Thread Title was original WIFE IN DENIAL ABOUT SECRET AFFAIR. Since my focus is no beliefs, at this time, The thread title about beliefs, may be more accurate.

Today I asked my wife to be cautious about people who asked her to keep secrets from her spouse.

Meaning: Your Boy Friend is No Good.

Since W mostly denies here current affair, except when she gets emotional and slips out bits of the truth, I am wondering how to confront her, effectively?

What are the building blocks of the beliefs that fidelity is good? What changes in beliefs needs to take place for a cheating wife to become faithful?

My wife seems to be motivated to have our children think well of us, even after we die.

Got Fidelity?

Sen, instead of beating around the bush, I would inform her that you are fully aware of her affair, if in fact, you are. If you are not sure of her affair, I wouldn't say anything until you have investigated and found out the truth. What information do you have that would lead you to believe she is having an affair?

You don't need to convince her that fidelity is good. If she thought otherwise, she wouldn't be hiding it. [assuming she is having an affair]

And what changes need to take place to cause her to be faithful is widespread exposure of her affair. Exposure is ruinous to affairs and very often "motivates" affairees to conduct themselves otherwise.

Dear Melody Lane,

Thanks for the idea of exposure.

Wife has fairly clearly admitted an ongoing affair, and confirmed that again toady.


I am not sure whether to resign my self to a partly open marriage, or move out and ask her to demonstrate sincerity when she is ready.

As it is, I am studying what i am doing wrong, and spending too much time trying to change myself, and trying to manage my oppositional nature, which is further kicked in by W carrying on an affair.

Ideas?

I would first suggest that you don't move out. That will only allow her to carry on her affair unimpeded with no consequences. That will work against you.

I would suggest exposing her affair to her parents, your parents, close friends, the OP's spouse, parents and perhaps employers, if applicable. If your children are teen +, you might also consider exposing to them. Exposure has a powerful effect on an affair in that it causes a very damaging jolt of reality to intrude in the fantasy. It is ruinous to affairs.

Exposure should be done in one fell swoop, without forewarning the WS.

The second part of Plan A is to do your best to meet her needs, while avoiding lovebusters. Are you familiar with the principles of Marriage Builders? A couple of very good books are Surviving an Affair and His Needs, Her Needs by Willard Harley.

Of course, if you want to have an open marriage, none of this would be necessary.

Dear Melody Lane,

Thank you for the references to Harley's books. I am familiar with the concepts of Plan A and Plan B, and meeting W's needs. I understand the No Contact Letter.

My current goal is to try to address the beliefs that allow the affair to exist. My wife has trouble saying NO even to her relatives. So I am looking to build wife's ability to say NO. Whether the impulses arise from another man, or whether it is her own feelings of a desire to flirt.

I did a search on BELIEVES.
Dorry mentions a belief that she had things under control.

Certainly, exposure is one dynamic to demonstrate that W does not have things under control. So since my wife is a secretive person, perhaps a phrase:

Idea for words for Senator to Wife: "Did you want to give me assurances that you have ended all affairs, or do you feel I should hire a PI to make sure?"

Positive Belief Phrases: You want to avoid the embarrassment of relatives and friends finding out about your flirting, so you are avoiding people with whom the temptation arises to flirt.

The Motivation is to move away from a possibility of shame from discovery. Moving toward keeping receiving respect from children and relatives.

Ideas?

Threats of exposure prior to the actual exposure taking place is totally counterproductive. To do so will give your W a chance to tell everyone her jealous husband has gone crazy and is spreading stupid lies about her having an affair. The impact will be reduced to rubble.

Get concrete evidence of the affair, read "Surviving an Affair" and prepare for battle with the proper weapons. Otherwise, you are wading in uninformed and unarmed, and WILL make huge mistakes that will prolong an already unbearably long process.

Any notion you have that you can do this without a proper plan is dead wrong.

Best wishes,
SD

Senator, I think it would be insane to try and reason with an insane person. Her affair is an addiction so she must be treated as would most other addicts. If you understand this aspect of her thinking, then you better understand her mental state. She is not using reason and logic in her approach to her affair, so expecting a reasonable reaction from such a person is an unrealistic expectation.

And what works best to shock her out of the fantasy of an addiction? EXPOSURE. Not idle threats of exposure, but actual exposure. As long as you keep her secret for her, you enable the affair.

It is a bad idea to make threats of exposure, rather than actual exposure, because it does nothing to bust up the affair, just causes them to go deeper because they are forewarned. You lose the leverage of shock because they are forewarned. Exposure ruins the fantasy because it causes the affairees to see how sleazy they look through the eyes of others when forced to explain themselves. This causes great conflict and causes the affair to start crumbling. If you just make a threat, you lose that leverage.

Forewarning them also allows them to pre-empt you to exposure targets and spin the story. The story is always spun with the BS starring as the "jealous, paranoid nut" so that when you DO expose, no one takes you seriously.

The PAIN and embarrassment of exposure is what will motivate her to stop her affair. Threats will not suffice.

Don't throw away your best weapon, Sen.

Melody, speaking of affairs as addictions, Flukeboy and WasLost71 had staged an elaborate intervention (drug style) for Flukette when she was deep in her affairs.

They had Flukeboy's wise parents, and the two of them, aand Flukette was forced to make a choice right there & then - her marriage or the OM.

It was a long meeting, but in the end the beginning of recovery. Boy was Flukette pis*ed when WasLost got in an A less than 6 months later after everything he said to her that night!!!

Both families now in recovery... (the Flukes & us) - don't know or care about the OPs.

MSA

Senator,

Go back and read your thread on the Divorced and Divorcing Board from start to finish and, then, ask yourself, "Gee, why would my wife be having an affair?" The answer is because you are not meeting her emotional needs and, I believe, may be engaging in LB's without even realizing it (something many of us have tried suggesting to you). Instead of looking at yourself and your behaviors (which is what Marriage Builders advocates), you spend all of your time trying to change your wife. Even your last post, above, looks to how you can manipulate your wife to do what you want, instead of changing your behaviors so that you are the attractive alternative. You can only change yourself.

To everyone else, I would suggest you go and read Senator's thread (start to finish) on the D&D board before giving any more advice - there's alot more at play here than his wife simply having an A. Several of us have been offering him advice that is in full keeping with MB - he doesn't want to look inward and see what he may be doing to contribute to his WW's behavior. As many of you know, I don't condone adultery, so I am not condoning Senator's wife's behavior. I am merely suggesting there is more to this story...

BB

Further Information:

I previously had a thread under Divorcing/Divorced, titled: NLP/Matrix Coaching to Change Spouse's Difficult, Annoying Habits.

In that thread, I discussed using NLP and Matrix Analysis principles, in addition to MB principles, to increase respect in the marriage and family. My family includes a college Age son, of both my wife and I, living at home. Link to the Divorcing/Divorced thread:
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/sho...rue#Post2864563

During that thread, some people posting suggested that I should focus on the respect issue of my wife carrying on an affair, and having had affairs in the past.

I feel I made progress in the Annoying Habits thread, but I am now wishing to make progress in the area of fidelity and respect.

I am looking at beliefs and the basis for the beliefs, in relation to a secret affair. It is intended by many engaged in an affair, that the affair remain secret. So my situation is not so unique. But most poster's approach the affair through confrontation. I am looking for non-confrontational methods of addressing the underlying reasons for an affair. Certainly meeting my wife's needs is one area for evaluation and change.

I am searching some old threads on beliefs; One discusses the belief that if the marital bedroom secred garden of marital pleasures is used sufficiently often, that the temptation for straying will be reduced:
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/sho...true#Post230416


Ideas?

I have no ideas other than what I have suggested, those are tried and true Marriage Builders principles. I can't imagine a "non-confrontational" way to effectively address an affair. Meeting your wife's needs is only one part of Plan A, and won't work alone. The other part is exposure and is an essential element of Plan A. Otherwise, the WS has no motivation to end the affair. And if you don't bust up the affair, you won't be able to effectively meet her needs if she is emotionally invested in another man.

Have you read Surviving an Affair?

First off, that is not what people were suggesting to you on that thread - they were suggesting that you wake and smell the coffee - that you are a large part of the problem here. While adultery is not the appropriate way to solve marital discontent, the bottom line is your wife is not happy with you. WHY? I suggested that you ask her, directly, what it is that you are doing that is causing such unhappiness in the home? What is it that you are doing that makes her not want to be around you? What is it about you and what you are doing/have done that has caused her to lose respect for you? Then, instead of arguing with her about why you are right and she is wrong, focus on what she says about you that is so darn unpalatable and, then, you change those things about YOU. If you do not want to change those things, then you are destined to remain on the path that has already proven unsuccessful.

Senator, you are viewing this all through what your WW and 27 year old son must do to change - that is your goal to change them and their way of thinking. Well, it doesn't work that way - you can only change you. Plan A - read about it on this site and DO IT. Don't make them do it, you do it. Stop trying to control them through mind games. Stop trying manipulate them. Instead, look and say, gee what have I done that has caused them to lose their respect for me? What Lovebusters am I committing that have caused them to distance themselves from me - so much so that my wife has affairs? (I suspect there is an awful lot of condecension on your part coupled with disrespectful judgments about them as persons - you think you are so much better and your way is the only way).

Look inward instead of looking to them to place blame. The first thing that the people on this site will tell you is you have to own what it is that you have and are doing that is destroying your marriage and, then, change those things.

BB

Senator
I couldn't believe when you wrote "spending too much time trying to change myself." Do you really believe that? Or is it that you spend all your time trying to change your wife and "27 year old college age son." I had to read that twice as I couldn't believe what I was seeing.

What about your newspapers being moved, their laundry not done to your satisfaction, your wife's arrival time at work, your son's housekeeping skills, and your demand for respect. The manipulation of your wife is nothing short of emotional abuse. Your house is burning down and you're concerned about the dirty dishes in the sink.

You've already moved out and back in again so what about doing it again would change anything? I sincerely hope that you begin to listen to posters on this forum because you certainly didn't on Divorced/Divorcing.

Dear BB,

1. It does not matter to me whether W is actaully cheating or not. Either she is cheating and doing a poor job of covering it up, or W is NOT cheating, but attemtping to deliberately make me think she is. Either way, Trust needs to be imporved.

2. W does says YES to other relatives and church, when she could be with me. So the time together is less than it should be for a marriage? What should change?

Are there things you have in mind for me to change?


Ideas?

Dear JPH,

Time spent on Forums, and time spent studying NLP, are two expenditures of time I spend for changing/improving myslef.

Do you have suggestions other than confrontation? I may confront the issues tomorrow, or some other time in the future. Right now, I am trying to understand my wife's beleifs, and see if ther are some misonceptions that could be straightend out. Perhaps the marriage is doomed.

What beliefs do you feel underpin Fidelity? What thoughts arise for you when the temptation to cheat comes to your mind? Ther are many threads on MB where the word Believes appears in teh Infidelity section. Any threads you think are good at discussing thebeliefs suporting Fidelity? Leading to Infidelity?

Many people have postedideas, but mostly they post from thier own sense of frustration, or what they have done to solve a similar problem. Most posts have not dealt withthe issues of Secrets and the subconscious motivators for cheating.

Ideas on underlying beleifs for fidelity?

Senator - you haven't listened to anyone else who has very specifically outlined areas that YOU need to work on changing within yourself - not trying to change your wife... And you haven't listened to them any more than I will expect you will hear me...

When my husband and I first started encountering marital difficulties, he worked hard to change me and all the other external factors in his life that made him unhappy. Psychobabble at it's finest - it was an ugly time in our marriage that lasted for almost 8 years.

One day he brought home another book on marriage and while we were in the car, asked me to read to him. It was His Needs Her Needs. I very nearly tossed the book out the window at 55 MPH! Another book to fix me, was what I perceived was his motive. Somehow, we kept reading, and I knew that our marriage was about to take a fundamental shift when he asked what the biggest lovebusters he was guilty of doing to me. He was ready to work on him, instead of finding my flaws and demanding change...

If it were not for his willingness to look inward, we would not be married. I don't have to be married. I choose to be married. And I choose this man, flaws and all, because he's no longer interested in fixing me - he's focused on being a better, kinder, compassionate and gentle man!

Can your wife say that about you???

Dear Kayla Andy,

Different marriages have different problems. Thank you for sharing your experience with the Her Needs, His Needs book. I am aware of Love Busters, and my Love busters are not a problem in my marriage, because I speak politely to my wife and exercise consideration to her.

Right now, I am trying to understand my wife's beliefs that cause fidelity/cheating decisions. I am not trying to change her cheating directly at this time. I wish she would stop cheating, but the only outstanding requests for changes are to stop bollixing the chore processes, and to find ways to demonstrate respect for me to College Son. I have asked her to more carefully evaluate people who advise her to keep anything secret from her husband.

My wife is not fully on board with those requests, but I don't go Love Busters over the requests.

I am working on formulating requests for my wife's time schedule. I am preparing to discuss the beliefs that underpin cheating. I am working on understanding the beliefs that are the basis for my wife's cheating, and work on requests to ask her to change those beliefs. Then it is her choice to make an attempt to give me assurances that she is not intending to cheat in the future. For me, Marriage is about the Future.

In what ways did your husband convey the idea that everything was your fault?

Ideas on Beliefs?




p

UPDATE:

Since I am currently focusing on understanding my wife's beliefs that underpin her past and present affairs, I have changed the title of the thread to more accurately reflect my perspective of struggle at this time. I am actuallly more interested in assurances that the beliefs for fidelity are in place, so that I might have confidence in the future.

Ideas on Beliefs?

I hesitate to enter the fray, as it appears you don't wish to be confused with facts in your endeavors.

Once a Wayward decides to "cross over" into an affair, they become a completely different person. People who were fine, honest, upright individuals become very adept liars, capable of the most unbelievable deceptions and, in short, become an entirely different person. Once involved in an Affair a person is completely absorbed in "that" world, and no amount of teaching, training, coaching or rendering of fact will make an iota of a difference. Fact is, if your wife is in an affair, you don't even "know" this woman. It's not the wife you knew.

With affairs you have only a few choices. Cut your "losses" and run right to a divorce lawyer, stand by doing nothing and let the affair run it's course, invent your own course of action based on your own guesswork and influence from uninformed others, or take actions described in the Marriage Builder's philosophy, a course of action that produces positive results many, many times.

The philosophy of Marriage Builders is designed to make you a better individual, whether the marriage makes it or not. Most of the success I had with MB is directly related to changes I made in myself. Was it easy? No way. But I thought about all the complaints my W had about me in our marriage previous to the affair. Serious, brutally honest introspection. I began doing more housework, cooking, laundry, became more caring, and gave more validation to my W for who and what she is, and what she brings to the marriage. I would forego a round of golf with buddies, or a trip to the casino in order to stay at home and be more of a contributor to the household responsibilities. At first she didn't believe any of the changes were for real, but after 6 months of sustaining those efforts, she began to believe they were for real. I used my efforts as a bargaining chip, if I were to do a bigger share of the chores, she'd have more spare time. My only request was most of the time saved, she'd spend with me. Basically, it allowed us to start "dating" again.

Senator, your search for her underlying beliefs here is a search for the Holy Grail. Frankly, you need to rethink your entire strategy, and buy in to the MB philosophy, which is the basis of 95% of the advice you are going to receive here, or just decide to do it "your way".

I appears that you do not receive the respect you beleive you deserve from your son, and you are displacing the blame for that on your W. I don't buy that. Respect is earned, not just given. Apparently there is "something" about you that commands no respect from either your wife or your son. Perhaps Individual Counseling would be in order. Or perhaps a man to man discussion with your son would give you some serious clues as to what he and your wife see as faults in you.

You, however, would have to put yourself in a postion to really listen to what he says, put your pride and anger aside, and HEAR some things you don't want to hear, but nonetheless, things that YOU need to HEAR in order to have some direction in personal changes you NEED to make.

Are you brave enough to do this?

Best wishes,
SD

I haven't read every post on your other thread, so I don't know if anyone has mentioned this way to change your wife....

Give her the address to this site and ask her to start reading the info pages. There might be things that appeal to her that would lead to her wanting to change some things.

What do you think?