Hi all,

I have been living my own little hell the past few months and I need some opinions about what I should be doing at this point.

Summary:

In March of 1999 my wife requested that I move out of the family home. You see I had an anger problem which caused me to have angry outbursts. She called it abusive and I agreed. She wanted me to get help and I believed her. Well you all know what was really happening. She was having an affair which I found out after a few weeks of being away. I found this site sometime in the fall of 2000 and began my plan to get my family back. She originally asked me to move out for 6 months and said that I would move back after this time and see how things would go. Well you all know that when the 6 months rolled around, she did not want me to move back but I did anyways. I moved back in September of 1999. The affair was the worst time of my life. There were many confrontations with her and her friend from April 1999 through May of 2001. I helped bring a little reality into their otherwise fantasy world by exposing the affair and the affair soon began to loose its luster. Actually things got so bad for my wife with the guilt, I had to have her committed to a mental hospital (with her mothers nod in July of 2001 ) as she was starving herself to death. When I had to do this I was at the point of filing for divorce as I had all I could stand and thought there was no hope. She spent 15 days in the hospital. The day I brought her back home she told me on the ride home what a fool she had been and than she wanted to try and save the marriage. This was in the early summer of 2000. I was shocked but thought 23 years is not something to throw away and my kids needed a father in the house. So we began to reconcile. We had a few bumps but all in all things went well, at least I thought. She is the director of the local library and that is where she met her "friend". The were a few incidents where I went to visit my wife and found her friend there. Needless to say I was stunned each time but the frequency died off until I no longer discovered contact. I felt that we had started recovery in December of 2000, as that is when we started to be intimate sexually again, after STD testing of course.
The years 2001,2002 and 2003 were good for us. We both felt our marriage was improving. In 2003 she started a masters program to obtain a required library of science degree utilizing a program via the web. Things got really tough for us. She had absolutly no time for me or our children and I knew it was not good for our marriage. In August of 2004 she began an emotional affair with a local man she met on the internet. I found out about it in March of 2005, but knew something was going on in September of 2005 and even checked out her old friend a few time to see where he was spending his time. I felt like a fool when I found nothing never considering that it might be someone different. Our relationship was so bad while she was going to school, no fighting but no chance to make real deposits in the love bank. I confronted and she explained that she thought I was going to leave her when she was finished school. She had seen a singles site popup which she believed was me and described me to a tee. I have no idea if this is true and I really have my doubts. Anyway, currently the affair has ended after repeated confrontations since mid March. It has been excruating for me but I am still sane. Again I had to expose the affair before there was any headway at ending it.

My problem is that while I was in search mode for evidence of the affair continuing I found some old email subject titles from 2002/2003 which were from her old friend. These titles were inappropriate, she calls them "only sexy talk". No meetings took place but this has really upset me. I feel as thought I lived an illusion during 2002/2003. This is actually been harder on me than the newest affair.

At this time she is seeing a psychiatrist to try and determine what "is wrong with her" regarding these problems.
The current affair was an emotional one as we continued to have a sexual relationship until the present day. She is one that cannot have sex with two different men at the same time although I did ask her if we needed to have the STD testing done again and she said no. She has asked her doctor for some Marriage Councelers names, people that save marriages not break them up. She is making an appointment with one this afternoon. This is her doing as I am still in too much shock to even think of this yet. I have scheduled an appointment with an Individual Councelor for tomorrow, someone I have seen in the past and has been very helpful.

My biggest problem is my confusion, as again, through all of this she has told me that she loves me and wants to save the marriage. I feel so lost. Help please.

I am sorry your post got overlooked this long. I hope a better poster than I can help you. If you haven't read it, go to the Just Found Out forum and read WAts guide. Get yourself under control, even if that means getting medication. Find a counselor. Probably a good idea on that one because of your potential anger problems due to this newest crisis.

Again, I hope someone with better 'guns' can post to you. Keep things safe and do not do anything foolish(refering to the anger problem again... if it still exists)

I wish you well.

Go ahead and get tested anyway. It doesn't hurt to err on the side of caution here.


Well, when you are feeling lost and confused, it's best to settle yourself down first and gain some emotional stability before making any major decisions.

So for now ... be gentle with yourself. Be civil to your wife. Try to find something to do every day that brings you some relief from this pain. The pain cannot stay at this high level forever. Eventually you will be more emotionally balanced and able to function fully.

Counseling certainly seems like a wonderful plan.

Take it easy.

Pat,

Anger problem is under control for some time now. The conselor that helped me with the anger problem is who is helping me with this issue.