I'm cautiously optomistic.

My wife was just honest with me. Over the summer (during the time of the A) she apparently realized that the physical attractiveness of her man is, in deed, important to her.

It was something I never realized.

I like lifting weights, but I haven't had much time for it since I was in high school (That was when she and I started going out, and I was pretty buff). Since then I figured that my most important muscle (as far as being a responsible husband and father) was between my ears, so I've largely let my physique go. Not to mislead you, while I'm outta shape, I'm no Jabba-the-Hut.

My wife doesn't know if she can ever be attracted to me again, but she was sure that I would never put serious effort into getting back into shape.

I've been wanting to get seriously into shape for a long time, and I started to go to the gym a lot over the summer, but then as I tried to Plan A her and meet her need for time together and conversation, and family participation, etc. I didn't have any time for the gym, and figured that since I was doing that only for myself it was less important. She, however, decided that my lack of committment to getting fit was about me not caring to give her an attractive mate. Woulda been nice to know that physical attractiveness was one of her most important ENs. (It didn't show up that way when she took the test, but I suspect that she intentionally chose to lower it out of fear of being seen as shallow.)

So, I can't change over night, but I can make a noticible change within a month, and this is an "environmental factor" over which I do have control and which is likely to have a positively influential effect on my wife.

Radical honesty is truly nice.

It doesn't solve the other myriad of problems we're facing, but at least it may buy her time and attention long enough to get some counseling and start turning a corner.

I'll keep my fingers crossed... It seems as though there may be other bits of honesty she's been holding back that need to come out. We'll see.

Not to burst your bubble, but she is more likely throwing you a crumb rather than indicating breakthrough. It may not even be true.

Very typical behavior for someone in an affair.

That said, this does give you something to act on. Seize this opportunity to demonstrate your devotion to the family and fill this EN - whether it's real or an excuse. This is a staple of Plan A, which you should get well versed in.

I strongly recommend you vacate this Divorced/Divorcing board and take up residence on GQII in the Infidelity section. You'll get more traffic and input from folks in the same sitch - divorce may be coming, but many other things are available to do first.

Perhaps I'll post some on GQII...

I'm not sure if my wife's "honesty" was a rouse. I don't think it was intentional. I think that, if it is, she's deceiving herself first. Was it a crumb, I suspect so, but I'm hoping it's a crack in the wall, and buys me time. I would absolutely prefer to Plan A her than Plan B her. And you're right, I think that this may be some way to continue to Plan A her. I do think I have a little more time to work towards a reconcilliation, but I am less than confident because I don't see a committment to actually try, yet.

Some later discussion with my wife last night indicated that what she's looking for is a mate who will be the "full package" (phyically, attitudinally, financially, etc.) who will be able to arrouse her fully and frequently. She says she's just not willing to go the rest of her life without feeling fully aroused, and that after this summer, she believes has the confidence in her femininity that she can attract a real hunk and that when she married me, she was just settling. (I may not be Tom Cruise, or Mel Gibson, or whoever, but I'm no Earnest Borgnine either!)

To me, this says the affair addiction-drug is fully in control of her mind, whether or not she's actually with OM (or anyone else) right now.

One thing she has said to me is that she NEVER wants to be considered a s-l-u-t. However, although I believe that she's a fine and attractive woman, and when she's not in the fog, she's a great wife, getting a hunky guy to be willing to have sex with you is NOT the same thing as getting him to commit to love and care for you for the rest of your life and be a proper step-father to your kids. Also, she said that she believes that there is someone out there for her who IS the whole package, and to whom she will be able to be passionately attracted for the rest of her life. I fear that she's setting herself up to jump from guy to guy and become exactly what she doesn't want to be seen as. As soon as she's not passionately excited by a guy, that will be proof that he's not the right one, and she'll move on.

I HOPE, for her own safety, and so that my kids will have a mother they can respect and who will live a good long life, whether or not she stays married to me, that she wakes up and realizes that the addiction is driving her to ruin her life and traumatize her kids.

I hope the fragile bridge of preliminary honesty that she's started to create with me will be a life-line that will guide her back to her senses before it's too late.

Nor will you see a committment any time soon. Committment won't come until she convinces HERSELF that she had her head up her butt. You can't do this - she won't see reality until she discovers it herself. Time is your advocate.

You're still talking about her as if she's a rational person. Do not think of her this way. Detach from the woman she temporarily has become because thinking about her as a rational person will only cause you further frustration when she doesn't act it. She's been abducted by aliens and had her brains scrambled. No earthly explanation for her behavior makes sense. Keep saying this to yourself and it'll be easier to remember NOT to try to use everyday logic with her.

Everything else she said is right from the script.

"Blah, blah, blah."
"Blah, blah, blah."
"Blah, blah, blah."
"Blah, blah, blah."

Nothing new here. It all sounds the same.

Spend some time on GQII and you'll see the same stuff over and over and over. Promise.

Get hot on Plan A and consider the time she's transporting back and forth to the Mothership as free time - you get to make improvements in YOURSELF while time stands still for her in LaLa Land.

WAT

Scratch the idea of a breakthrough...

The Mrs. went on an interview for a local job today... a fairly good one, and she got offered the job on the spot. I told her that (honestly) I am proud of her because I have always recognized the valuable productive qualities that her soon-to-be employer saw in her today.

I took her and the DDs out to dinner to celebrate, and while at dinner she mentioned that she wants to save a majority of the money from HER job for HERSELF. (100% of MY income to support the family, but only so much of hers as is necessary to make up the current monthly shortfall, and the rest to be saved in HER own account.)

I told her that I thought we should discuss and come to a joint agreement on what is a reasonable set-aside for herself, and that it didn't strike me as fair, at first glance that I was to remain almost totally responsible for all of her and our kids' expenses and what she makes is for her. She, apparently thinks that her income is hers, and it's only fair because she's been a stay-at-home-mom for a bunch of years. I still don't get why my income is OURS, and my retirement savings are OURS, but anything she makes is HERS... Actually, I do know what her game is. She's trying to make her very-own nest-egg so that she can live nicely when she dumps me and I get the honor of supporting her while she prepares her escape.

When we got home I sorta called her bluff when I said, okay, why don't you set the money aside for yourself, but then I won't have to give you any alimony, if we don't make it. That made her livid. She went on to complain that I was a jerk to suggest that she shouldn't enjoy all the raises I hope to get AFTER we're divorced (but while I'm paying alimony to her) by being given greater support, herself, when I get a raise. Mentioning that the purpose of the law was to help rehabilitate the recipient spouse and is expressly NOT to give the benefits of post-marriage advancements to the recipient spouse only made her madder.

I guess it doesn't really matter. For as smart as she is, every bit of money she makes until a divorce is final is "marital property" just like mine, so whatever she sets aside for herself just counts against her "equitable" portion of the rest of the marital estate. And under no theory of law would she be entitled to increased support from me because I get increased income. (Child support is a different matter, but I expect to have significant, if not primary, custody, so that shouldn't be a big deal.)

And of course, this new job gives her an additional sense of control (fine) and an extra reason to NOT want to move when I finally get offered a job as an attorney in the state we were planning to move to.

However, WAT, you are SOOOOO right. She's got a totally alien-scrambled brain. One minute she's spouting what divorce law she's looked-up that she thinks supports her, and the next, when I point out that the effect isn't what she thinks because of X, Y and Z, she shouts that she doesn't care what the law says. Another almost funny thing was that at one point I mentioned that it was her, in fact, who is the one pushing for the divorce. She flatly said she did not want to go there.

I'm getting to the point, and I do hope that I can stay committed to the Marriage, but the release of being free of her manipulation and deceit is looking VERY attractive. On the other hand, I am a fan of "dark comedy" and this really seems to qualify. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I know you are a STB lawyer, but in many states, her theory would hold. Your future income would be counted toward both alimony & CS as would her income from her new job. Consider yourself lucky. Many spouses purposely don't get jobs until after a D is determined just so that their potential income won't be included in the calcs. Also, don't expect to see her newfound salary "savings" to appear in a "bank account" that you can use in a divorce settlement. The money will all be gone.

Newly,

In my current state marital property acrues from the day you say "I do" to the day the judge says, "You don't anymore." Also, children DO have a right under the law in this state to enjoy the benefits of the parents' lifestyle, but once someone is nolonger a spouse, the recipient of alimony does NOT have a right to enjoy subsequent advances from a former spouse's efforts. Anyway, the point of alimony is to put the recipient back on his/her feet, and NOT to even the lifestyles. In my state the marital property division is where equities are to be settled, mostly, and in that determination one of the BIG factors is the reason for the failure of the marriage (even if it is officially a voluntary separation, the A and her continued contact and destructive conduct is the underlying cause).

As for my wife... Despite her mind having been scrambled by aliens, I suspect that out of compulsion to FEEL secure, the money will go into a bank account. Nevertheless, at this point, since she's already talked to a number of people of her desire/intent to divorce me, if I can show that my check goes to pay for family expenses, and her check just vanishes without being applied to the family, the court can attribute that money to her under the theory of "extant property." (i.e. Property one spouse unilateraly disposes of in contemplation of a divorce for the purpose of keeping it from being available as marital property.)

From where I'm standing, I'm doing what's right, and I'm in a better position than her, and she's too gung-ho to realize it.

I’m so glad that all of you in this forum seem to KNOW who I really am. Oops! I’m sorry…I guess that was a DJ.

I am posting this same message on every one of my husband’s (TestedDevotion) threads.

I know that people in this forum are trying to be helpful. However, it’s very difficult to be the judge and jury when you’ve only heard half of the case (as hubby would say, “It’s easy to indict a ham sandwich”), and perhaps it would be wise to think twice before making far-reaching assumptions based solely upon stereotypes and one-side of the story. I’m not going to use this opportunity to justify myself or my actions, because I don’t have the innate need to be right all of the time, unlike TestedDevotion (yes, that is a DJ, but a well-earned one). Perhaps as you read the letter he posted on the Letter I sent to foggy WW - Was it a mistake to send it? thread, you might just get a glimpse of what life is like in my household. Maybe if you’d lived in an atmosphere like that for a decade or more AND felt devalued by your spouse daily (in actions, not words…and we know that actions speak much more loudly) AND dutifully catered to what you felt were the selfish desires of your spouse AND felt as though you bore 90% of the burden of raising three small children…maybe only then you can understand that I’ve just had it! My body, my mind, my spirit, and my heart are all completely worn out. For me, staying in this marriage to heal it (it’s been shot in the head 10 times and is on life support right now) is like expecting a tire who’s tread has been worn down to the steel belts to perform perfectly in the snow.

Should I have had an affair? Absolutely not. Am I sorry that I did it? Yes, I am VERY sorry that I did it. I only wish I’d had the strength to separate from my husband before getting involved with another man. And, as it turns out, I was never really “in love” with the OM…I was merely in love with the idea of being “in love,” as I have so desperately craved love throughout my marriage, and TestedDevotion was unable to give it to me.

And perhaps, before rushing to judgment about me, you should know that TestedDevotion’s old screen ID was BronzeGuy from this board (Summer 2005) and mine was PHgirl (also summer 2005), and our exploits into “swinging” and the subsequent turmoil that lifestyle created are clearly chronicled in the “In Recovery” discussion topic.

For the record…had the “swinging” never taken place, the affair never would have either. I was a monogamous, devoted, caring wife to my husband for the first 12 ½ years of marriage. I gave him MUCH more emotional support and made MANY more sacrifices (both for his sake and for the sake of our family) than he ever did for me. However, because he had undiagnosed depression during that time, he has acted as though that’s his “get out of jail free” card…he “unknowingly” destroyed my self-esteem, depleted my love bank, emotionally neglected me, and manipulated me into his way of thinking (hammering home his point until I cried “uncle”)…so I should just forgive and forget and move on as if my heart hasn’t been broken (more like ripped to shreds) for the last nearly dozen years???

I am NOT saying that there weren’t good times that we’ve shared over the years, NOR am I saying that I played no part in the breakdown of our marriage. There were many good times, and perhaps it’s those good times that had given me the strength to stick it out in our marriage for as long as I have. My contributions to the marriage’s demise aren’t minor, I’m sure. I had the affair. Ok, we all know that by now. I was very critical of him in the beginning of our marriage, especially when he made mistakes that I know I wouldn’t have made…my perfectionism was often difficult to live with (even though I held myself to a higher standard than I expected of him)…I yelled when we had arguments…I was judgmental of him when he was too “blind” to see the important details in a given situation (but details are part of MY personality and he’s more of a “big picture” guy)…and I’m sure the list goes on and on.

The sad thing is that he said, throughout our marriage, that I expected him to “read my mind.” However, I told him in so many ways what I needed, but he never heard me. It wasn’t until he read one of the Dr. Harley books (12 ½ years after we were married) when he finally GOT it, to some extent…and I said to him, “I’ve been telling you those VERY same things for years, but you never listened.”

Beat me up all you want for wanting out of my marriage. Argue that I’m “in the fog” (of an affair that is NOT continuing). Continue to support TestedDevotion in his one-sidedness. This forum has fanned the flames in our household recently, both before and after I discovered what he was posting. I’m moving out of our house very soon. We’ve told the kids, and I’m hunting for a place to live. Perhaps some time apart, where we’re not in each other’s faces all the time (he ONLY wants to talk about the state of our relationship at any given moment), will give us the chance to reflect on what we’ve done to kill this marriage, and why we ever got married in the first place. I have no idea what the future holds…but perhaps all of you veteran MB’s can look into your crystal balls and tell me what lies ahead (there goes another one of those nasty DJs).

Crystal