No e-mail other than the one I sent him. This was all in the course of our phone conversation. I am terribly desperate, confused, depressed, anxious and suicidal and will try anything. I did give him the money. I'm guessing I just funded a nice getaway for him and the WW. I just don't know what to do.

Her demeanor around me and the kids is better than it's ever been, she is engaged and somewhat affectionate towards to me, heck we still sleep in the same bed with SF from time to time. She's enrolled the kids in the new church parish and is proceeding like we are going to be here for the long haul but my intel shows that the OM is her Plan A.

This leaves me very confused as she isn't even thinking of the implications of her so called Plan A, if we proceed with the D, the house gets sold and we are both broke living in seperate apartments in the same complex. He doesn't have a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of so, the reality of her so called future with Plan A is pretty bleak unless she is willing to support him (with my Child Support and Maintenance payments) so he can continue to meet whatever EM's she is missing from me.

B,

I notice that you have a great talent of ignoring the advice given to you here and using “impatience” as your excuse for not doing the right thing. Before I comment anymore on your thread I need your answers on the following questions. I do not want to waste your time nor mine.

1. Do you agree that your way has not worked so far?
a. Are you willing to try doing things differently and listen for a change?

2. Are you willing to MAN UP? You say that you feel like a doormat, so are you now willing to shed that doormat’s skin? Only if you are, will I jump in into the fray, but others will help you anyway.

Good luck, and I look forward to your answers.

UVA,

1) Yes, I've not had much success....

2) Yes and it would be a great help if I had someone coach me at every turn

3) I am tired of being a doormat for sure. It's not necessarily impatience that is my "excuse". Trust me when I say this I am just about at the end of my capacity to deal with this.

I await your reply (and encourage others to jump in)

BS

Cool, I have to go now, but I will read up your sitch later on today and comment on what I think you may want to do to help your case.

But the biggest thing though is your willingness to MAN UP to give your M a chance and to protect CHILDREN and yourself. I am glad we have this squared out.

Later.

P.s. Before making any more drastic moves, like giving $ to the OM, run it by us first. 20 heads are better than one.

I really appreciate the help. Unfortunatly, I've already paid the guy off.....I realize it's a slim chance it will work. I'm really that messed up.....

Does she know he sold her out for $? That might help burst the fantasy of it all. Did you put in the memo of the check "payment so you'll stop ***ing my wife"?

This is blackmail. I'd consider calling the police, but that's me.

You definetly need to focus. One year of this... how's your plan A been? Completely emilinated LB's, trying to meet her top EN's? If it's been good, it's probably time to consider Plan B. You cannot continue as you have. - Dru

Dru,

We split up our finances shortly after I filed for a D so, she has no idea about any of this. In my e-mail to the OM (at the beginning of this thread) you will note that I asked him to keep it between him and I and he has as if WW knew, her additude would probably be a bit different.

I have followed Plan A guidelines as best as I can with as few LB's as possible, unfortunatly, I really don't know what her emotional needs are as she cannot (more likely will not) articulate them to me so, it's hunt and peck all the way.

Technically, it's extortion as he is promising to keep away, dissapear as a form of protection. Plan B isn't possible due to financial constraints so a 180 plan is the only option. Wish I had someone local to coach me.....

BS

You paid the guy off?? So you have a contract or formal agreement?? Wow...I can't believe....it...speechless...

Listen to these people and determine what it is you want...cause that $5000 did nothing at all for your marriage....

Nope, nothing in writing other than the words we spoke on the phone yesterday. I am that desperate.....

Look, if you had enough $ to pay $5000 to the schmuck, they you could do Plan B.

Do me a giant favor - spend a little more $ and set up an appointment with Harley TODAY, OK? The link is below.

[b]Marriage Builders®' Counseling & Coaching Center page[/b]

It's your best bet - get the professionals involved - Dru

UVA's War Post

This is what I wrote from another thread. It may be useful:

I prefer not to hold any punches when I speak, and what I say below may be hard to swallow, but you need to hear the truth so that you may act in a way that is most conducive to the achievement of your goals. Thus, what I say is not for the weak-hearted. Where I seem harsh, I do not mean to offend, it is to WAKE YOU UP from the big slumber that you seem to be in. I, like the others, have your best interest at heart. In the end, you will be ok and remember that you are stronger than you think you are, as will be discussed below.

What follows will be very long, as I gave a lot of thought of what I wanted to say to you and tried to come up with a fairly comprehensive strategy that you may want to put into action. It will be information overload and you won’t get many of it right away. But use it as a guideline and refer to it on an ongoing basis in addition to the advices you are getting from others on your thread. In time it will all make sense. So break what follows up in parts and come back to it from time to time.

I think analytically, so I will write in an outline form in the hope of being as clear as I can.

A. ACCEPT REALITY for what it really is.

You wife is in a full blown affair and you are, sorry to say, being played for a fool. All WSs at some point or another play their BSs for a fool. So you are not alone.

I will say more on exposure below, but for now I think you need to expose to your parents for two reasons. One, you will need all the emotional support you can get and they can be a big source of that. Second, you obviously need some outside perspective from all of this, and I think your parents can clearly point out to you what is really going on even though you are refusing to believe your own eyes.

So accepting reality is one of the first steps you need to take in order to give yourself a chance to save your M, to protect your CHILDREN and yourself.

B. You need to MAN UP

I hope you understand the concept of war. This crap you are going through is war. It is a war to save your M, to protect your children, and to maintain your sanity. Even though you may feel fear, you must act decisively, lest you and your children become the latest casualties of infidelity.

The weak may inherit the earth, but they do not win custody…especially if they are males. You need to be strong to fight for your children. Further, as some has suggested, women do not like men they perceive as weak. You will not win your WW back by catapulting to her every demand. Since, right now she does not have your best interest in mind, she is sure to exploit whatever weakness you exhibit. Thus, you are going to have to start standing up for yourself. It does not mean that you have to be rude, which is totally contrary to Plan A, but you need to stop being a doormat. A delicate balance, I know; a necessary one, nonetheless.

C. SNOOP

We know that there is an A. What you need now is proof of the A. The proof in my opinion is neither for you nor for your wife, since both of you know (and should know in your case) of the A. I see no value in trying to convince a WS that they are in A. If they are in A, they know they are in A. Trying to convince them that they are in the A is a waste of time.

Now your WW will try to convince you that she is not in an A, but if you know that your WW is in an A (as should be the case here), it is also a waste of time to argue with her about the existence of her A. When you have the proof in hand you can just show it to her if you wish—provided this does not jeopardize your source or legal case—but I don’t think that is necessary. You can just tell her that you know she is in an A and she can do whatever she wants with this information, i.e., the knowledge that you know what is going on. Don’t let her trick you into a fight on this. It is a waste of time and emotionally draining.

There are two other reasons, however, why I believe it is imperative to get proof of the A. One, you need proof for your legal case if your situation proceeds that route. Merely saying that you WW is having an A will not be enough. Since your WW is going to lie and say otherwise, you will need proof that can stand in court. You don’t want this issue to be just a he-says/she-says scenario in court. Note that even if the divorce laws in your state say that infidelity is irrelevant, infidelity may nonetheless be a factor in deciding who gets custody of your children. Moreover, since the judge is human, and even if the law says one thing, human nature will force him or her to take your WW’s infidelity into consideration when he or she deliberates on your case.

A second reason to snoop is to establish your credibility to those you expose to. Your parents will naturally believe you, so this is not for them. But her parents, and friends, others who can be influential with her, will be more apt to come to your aid if you can back up claims to them. A WS is a big time liar. Therefore, your WW is a big time liar right now. Just as she is lying to you now, she will be lying to those you expose to. If you have irrefutable proof in hand, she will have no where to hide and those you expose will have to come to terms with the reality of the situation. For these two reasons, I think it’s important to snoop your butt off on this.

How do you snoop? Well as others said, get telephone recording devices, car or personal tracking devices, computer keyloggers and hire a PI. Hiring a PI would especially be good. That would really solidify your case in court for custody, should it come to that, and open the exposure targets eyes to what your wife has really been up to. I know that hiring a PI may seem very expensive to you right now, but a divorce and losing custody of your children will be much more expensive than that, this I promise you.

Others are better expert on how to go about snooping, so I will defer to them on that. But what is clear, is that you need to do it.

D. Plan A: Exposure

1. Make a list of exposure targets and proceed to expose to them. They should be your parents, her parents, her siblings, friends of the M that can have influence on your WW. Later on, if that does not work, you can expose to the church you guys go to if you go to one or other people that can make a difference in your sitch.

2. When you expose be sure to tell the people that you expose to that your goal is to save your M and that you need their help in reaching that goal.

3. Do not threaten your WW that you are going to expose. Just do it. Do not tell her your plan here. In fact, do not tell her any of your plans in trying to save your M and protecting yourself and your children. Just as you would not tell an enemy your plan in a war, you don’t want to tell your WW your plan in this battle. Unfortunately, all WSs are the enemies of marriages.

4. Be ready for a big backlash when you expose. Your WW will say that your M is over, that this is the last straw, blah blah blah. Don’t worry, you will survive it! But don’t argue with her on this; just keep telling her that you will do whatever it takes to protect your M. Keep repeating this over and over as she brings it up.


E. See a Lawyer ASAP

1. Be sure that your lawyer tells you what your rights are, both for divorce and custody purposes.

2. With respect to custody, do not change your schedule with your children to accommodate your WW. The court will most likely give custody to the parent who takes care of the children and is there for them the most. As of now, that seems to be you. WW’s lawyer may told her that she needs to change the nature of the relationship that you have with the children, so WW can better position herself for custody at your expense. Do not accommodate her at all in this end. Continue to be the primary caretaker of your children.

Further, be sure to document all your interactions with your children and WW from now one. Again, in court your mere words will not be sufficient. If you document everything, however, the court will give me more credence to your contentions than your WW’s. Henceforth, not only do you write down everything you do for children and everything your WW does not do for her, keep every receipt of the things that you do for your children.

Also, when you document what is going on, make sure to write with a pen. A typed document will be given less credence in court (because you could have just written it just before court day). So get to work on this.

3. Don’t discuss divorce with your WW. You do M and your lawyer does divorce. If she wants to discuss divorce refer her to your lawyer. Be a broken record on this too. Do not let her bait you into divorce talk. Your WW will claim that she will do this and that to you if you don’t give in to her. Don’t take her seriously or listen to her nonsense on this. You have much more legal rights than she knows or wants to acknowledge. Thus, on the legal front, listen to your attorney, not your selfish, deluded, fogged-out WW.

4. Put your finances in order, and ask your parents to help you with upcoming financial difficulties that you will face because of this.

a. Separate your finances from WW. WS are known to deplete the finances of the family while in the throes of the A or when they are contemplating divorce or separation. You need to do this ASAP.


F. Schedule an appointment with the Harleys.


G. Plan A: Being the Best You Can Be.

1. Be as nice as possible to your WW without condoning the A. Do not be a doormat! Many confuse Plan A with being a doormat, and I vehemently disagree with this. Set up your boundaries without gratuitously being mean to her.

I believe being the best you can be will encompasses you treating her well. You see if you are being the best person you can be, you will strive to be the best husband, the best father, and being the best in whatever other roles your life entails. In being the best possible husband you can be, you would want to treat your wife well and meet her needs. Thus, you would try to find out what her needs are and try to meet them. You would be polite with her whenever you’re given the chance. To be sure, as a WS, your WW will rebuff many of your kind overtures, but that should not deter you in trying to be a great husband. Similar considerations apply to your roles in the other areas of your life.

But please do not confuse this with letting your WW walk all over you. A BS should never have to grovel to a selfish, unethical, irrational WS. Be polite, kind and loving whenever given the chance, but be firm and strong with respect to your boundaries.

In short, determine your shortfalls as an individual in all of the roles you play, and try to rectify them.

H. Get Full STDs Testing

Many on this site want to bypass this step, but I think for your health, your peace of mind, and the well-being of your children, you need to do it. STDs are alive and well in this country even though almost everyone, including me, wants to pretend otherwise. To ignore it is a big mistake in my opinion.

Most WSs have unprotected sex with the OPs. Thus, the BSs, when they sleep with their WSs, expose themselves to all the potential STDs that the OPs may have had. We have some cases here where the BS fell victim to an STD courtesy of his or her beloved WS. This is not a game, and as unsavory as it is to think about it, you must protect yourself.

In addition, before you have unprotected sex with your WW in the future, be sure she gets herself tested first. Since she slept with OM, you should require this as a condition for unprotected sex with her. If you want to pretend that the possibility of STD does not exist in your case, feel free to do so. You can deny this all you want, but an STD, if any, will not deny you.

I. Pray to God and ask Him to help you with this.

Although God helps those who help themselves, this is the most important step, in my opinion. He is greater than all of us and greater than all of this. It will be hard, but slowly and surely you should learn to put this, with everything every thing else, in His hands.

J. Some General Points

1. Do Not Move Out no matter what.

2. If WW wants to leave, she goes by herself. Your children stays at home with you, where they belong.

3. Ask OM to leave your WW alone, so that there will no doubt about how you feel about their A. Don’t expect much from this. It will be more to put OM on notice of your resolve to fight for your M.

a. If you can afford it, do like Bob Pure did and find out every thing you can out about OM. Find about his weak spots, and we can try to see where we can exploit them.

4. I think this bears repeating, do not grovel and beg your WW to stay with you. One, since you did not do anything wrong, you do not deserve to put yourself in that position. Second, a woman wants a man that they can respect. They won’t respect or be attracted to a groveling man. So even if your reflexes are to beg, stop yourself from doing said action.

5. Do not try to reason with your WW while she is a WW. As they are fond of saying here, WS are abducted by aliens. They cannot reason, and all they want is their next affair fix. You would be wasting your time if you think you can make your WW see the logic of your position. Just let her know your conclusions if need be and move on. (Do this in a non-DJ way though).

In the same vein, do not try to make sense of every utterance that comes out of your WW’s mouth. Again, you will be wasting a lot of time trying to follow the logic or reason of your WW’s statements. She is confused and thus so will be her words.

6. Unless it obvious, do not believe anything your WW tells you right now. WSs are pathological liars. As I have heard here, believe nothing a WS tells you, and only half of what you see. Also keep in mind that your WW does not have your best interest at heart at the moment; she is h*ll bent on destroying your M. Hence, as a rational person, you cannot rely on what she tells you.

7. Be acutely aware that what is going on in your M right now is NOT YOUR FAULT. It is easy to believe that your shortcomings in the M are the reasons that your wife cheated, especially when your WW rewrites the history between you two and blames you for everything. You may not have been the perfect husband, but you did not make her have an affair. I suspect your WW was probably not the perfect wife either, but yet you did not go outside of your M to fix your “marriage problems.” Her A is her personal CHOICE. People are free to make their own decisions. So repeat after me, “IT IS NOT MY FAULT THAT MY WIFE IS IN AN AFFAIR; IT IS HER CHOICE!”

8. Again, do not discuss your plans with your WW.

10. Even though it may not seem like it, your M is very salvageable.

God Bless.

Unbelievable.......absolutely unbelievable. I am speechless and will reserve further comment for the moment.

Thanks UVA,

I won't respond to every point of your post but will confirm that I've done most of it already. Exposure, Done shortly after D-Day August of last year. Snoop, you bet, access to everything and anything, anytime. Contacting an attorney, Done, I filed for divorce and she was served 8/05 (this is before I found this site and realized I had acted out of pride and ego).

Up until a couple of months ago, we were heading straight for the D in fact, our trial date was set for 6/7-6/8/06. She came to me and said she wanted to try and work things out so, I called my Attorney, dropped my petition and she called her attorney and put her counter-petition on status hold with a meeting in front of the Judge 10/06. We actually had everything worked out, Custody, Visitation and Financials all done so, we could have had everything over with two months ago.

My intel was that the relationship was ending but, and ever she admitted that it wasn't going anywhere. Well, I was wrong (I guess this is the accepting reality thing), NC lasted for about 30 days when she contacted him basically throwing herself at him and pressing him for a committment.

Anyway, Plan A isn't difficult for me however, I don't do well with the balance between holding my boundaries and being a doormat. It seems that whenever I explain to her that I don't appreciate the fact that she is calling him and it needs to end, she takes that as an ultimatum and basically says, "maybe I should call my attorney and get this over with" Well, it seems that she will do anything to stay right up on top of that fence, playing me and our kids and I suspect the OM as well. She is eating cake every step of the way.

This is where I fall apart and all the MB principles go out the window.....Thanks to all for the insight.

Lemonman, I understand, I too don't know what to say about my own actions.

To all: I've been thinking of telling the WW about the phone conversation with the OM and the little "help" he said he needed to dissapear. I was originally thinking that this is something I would not ever tell her but the more I think of it.... She might not beleive it but I have the deposit slip and his bank account number.....

Thoughts, Suggestions, Flames, All welcome here.

BS

Oh and did I mention we just sold our house and bought another (more expensive) one??

Before you make big economic move with or on behalf of your ww, please run it by us first. I really don’t know what you were thinking (again) when you bought this new house. Oh well.

Since you have money, I strongly suggest you make an appointment with the Harleys. I think they can be really helpful.

And yes, you should definitely tell ww about the money you gave OM. She may then see him for the scum he really is.

UVA and all, I am leaning towards telling her about the e-mail, phone call and money but I have one great fear. She will call her attorney and proceed with the divorce. That will then leave us back where we started. I know most of you are frustrated and angry with my gut reactions here but I am doing the best I can with what I have. I would like to see a few more regulars chime in here on whether I should tell WW or not.

Thanks again for all your support

BS

Where has your fear gotten you so far? If you are satisfied with the results you have been getting so far, then by all means continue to follow your emotional inclinations.

I, for one, believe one your biggest problems is YOU. You are trying to preserve what you have already lost—a faithful loving wife. The sooner you accept this reality the sooner you can start doing what you need to do, instead of living in fear of losing something you have already lost.

How did you pay this guy? Did you put a check in the mail? If so, how about just putting a stop payment on the check? It'll cost you $15 but that's better than $5k.

And I agree with the others...if you have this kind of money to throw around, call SH.

I deposited Cash into his bank account.......

Yes, I understand that I have been my worst enemy many times in the last 12 months. So, are you suggesting I accept whatever consequences arise from me telling her all about the communication and payoff to OM? This will more than likely end in a divorce which, is what I am trying to avoid.

Not true. You are merely responding to you fear, for the most part.