months ago. Although I had been aware of his withdrawal, and had even persuaded him - fruitlessly - into MC, I could not have been more profoundly shocked about the extent of his betrayal, and how cunningly he had covered up his activities. Looking back, can you see any hints that this was happening in your marriage?

To be in a affair for 3 years is a long time. It's a big emotional investment, a huge part of a person's life. However, from the MB book Surviving an Affair (of which you'll hear a lot on this site), I know that if a man is going to leave his wife, he will usually do it within six months of the affair starting. After three years, your H's mistress could have little hope of him leaving you for her, unless the shock of disclosure caused you to throw him out and end the marriage. Do you know why he decided to come clean after such a long time?

Whatever he was getting from her, it was probably 'in addition to' you rather than 'instead of' you, and it was probably about weaknesses and needs in him rather than deficiencies in you.

You CAN recover from this, but I think it depends more on what you do from here on in, than on what happened before. As others here will tell you, your husband has to make a clear decision between you and OW. If he chooses you, he must break off all contact with OW (see this site for No Contact guidelines). Has he made this commitment? From my own experience, I know that ending all contact can be hard to do, especially after so much of his life has been occupied by this woman. He is likely to be in a state of addiction to her. You have to set your boundaries on this out clearly and stick to them.

I found that reading everything I could get hold of on the subject of affairs and recovery, was a huge help. I'm sure everyone will recommend the Harleys' books - particularly SAA as mentioned above, and I concur. However, from the point of view of the 'double-life' affair, I found the most helpful description in "The State of Affairs" by Todd Mulliken, and further useful information in "Private Lies" by Frank Pittman. I also found 'Love must be Tough' by James Dobson useful.

It has been a hard slog since dday for my H and me, and I anticipate a tough road ahead. I think it will take us YEARS to get past this. All that I can ask at the moment is for his commitment to absolute honesty - no matter how painful this might be to us both. For my part, I have to make it possible for him to be honest, without being blasted out of the water by my reaction. I also have to work on myself, to be more sure of who I am and what I want.

I hope this helps a bit, until the Wise Ones get their fingers on the keyboard!

TA

Hi Getreal,

Oh my heart aches for you. My H had a 3 year long affair also. A friend dragged him out of it after two years and thought he was keeping him accountable, but then was furious to find him still involved with her a year later. The friend told my husband if he didn't tell me he would. So H told me. I've always felt this would be so much easier to handle if H had told me himself. To this day (12 years later) I still think he would still be with her if the friend had not found out.

We are just now going back and trying to work things out, I'm new to MB and we just started the HNHN and Love Busters books.

My advice to you? Lots of prayer.. and IMMEDIATE counseling. I am so sorry we didn't resolve some issues sooner. The only reason my H is now interested in the books and counseling is because I told him I would have to divorce to maintain emotional sanity.
My heart goes out to you. One thing you've got going for you is that your husband broke down and told you himself. He truly chose YOU over her. She was a horrible addiction and I would guess your husband wishes he had never laid eyes on her, because what you are heading into will be painful for both of you.

The counseling with Dr. Harley and his kids is very expensive, but I think I should've paid ANY amount years ago to perhaps prevent the ongoing pain I've been in. Dont' get me wrong, other areas of my life have been fine and enjoyable, but always with that dull heartache.

You may think you are the unluckiest woman on earth and I know how shattered you are feeling. BUT many woman have been left in the dust and many men are continuing affairs right under their wive's noses without them knowing. I can really respect your husband that he finally came to his senses and told you. I hope he was crying and good and upset@!

Don't give up... ByGrace

As you can see from my tag line, the answer is yes. Our situations are/were similar (You don't live in Europe, do you?) You can recover, and have a better marriage than you had before, if the two of you do three things:

1.) Learn. Read everything in the Basic Concepts section of this site. Next, read all the Q&A's on infidelity on this site. They are found at How to Survive Infidelity Then buy and read “Surviving an Affair”, by Willard Harley, (hereinafter referred to as “SAA”) available at the Bookstore. SAA is THE best book on the market for helping one get to the root of “the message of the affair” (BUT YOU HAVE TO DO THE QUESTIONAIRES!). SAA, (along with the Basic Concepts section of this site) is also helpful for giving you a vision of what a great marriage should look like. The approach of SAA to this problem is that the best defense against affairs is to have a great marriage. My wife said we had a good marriage, but she still had an affair. She was kidding herself, but it was not until we read SAA and saw what a great marriage should look like that we could clearly identify the problem areas and had the tools necessary to fix them.

The phrase “the message of the affair” is from the book “Torn Asunder”, by Carder (hereinafter referred to as “TA”). I personally think this is the best book on affair recovery we have read. In particular it deals with the two different paths the recovery of the betrayed spouse (BS) and the wayward spouse (WS) need to take, and deals w/ remorse in a way that I prefer to SAA. Read it together. If you or your spouse has issues with control, you might also want to read “The State of Affairs”, (SOA) by Todd Mulliken, which also treats the remorse issue similarly to TA. SOA also deals with "the vision thing" for marriage, which is neglected in SAA.

2.) See a marriage counselor. This is hard. You need help. These boards are populated by amateurs. MC’s are professionals. There is a difference. They can help deal with issues the books don’t cover, and customize things to your individual situation. That said, there are lots of bad MC’s in the world. Read, and take to heart, How To Find A Good Marriage Counselor. You do not want an MC that is going to teach you how to live with an awful spouse, or how to adjust to divorce. Too many of them do, as is documented here: Hazardous Counseling. Reading that link may scare you off counseling, but it should give you some good ideas to ask a potential MC before you start w/ them, so you can avoid those that give you the wrong answers. You need one that is committed to helping couples have great marriages, and knows how to do that.

You are on an emotional rollercoaster right now, and there will be times that you will think it would be best to just divorce your spouse and go on with your life. Though there are no guarantees, recovery IS possible, but it takes time and effort. You will hate yourself if you don't do everything you can to make that happen. Give yourself the time you need.

3.) I understand that you may not be a person of faith, but for me, getting my spiritual life in order was crucial. As I said, this is hard. I knew I would need all the help I could get. Repenting of the habitual sins in my life let me stop pushing God away so I could hold on for dear life. I had to humble myself and ask Him what I had done wrong, and what I could do to be the husband He wanted me to be for his child, my wife. This was not about blaming myself. It was about doing what I could to do my part in having a great marriage. My wife could participate or not, but I had to know I had done everything I could do. It also helped me to let go of thinking about what SHE needed to do, since I couldn't control her, anyway.

You might also want to read through: WAT's Quick Start Guidelines for Betrayed Spouses, but keep in mind that these are the writings of amateurs. Get the books, read the articles, and see a GOOD counselor - you need the best help you can get.

One more thing: There are a fair number of men who have marraiges that are good from their point of view, but cheat anyway. They are described in the "Double Life Man" chapter in SOA. If you think this fits you husband, you might want to read it.

<small>[ March 01, 2003, 08:14 PM: Message edited by: johnh39 ]</small>

John39,

Your post was so good and helpful to me. My H is finally interested in really working to make our marriage better. When he was forced to tell me about his double life 12 years ago I was so emotionally devastated that I just could not begin to know what to do. I cannot describe how alone I felt and how that isolation contributed to my pain.

I leaned hard on the Lord and survived obviously and can honestly say that the closeness to Him is worth the heartache, because I don't know what else in life could've driven me closer to Him. Maybe the death of a child.

I WISH so badly that I had this site for a resource back then. After 12 years I am hesitant to read the books you suggested, but I think I will, I've had such a hard time understanding how this could have happened to us. The wound has been open that long and I will truly go nuts or get cancer or something if things remain unresolved.

Getreal... there is real hope for you. Do the work, cry buckets and hopefully your recovery will be a lot faster than mine. Bless you John and Foreveralone and the others lurking around and posting, for your williness to reach out to others after your tragedies.
ByGrace

BG: Torn Asunder argues that you really can't move on until you have properly processed the affair - it will always come back in ways that you won't necessarily be able to predict. So, better late than never. Too many people try to forgive but realy just bury things. I did that for years, and it just led to depression and resentment on my part, and greater emotional distance between us - which is one of the things that led to my wife's affair. I had to learn how to handle conflict constructively, not destructively.

Not surprisingly, perhaps, this is hard. Because I avoided conflict, it was the "dealing with conflict" part that was hard for me. It may be that for you the "not destructively" part is what you need to work on the most. In either case, lots of books have been written about this. Harley, in his books, deals with it under the concept of "The Policy of Joint Agreement" (POJA). Gary Smalley calls it "LUV-Talk" and describes it (though does not use that term) in chapter 9 of "Making Love Last Forever". I'm guessing chapter 13 of the same book "Conflicts: The Doorway to Intimacy" will be good, too, but I have not read it yet. I have heard him talk about it at a seminar, though, and it was good. John Gottman discusses it in several places in his excellent book "The Seven Principals for Making Marriage Work", in particular chapter 10.

My 50 cent summary of what I have learned about this topic is: before you can successfully resolve a conflict w/ your spouse, you have to understand their point of view, and it really helps a lot if they also understand your point of view. To do that, you have to get beyond the words to understanding feelings. Doing that, and verbally expressing that understanding, not only will let you see new possiblities for solutions that you would not have previously considered, but leads to greater emotional connectedness. Gottman and Smalley in particular emphasize how a "soft start" and a gentle approach can enhance your ability to encourage intimacy during conflict resolution.

I know this is not easy when you are in pain, but it is worth learning.

^

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Does anyone think we can recover from this? We are in counselling separately and together, he says he loves me but is this too long of a betrayal? </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">No, 3 years is not too long. It CAN be done.

You didn't say how long you had been married, but I'm sure it is more than 3 years. Isn't is too many years to throw it all away?

Susan

<small>[ March 03, 2003, 12:23 PM: Message edited by: Susan ]</small>

No, 3 years isn't "long" at all. My W's A started 12 years ago. They were seeing each other for 4 years, then resumed about 2 years ago for several months. My W ended the A before I found out, and we're still struggling to get to recovery 13 months later, but we are still together.

This is hard work. It's good that you both are in counseling. It's important that you work on your own abilities to trust and forgive EACH OTHER for the important things - what was wrong with your M, NOT so much the A. John39's post to you is an excellent resource for getting this process started.

All my best,
-Qfwfq

Thank you all for your encouragement. We have been married almost 13 years. I am actually still blown away, almost 8 weeks after him revealing this to me. johnh39, I will read some books, I have another that was referred to me but I think it's heavy on blaming me so I will try another. I was sure everyone would tell me to forget it, it was too long but perhaps with time and therapy, I will recover. By the way, I have also been getting to know God more because of this situation and I do think that is the good side of this. I am in extreme pain though, as you all know.

Any ideas on how to get the constant sickening images out of my head?