To the Wayward Spouse;


This "Toolkit" is a compilation of information that a Wayward Spouse might find helpful in their journey to Recovery. It consists of various links to threads, MB principles, Q & A columns, and books that may be of particular interest to the Wayward or Former Wayward Spouse.

Many Wayward or Former Wayward Spouses have come and gone. All of us have hurt countless others with our selfishness. This Toolkit is a sort of “one-stop shop”, and from the information provided here, you can find just about everything I found helpful, productive or just informative. Keep in mind that all things you read will not be grand pats on the back for you and your actions -far from it, actually. These forums, and just about any other forum you find on the internet, will be emblazoned with Betrayed Spouses spilling their feelings and rebuking you. You should understand this for what it is.

The Betrayed Spouse is someone who has been destroyed by another person, and they are hurt - beyond comprehension, often times. They are victims of the choices made by another person. They are not unlike wounded animals and will whimper and rage similarly. The key thing I have come to understand about the Betrayed Spouse is this...they were betrayed by the one person who promised to accept, love, cherish and forsake all others for them. ***EDIT***

First and foremost, I am no expert. I am an amateur at relationships, dealing with confrontation and being selfless. In the past, my very nature was anti-relationship…and, therefore, anti-marriage. I have learned, from the woman I betrayed, that life is beautiful and I am learning what a marriage can be. I have become very pro-marriage with the aid of the person I placed in hell. We still have much room for growth ahead of us. I imagine that room for personal growth exists, regardless of whether we have infidelity in our pasts or not. Without personal growth, we become stagnant.

I encourage additions by other Wayward Spouses who have grown from something here or somewhere else. These forums are designed to help people, and the Wayward Spouse is a person. It has been my experience that often times the Wayward Spouse arrives at a place filled with stifling guilt and loneliness with the realization of what they have done. There have been times I have needed someone to help pick me up and push me back on track. It is my hope that the information provided here will aid someone in that manner.

NOTE: I ask that the community add things to this that they feel might be helpful to the Wayward Spouse. I will add any links and information to this compilation and remove this note in a week or so.

NOTE TO MODS: I have placed links to other sites in this post. I am asking that they be left in, if at all possible. If this request must be denied, then so be it. I understand.


***EDIT***

The Marriage Builders Bookstore
Many helpful books can be purchased here to help you and your Betrayed Spouse transition from the nightmare of D-Day to a marriage that can be even better than before the affair. It could be useful to obtain some of these books, as they contain great "good marriage" information.

Q&A Columns
It would be beneficial to read all of these. There is so much information here that you may miss out on, if you don’t.

Pregnancy/Child
Discussions of children born from an affair and how people have dealt with this situation can be found here. There are many occasions where a pregnancy is the result of an affair and you may find this information helpful if you are in this situation.

Abbreviations
This is a link to definitions of abbreviations used on MB, and probably many other like sites. It may be helpful information, initially, in reading posts, since many people use them.

***EDIT***

I hope the information provided here is helpful and receives many additions from others. I ask of the community - please help me out with this, because for every Wayward Spouse that receives guidance, a Betrayed Spouse may receive a possible opportunity at a ticket out of Hell.

wonderful----thank you patriot for taking the time to do this!

I have done some major editing on this Toolkit. Please review and let me know if you think it reads better than the original draft. I still hope to receive more links and information from the community. Please send anything my way that you feel would be helpful or useful to Wayward Spouses.

patriot92,

Instead of including links to other sites and their books, perhaps you could include the link for the MarriageBuilders Bookstore

We also have a thread on the General Welcome for New Builders with a list of Suggested Reading Material for New Builders

Perhaps you could also include the link for Harley's counseling services?

Good job, patriot.

I'm confident this will be beneficial to all who absorb it.

WAT

Patriot 92:
Good going!
Be Proud of this effort!

Next:
The letter you included, made me think of this Letter that has been referred to Often on the Board.
I think it addresses the reasons for asking details pretty well and hopefully can make the Reluctant to "talk" WS.....at least consider changing their approach.

See what you think:

The Need To Know......
This is a copy of a post by Joseph, a member of the now defunct BAN Message Board. He wrote to this letter to his wife to explain why he asked for details of her affair.


To my Wayward Spouse,

I know you are feeling the pain of guilt and confusion.
I understand that you wish all this never happened and that you wish it would just go away.
I can even believe that you truly love me and that your indiscretion hurts you emotionally much the same way it hurts me.
I understand your apprehension to me discovering little by little, everything that led up to your indiscretion, everything that happened that night, and everything that happened afterwards.

I understand.
No one wants to have a mistake or misjudgment thrown in his or her face repeatedly.
No one wants to be forced to 'look' at the thing that caused all their pain over and over again.
I can actually see, that through your eyes, you are viewing this whole thing as something that just needs to go away, something that is over, that he/she doesn’t mean anything to you, so why is it such a big issue?
I can understand you wondering why I torture myself with this continuously, and thinking, doesn’t he/she know by now that I love him/her?
I can see how you can feel this way and how frustrating it must be.

But for the remainder of this letter I’m going to ask you to view My REALITY through My Eyes.

You were there.
There is NO Detail left out from your point of view.
Like a puzzle, you have all the pieces and you are able to reconstruct them and be able to understand the "whole" picture, the whole message, or the whole meaning.

You know exactly what that picture is and what it means to you and if it can effect your life and whether or not it continues to stir your feelings & How.

Thankfully, You have the pieces, the tools, and the knowledge.
You can move through your life with 100% of the picture you compiled.

Should you have any doubts, then at least you’re carrying all the information in your mind and you can use it to derive conclusions or answers to your doubts or question.
You carry all the 'STUFF' to figure out OUR reality.
There isn’t really any information, knowledge or pieces to the puzzle that YOU don’t have.
Indeed, You have the advantage of seeing things from every side and every angle.

Now let’s enter MY Reality:
Let’s both agree that this affects our lives equally.
The outcome no matter what it is, will affect us both.
Our future and our present circumstances are every bit as important to ME as it is to You.

So, why then is it okay for me to be left in the dark???
Do I not deserve to know as much about the night that nearly destroyed our relationship as you do??

Just like you, I am also able to discern the meaning of certain particulars and innuendoes of that night and just like you, I deserve to be given the OPPORTUNITY to understand what nearly brought our relationship down.
To assume that I can move forward and accept everything at face value is Unrealistic and unless we stop thinking unrealistically I doubt our lives well ever 'feel' complete.

You have given me a puzzle.
It is a 1000 piece puzzle and 400 random pieces are missing.
You expect me to assemble the puzzle without the benefit of looking at the picture on the box.
You expect me to be able to discern what I am looking at and to appreciate it in the same context as you.
You want me to be as comfortable with what I see in the picture as you are.

When I ask if there was a tree in such and such area of the picture you tell me don’t worry about it, it’s not important. When I ask whether there were any animals in my puzzle you say don’t worry about it, it’s not important.
When I ask if there was a lake in that big empty spot in my puzzle you say, what’s the difference, it’s not important.

Then later when I’m expected to understand the picture in my puzzle you fail to understand my disorientation and confusion.
You Expect me to feel the same way about the picture as you do but deny me the same view as you.

When I express this problem you feel compelled to admonish me for not understanding it, for not seeing it the way you see it.
You wonder why I cant just accept whatever you chose to describe to me about the picture and then be able to FEEL the same way you feel about it.

So, you want me to be okay with everything.
You think you deserve to Know and I deserve to Wonder.
You may honestly feel that the whole picture, everything that happened is insignificant because in your heart you know it was a mistake and wish it never happened.

But how can I know that?
Faith?
Because you told me so?
Would you have faith if the tables were turned?

Don’t You Understand that I want to believe you Completely??

But how can I?
I can never know what is truly in your mind and heart.
I can only observe you actions, and what information I have acquired and slowly, over time rebuild my faith in your feelings. I truly wish it were easier.

So, there it is, as best as I can put it.
That is why I ask questions.
That is where my need to know is derived from.

And that is why it is unfair for you to think that we can effectively move forward and unfair for you to accuse me of dwelling on the past.
My need to know stems from my desire to hold our world together.
It doesn’t come from jealousy, it doesn’t come from spitefulness, and it doesn’t come from a desire to make you suffer.
It comes from the fact that I love you. Why else would I put myself through this?
Wouldn’t it be easier for me to walk away?
Wouldn’t it be easier to consider our relationship a bad mistake in my life and to move on to better horizons?

Of course it would, but I can’t and the reason I can’t is because I love you and that reason in itself makes all the difference in the world.

Joseph

Patriot, you can add my withdrawal thread to your post if you think it might be helpful (I posted the link to you on the other thread). The withdrawal thread contains specific suggestions/links for FWS’s on how to get through withdrawal and to help the BS recover. You will also find a link to truheart’s letter to FWS’s everywhere in that thread. You might decide to put that letter as a separate link to this thread since the letter is excellent and a must read for any WS/FWS.

bumping this one up......

ark

Patriot

Good going
H

I wanted to resurrect this post to work on it again. If anyone has any ideas, please let me know. It fell off my radar for a while.

I would like to get it done.

Thank you for posting this list, I found it in a search and am just bumping it up.

ak, be sure to read old stuff like this with a very critical eye. In the past people used to play a lot of "mix and match" with Marriage Builders and other programs. For some reason people seem to think all marriage counseling material is basically the same, even though Marriage Builders is very different and most other programs don't actually work long term.

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE listen to the Marriage Builders Radio show on a daily basis and let Dr. Harley himself teach the program to you. If you are reading old material around here there's a good chance somebody will pass you a recommendation that will not work.

Scares me to death to see links to other sites like this. Dr. Harley doesn't endorse any other program, and the reason is because they all make recommendations that contradict his recommendations.

If you are here posting on Marriage Builders, presumably it is because you are convinced Marriage Builders might work for you, so try Marriage Builders instead of mixing and matching with other people who don't have Dr. Harley's success record.

ak, I have to ask - you have four posts here and no history. We have no knowledge of your own marriage or your own use of Marriage Builders. You've offered people advice, but we don't know if you know Marriage Builders or not. We have so many good Marriage Builders resources now, but you are bumping old stuff that links to incompatible sites.

What's the deal?