Yesterday I went to the urologist and was diagnosed with interstitial cystitis. It is an ailment that may include pain during intercourse. Men can have it too and have enough pain that they can not become erect.

About 6 months ago I tried to have a discussion with my H about the need for understanding if your spouse had a physical problem, but at that time he said he thought it was appropriate to go elsewhere if your needs aren't being met at home. That is why I have filed for divorce and moved.

Last night H came over to see my new house and me and my son. I gave him the literature from the drs. office to read and he said he was sorry for what he had done. He seemed to be thinking about it at least. He gave me a hug. There may be hope for us yet but we have a very long way to go.

I'm glad he sees proof that your reluctance to have sex was due to a physical problem. You've certainly made it clear you won't put up with a H's justification for visiting prostitutes.
Cherished

It was the combination of physical problems and emotional distancing that made it impossible to keep going on the way I was. He was just convensed that it was my problem and that I was being unloving not to submit whether I wanted to or not.

I can't believe it. He came back last night and had his wedding ring on again and said he wants to work on our marriage. He said he didn't sleep very well the night before. I let him spend the night. No sex though. Of course this morning I am wondering how much he is expecting to put into this or if he he thinks he can just slide back in. As much as I would like it to work with us, I know he has a lot of work to do.

He called and wanted to go to lunch with me which I was releived that we would have a chance to talk but I was very wound up and ancious by the time we went. I had been over to pack up the stuff in the garage and discovered that he has changed the locks to the house and had all the doors locked. You have to understand that this is a man who leaves his keys in his vehicles at all times and never locks anything even when he is away on a vacation. And that is still my house too. I was very upset about that. Then we got to the restraunt and sat down and I looked at his hand and he didn't have his ring on. We have gone round and round about that one in the past. So I got up and said I wanted to come home. I told him that he can do what he wants to do that is why I have filed for divorce. If he doesn't want to choose to do the right thing by me instead of trying to convence me that he is a pretty good guy and that I am asking too much then we are wasting our time. I got out the list that he wrote 6 months ago of what he needs to do and hasn't. He didn't like me being upset with him but he didn't run away at least. He said he will be back tonight and he took the Surviving an Affair book to go over again. He also checked his cell phone to see if Dr Harley's phone no. is programed in to it. I also told him that the bank account with his lover is unacceptable. In a lot of ways it is harder to still work on this and have hope than it is to just walk away.

rb123,
See if you can get a commitment to spend 15 hours per week alone together, which is Harley's first assignment. What I am seeing with my H is that the simple commitment of time together starts to put us on the same page. He doesn't want to be miserable for 15 hours per week.

If you look at LM's response to me about the 15 hours, you can appreciate that it is not enough to simply spend 15 hours per week together, but I do think that that one commitment does start to pull a couple together. I know a woman who returned to her H after he ended an A, and now they are leading completely separate lives. He golfs, hunts, fishes... No way do I want that sort of life. If you don't either, set the expectation upfront that this is part of what will get you back. If he doesn't want that, fine. Fine. You're better off divorced.

Cherished

Cherished,
We were spending 15 hours together before we separated. The problem was that getting any commitment from him is like pulling teeth. I am soooo tired of having to make him do the right things. The time we spent together was ok but to get it I had to put my life totally on hold to be available when he was ready to do anything with me. His schedule revolvs around his work and everything else comes secondary. In fact a lot of the time we spent together was in running errands for his work. We had a huge disagreement on his need to go on errands at the drop of a hat. He saw nothing wrong with keeping a change of clothes at work so he could go run errands when ever the need arose. Never mind that was the cover that he used to have his affair. He always considered me to be the unreasonable one. I caught him with his clothes changed and ready to go do something on his own about a week before I filed. It was confermation to me that he will never be willing to change his behavior. I told him at the time that his behavior was unacceptable and I would never find it ok for him to slip around on me again. It doesn't matter that he sais he isn't doing anything wrong. His words don't carry any weight with me it is his actions that I am watching. I talked with him about this problem yesterday. He knows how important making commitments is to me. I live by my callender. I would love to be able to pencil him in all over the place. I have a dairy lunchen scheduled for the 14th with him but even when it is written on the callandar it is questionable whether he will back out. We also have a conference scheduled for the end of the month in California. The room reservations are made but not airline tickets. Who knows what his thoughts are about that. We probably won't go to that.

rb123,
My H did things like call me on the last day of school before Christmas break right when the kids were getting out of school. I had taken our pre-schooler to the Christmas party for the first graders, and I was paying the music teacher for private music lessons when the bell rang. I told my H I couldn't talk. He said we can't make our time together if you aren't available. I told him I won't always be available -- maybe we can plan time together -- but we maintain above a 15 hour average together or we separate. If we can't manage that, then we separate. He said maybe I should leave. I said I'm not leaving. He said he wouldn't leave. I said then I'd file for divorce. I'm not sure what this is because I cannot read his mind, but I'm sticking to the 15 hours. We had banked 10 hours as of Monday. If our time together falls below 0 before I go to San Francisco, I'm not going. One thing about time together -- it is measurable. I'm not spending my life trying to figure out if he's having another affair. Commitment to care has to be internal, and the only way I see it developing in him is if he's actually got an investment of time in our relationship.
Cherished

This morning I see only a hopless situation. This last week has been a rolercoster of emotions. One minute I was overwhelmed by the affection he was showering me with that I have been so longing for and ready to fall into bed having sex with him and whispering I love you, and then the next I am remembering that he is still banking with the other woman and being furious with him. I have cried and cried. I have felt conmpletely confused about what his intentions are. On Thursday he said he needed time to think about it and come up with a plan for our future. He said he needed till last night. When he came over last night he started out bu saying he had accidently locked himself out of his house and his son was going to have to bring him a key. That struck me as all wrong again. The only reason he is locking the house is to keep me out. You would have to know him to know how signifficant this is. He doesn't lock anything ever. That is why he can't keep up with the key. Our discussion about his intentions went very bad. He was invissioning living two seperate lives. One with me when he had time where we date and one where he lives with his kids and spends his time and money the way he wants. A friend of mine asked me what it was like when we dated and I guess that was how it was before we got married. I just didn't see it as a problem then because we weren't married. But married people live differently, or should. He has wanted to keep our finances sepearate the whole time we have been married and this has been a conflict between us. He even tried to set up a seperate household for him and his kids two years ago and I had the same problems with it then that I have now except that now I know he is capable of having an affair instead of just suspecting. His kids want him to divorce me and have no desire to see us work on our relationship or work on a realtionship with me. I see this attitude as distructive to our relationship and have always wanted to work on a relationship that involved them. I see any effort on their part to push me out as distructive by them and of corse they have won on that score. My H has an uncle who lives across the road who is divorce and his children were disrespectful and mean to his second wife. He supported his wife and his kids left and never came back. This happened several years before we were married and it had a profound effect on the way my H interacted with me and his kids. He has always been terrified that by supporting me he would allienate his kids and they would leave and never come back. As a farmer his life goal has been to pass his farm on to the future generation.

We got back from our trip to California last night. We had a wonderful time together. It was a lot like a second honymoon. We just lived in the moment and didn't talk about anything in the future. This was very difficult for me since I am a planner big time and commitment is very important to me. This wasn't commitment except for the week. It was awckward when his lawyer called him and when my lawyer called me. He feels like I am confrontational so I resisted the urge to ask about the future. After his lawyer called the second time we did talk about some of the financial aspects. We didn't agree but it didn't turn into a fight. On the way home we talked about the financial stuff a little more. We came closer to agreeing I think. Before we left he had said that he would change banks again after talking to Dr Harley. He was back paddling and I got upset about that but he finally said he will change banks. When I got home I had a letter from my lawyer with a huge list of documents that I need to get together. I have spent the day collecting paperwork. Looking over old stuf has made me feel hopeless again. He is spending the weekend with his children. He hasn't called or made any contact at all.

Post deleted by Cherished

I'm pretty sure he will be over again this evening and want to pick up where we left off but I will need to reconnect. I would like to have a commitment for his plans for the next week that would include 15 hours of scheduled time with me or more. We both know that this is his slow time of year and there will be full weeks in the summer when he will have no time at all for me. Every Spring, Summer, and Fall he tells me that it will be better in the Winter but every Winter he gets depressed and doesn't want to do anything. Before we left Dr Harley told me that he thinks the best arrangement is for us to live seperatly till his kids are grown. I don't know how that is supposed to work. I realize that they present a major obsticle in our marriage though and Dr. Harley is the expert.

It does sort of feel like when you make love and then your lover gets up and leaves right away. Two days of no contact feels like being jilted.

We even discussed that his kids are likely to have been especially troubling this weekend. Also, if I look at past behavior I'ld say this behavior is typical of past experiences. We can have a fantastic time on a trip by ourselves but, as a workaholic, when he gets back he feels compelled to work like a maniack to make up for all he didn't do while he was gone.

I'm pretty much in a plan B phase. We have only necessary conversation at this point. I am not letting him come over or going out with my H any more. That was still meeting too many of his needs and not enough of mine. My major need for commitment was deffinitly not getting met. I see all the disagreements and just can't invission fighting for the rest of my life about the same things because he won't address them. I'm just ready for peace.

Is there any possibility you can live in different homes? I think that would help. I know exactly what you are going through. My WH had 6 kids when we married, and I had two.
The kids were 6, 8, 11, 12, 13, 13, 15, and 17.

I think my husband picked me out because I am a hard worker, and very responsible. I did much more than he did for all of our children.

When the kids left home, he ran off with the OW who is 16 years younger.

Believer,

I filed on Jan. 19th which was a Thursday. The first weekend after that was so bad that I knew I needed to move fast. On the next Tues. I sighned a purchase agreement on a house and started moving the next day. I have been moved now for almost 2 months and the contrast of peace-vs.-conflict is huge.

Like you I am very organized and dependable. I love being a mother and my 2 older daughters are a joy. The rejuction of my H kids of me has been very hurtful. My maternity very much defines who I am. Like you, he had his affair as soon as his oldest at home was old enough to buy a car for so that he didn't need me any more to drive the rest of his children around.

Before we took our trip together at the beginning of this month Dr. Harley told me that it would be best for us to continue living in one house for me and one for the children untill the childern are grown. He's the expert and I guess he has seen this work but I have major questions about how.

At this point we are not even talking about that or anything though. Before the trip, my H told Dr Harley that he would stop banking with the OW. She is the manager at his bank. He changed banks for some months at my insistance but as soon as I filled took his accounts back to her bank. He said, "He can trust her". We had a very good time on our trip. On the way home he started saying he was going to take time to change banks. Dr. Harley recomended that there was no need to even date if he was not willing to keep this commitment.

Then when I talked with my attorney it became clear that the foundation of our whole marriage was so bad that there wasn't any way to salvage it unless we decided to start over from the beginning. This has to do with the prenup that H had me sighn the day of our marriage. We have fought over its interpretation our whole marriage. I had no problem with granting that what was his and mine before we got married should stay in ours and our childrens posession. I had my attorney add a clause that I enterpreted as meaning that all the fruit of our labor after we got married would be both of ours after we got married though. He interpreted the clause to mean that the farm was his before he got married so when he worked 110+ hours on the farm that income was still all his and only what he chose to put in the family budget became ours. Of course he was never generous with anyone except his kids. We fought bitterly about this from the time I became aware of his feelings which was about 6 months into our marriage when his farm bank account started growing enough that he opened a savings account in his name alone. We fought untill he added my name. This selfishness repeated itself again and again. The attorney said that the clause that my attorney added does not legally protect me from my H selfishness. We have fought for 8 years about this. I know his point of view and he knows mine and I'm not willing to fight any more. His having an affair gives me a biblical reason to walk away from this marriage. I would still give him another chance in a heart beat. I'm not looking for someone better and I don't want to be alone but I can't live with the fighting and unhappiness. I guess I still have a small hope that after we are divorced he will want to start fresh with me again. I told him that I would entertain the possibility. I have an appointment with the attorney on Fri. to discuss propossing a settlement. We'll see what becomes of that.