Here is my story (a long one) warts and all. I’d really appreciate some advice from both sides of the fence.

I am a WH and regret what I did. Earlier this year I had a one-off A with a work colleague. We had discussed our physical needs that weren’t being met by our respective partners earlier and once she had decided to leave our company (for unrelated reasons) we decided to have sex together. I wanted it to go on as I was not having regular or fulfilling sex at home. However the OW didn’t, so it was only a 1 off. In July, my wife found an email that I had written to the OW, saying that I wanted to be with her as a friend and lover, while still having my life at home. It doesn’t read well for me, but it was purely sex what I wanted. However I can see how it could possible be read as more than that. My EN (sexually) were not being met by my wife. We’d been together nearly 12 years and married 6 years). Sex in the years pre kids was ok, but nothing as good as it could have been. And especially post kids it was infrequent and unsatisfying (e.g. my wife gave me the impression she wasn’t that interested and she wanted it over with as quickly as possible – not all the time but more often than not). I just accepted it as her not having a high sex drive. However over the last few years I’ve been getting more and more frustrated about it.

We’ve never been great communicators, although after reading Dr Harley’s information on MB I’m trying to improve myself in a number of ways.

My wife and I would regularly argue, mainly small things that one of us probably interpreted the wrong way. We have 2 young children (2 and 4) and my wife studies as well as looking after the house. I work fairly long hours and have over the past few years felt a bit insecure in my job as well as not overly confident in my ability to work as well as I should.

Another big issue that my wife has had to deal with has been that in March she found out that I had lost a lot of money gambling – I’ve been addicted for many years to having a bet, but in the last couple of year the value of the bets have got out of hand. I’ve now lost all the available funds in our mortgage. It the typical greed scenario, wanting everything but not being patient about it. So that’s 2 big hits to her in the last few months.

We’ve set the access to our finances (what’s left of them) so that I can’t get single access. So now I have not had a bet for nearly 12 weeks. I’m also starting to see a gambling counsellor (who also does some marriage counselling so I will be talking about my marriage problems as well).

So I realise that I have stuffed up so many things. But I want to make my marriage and my family life work. I want us to be happy together (I’ve told my wife that I haven’t been that happy in the past, but she, probably quite rightly identified my gambling problem as a major contributor). But we also have not met each others EN very well, especially with children, work and study being in the way.

Now she is still studying for assignments and exams and does not really want to think about us and what we should do. She has mentioned going to counselling together, but that won’t be until after her exams in mid November.

After Dday she slept in a room with one of our children for about 10 days, but is now back in our bed. I get some cuddles in bed, but no affection. She’s said that I’d be lucky to get sex again for a very long time, which does concern me as it was lack of sex that caused me to cheat. I don’t want to cheat again, but I want our sex life and our happiness together to be so much better than what it was.

I want her to read the MB website, but once again she is too busy to even look or try and talk to me (except to say how much I’ve hurt her, ruined all our lives etc). After exams she will have more time, but I can’t live in limbo until mid November.

I would welcome any advice (and provide clarification where necessary).

spyglass,

Welcome to MB! It is a good place to be and you will find some helpful advice from experienced people here.

Congratulations to you for seeking IC for your gambling addiction. Be cautious about seeking marriage counseling, not all MC are actually pro-marriage, believe it or not.

It sounds like you understand that you have hurt your W terribly, but you may not realise quite the depth of the pain you have caused her. What she needs most from you right now is a safe environment and time to heal. You have a lot of work to do before you deserve her trust again. Continue working hard on improving yourself. do your best to meet her EN. Make her feel safe. Get yourself checked for STDs and show your results to her. Give your W access to your email and cell phone. Make sure she knows where your are and what you are doing all the time. Give her as much support as you can and make it easy for her to prepare for her exams. Make her exams your priority too. Make her feel like she is the most important person in the world to you. With time, as you successfully and consistently meet her EN, her loving feelings for you will begin to return. Set yourself a time limit of sy, 3 months, where you try to fulfill all her EN without expecting anythink in return. Put your "taker" away for a while. Can you do this?

Thank you Lost for your wise words.

My priority with MC is to get my wife to read Dr Harley's work. However I think that we will also see a MC together. Before this though I hope that we can work out our objectives for the sessions and if these are not met then we should be prepared to not return.

I realise that I have to be a 100% giver...it is hard and there will be lapses, but I know it is the right way to be, both now and as much as possible in the future. I've got to get rid of my selfishness and do more for others.

My W won't really talk about her EN, but like you have said it's really about giving her support for her study. I try to help when I can but often jsut make the wrong choices e.g. last night I did the dishes, but was told that I should have been getting the kids ready for bed (which was correct - I jsut don't think those things through too clearly).

I'll keep trying....I want to be a better person, both for my wife, my family and myself.

Spyglass,

It's a learning process for us all. We all make mistakes along the way. Accept grwoing pains as a given.

Suggestion: find out specifics of what you can do to help. What time should the kids be in bed? Make sure you have them wash up and brush their teeth. Try and make it fun for them. Reward the kids with a book. Kids that get read to by a parent end up being readers as adults. Make that a special bonding time for you and your kids. Your helping your wife in this way will not be a burden, but a joy.

Would you taking the kids on an outing for half a day each week give your W some needed quiet study time?

When you do the dishes after putting the kids to bed, remember to clean the stove top and wipe down the wall behind the stove... <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Think of all these things you do for you wife as joyous acts of love, instead of a burden or punishment. This will help you tremendously.

Try to do one special little thing for her each day. A flower from your garden on her pillow at night. A little bottle of perfumed cream. A funny joke cut out of a newspaper on top of her study books...

Hi spyglass,

I'm sorry for what's brought you here, but am happy that you are here. It is difficult to own up to mistakes and I applaud you for wanting to make things right.

Have you established "no contact" with the woman you had the affair with? Does your wife know that you have ended things with her?

I suspect that your wife is currently feeling as though the rug has been totally pulled out from under her (to put it mildly). She is at home with your kids and studying, correct? Does this mean that she was depending on you to provide the primary financial resources while she was doing this?

In short succession, the foundation upon which she built her life has received two devastating blows. First, the husband she thought was faithful betrayed her with another woman. Then, that same person revealed that he had jeopardized their financial future as well.

I agree with losttranslation - your wife needs to feel safe. You can help her feel safe by demonstrating by any means necessary that your affair is indeed over (be totally transparent in terms of email/cellphone accounts, account for your time etc. - this will help her in terms of the gambling, too). You can help her feel safe by working at understanding why you had the affair - why did you allow yourself to go outside of your marriage and what will you do to prevent this from happening again?

I would encourage you and your wife to find a reputable marriage counsellor as soon as possible. In the meantime, keep meeting her ENs, and reading and posting here - lots of good people here who will help point you in the right direction.

Best wishes,

G

Spyglass,

Our roles are reversed and I commend you on visiting MB and fighting for your M. From what I have seen many of you WS are in to much of a fog from the fantasy of the A, to be fighting for it and when you start to come down off that high your in too much pain. Like us the Faithful spouses aren’t?

I have been here at MB trying to find out how, how to save my M and make it special again.

My wife too won’t visit MB and everyone here would love to talk to her. You must remember this site is filled with people who have felt our pain, they have been through this and know many of the trials we are going through and if given the opportunity they well help!

So keep encouraging your W, to visit…Personally I have placed many of Dr. Harleys articles in a folder for my WS to read and even given her a link to MB, but to this date…Nothing she hasn’t read them or visited this site, I did get her to read some of the ones that I printed and handed to her, but than again she said they where to hurtful.

Let her know this site is dedicated to rebuilding and building a stronger and better M!


You are going to find sex or SF to be a rollercoaster; currently me the FS has also experienced increased exuberant love sessions and than nothing.

I can tell you that for me a faithful husband nothing in my life has come close to the betrayal I felt when I found out about my wife’s A. So I do understand her pain and its great your fighting for your M. But she needs to no she is not alone. If you read my story, I thought I had the perfect M, but I have found out that all M, even good ones are susceptible to affairs.

You stated that you know there are things you need to improve on, that great, what about your W? We all must improve the way we meet each other EN’s! Personally and I think your W, might agree with me, I would say the most important is Honesty and real open communication.

So if you’re not meeting her number one EN, I don’t think she is going to be in the mood for SF. Talk about your EN’s and get her to visit this site, let her know its all anonymous, she can tell us she is your W or not, but even if she say’s that she is Spyglasses W, its still anonymous because we have no clue who you really are, so she can feel safe and free to talk.

GOOD LUCK!

Thank you all for your advice and comments.

Things weren't too bad last night....we had dinner, talked abit...I looked after the kids as much as possible, trying to give my wife time to study, although she always seem to manage to spend more time playing with the kids than she should...lol.

I then did the dishes and went to bed...my wife came to bed later...we had a brief talk about going to MC at some stage. I also mentioned that I have a lot on at work and may have to spend time there in the weekend....she made some comments like are you sure you'll be there for work...or are you looking for someone else to choose...I just let that comment go and ignored it....but is does show that she is still really hurting (as she has every right to). As an aside she's never been that happy with her body, especially after 2 kids, and she is talking about getting a boob job and stomach tightening. As long as we have surplus money I'll be ok with this as I've lost so much of our funds anyway, this will be money spent on her. And hopefully I'll, one day, benefit from her increased self confidence as well <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I've had NC with the OW and it will stay this way. I also try to account for my time to my W, but there is not a lot to account for....usually I'm at work or home!! Trouble is that if I want to do something to relax I get the comment that If I've got so much work to do, why don't I keep doing it rather than enjoying myself. I'm stressed enough at work and try not to bite anymore to comments that are made by my W. I've just got to take it and really try hard to be a better person...not engage in arguments like we once did.

Griselda - I don't need to think too hard about why I had the A......I wanted to have a sex life that I coulnd't get with my W.....more frequent....more activity....I was tired of waiting for our sex life to get better...but also my wife has commented that I hadn't worked on making our relationship better. She is right there, I just wasn't meeting her needs and she wasn't meeting mine. I understand that a lot more now...but am fearful that I have done too much damage to her already. But as Losttranslation has advised, I'm just going to try to be a total Giver for an extended period.

HLRomantic, I've printed out a lot of MB articles and am halfway through reading them. I have them at home and will file them for my W to read when she is ready. She has said that she might read some after her exams in November. I hope she does as everything make so much sense (in fact at my first counselling session I referred my gambling counsellor, who also does some MC to look at MB so that he would know more about what I would be saying to him - it will be interesting to hear what his thoughts are when I have my second session next week).

Thank you all for your help

Hi spyglass,

Sounds as though you are working really hard. Keep going - your wife is probably looking for consistent, long-term change before she is willing to open up.

A couple of things jumped out at me:

"I also mentioned that I have a lot on at work and may have to spend time there in the weekend....she made some comments like are you sure you'll be there for work...or are you looking for someone else to choose...I just let that comment go and ignored it....but is does show that she is still really hurting (as she has every right to)."

As a BS, I threw out comments like this, too. They were LBs, but underneath it, what I meant was "please reassure me that you are really in this and that you are protecting our marriage from another work-related affair." I'm glad you were able to see the hurt that was underneath it. If it had been me, it would have been a perfect time for my husband to acknowledge that hurt and go on to reassure me that the only thing going on would be work and that he would never do that to me again. Might be nice to call her from work on the weekend to check in. A WS who goes out of his/her way to volunteer whereabouts and confirm activities really helps to build trust.


"Griselda - I don't need to think too hard about why I had the A......I wanted to have a sex life that I coulnd't get with my W.....more frequent....more activity....I was tired of waiting for our sex life to get better...but also my wife has commented that I hadn't worked on making our relationship better. She is right there, I just wasn't meeting her needs and she wasn't meeting mine. I understand that a lot more now...but am fearful that I have done too much damage to her already. But as Losttranslation has advised, I'm just going to try to be a total Giver for an extended period."

I am glad that you are acknowledging your own contribution to the state of the marriage before the A. It is important for both you and your W to figure out what both of your ENs are and how to both change behaviors that led to not meeting those needs.

However, I'd encourage you to keep thinking about this. My guess is that before the A you would have said that having sex with a woman who was not your wife was not OK (unless you had a prior agreement for an open marriage with your wife, which changes things). So what changed? What made it OK in your mind to not only have extramarital sex, but also to plan it in advance?

I commend you for the hard work you are doing - best wishes.

G

Hi Griselda,

Your comment

"As a BS, I threw out comments like this, too. They were LBs, but underneath it, what I meant was "please reassure me that you are really in this and that you are protecting our marriage from another work-related affair." I'm glad you were able to see the hurt that was underneath it. If it had been me, it would have been a perfect time for my husband to acknowledge that hurt and go on to reassure me that the only thing going on would be work and that he would never do that to me again. Might be nice to call her from work on the weekend to check in. A WS who goes out of his/her way to volunteer whereabouts and confirm activities really helps to build trust."

makes perfect sense and I realise that I missed an opportunity to reassure my wife. I'll make sure that I do next time it comes up. I know that I do need to reassure her more and then act the right way i.e. live the reassurance.

Also, I agree that before the A it was not acceptable behaviour to have sex with someone else, but over a period of time I had become so frustrated with my lack of a sex life (my wife does not think it was that bad, but that is based on her thoughts not mine...so we are at odds there of what a good sex life should be like) that I had rationalised in my mind that we didn't have much of a marriage anyway and that good sex with someone else was better than unfullfilling sex with my wife. See how us stupid males can completely lose our minds? No excuse for stupidity though....all I had to do was try to find a way to make our marriage better and the sex would probably follow....not sure if it would have got to where I would want it to go, but it would have got a lot better.

So now at least I can try on making our lives a lot better...something that i can focus on anyway...get rid of my selfishness and try and be a much better person <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

A few days further on and I'm not sure if I'm making much progress.

We had a bit of a talk last night, but my wife keeps saying that she needs time to think. She says she hasn't done any thinking about us yet, she has been too caught up in her study and assignments. I told her that there are really only two choices. Either she wants to fight for our relationship, move on and have a better than ever relationship, or the second choice is that she doesn't.

I keep letting her know that I want to fight for us and that we can have a great future together.

As part of our discussion I mentioned that we were not good at commnicating to each other. Part of that was shown up not long after when we were speaking about meeting each others needs. I mentioned sexual needs, to which she said she doesn't know if she'd be able to meet them (I didn't give examples of any specific needs, so I presume she meant having sex in general). I then said what about her needs and she replied that if I didn't know what they were then she wouldn't tell me. I then tried to get her to see that this statement didn't make a lot of sense, but she just kept quiet.

What can I do? It looks like she just isn't up for talking yet (7 weeks since Dday) but I think that I should keep trying. Even if we end up having the occasional argument as a result (although I'm really trying to button my lip and reduce the comments that I make that can cause an argument) it will show her that I am serious about trying to sort things out with her. To me the only other option is to just give up...something that I don't want to do at this stage.

So does anyone have an idea as to how I should approach this?

Okay...I'm not feeling very WH friendly tonight but I'll try.

First of all, 7 weeks really isn't very long. It probably took you longer than that to slide into an A. Some people need more time to process. All of this hit her in the middle of the summer. I imagine she was home with the kids while you were out f*** someone else. You were gambling and endangering your whole family's security. Where did you gamble? Online? At a club? A track? Where ever it was, I'm sure to her it sounded a lot more glamorous than being home with 2 kids all summer. Remember, no matter how much a mom loves and want to be with her kids, a bit of the mom wants a slice of the adult world.

Have you really got a handle on your sexual needs? It always seems that men want it in a different way than women. Have you set up the romance of it? Or are you trying to jump her in bed after she's done the whole bedtime routine with the kids, finished her homework, loaded the dishwasher, figured out if everyone has clean clothes for the morning and is completely exhausted? Are you making love or do you just want sex? Is it just a physical release for you?

In my very, very humble opinion, she is not fighting for your marriage at this point. YOU are fighting for your marriage. You are the one who screwed around, gambled your savings and cheated. CHEATED. Sounds like she was home doing everything she should do except being your sexual concubine.

I suggest you be on your best, "yes, ma'am" behavior. She needs some time to heal. Can you expect her to be in bed with you with no baggage? Duh, you cheated on her! You can't just say, "I'm sorry and I'm finished doing bad things, now I'm back." She's an angry, busy, hurting woman. If you really want your marriage to survive, don't push it too fast. You have a lot of answer for.

Thanks GG, I understand where you are coming from and totally agree.

But I just want my wife to talk to me. But once again that is MY want, so I guess it doesn't count for much atm. If she doesn't want to talk then that is her perogative. I'll just continue doing what I have to do. Sometimes I'll get it wrong, but I can only learn. I've got a lot of learning to do.

I don't expect any SF at this stage. I just want to know that one day we will be in a better relationship than what we had. In time I'm sure it will be.

I've just got to keep pushing my Taker away and being so much more of a Giver.

I'll do my best...and will become a better person.

I'd be willing to bet that if you can be more of a Giver, you will find that it will benefit you in all of your areas of your life. Be a giver towards your children and you will benefit from knowing them better. Giving to your wife will make you realize how much you've taken away. Think about the Karma of being a Giver.

Try babysteps with your wife. Woo and court her all over again. Are you bringing flowers home? Giving a gentle backrub while she's studying? Sweet kisses? Cuddling? Taking out the garbage and emptying the dishwasher without being asked? Be careful. You could be a WS who becomes a BS.

I try to do the small things GG. Sometimes they just don't get noticed...sometimes my W even thinks she has done them!!!

I don't really get allowed to give her a kiss (she just turns her cheek, sometimes even pulls right away). Cuddling, I try, but she is very defensicve in her body language and won't let me close for long at all. I try the backrubs as well, but once again I'm not allowed to for very long...but that has been getting slightly better . I do the handwash dishes when I can (most nights) and stack (although I don't always do it "properly") and unstack the dishwasher regularly. The garbage is my job, but I'm often told to do it, mainly because we have different perceptions about when it needs to be emptied - I prefer to get a full bag while my W will tell me to empty it before I thought it needed to be.

i don't know...I just have to keep trying. I don't think I'm re-writing history here....and I don't think I do anywhere near enough at home, but I hope for some recognition that I'm trying really hard (also need to give my wife more recognition for what she does)

Am I being too heavy handed?

My IC has told me to express my thoughts and feelings more, but also make sure that I am just not doing whatever my wife wants in order to avoid conflict. I must still express my own opinion.

Below is an email that I wrote to my wife this morning as a result of an argument about what to do with our 2 year old who was crying in our room this morning just before 6am. I wanted to cuddle and settle him (I was getting up to have a shower) while my wife wanted me to get him a bottle to see if that would calm him down (and then hopefully he would go back to sleep - not much chance of that based on his past history). Not much of an issue really, but she is still very angry with me, so I think any situation may set her off.

Anyway, I wrote the following email. Can I please have some feedback if I am going about things the right way.

“ Whenever we get to a stage where we can't discuss an issue, say because of arguing, I feel that we should at least get it out, so I'm going to use email instead. I think it is very important that we both express our thoughts and feelings. As I've already mentioned to you, I do not want to go back to our old relationship e.g. our arguments, insensitive comments, lack of care and respect, not discussing our thoughts and feelings, not identifying and meeting each others needs etc. I feel that we were both sinking in it and I am going to do all I can to improve it. I really hope that you will commit to this aim as well.

As far as this mornings issue with *DS2* goes, I feel that we have to work out a few things, otherwise this sort of situation is going to come up again. What do we do when we disagree and the issue isn't that important (e.g. getting *DS2* to calm down at 6am, when I am getting up) but I think doing it one way is best (cuddling him and calming him) while you think another way (bottle). Should I always do what you say? Or should the person who is actually doing the task decide what they think is best? I would prefer the latter as that gives them the sense of contributing both in decision making and in deed. To basically tell them that they are wrong shows a lack of respect. I know that I have sometimes been like that in the past and may sometimes lapse again in the future. But I don't want to be like that.

Sometimes insensitive comments can do a lot of damage. As it is, I often feel left out of decision making for the kids and that I don't get a lot of say in things. So today comments like "what do you know, I'm the primary caregiver" don't do a lot to make me feel like I'm part of the family. It really makes me feel like my opinion doesn't count.

Other comments like "Thank God" when I told the boys that I was going to work. Do these sort of comments serve any purpose? I think that they probably just make us both feel bad. Definitely something that we should both try hard to remove . On Marriage Builders they call these sort of things Love Busters. Things which really aren't necessary and do harm to the relationship. It all adds up...and has been adding up both ways for a long time. So unless we break free from these sort of things, we are both going to be miserable. That is something that I don't want and I'm sure you don't want either.

Also, I'm also not sure what you mean by you thinking that I'm, having a "powerplay". What I am trying to do is improve myself. It is not a game and I am serious about it. So I'm not playing a game or playing the kids off at all. I just don't really understand what you mean. Can you please help me understand more how you see this about me?

As I mentioned to you last night, we have not expressed our thoughts and feelings much at all. We have not been great communicators. I really want to change that dynamic in our relationship. I want us to become closer together, to understand each other better and to be partners together, not just a Mother and Father. I want US to have a relationship...a proper and real one.

I believe that I can change and have to some degree already changed. I really want to improve our relationship, but that still means expressing our thoughts and opinions - but we must both learn to do it in a positive and respectful way....a lot of unlearning for us both to do here. I am going to be the type of person that I can and should be and have the relationship that I want and deserve. I hope that you can be part of it. It will require work from both of us....hopefully that is what you want. I will be working on it.

love you”

Thanks for the people who have helped me so far...I appreciate it....I just don't think I'm doing a very good job at saving my marriage at the moment, although I realise my wife is still very hurt and angry. About the only concession that she has given me so far is that she has said, "yes you are trying".

Spyglass,

I didn’t see if you posted your D-Day, you might want to include it in your Bio.

My D-Day is June 25, 2005; that makes it a little over two months in recovery for me. Your W sounds a lot like mine…So let me tell you what is going on, my W started to withdrawal about a month ago; She is more quite and we aren’t that intimate but sometimes I think you need to let them know how you feel and LET THEM KNOW YOUR HURTING. Yes, you must help them with their pain but not at the expense of holding everything in yourself.

I have a posting named:
I exposed my feelings to my WS, how much damage did I do?

Guess what, everyone was supportive and I believe it may have created some negative feelings for a couple days, but it not only let me get something’s off my chest, my W now knew how hurt I have been. It also caused her more pain and we both talk about our rollercoaster and its ups and downs. We both thought the emotional ups and downs where very bad…but I’m not sure…I’ll say this, I see my W trying harder, she sent me a text message on her way to work just to say she loves me! Wow that was cool, especially considering we had a conversation before bed about which needs she isn’t meeting. Those are very hard but very important…I told her that I can see her trying very hard but I still see something is missing, I even told her that we haven’t been very intimate; she listened countered, oh yes didn’t care for everything I was saying but I told her that it was my turn because she gave me a lot to think about the night before.

We both agree that we should set time aside for these type of talks, I wouldn’t recommend having them before bed.

Your in for a ride my friend and my W is right that its like a rollercoaster but don’t avoid the hard stuff.

Spyglass,
Your letter is excellant.

How did she respond?

I hope she gets it, and will help. If so, you are well on your way.

SS

Actually Spyglass,

Things didn’t go so well for me afterwards and at first seemed to have been responsible for putting her in a funk and I told her so the other day. Funny thing is this morning she text messaged me, saying I love you and to have a good day. Something she hasn’t done in quite awhile, it actually brought a tear to my eye.

HLR and SS...thank you for your replies... I appreciate your responses.

HLR, I commend you on what you are doing to rebuild your marriage…if only my BS felt like you, then we could get on with making our marriage the way it should be. But I know that I have to let her grieve for what she has lost. I will try and help her through that, through my words and deeds (although deeds will carry much more weight as she doesn’t believe much about what I say anymore). i really like the idea about remarrying with new vows. I would like to do that with my W oneday....commit to her again, with vows that reflect where we are at in our lives. It won't be soon though, but hopefully when we have recovred form this devastating experience.

I actually sent my W two emails over the last couple of days. The first was a paragraph from MB from a BH in relation to his thoughts on a WW (apologies, I can't remember who wrote it). It basically said that the past is the past and it can’t be changed. We can learn form it but it is how we act in the present that counts. Don’t live and grieve in the past. Enjoy and experience the present.

We had a conversation in bed last night after she had read my emails. One of the main points that I remember is that she thinks I am acting. That I am not real of serious about what I am doing. She does not think that people can change themselves (well she said that but I am not really sure if she actually believes it). I replied that I can and I will, although there may be relapses (LB) along he way. She understands about relapses though, in relation to my gambling…although I have not had a bet since 10th June….so I think she can see that I can change…she helped me through that and now I’m sure I can become the person I should be.

We had a quick chat about MB, where she said that it was aimed at a target audience (one of her normal replies to dismiss things that I have been reading, especially in relation to sexual desires)….however her thought was that MB was aimed at WS, so I let her know that from what I had seen there was probably more BS on MB, but it was aimed at both of them and helping them try to make their marriages better than what they have been.

I told her that I understood she was angry and that it was ok to be angry…I deserved her anger. But what I want to do was rebuild the marriage…to be better than before (this is going to be my constant theme). However she is concerned that I am going to make her out as being the “bad guy”. That I would keep my emails of instances such as yesterday, show my IC and make her out to be a bad person. I kept telling her that I did the wrong thing and that it was my bad choice to do so. However I do want her to face up that she is not perfect and can improve herself in relation to our marriage. I let her know that I did not consider ourselves to be great communicators and did not express our thoughts and feelings very well. I said that I want to improve myself in this way (now the hard part is doing it!!).

It’s going to take time, but I think that if I keep doing what I am doing…trying by deed to be a better person, then I will have a good chance of rebuilding my marriage. I know that I will improve. I am concerned however about how much effort my wife will put into making our marriage a lot better than before. But I also realise that it is very early in the piece and that the more I can show her how much I am improving the happier she will be with it and the more likely she will respond.

It’s a long walk….but I hope it will be well worth it.

Spyglass,

My D-day is about 3 weeks ahead of yours and as you know by now there are good days and bad days. My WS and I have referred to it as a rollercoaster and I think by knowing and understanding that makes it easier.

I really think you should encourage you W to visit this site, but I understand her reluctance. Its kind of funny, I’m here as a BS and you’re here as a WS but we can’t get our wives to visit. What’s with that, mine thinks everything here is going to make her out to be a bad person and told me she can’t deal with that. I told her that there are all kinds of spouses on MB those that have cheated those who thought about it, those that have spouses that have and those that have become a WS after their spouse cheated, oh if there is an other kind that type would be on MB too. My point is all points of view are represented here at MB and everyone wants to help and avoid some of the problems and pitfalls they ran into.


Let me tell you sometimes I get angry and make sly remarks, I would suggest that you don’t fight back when they occur remember from a BS point of view you changed everything without their input. Little things can remind a BS of the pain they are enduring, they don’t want to put you through he11, but want some understanding. I would suggest that when you FS does something like that you should take it as a complement. We wouldn’t hurt if we didn’t care so very much!

I too know we must look to the future and think of what a wonderful life I can have, I’m sure your W is thinking the same thing. But we can’t ignore the past; we must learn from it and prevent it from repeating. I know it’s hard on the WS to go through and relive their deception, but they must reassure their spouse. You are doing many of the right things and I commend you on that, but from my point of view let me tell you what your spouse might be looking for.

You love her, great she might even know that, but she no longer feels special and had all kinds of emotion that words CANNOT describe. Words and deeds must go hand and hand, she needs to hear, see and feel it. You might want to tell her that what you did is the worst mistake of your life and the best way you can make it up to her is dedicate the rest of your life to your marriage. Everyone wants to hear you\we will always be faithful but if that where true we wouldn’t be here, so I suggest you promises to tell her anything she ever asks and you will never lie or with hold the truth. Of course for some that might be harder than being faithful, but the truth is our faith and trust in our spouse has been shattered.

Sorry for the tough words but if you really are on the road to recovery and you want to do everything you can than I suggest you take my advice to heart.