Sorry for asking what may seem an odd question-

When there is an A and the WS is relucted and/or
refuses to end it- does it always mean that
they're in "a fog"? Is it ever believable that
the WS truly loves the OP and simply wants out
of the existing R, or wants to have both relation-
ships?
And how can the old adage of "once a cheat, always
a cheat" and Dr. Phil's "if he does it with you,
he'll do it to you" be quoted- since that would
imply that your WS would by nature cheat on you
again.
I realize that as an xOW (I married my short term
MM about a year ago- no children involved)- I
may not be the most welcome voice- but I am here
to learn. BTW- I am a member of TOW under the same
name and under Paige on the Pink pages.

So, how's your marriage going? Do you trust him?

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by The Pink Paige:
<strong>Is it ever believable that the WS truly loves the OP and simply wants out of the existing R, or wants to have both relationships? </strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I think it's usually the case that the WS believes he/she loves the OP. And it's usually the case that they want it all - both relationships - at least for awhile while they make up their mind.

But this is irrelevant to whether the acts are right and/or justified.

WAT

<small>[ June 15, 2004, 02:22 PM: Message edited by: worthatry ]</small>

The marriage is going well. We just celebrated
our 1st anniversary. Marriage is new for me-it
is my first marriage- I'm now 40. It's my H's
3rd marriage- he's in his late 50's. I was his
only marital transgression. We are working with
my local parish church to right things.
And yes, I do trust him. I have found that
underlying most of my concerns about him- where
really issues with me. I also think that XW moving
across the country helped with that. She still calls him occasionally to share goings on in her life and no one is more surprised than me that I have made peace with that. Like most BS- it's easier for her to blame the whole A on me-
although we've never spoken or had any ugliness between us. I only know that she hopes we never meet and I understand her feelings 100%. I wish her nothing but good things and feel genuinely bad for any pain I caused her.

Hey Paige. Interesting questions. Here's my .02 FWIW.

Is it ever believable that the WS truly loves the OP and simply wants out of the existing R,
That would be an exit affair. Sometimes people who are unhappy in their M don't have the strength to fix the problems nor the strength to leave, and they get into an affair to distract themselves from the pain while they seek a D. They rarely work out, though, because the person leaving the existing R is a runner, not a fixer.

or wants to have both relation-
ships?
Who *wouldn't* want to have two people wooing them? But that's not real love, because when you're with X, you're hurting Y. That's just selfishness, and confusion. If you REALLY loved X and Y, you'd set one (or both) of them free.

And how can the old adage of "once a cheat, always a cheat" and Dr. Phil's "if he does it with you, he'll do it to you" be quoted- since that would imply that your WS would by nature cheat on you again.
You're confusing those who leave their spouses for the A partner with those who leave the A to work out the problems in the M.

If a person leaves the M and runs into an A, then they are a "runner" - they are likely to run again when things get tough. They don't have the wherewithall to face the music, to do the tough work.

If a person leaves the A and works on the M, they have realized that an A is not the answer, and that real happiness lies within themselves and their own integrity.

The problem, Paige, is that there is no way of knowing whether the marriage really stands a chance when one of the spouses is having needs met outside of the marriage. The question of how the spouse really feels about the OP IS NOT THE QUESTION - it doesn't matter. CAN THE MARRIAGE BE SAVED, is. If the answer to that is yes, then there will always be attachment and regret - wondering if a new relationship hadn't been started, could the family have stayed together.

If your H didn't find the emotional glue to keep him connected when his first marriage no longer suited his needs - you have a job ahead of you making sure he either learns to see things differently, this time, or keeping his every need met so that he won't go shopping again.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by The Pink Paige:
<strong>Like most BS- it's easier for her to blame the whole A on me-</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">This is not a true statement.

Most BSs who understand the dynamics of affairs understand that the OP shares the blame for the decision to have an affair with the WS.

WAT

I'm glad you were honest here about who you are. I haven't visited the TOW site, but I do know that people here don't think much of the women that post there.

With that being said, I have asked this same exact question!

My H started an A with a married woman almost a year ago. He/they tried to end it many times. The last time I thought was for real ... only to discover continued contact. They don't see each other anymore (I think), only text message, email or call infrequently.

So does this mean that they are supposed to be together? That we were never right for each other? That we just co-existed for 14 years?

I wonder ... if they are truly meant to be together, would they have to be about, what, maybe 75 - 80% happy in, let's say, 5 years to make it all worth it (from my perspective)? To make all the pain, agony and destruction of two families to make it worth it?

Hope this isn't coming out as hostile, because I'm not feeling that at all. I am at peace with myself. I am making myself a better person than I was. I know that I have done all that I can do to save our marriage up until this point.

I am starting to struggle now with the question of should we really stay together. Reading the boards here, guess that is also something the BS go through ... I don't like this feeling!

Thanks for listening .........

As whatever singer it was said "What's love got to do with it". In the end - it's commitment that keeps a marriage together - love is sweet reward to doing it right.

Heading for Happiness,
I am not offended in the least- just glad you
all are willing to talk to me.
I don't know if I buy into the whole "meant to
be" crap- I think we make choices and have to
take responsibility for them. If a WS keeps
choosing to deceive and cheat- he is making
choices and I think you need to make the choices
for you (and your children if that is a factor)
based on what you know from these choices.

worthatry-
sorry if I misspoke. I guess I should have said-
from the feedback I've seen- it is easier for
the BS to blame the OP because despite everything
they usually still love the WS and want to make
things work.
Is that a more true statement :-)?

Being in love IS being in a fog, whether married or not! But when the fog is being used to obfuscate lying, sneaking around, hurting the people you are close to, dumping on your kids, etc., it's a poor basis for a new relationship. When it means putting oneself ahead of everyone else -- eventually, the selfishness usually turns on the two people involved...

Here's a post from Redon in 2001 on the subject:

"Just did some thinking today. What exactly are the differences between falling in love and the "Fog"....Well, biologically, probably nothing. Everyone goes through what we call the Fog when we fell in love with our WS. So what's the dynamic that comes into play when an affair takes place? Why do we call it the Fog instead?

Hmmm, my guess, and that's all it is, is that reading from Harley's articles a lot comes into play. Paraphrasing here, romantic love is an extremely powerful emotion, people lose their spouses, their homes, their children, their jobs, their self respect, dignity and the respect of those around them to experience that feeling of romantic love.

In a 'normal' relationship, this 'fog' isn't a problem. And as the relationship progresses, the chemicals that cause this feeling eventually 'dry up', and if the relationship is to continue, then another kind of love takes it's place. A committed, stable affection that can grow deeper (hopefully) throughout the years. This is the real glue that holds a relationship together for the long term. And it's based on trust, truth and respect (among other things).

However, in an affair, biology takes the reins. Both the WS and the OP are riding that chemical wave. Physical attractiveness isn't usually an issue because the affair started through an emotional connection. A connection that's surprisingly easy to make when the WS is in a vulnerable time in the relationship with the BS.

Once the feeling of romantic love is established, everything else goes out the window, and this is what the BS calls the 'Fog'. How could the WS give up everything? It just doesn't make sense, but romantic love is like that. The upside to all of this is that inevitably, those chemicals will 'dry up' too."

Here's another classic post on the "Fog" -- from TogetherAlone:

"So the following is a personal slant on what I think goes on in the mind of affair partners, and how I think the fog works. It's talking about the 'soulmate' kind of affair - I think fling-type affairs follow different paths. I'd find it useful to know if it matches with others' experiences.

And it's LONG.

To begin with, I believe that 'fog' is a distorted reality.

‘Reality’ for each of us, consists principally of two things – our ‘life model’, and our value system.

The ‘life model’ is the picture we have in our head of how the world works, how people interact with each other. As with an engineering model, we feed possibilities into it and come up with predictions. The accuracy of the model is dependent on many things – how good a starter pack our parents gave us, how detailed we’ve made the model, how much we’ve tested it by running sample data through. Some people have highly accurate models and are considered ‘shrewd’, and some have poor predictive powers and are thought naive. Most of us fall somewhere in the middle.

Our values system is what we use to guide us through life. It’s the set of rules and restrictions and codes that we innately believe will give us the best chance in life. It can be a narrow set – “what’s best for ME”, can revolve around the family, or can be very broad – “what’s in the best interests of the community (town, nation, world)?”

Some of our values are personal – we’ve learned hard lessons from our own experience. – “Don’t steal, or you’ll get a record.’ Some we’ve unconsciously absorbed from our parents – “It’s wrong to steal”. Some we adopt to fit in with peer group ideals – “Her son was done for burglary, isn’t it awful?”.

When we engage with a life-partner, we usually pick someone with a similar values system to our own, and we work hard to bring those systems together. This is not lovey-dovey stuff - it’s innately practical. If we are both bound by the same restrictions and drivers, we are likely to support and reinforce each other. We will be able to ‘trust’ – to confidently predict the other’s actions and opinions – and will therefore have a solid platform on which to base our life.

Our values system is based implicitly on our life model, and it works by reward and punishment. If we conform to our values, we build self-esteem and feel good about ourselves. If we violate our values, we feel discomfort. We attempt to get away from the discomfort by a) confessing and apologising, ie reconforming to values, or b) stuffing the discomfort down, or c) altering the values system so that we don’t appear to have breached it.

When an affair begins, there is usually huge temptation involved – for whatever reason. The temptation overwhelms the values system – when the WS says “I didn’t think…” , that’s exactly right. The normal mental mechanisms were not in play, largely because the life model was not sophisticated or accurate enough to detect what was happening nor predict the likely consequences, or because an intensity of resentment or anger caused normal mechanisms to be deliberately ignored. There is a ‘fantasy leap’, almost like a leap of religious faith. This leap says ‘ I want some fun / excitement / attention. I deserve that. I believe that this will make me feel better, and I believe I can control it, and get what I want out of it.”

The ‘denial’ mechanism can’t operate for long – the values system is too powerful for that. But by the time the underlying values system kicks in, the two affair partners have usually got themselves in sufficiently deep for there to be painful drawbacks in pulling out, and significant benefits in staying in. Excitement and pleasure oppose pain and discomfort.

For most people, an affair is a serious violation of their values system, so that sooner or later, the intense discomfort of values-betrayal is felt. This is heavy-duty pain, the kind that the WS is keen to escape from, like appendicitis. So how do they escape that pain? See above. They could a) confess – but of course it’s not something trivial they’d be confessing, so forget that, b) stuff the discomfort down, or c) alter the values system.

I suspect that most WS’s begin by trying to stuff the pain. But it’s too big – like getting an elephant into a suitcase. So there is really only one way to go. The values system has to change. It seems likely that the WS moves rapidly away from such intense pain – perhaps so quickly that its presence is not even noticed.

So the WS’s position metamorphoses:

1) It’s wrong to have an affair.
2) Friendship is not an affair.
3) Affairs are only wrong if they threaten the marriage. This is a friendship-with-sex and does not threaten the marriage.
4) The outside relationship ‘brightens’ me, and is therefore good for the marriage.
5) Other people are inexperienced. They don’t understand the power of a passionate friendship, and how enriching it is.
6) This affair is not wrong. In fact, I could not live without it.

The process is driven, I suspect, by a factor which none of the literature seems to comment on much – the fact that TWO people are involved.

Both affair partners are having to alter their values systems to accommodate what they’re doing. This feels uncomfortable, so they look to each other for confirmation that they’re justified in acting as they are. Neither wants to believe that they’re involved with someone whose values system is easily changed – that would be weak - so they must each work hard to convince each other that they are good, that their values are altering only because they are ‘growing’, becoming too complex and sophisticated / visceral / emotionally liberated for the old realities as personified by their spouses. They therefore reinforce each other, generating a self-perpetuating cycle that builds like a fire in heavy winds.

In addition, the same values-converging process that happened with the marital partners operates on the affair partners. Ironically, there is a strong need for security, perhaps to replace the dwindling security that the marriage is likely to provide (if the affair is exposed). The affair partners therefore work to keep each other ‘in’ the relationship by escalating involvement and increasing the other’s personal investment.

The desperate need to believe in the security of the relationship, in its ability to support and nurture, in its essential goodness, leads to what looks from the outside to be reckless behaviour. There is a mutual denial of the dangers of STDs or pregnancy.

By this time, the WS’s values systems are a LONG way from where they began.

Think back to what a values system is. It’s a set of beliefs based on a life model – the most realistic picture an individual can generate of how the world works. To support the altered values system, there has to be an altered life model (the one that says, eg, affairs won’t hurt my family).

The problem with the altered life model is that it’s not realistic. It starts from a premise that’s innately flawed – that it is OK for this individual to have this affair. The flaw distorts all logic.

Imagine that you postulated a theory that air would support your weight if there was enough of it under you, ie if you got high enough above the ground. Obviously, water supports large ships under a similar theory, so it’s a reasonable conjecture. The theory would look OK as long as you didn’t have to personally prove it. We can see that skydivers don’t appear to conform to the principle, but perhaps that’s just because they don’t get high enough?

Once you’re working to this theory, it becomes obvious that planes are a rather naïve concept. All that going-fast when all they have to do is climb up to the level where they’re supported by air molecules! The notion that satellites have to orbit at high speed is also clearly daft – at that height the trouble would be getting them down!

The affair partners are now operating far above safe oxygen levels. But to them, everything makes perfect sense.

This is ‘fog’.

The flawed model is a poor predictor. It fails as soon as it’s put to a real-world test. In fact, it fails all the time. In truth, it fails so frequently that the affairees must exert colossal energy just to keep themselves in the suspension of disbelief. And the self-delusion may eventually be exposed by real-world reactions that cannot easily be denied or ignored – the anguish of children, the disappointment on a mother’s face, the lash of a lawyer’s letter.

So what’s happening to the marriage, while all of this is going on?

To begin with, the WS moves between the two realities with a sense of excitement. It’s an escape. But, as the two realities diverge, there is increasing discomfort at the difficulty of bridging the two, of making the transition between them. To counter this, and because the affair is where the excitement is, a sense of anger, indignation and self-righteousness develops that the WS is ‘having’ to lie and deceive. If only the BS’s could be sophisticated enough to understand the benefits of the arrangement! If the BS’s were not so selfish, they would be glad that the WS’s are happy! It is infuriating that the stupid, inflexible BS’s would inevitably whinge and complain and wreck the perfect love of two people who were destined for each other…

There is no counter-balancing argument from the BS, because the BS does not know what is going on. But the likelihood is that the spouse has an instinctive awareness that something is wrong, and is becoming defensive and confrontational. The marriage is becoming an uncomfortable environment.

So the WS has now manoeuvred themselves into a position where the only source of acceptance and pleasure is with the OP. The WS inevitably moves further away from the marriage.

The affair usually loses its flavour, as the affairees begin to know each other and recognise that the affair partner is far from an improvement on the marital partner, and that the effort involved is no longer justified by the benefits. But as the emotional bond weakens, the two affairees may perversely cling to each other even more tightly, though not always at the same time. There is probably a bond of friendship, hopelessly complicated by the sexual connection and conspiracy to bteray.

By now they are in a position where exposure of the affair seems likely to end the two marriages anyway. The marriages are now so tarnished – the WS’s have moved so far away from the original values systems still supported by their spouses – that the affair, for all its misery, is now a more likely candidate for the future than the marriage. Both WS’s are locked in a death-spiral – each is terrified that the affair partner will leave the affair to recover the marriage, leaving one WS abandoned and hopeless. And at least one WS may be trapped by the terror of having to establish permanence with the affair partner, or be alone.

So what about the ‘fog’? The WS is moving between two realities; he or she is effectively two people. There is a ‘flickering’ effect, like moving between perceptions in a magic-eye picture. Sometimes WS#2 flickers into life in Reality #1. If the bad reception makes it difficult for the BS to ‘see’ the wayward spouse, the discontinuity makes it impossible for the WS to ‘see’ the old reality clearly too. WS convinces themselves that all is unchanged and well in the old life. They may even become angry if the BS is liberal with the old value system. It is necessary for the BS to be predictable via a well-understood parcel of values, in order for the WS’s deceit to work. There may also be a need, unacknowledged, for the BS to act as keeper-of-the-flame, to vicariously hold to what the WS has lost, to be a solid platform to return to.

And then comes dday, and the clash of matter and anti-matter, as the two realities meet. For the first time, the WS is presented with penetrating questions about the logic of the affair’s life-model. For the first time, the illogicality of the affair’s premise is exposed. The WS must defend the affair, or appear hilariously stupid. Defending the affair with dodgy logic has been the option for the life of the affair; the dodgy logic has been vigorously supported by the OP, so that the WS has had no practice in providing a reasonable defence. Small wonder that the WS feels threatened and humiliated and hits back. Small wonder that the arguments are so feeble – the same feeble arguments have been applauded as sage wisdom for so long, the WS is profoundly indignant at being challenged in any way. At this point, the WS provides us with all of those witty sayings that we howl at on the ‘dumb answer’threads.

At this point, the WS can head off in one of several directions. They might retreat permanently. They might reluctantly acknowledge that some of the logic was flawed, and move slowly back into the old values system. They might recognise immediately the mistake they have made, and set about with energy and determination to fix the mess they have created. Or they might settle for a fortress mentality and stubbornly defend what they’ve done, in unconscious fear that being wrong means being annihilated.

There seem to be lots of each WS type here on this board.

Has anyone reached this point without unconsciousness overtaking them?"

A.M.Martin
Thank you for the articles. I'm not sure I
agree with all the final conclusions. But I know
understand the philosophy behind the term.
Much Thanks!!

Hi Paige

(I love your name, that is my daughter's name).
Our situations are very similar, except that I did not marry my BF, after a two year engagement and living together I am having a hard time believing anything about him.

I never posted anywhere else, I am here because these are the values I want for my life and my marriage, if there ever is one.

I understand everyone's replies to you, especially WAT's and Hope's. How do we know that they are trustworthy and have the character to stick to a marriage and make it work, like they promised?

I am so happy to see you here. I often get the impression that a lot of posters here blame the OP, even though their spouce was the one to break the marriage vows. But I think I understand why.

My queston to you is how are you able to trust your husband? Was he honest with you when he met you? Did he come right out and tell you he was married? I am not going to judge you, I want to know because mine did not tell me, and I think that is a big part of the reason I can not trust him now.

Thank you Paige,

Weaver

Hi Weaver,
In answer to your questions.
Yes, I knew he was married. In fact I knew him as
a work collegue (distantly)for about 3 years before the A took place. We had to work together
on a few projects, became friends, became
"innocently" flurtacious culminating in an affair.
I was already "in love" before anything physical
took place. For those MBers out there who are
really angry now- I am not proud of this but I
own it.
I trust him because the fact is he had one
marital transgression in his life. Do I just
him by that one transgression or by all the time
and incidences of no transgression? I'm not
saying that trust fears have never crossed my
mind but they have never shown themselves as
anything but my own insecurities and these are
trust issues I would have with any man- they
stem from me.
I am here because although I am a TOW member
and support these women in their pain. And yes
much of their pain is based on choices they made.
They deserve to have a place to acknowlege that
pain and work through the situation they have
gotten into. I have always advised my friends
there not to settle for less than what they want
and not to be afraid to issue that ultimatim.
But I am here because I feel I have more to learn
from this side of the triangle and I hope I can
be of some help in answering ??? from the OW
perspective.

Hi Weaver,
In answer to your questions.
Yes, I knew he was married. In fact I knew him as
a work collegue (distantly)for about 3 years before the A took place. We had to work together
on a few projects, became friends, became
"innocently" flurtacious culminating in an affair.
I was already "in love" before anything physical
took place. For those MBers out there who are
really angry now- I am not proud of this but I
own it.
I trust him because the fact is he had one
marital transgression in his life. Do I just
him by that one transgression or by all the time
and incidences of no transgression? I'm not
saying that trust fears have never crossed my
mind but they have never shown themselves as
anything but my own insecurities and these are
trust issues I would have with any man- they
stem from me.
I am here because although I am a TOW member
and support these women in their pain. And yes
much of their pain is based on choices they made.
They deserve to have a place to acknowlege that
pain and work through the situation they have
gotten into. I have always advised my friends
there not to settle for less than what they want
and not to be afraid to issue that ultimatim.
But I am here because I feel I have more to learn
from this side of the triangle and I hope I can
be of some help in answering ??? from the OW
perspective.

Well, in the sense that you knew your H for three years before the A, and never witnessed deception from him, our situations are different.

Mine divorced his wife right after I found out and did not continue her pain by going back and forth, but ended it completely. Of course he knew I would have no part of it, once I found out. Maybe it is my own personal trust issue.

I can't stand that I was apart of another woman's pain, and I can't stand that he lied to me.

I wish you the best in your marriage, and I admire your courage for coming here and telling your story as the former OW, and the now wife.

Weaver

Yes, I knew he was married.

Do you respect marriage as something sacred, or are you more of a secular sort of girl?


became "innocently" flurtacious culminating in an affair.

I missed where this is innocent....
<img border="0" title="" alt="[Confused]" src="images/icons/confused.gif" />

For those MBers out there who are
really angry now- I am not proud of this but I
own it.

For the record, I am NOT angry ... just perplexed.... Your comments are not consistent with any philosophy or code of ethics that I can determine. (so far)

I trust him because the fact is he had one
marital transgression in his life.

How do you know it was just one?

Did he ~ever~ lie to his wife when he was dating you?

If he did ... he's a competent liar... and could be lying again at anytime if it suits his needs.

Be careful. When he's lied to his X ... he may have gotten pretty darn good at it!

I am here because although I am a TOW member
and support these women in their pain.

I'm sorry ... I didn't get this...

WHY are you here?

I think you cut your thought off mid sentence.

I have always advised my friends
there not to settle for less than what they want
and not to be afraid to issue that ultimatim.

Did you ever advise your TOW friends that adultery is morally wrong?


But I am here because I feel I have more to learn
from this side of the triangle and I hope I can
be of some help in answering ??? from the OW
perspective.

But see, here is where I have a problem with you.

YOU are no longer an OW.

YOU are a wife.

You are now on the WIFE side of the triangle.

How does your marriage stand up if both of you think adultery is "OK" under certain circumstances?

The underlying principle in your marriage is ~what~?

Answer as a WIFE ... because you are a wife. Time to throw away the OW ID card.

Pep

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by The Pink Paige:
<strong>I am not proud of this but I
own it.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">What do you mean by "own it?"

Also,

Why did he choose to marry you when being married meant nothing before?

What does marriage mean to him?

What does someone else being married mean to you?

WAT