There are those who start timelines at the beginning of their marriage and track big shifts.

2000 got married moved into new house
2001 was a lot of fun
2002 got prenant and had baby #1
2003 H stays home and W goes to work, W depressed and poor adjustment into new roles. Begin spending less time together. Take each other for granted. H meets OW, W becomes pregnant, A starts.

From where H met OW I (not dating) I switched to months.
7/03 they met
9/03 begin working on a project together
10/03 I become pregnant, we move to new home
11/03 WH and OW begin dating, I know somthing is wrong but don't know what.
12/03 PA in full swing, I find MB and share info with WH
12/31/03 we have New Year's party and OW attends WH gets drunk
1/04 WH says "I love you but I'm not in love with you"

Loy,

Okay, I was thinking in too many details. I think the way you did it here is much better than what I was going to do. I will go month by month also after the date he says they first started PA.

Just had an idea= what do you think about asking him to do his own timeline separate before I show him mine?

Well, he could have the same hurdle you did in getting started, too many details or whatever.

But what popped out at me in your quote was that you are afraid of him either lying to you or witholding information from you or both. You are afraid he is going to take advantage of your ignorance and you want to protect yourself by catching him in the act. Don't set him up for failure.

This is important, your WH may not be ready to tell you somethings yet. Help him find ways to be honest with you. If he's not ready to tell you something, or if he needs time to think about a question (especially as he may not have thought about some things before as a part of compartmentalization) give him that time.

Right now, the most important thing is creating a safe environment for establishing honest communication between you both.

I did not know or believe I was in recovery until three months ago, and even now I sometimes have bouts of reservations. I am not sure when marraige recovery starts, but it comes after withdrawl and creating a safe environment for you both.

Hi Loy,

I took some time and did a timeline--started by years, but put the milestones by months until Jan 05 when PA started. Don't know when he met her, he admitted to flirting for about 6 mos before PA. He will have to fill in that part.

You're right, this did help me to kind of sort things out in my head. But, I wound up with more questions based on some events I remembered....there was a car accident he had, and he was having some heart pains and went to the hospital for observation overnight (panic attacks--now I know why)--I have to check the dates of these incidents.

But all in all, I'm pretty satisfied with it.

Hi Loy,

Just read your post, I think we were both writing at the same time!

Yes, I'm afraid of him lying and withholding information from me, and you're right, that is not really fair to set him up for that. I'll have him look at my timeline for what I know and have him fill in how their relationship was (when the breakups were, etc).

I am focusing on creating that safe environment you mentioned. I read about this in one of the Harley books and it has taken all my effort, but it is working. When he told me that she had gotten pregnant, it was after his friend had slipped and mentioned it (he thought I knew). Honestly, though I had my suspicions before it slipped out. I told him "thank you for being honest as I felt that there was something you were still keeping from me". I feel that if I can handle this without displaying anger, I should be able to handle anything. I think that he is afraid to tell me if he felt like he was in love with her at the time, because he has so adamantly denied it all along, and has insisted it was just sex. I think he is afraid that I will leave if he admits this, and I think that he is also embarassed that he he risked everything for this woman, who he now refers to as that crazy b----h.

I am really glad that you feel that you are in recovery. Your situation was the most similar to mine that I have found on this board. Others I have met and corresponded with have been dealing with much shorter PAs and have not had as many questions as I have. I appreciate all of the guidance you have given me, as I am learning from your experiences.

When you don't understand things your husband says, tell him. "I am confused, I don't understand how you could say you don't love her when she was the third person you called after our baby was born."

Also, to encourage discussion, emphathize with him. "I can't imagine the stress you were under when we were both pregnant. That must've been very confusing for you."

Find ways to share the experience that is not a part of a trial.

Yes, this is a good approach. I think that he would respond well to this. He has been on antidepressants for a few years now, and has told me that I don't understand what he was going through.

I have also been reading the thread about the Male Midlife Crisis and this fits him to a tee also. I printed out the quiz from the thread for him to take. He has admitted that this is what it was--turned 40 and lost his damn mind. Within that article, it says "The truth is - when he says, she meant nothing to me - believe it. She didn't." I have tried to show him articles and posts written by WSs to show him how I can understand the struggle that he went through, to try to get him to open up to me.

One of our problems now is getting the time away from the kids to talk about this. I think I have some solid stuff to go over this weekend between the ENs answers, the timeline, and the MLC articles, and he won't feel like he is being attacked. Maybe this discussion will help get rid of some questions on my list.

Another question for you, Loy--

Did you find that when you approached your husband with empathy, as you suggest above, that he was more receptive to understanding YOUR pain ? I have tried to find ways for him to understand what I was going through while he was not home, but he gets on the defensive. He tries to focus on how he did alot when he was home, and how he tried to have a good time and enjoy his family, but I always turned it into an argument about why he wasn't home. Then, many times, he would leave and go back to her.

Mama,

It's very difficult to focus on everything at the same tme.

You want him to understand you.
You want to understand him.

These things may/ may not happen at the same time, but it will not happen on your timeline. I know you know that, but it's important to remember that just because you want to understand each other doesn't mean you will. At least right now. One thing that's neat about marraige is that just because you don't understand each other, dosen't mean you will stop trying.

My husband became more receptive to understanding my pain overtime. It was gradual. And I didn't make my husband understand my pain, he wanted to understand. I don't think I got my need to be understood met by leading through example.




So, he thinks you would turn his attemps of creating positive situations into an argument about him? is that right?

Well, first, I hope you know that you never forced him back to her. He was retreating from himself. I think.

Your husband wants to have good times with you and your family. It's important to him to feel like a success at home and good times help him accomplish that.

He wants to be important to you and your family.

Let him show you what he can do for you and your family. Let him lead sometimes. Overtime his confidence and belief in himself will return.

Try to concentrate more on yourself. What kind of parent, wife, and Mamafish do you want to be? What makes you feel good and happy.

Have you read the Five Love Languages book?

Really, you are doing very well. I am very impressed.

Thanks for the compliment. Some days I feel like we are connecting, and others, well, you know...I haven't read thd Five Love Languages...will get it. I've heard it mentioned a few times. I've read SAA and HNHN and lots on this site.

Yes, I think you're right, that he thinks I will turn any discussion into an argument about him. But I have been biting my tongue alot so that I do not make any minor disagreement into a argument about the A.

Yes, I know that I didn't force him back to her, and he has even said that I am wrong about him going back to her everytime he left. He said that many times he couldn't deal w/ her either (she would say you're only coming here b/c you had a fight with your W) so he would go out w/ his friends.

I will work on expressing my appreciation of him for what he does do, like you say, he wants to be valued for his contribution to the family and involvement w/ the kids. I think that the Rescue Syndrome came into play also and he didn't feel needed by me. I tried to do it all (housework, work fulltime job, childcare) to show him how competent I was, how I could handle it all. Turns out he felt rejected and not needed.

I have been working on myself and we have both been trying to make our marriage less child-focused, and have more time for us to be alone. This is tough but we are getting there.

Thanks so very much for all your suggestions and emails. I am taking it all to heart and will think alot on this over the weekend. I have to go now since it's almost 5 pm. I will check in with you on Monday morning.

HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND!!

Hi Loy,

Just checking in with you and hope you had a good weekend. We did, even though I didn't mention anything about the timeline or Marriagebuilding as I had intended. The reason for that is that my husband got a new job...so we were really in good spirits all weekend because of that. And it is on dayshift, so no more separate lives. He found out on Friday afternoon, and was so happy all weekend.

I took your advice to heart about him wanting to contribute and feeling like a success at home. I complimented him alot and told him how I knew he was going to get the job. I told him thank you every day for the little things that he was doing around the house, etc. At first I think he thought I was kissing up to him, but he could see that I was genuine about it.

He mentioned OW once on his own in reference to a bank that I mentioned maybe opening an account at. He said that's where she banks, so I don't want to go there. Instead of getting mad, I just said, oh in that case, we will never go there again., and I just left it at that (very hard for me to do)-trying to make him feel safe to confide in me, like you had mentioned.

I hope your weekend was a good one. I did tell H that we need to make a plan for our MB stuff, now that he will be working next week, we should do some this week since we will have more time. He agreed that we should do that. So all in all it's going pretty well. I'm surprised that I can even put all this on the back burner in order to do the day to day living. I think that has surprised me (and him) most of all that I am able to do that.

Loy,

I have a question for you. My H has started to slip back into old habits (i.e. Love Busters--disrespectful judgements,and angry outbursts especially). He has not read anything about LBs on the site or in the books, and we haven't talked about them (yet). Most of the reasons for him doing this, are because of little things that he thinks that I should know about him, because we have been together for so long. I have tried to explain to him that we are both different people than we were before the A happened, and due to our separate lives during the A, we need to get to know each other again. How did you and your H relearn how to be married to each other again? Was it just a matter of time? I try to ask him how he likes different things, so that I know what he wants. He assumes that I know what he wants or likes, and then gets upset when I get it "wrong". I know that during the A, he would do this as a justification for why he was in the A. I think that he was trying to put me down as a way to make him feel better about the A. I have been very conscious of not LB-ing him.

Any advice for me here?

Personally, I find that I do a bit better if I don't come here all the time. So, I am not the most consistent poster. However, I will be checking in on you.



How have you called him on this behavior in the past?

Did it work?



Focus more on sharing your feelings and trying to understand his feelings rather than "explaining" or teaching.

Work on clarifying and keep it emotionless and consise. "I feel hurt, when you say this. I feel that you think I am (insert descriptive word). I don't understand, is that what you mean?"

Hi Loy,

Good to hear from you. I understand why you do not come here often. Sometimes I get caught up in reading threads and get discouraged. I have to focus on things that relate to my situation.

Thanks for the advice. The other night, I used one of your suggestions -- I don't understand why you called OW after our baby was born, if you didn't love her? He said he was happy and wanted to share the news. She yelled at him because all it did was rub in the fact that she had the abortion. He said he didn't consider her feelings, just wanted to call someone that he knew was up at that hour (4:30 am, working graveshift).

Yesterday we went over some of my questions. I tried not to teach him, to empathize with what he was going through. It worked. At first he was very defensive. We took a break and later I told him that i knew it was hard for him to answer my questions but I felt better. He said that it wasn't hard for him, but he knew it hurt me to hear the answers. I told him that it all hurts but that the knowing is better than not knowing , and that I had to get it out of my system.

As for the Love Busters, I used to put up w/ this in the past. I know that he did this to me during the A to justify his actions. I listened in silence, or would argue with him to defend my position. Then he would leave because he didn't want to argue, just wanted to come home and have peace and a good time with the family, not argue. So I am trying for a different approach. I explained to him that we need to do the LB questionnaire because he says that his criticisms are in response to my annoying habits, and some of them I am not aware of. So, I think that will help that situation.

He also, after I posted this question on LBs, met me after work with a hug and told me that he didn't mean to act the way he did. He is realizing that his words have an effect on my feelings. This is big because he did say that during the whole A, he did not think about my feelings most of the time (could not or he wouldn't be able to justify A), because he never thought I would find out about it. This kills me. I tried to explain to him how he acted distant to me hurt my feelings. I see now from your post that I should stop the explaining and just tell him how it made me feel. That will help him to understand.

I even asked him about the middle name thing. He claimed he didn't know her middle name (it may or may not be true, I can't tell). He said that he just liked the name Nicole and would not have named his baby after her. He thought it sounded okay with the other names. He got so defensive about this, that I think there was more to it but I dropped the subject. I told him that I didn't want to find out anything new when I thought I knew everything, and he said that he will answer any more qts I have.

Thanks for checking back with me. This post is getting buried. I'm off line for the weekend, but may check in before 5.

I am so impressed. Good work.

You really have a great way at looking at your situation and evaluating your own progress. Well done.

You're husband has told you how much he enjoys having a nice and fun or relaxed night at home. Make sure you give him one. He is looking at himself and his actions which are very uncomfortable. Reward him. But I think you already know that!! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

Thanks for the pep talk...It helps to stop and breathe and think of the things I have read here, when composing my response to things he says. I try to consciously stop my patterns of behavior and do what he does not expect me to do...catches him offguard a bit. I find he opens up much more and is less defensive when I compliment him on his sharing and honesty, and telling him how much better I feel. I also told him that I was trying to fill in the missing pieces of my life, as you had suggested, and that seemed to be receptive to that angle also.

yes, I'm looking forward to a nice evening and weekend...I hope you have the same....I am going to reward him...and hope he rewards me too!