You need to stop blaming yourself. She CHOSE to have the affair. It has nothing to do with you. It is a selfish act that only has to do w/her. I beat myself up all the time over this same thing. I always say to myself, "I must not have been good enough for my H." So not true. If there was a problem she had with you, she should have discussed it with you, not cheated on you (same thing my H did.)


You're not a psychic. You didn't know what exactly it was she wanted because she decided not to talk to you about it....not your fault!!!

It's ok to hurt, but don't hurt over something you think you did wrong, hurt b/c you tried everything you could and she wasn't willing to fight for the M along with you. Again, HER fault!!!

--CO

cheated: all i have to say is truuuuuuuuuuuueeeeeeeeeeeeee dat
how are things w/ you today any special plans this weekend?

I'm doing ok today. No plans for the weekend. It is supposed to rain all weekend. That means good sleep weather for me. As you may have guessed, I love to sleep probably b/c it is the only time my mind is at peace. I'll probably get some housework done too to keep my mind off things. I have a lot to catch up on. Our dryer broke the other day and they were coming to fix it today. I hope they did. Did you get your wash done? Did you figure the bleach thing out?

What are your plans for the weekend? How long do you have the kids for?

--CO

well dang it all its going to be sunny here all weekend damn this fl weather.

i did sum laundry 2 day no bleach though.

this weekend i dont know what im going to do i may go watch a movie cause thats when my mind isn't thinking.

as far as the kids they will be w/ her 2 nite i dont know about the rest of the weekend.

i would like to go to my friends wedding but at the same time she will be there and i know i'll break down and ask her to dance and fill myself up w/ useless hope and what not.

i think i just did a bad thing i feel so good yet so very
bad.. ooooooooooooooppppsssssss.

what happened? What's wrong? What did you do?

well ah she came to pick up the kids so that they can go spend the night w/ her and well you know that thin line between love and hate. you get the picture? mind you im not complaining was it wrong though.

I'm guessing you mean SF?

where do i find a link to alll these abbreveations

MB codes

SF means sexual fulfillment

hey bro...im sure you fig'd out i have some FAR out opinions or ways of seeing things some times.....that said, you are still a MAN with needs....on this crazy rollercoaster, you can sometimes feel like youve lost your mind and feel "bi-polar"...

ive read that "bi-polar" can cause intense sexual appitite followed by extreme lows and lack of libido...thats what the BS roller coaster felt like to me...

if i didnt get it from my wife at the time, i "got" it else where...(remove any moral judgement here)

my opinion...just keep it for what it was....SEX...nothing more/nothing less....and dont let it cloud your mind...you still have NEEDS.....

OK

It's crazy for me to sit here and agree with what sturgis05 just said. But I do agree. I look at it a little differently though. I look at it as she is STILL your W. I don't see anything wrong w/it. It might do you some good. I know how you men are with sex. I guess I wasn't giving my H enough and that's why he went outside the M and "got" it elsewhere <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

strug where you been hows life on your end.

and yes i mean SF.

TJing (thread-jacking) to comment on CO's above post that "I guess I wasn't giving my H enough and thats why he went outside the marriage..."

Maybe male perspective from sturg and saenz would be helpful here too...anyway...

CO I beat myself up about this very same thing...obviously we have something going on here..we had 4 children in 6 years afterall <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> but I definitely don't feel at the height of my sexual self emotionally when I have a nursing baby and little ones hanging off me all day. My H's PA started when our 3rd was 8 wks old and I am not even sure if we had had our first post-partum SF yet. I asked him days after d-day if we had had SF before 8 wks would that have prevented the A? In his fog at the time he sort of indicated a "maybe" to that, but I know now that is ridiculous, that was not why he had an A or it wouldn't have been a 2 1/2 month A. Men, thoughts? (sorry if this feels like a thread-jack, saenz)

Anyways, what I guess I am getting at is CO we cannot let ourselves think that if we had just given them more this wouldn't have happened. I have to think an A is more complex than just SF....it embodies the word STUPIDITY. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Our 4th baby just turned a year and we still are not in a good SF pattern and I think about this sometimes but don't feel threatened that he would look elsewhere...but I am also not a blind girl anymore and keep my radar up in a positive way for the preservation of our now healthy, happy marriage.

Blessings,
Glad

glad:
no problem, in my case is some what the same as yours we have 4 kids as well, 2 SC hers and our 2 who are almost a year apart.

like you my wife had lost intrest in SF after the 4th baby
little by little i had to beg for SF and thats not cool a husband shouldn't have to do that. however i should of helped out w/ all the stuff around the house and kids and all that i was ignorant to her needs as far as sharing the house hold chores.

also for us it was hard to find time or make time for some us time its hard when you are on a budget and you have 4 kids.

however im not the one who went out and had the A.

but like w/ everything else in life i 've learned that i can't overlook one aspect of my life while trying to deal w/ other stuff.

bottom line for me i put to much into the P side of our marriage and not enough in the E part of it.

now i feel like i have failed my family even though i know im not the one who had the A i also didn't notice the signs of an unhappy W. people say that they chose to do what they did but lets be honest they might of not of had an A if we would of just payed alittle more attention at least in my case.

i hope that helps a little if not its like i've read in other post here which i do put sum value in. which is
men cheat for the P aspect of it where as woman do it for the E side of it. which is worst? for me its the E aspect of it cause sex is just that for men sex. W attach emotions to sex.

well, maybe my view is alitle different, ill throw this out here and give my opinion...

i got married young, 23...my wife got preg early and 24, i was a dad...then 4 yrs later...#2 came along...

i went through periods of complacentcy and boredom in my marriage, as we all do....but I NEVER CHEATED...i would flirt ALL the time, and of course fantasize....i told some here...(im a cop in LA), so there IS NO lack of female attention, if i wanted it!

that said, after my W A, and we seperated, i totally became a "player"....it wasnt about quality, it was about "quanity" ...i had balanced (3) diff. GF at one time, and neither knew of the other...livin total lies...

here i was, 40...going thru D, dating 20 yr olds, and livin like a "rock star"...that was my mantra at the time, "livin like a rock star"...bought another MC, got tattoos, rode to MC raalies, sturgis, hollister, texas...all over...life was pretty good....but i got burnt out on it!!

its no different from any affair or "addiction", its all fun but eventually you get burnt out and it does end....

ok...thats kinda where im coming from when i form some opinions...

SEX, was just SEX...no emotions, no feelings...JUST going through the motions and taking care of a need....

i look back now, most of it was booze related fog, "how many women can i sleep with to get back at my wife"....that was my attitude...

it was all physical...nothing more...if i dated someone more than 3-4 times, then i would "cut em from the team" and move on....

NOW.......i met someone, by accident at the carwash one day, we connected, and ive been in a committed relationship for the past year, acually mid may, is one year...

now, theres emotions involved, my EN's are being met and the physical side of the relationship, well...its totally fulfilled and things are back in balance....

to say a man just does it for physical fulfillment, its true to a certain extent...but i work with many guys, who have cheated and every single one, who gotinto a relationship A, traded down, somewhere along the lines, our EN's DO take over as a priority, eventually replacing the physical part...

i have found, that the more attractive or "smokin" a woman is, the MORE insecure or emotional needy they are...im sure theres all sorts of differences of opinions, but im around all sorts of "beautiful" women....and most of them have security issues...

men have a tendancy to over look inner beauty for outer beauty...because WE are very simple minded when it comes to choosing a mate...JMHO...

anyway....ill take "inner" beauty...over "outer" beauty anyday now...i have found it amazing....that the longer im in my relationship with my current GF, the more beautiful she is...im told by friends, she looks like the lead singer from the band "sugarland"...its a country band....i dont see it tho...i just see a GREAT gal....

but, i found that my #1 need is "affection" not sex...quite the shift from 2 years ago....

anyway...thats my 2 cents...(thanks for not judging me!) <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

""now i feel like i have failed my family even though i know im not the one who had the A i also didn't notice the signs of an unhappy W. people say that they chose to do what they did but lets be honest they might of not of had an A if we would of just payed alittle more attention at least in my case.""



hey saenz, thats my struggel now, ive posted some thoughts to "lovingAnyway" about it, but 2 1/2 yrs later....im finally coming to terms with my sense of guilt or failure...

you need to keep working on your M, until you exhaust EVERYTHING...before you realy start to deal with the sense of failure...

i believe, that a person with good self esteem and healthy ego, may go through a period of un happiness, but if they DO not share that with their spouse and choose to cheat instead....most all of the complaints or "you did this or that" always comes out after the A has been going on...

to take a large amount of blame or blame yourself for their A, is BS (i dont mean betrayed spouse)...

a normal person should say "i like the change, im not sure how long they can keep it up, but its nice and pleasant"....not "too little too late"...

if you take steps to take a hard look at yourself and make some behavior changes, and that the response you get...then i look at it as the same as the "peanuts" cartoon...its all....."whaw whaw whaw whaaaawww whaaw"....it means NOTHING!!!

its all about the WS.....and their selfishness....

thats another 2 cents for ya!! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

Glad,
Thanks for commenting.


Yes, that's true. I do wonder if I would have given him more, though, if the A would have happened. I guess now will be the longest he is going to have to wait for SF. I'm not even close to SF right now and I know I won't be for a long, long time. Am I getting back at him......maybe that too <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />. Now he can see what it's really like to not have SF and he should have been happy with what he had before. Sorry if I sound mean, but that is how I feel. I know I shouldn't be trying to get back at him for what he's done to me, but I'm not ready for SF anyway. If this was our pre-A marriage, I would just give it to him b/c I knew he "needed" it. Now it's about me.


--CO

CO...

dont forget that for a man, sex came be emotionless and just the need thing....for a woman, its alot more complex than that

protect yourself emotionally....do what you must do for YOURSELF....not him!

This is exactly what happened in our case. By the time I got to bed, I wanted to sleep. It wasn't that the sex was bad (which he thought), it was about doing EVERYTHING around the house, working full-time (him part-time) and getting the kids to bed on my own. When it was time for bed, it meant sleeping for me, not sex. My H NEVER helped me around the house. I was burnt out. Here I was supporting him financially, he's working part-time and I'm still doing EVERYTHING. Can you tell this is a sore subject w/me???


They're both just as bad IMO. You said that women attach emotions to sex, well who do you think the men are having sex with, it's women and they are emotionally attached (well, not the wh*res) to the man regardless of whether he is to them or not. Do you understand what I'm saying?

I am such a strong believer in sex being something sacred b/t a husband and a wife. I'm sure a lot of you guys will bash me for this comment but if I were to D and start dating again, I would not have sex before marriage (yes, I realize I would have a hard time finding someone). I admit I made that mistake before (sex before marriage). And I would never do it again. I am living for God now.

--CO