have the discussion with her about the difference between PRIVACY and SECRETS .... you may find out that what she really desires is some privacy ....

where is that list by 2- Long????

lemme go look for it

Pep

found it !

"The Difference Between Secret And Private

Private matters are those traits, truths, beliefs, and ideas about ourselves that we keep to ourselves. They might include our fantasies and daydreams, feelings about the way the world works, and spiritual beliefs. Private matters, when revealed either accidentally or purposefully, give another person some insight into the revealer.

Secrets, on the other hand, consist of information that has potentially negative impact on someone else-emotionally, physically, or financially. Secrets, when revealed either accidentally or purposefully, cause great chaos or harm to the secret-keeper and those around him or her.

Private: I believe in reincarnation.

Secret: I have a wife and a mistress and neither knows about the other.

Private: I got terrible grades in high school.

Secret: I forged my medical degree.


The Difference Between Truth and Honesty

Truth is empirical, demonstrable fact. Your bank balance, today's date, whether or not you're married.

Honesty is about feelings. If you're honest, you are open and clear about how you feel. You can be truthful without being honest and you can be honest without being truthful (the latter a little more difficult). The best relationships, stating the painfully obvious, are both truthful and honest. Trust is built on both truth and honesty, tempered by the proof of predictability and reliability."

Knew - I understand your point.

Pep - Thanks for the post. I don't know if it is as much about privacy and secrets, as it is about being hidden or exposed.

The analogy I use in my mind is wearing a belt. You wear a belt to keep your pants from falling down, to keep from exposing yourself. The belt helps keep a part of you hidden. The more you don't want to expose yourself, the more you tighten the belt. You loosen the belt when you are willing to risk exposing yourself.

Exposing yourself emotionally and (no pun intended) physically is intimacy.

There are some people who have a very hard time with intimacy. They don't feel safe exposing themselves. They want to wear the belt tighter and tighter to make sure that no one sees what is hidden beneath. There can be a lot of reasons for this, low self esteem, upbringing, having an A, conflict avoidance, etc.

What has frustrated me with my talks with MT has been she says she has trouble with intimacy, trouble with loosening the belt, in general. But the mere fact that she discussed our M with OM, could invalidate this. I'm not sure, but I think so.

Anyway, I'm trying to find a middle ground, a criteria, for establishing what we must be open about. Loosen a notch or two on the belt without the belt having to come off, so to speak.

But I don't really know how to define that, since its somewhat a function of the observer.

But maybe I'm completely nuts.

MT and I are on day 10 of living in the same house. For the most part it has been fun for me. I think MT has had a good time too.

Last night we had a very long talk until about 4:00 in the morning. It was mostly about MT's family and things like that. However, one thing MT keeps bringing up is exposure. She feels this has ruined her credibility with her family and makes reconciling more difficult. She feels I did not give her enough time between D-Day and when I exposed. She says she is p***ed off about it. Not at me, but at the situation, and would have rathered handled the matter between us.

I feel, and told her, that I did what I had to do, that if she had ended contact immediately and moved home, and had been truthful with me from the start, that I would not have exposed. I also told her I did not feel I owed her time to end the A and also could not wait because she potentially would have created a story to her family about how I was nuts or something.

I also asked her to try and reverse the situation and what would she have done if she were in my position. She said she doesn't know, but asked how would I feel if it were reversed and she had exposed to my family. Honestly I told her I would be p***ed off too.

Anyway, so what's done is done. Anyway FWS out there that had exposure done to your family. How did you mend that? Should I be less matter of fact about this? Should I be doing something to help MT work through this?

rp,

I am not a FWW <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />. But, it occurs to me, that your W is missing something here, as are you. Her family and your family and presumably others know she cheated on you. She is ashamed of that...I hope so anyway. But, what she has not factored into this is that by exposing the affair, you had to suffer some humiliation as well. Most BS's feel humiliated that their spouse cheated on them, and found someone else. It is hard to expose that to other people.

Now the opportunity that sits before BOTH of you is really simple. You both have the opportunity to show the people you care about that: you can learn, you can forgive, you can love, and that you able to overcome mistakes.

Some won't be impressed but little will impress them. Most will be impressed and will ultimately use you two as an example of what working on a marriage can do, what love can overcome, and how two people that love one another can deal with anything.

So let me ask you would you or she be embarrassed if they felt that way about both of you?

Ask her that questions as well.

God Bless,

JL

rprynne,

Explain to MT that she is the one that ruined her credibility with her family by having an affair...THAT is ALL HERS to OWN...Um rprynne, do you feel that MT was fair to you, or "gave you enough time" to work on the marriage before she started an affair? Please tell her that I said if she is P*SSED OFF about it to redirect her anger where it belongs...FULLY ON HER SHOULDERS AND IN HER LAP...(Hey, it's not a love buster from me! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />) Agree with her and tell her that you too feel that you should have handled your marital problems between the two of you and that you would have much preferred for OM not to have been involved...SHOCKING, huh?

As far as damage control with family...I exposed myself to my family...I have been honest with them about the nature of affairs and told them what an imbecile that I was then, and all that I am doing to change that and make ammends now...They get it, appreciate my candor, applaud our efforts, support our family and love us all very much! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

I am glad to hear that you guys seem to be enjoying each other and opening up! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Mrs. W

EDITED TO ADD: MY FAMILY WAS VERY P*SSED AT ME!!! UNDERSTANDABLY and THANKFULLY...I just wanted you to know that it was not just "EASY/BREEZY"...

JL and Mrs. W


I do think MT at times misses that exposure was not easy on me. I think she sees it as it was no big deal for me because I was the victim or the righteous one who did no wrong. I really did not want to expose. I don't know if MT realizes this, but most of my exposure talks had less to do about what she was doing and more about where I felt I failed in our M. The letter I sent her parents ends with me apologizing to them for being a failure as a son in law.

I struggle to convey this message to MT. Immediately after D-Day, you don't believe a word the WS says. You have lost your capacity to listen, you have lost your ability to see in shades and colors. You only go with what you see in black and white.

What MT feels now, is that if I had given her more time, she would have come around. That I misintrepreted her actions. She has said exposure did nothing to affect our situation. It was something that provided no benefit and only caused problems. She may very well believe that and the fact of the matter is she may very well be right.

Its the analogue of when she says to me, how would you feel if it were reversed and I exposed to your family, when you knew your were getting ready to come around. I like to think that I would have taken responsibility for my actions and talked it with my family and tell them I made a mistake. Maybe I would have, maybe I wouldn't.


I agree - we will never know for sure what the path would have looked like if we each had done different things. I just would like to find a way to help MT through this with her family. My father came up right after d-day and I had these talks with him. I had these talks with my mother. MT thinks my parents don't love her anymore. Its not true. I explained to them the nature of affairs and what was going on and what I wanted to do. They were dissappointed with the situation, but they were supportive and they cared for me and they cared for MT. I can remember, my father got a little emotional (which he sledom does), when I was talking to him about the mistakes we had made in our M. He felt like he had done some of the same things and decided when he got home he was going to change those things. I would like MT to talk it out with her family. But we have differnt kinds of families. Mine was always very open to talking about anything, while MT's has always been sort of closed.


I think MT knows this. I think MT would also say she feels she gave me enough time to work on the marriage. We have talked at length about this. Still one of those things we are going to have to sort through.

rprynne...

There were options available to her if she felt this were the case...

1. Talking to you

2. Marital Counseling

3. Divorce

A relationship with another man is not an available option for a married woman...It simply is not...

As far as whether or not exposure was effective...Yes, it was...It damaged the affair irreparably, whether she chooses to see this as truth or not doesn't make it less true...

Mrs. W

Mrs. W - 100% agree, in fact that is exactly what I said to her.

I think MT knows this. She knows it now. I think at the time during her A she felt, she couldn't divorce me, and she tried to talk to me about it.

She asked me last night, why are you making all these changes now, when I had been asking you for years to do this. I told her I just never understood the seriousness of the situation. I told her I just took our M for granted.

rprynne...

I think that is a very normal response that you are getting from MT regarding the changes...She doesn't trust them yet...I understand that feeling...I remember it...FWIW, Mr. W's changes were real, and so were mine...And we are still at it and lovin' it! It takes time...baby steps...I think that you are on the right track now that you are living together! Keep at it!

Mrs. W

Edited to Add...MT got mail from me a few days ago...

MT had to go out of town on Monday. It was work related and she is supposed to be back tommorrow.

Anyway, we talked some last night. One topic that came up was that I didn't really care about work anymore. I tried to explain my feelings were that work was always a means to an end for me. What I was working for was to make enough money to support kids, her, etc. and then one day retire comfortably. That I really wasn't all that concerned about material things. I felt like things had changed in my/our life to such an extent that there was no end I was working for. I have enough money to retire and just do something like odd jobs.

MT said she was frustrated hearing this because she felt like I really cared about material things and that is why she worked so much. I told her that to some extent I did care about material things, but since she has essentially been gone for a year and a half, I realized that I only cared about those things as a way to bide my time when she is gone. I've noticed that when she is home I have no desire for any of my material things.

Well, I was up most of the night thinking about some of this. All of the above is okay, I mean its MT and I being open and honest. But the thing that kept me up all night was the fact that in the year post D-day, there never seems to be an Ah Ha moment. Its like in that little conversation MT told me she was only working to keep me happy. Then I tell her that her working is not what makes me happy, I would be happier spending more time with her. That seems like a big revelation to me, but to her, it just seems like oh, that's nice, glad we cleared that up. But I sense that nothing is going to change in her workload.

I'm not trying to compare myself to OM. And its not that all their time was fantasy. I know from the e-mails, they fought. He made demands on how she treats him. But I have been the best husband, friend and lover anyone could have over the last year. But nothing makes a dent. No Ah Ha's, no sparks. Its like my love bank deposits are worth $1 and OM's are worth $1,000. MT will say it wasn't the OM, but the "idea of OM" I don't know if that is true or not.

What I can't seem to get is that if I was not married to MT. If she just knew me from work or something and I was treating her like this, I think she would be falling all over herself to be with me. But because I'm her H, none of what I do counts. She says she appreciates it, but its like saying thanks for a pair of socks you get at christmas from a second cousin.

This really frustrates me because I feel like for the first half of our marriage, I never neglected MT. But after 8 years of feeling like nothing I do or say "moves" MT, I quit doing it. Then somebody else comes along and does nothing different than what I did for the first 8 years and she is moved so much that she decides to change her values and throw away our M. So then I say I realize I neglected you and I should make some changes in myself. Now when I say, is there some EN I'm not meeting, is there another way you'd like them to be met. She says, no everything I'm doing is great. But its still thanks for the socks.

I keep coming to the same conclusion that MT is consciously or sub-consciously regulating or controlling her emotions to keep me in her eyes as only a friend and not a lover. The spark she searches for can not come from me because she has decided it can not come from me. Is this possible? Why would she do this? What can be done about it?

Mrs W. - Yes, MT told me she got the e-mail. I don't know if she will respond or not

rprynne,

Reading over your entire post, it occurs to me that your wife is not being transparent with you. Do you have full access to ALL of her communications tools?

Two flags for me:
1) The phone - I don't buy the phone story she fed you for a second. Keep your eyes open for a replacement.
2) The email...did you read it? Why hasn't she blocked his address? Set up an email rule to auto-forward these to you then move them to junk.

Her pleas for your trust aren't genuine. I suspect you have gotten the ten days you have in her attempt to "stablilize" this end of her life. Just my feeling from this post is that you are being "shined on" to some extent.

Unless she starts making some real attempts at owning what she did and becoming transparent, she will restart the relationship with OM as soon as you are placated.

The exposure? I agree with the others...it is a consequence of her affair...not your action. She HAS to own this. It sounds as if you went about exposure in a good way...not vindictive or mean...so I don't understand her beef.

I don't know about her family, but my family...mom and dad...made it clear to me that while they were dissapointed in what I had done, I was still...and would always be...their son and they would always love me. They were there to help and support us through that.

Until your W starts owning the things she has to do to restore your faith in her, you are ill-advised to trust her.

rprynne...

Ask MT to come back here and start talking with the other FWWs about what they had to do to recover.

IF she's really serious about this, I would expect she'd want to find out all the tips and tricks to making it go as smoothly as it could...

Low - I've asked MT to come back, but I don't know if she will. IMO, she thinks everyone here has an agenda. She thinks I have an agenda. When we go to MC she thinks SH has an agenda. Because of that, it invalidates what anyone says or writes. I think sometimes this is part of the problem between us. Everything I do is viewed as an angle, or managing her. She basically won't just let go and go with it and give it a try.

About her shining me on. I don't think her plan is to start up with the OM. I think her plan is just to start over. But to some extent your right. She is placating me in order to avoid making a decision. She is avoiding making the decision because on one hand, maybe everyone is right and we can recover our M and she'll be happy, but maybe not. So she doesn't want to dissappoint me. She is waiting to feel like being knocked off that fence. But because she tends to filter everything I do, all I seem to be able to do is push her away.

There a lot of good stuff in your last post...



DING, DING, DING!!! SHE'S RIGHT!!!! Everyone here has an agenda! It's the agenda of saving your marriage and rebuilding happiness between you two!
She's clearly a perceptive woman...



This tells you that she has given up power in her life to you and others...and has chosen to resent you for it...

Tell her that nobody has the power to "manage" her unless she gives it to them. And if she gives it to them, she has no one to blame but herself.

When I realized this, it suddenly seemed silly to me that I could be angry with someone for "controlling" me.



It's not an issue of letting go. She has already "let go" of herself and that's why she's in the mess she's in.

She has to GRAB HOLD of herself and reclaim her sovereignty and power. But she fears doing this, because it means she would then have to take responsibility for her actions.

This is what she could learn here.

Low -



But this is a big problem to her. When someone says, "if you get on board with the MB principles, you can be happy". She just seems to view that as "you people would say anything to convince me to stay in the marriage" or "you people are in denial, and are just trying to convince yourself that staying in your M is the right thing and makes you happy"

She has not said this to me, but some of her actions and other comments suggest this. Many of her posts her seem to be fishing for someone to say, "yes, your right, you should leave your M, there is no way for it to be fixed and you to be happy" We were once talking about the book Bridges over Madison County. She told me she did not like the ending because the woman denied herself of her true love and chose to live in a boring loveless marriage for the sake of her kids, husband, and doing the right thing. I have not read the book, but I said to her, you're right, that is a crappy ending. She should have gone back to her marriage and then worked to make it something other than a boring loveless marriage. But that's the crux of it. She does not see that as an option. Its either run off or boring loveless M. No option C in her mind. Because option C doesn't exist, it seems as if nothing I do matters. I have become, in her mind, the symbol of a boring, loveless M.

I once told her about an article I read that said that most people who were unhappy in there M and got a divorce were no happier five years later. She didn't believe me that it was a real article. So I send it to her. She doesn't read it or comment on it.

Now, I don't think she always feels this way. I think she has moments when she says maybe option C does exist. But to her, it should come naturally, with no effort. Like she probably believes it did with OM. If someone says, "no, you put effort into it with OM" Nope, she says, again everyone is wrong and is just trying to convince me to stay in my M.

But here's the thing, the facts suggest she did put effort into it. She denies "intimacy" between her and OM. But I've seen a sprinkling of correspondence from him. She discussed the state of our M, her unhappiness, what she wants for the future, kids, moving in together, her health, etc. In my mind all of this is intimacy, and its all stuff, she won't discuss with me.


You're very right about this. There was a time when I was very controlling, and she had given up that power. Let me elaborate on this and please tell me what you think.

MT has always been the peacekeeper in her family. She can't say no on most things and feels very guilty when she does. She struggles with (in fact I would almost say is terrified of) being a dissappoint to them. This is really what bothers her about exposure. How did she solve this with her family? She minmizes contact with them. She left home the minute she could, vows she would never move back, etc. Keep them at a distance and keep any talks with cliche and superficial. But it eats her up. She will never leave her family, but she will never be close.

When we first met, life was great. She was intimate. Why? Because she didn't have to worry about dissappointing me. My opinion did not matter. Plus, early on in a R, nothing ever dissappoints you. Once my opinion did matter, she pulled away. Just like with her family. At first, work was her refuge. More and more time at work. And that worked for awhile.

The appeal, or "spark" of OM was that she could talk to him without dissappointing him. I believe she keeps breaking contact with him now, at least in part, to keep from dissappointing him.

Now she's in this mess where she feels like everything she does dissappoints someone. She also feels like she is incapable of having an R with anyone because it is going to be inevitable that she dissappoints them. I can't seem to help her with this because she is the one who decides what is a dissappointment to someone else. We can't be intimate because before any word she says to me, she tries to predict whether I will be disappointed. If she thinks I will, then lie, shade, or keep your mouth shut.


I know what your saying. What I mean by letting go is to quit spending so much time managing her image with me, and quit spending so much time trying to manage me.

This alludes to the post I started about Passion...about how passion is easy with someone who you don't have much invested in because you're more than willing to take emotional risks with them. It becomes harder the more attached to them you become.

Her FEAR of disappointing people is destroying her life...and will continue to do so whether she remains married to you or not. Oddly, this fear leads her to conclude that she is being "controlled" by these folks. It's their fault for having such high expectations of her.

She is so worried about everyone else that she has no idea who she is and what she stands for. She is not well differentiated from people she has relationships with.

By constantly seeking peace with everyone, she can never have peace with herself.

People with a strong sense of self can accept that they can't make everyone happy...and don't see it as a personal failure (as long as they have acted with integrity).

Does she see an individual counselor? This is not something that is fixed by taking a Cosmo survey...

Low -


I agree, spot on. This, IMO, is why their is no "spark" with me.


Agree again. This why she feels "smothered" and "trapped" when she is at home. Its not any action or inaction I take, its her watching me, wondering am I dissappointed. The only time she comes out of this a little is when she drinks. Most times, she basically won't talk to me until she has had a drink or two. I would imagine that most of her times with OM she had a drink or two as well. At that time, I did not care to go out much, or drink much. So the low risk of talking to OM and add in a couple of drinks and viola, he's so easy to talk to.


Sadly, no. She started, then quit. She also has told me she has been to two doctors about getting AD's. But they both want to run tests on her hormones. They run the tests, but she doesn't follow up.

You seem to get a little of what I'm talking about. This is why I poke your brain so much, as you seem to have gone through it yourself. I have realized this for quite some time. I just can't think of any way to help her through it.

If I talk to her about, I'm educating her, controlling her. If I don't say anything about it, things don't change. She assumes I'm dissappointed and again I'm controlling her.

I would love to recomend she get some IC. But to be honest, it scares me a little. There seems to be a big trend with IC to just tell people "do what makes you happy" Well, her past experiences of what makes her happy will say "time to cut and run" But that is just a ticking bomb. IMO, she isn't going to be happy until she faces this.

She gets that, she just has not internalized it, if you know what I mean. She has days when she wakes up and plans to do things a different way. But then, that fear of dissappointing comes up and she falls back into old habits.

What I would like is someone to recomend what I should do?

What I have tried to do is be very careful or thoughtful about what actually disappoints me. Similar to what Ark said on your other thread. I don't waste my time worrying about how she loads the dishwasher, etc. I have tried to talk to her on any range of topics. I have said I only need 3 things in my M right now. Honesty, no contact, and her to be at home. If she can do those things, I can assure her I am not dissappointed.

But, this never seems to get through.

MT has been back in town for a few days now. We've been going out and having a good time. At least, I think we are having a good time.

We've had a couple of talks. I really hate that I have to bring things up. I know I don't have to bring them up, but I feel like if I don't talk a little about what's going on, that things are going to just happen right before my eyes. Kind of like when I kept my mouth shut and the A happened.

So, one of the talks was about my spying. MT seemes a little obssessed by it. I went ahead and told her everything and all the ways I have and could spy on her. Some might think that was a mistake, but, I've found that the spying is not that important to me anymore. Its not that I don't care, its just, well once your eyes have been opened on something like this, its not that hard anymore to see if something wrong is going on. I don't know if telling MT this stuff mattered or not.

Last night we went out for drinks and had another talk. I sometimes get worried that MT only wants to talk to me when she is drinking. Maybe she needs that to get through it, I don't know. I would dearly love to able to have a intimate conversation with my WW as a normal course of a day. Rather, she seems to think they are punishing talks that must be endured. I can't help but think she didn't view it that way with OM. Which really gets me cranky at times, since IMHO, her actions and how she deals with them are what makes conversations with me so difficult and with OM so easy. Of course that can't be true, its just OM is so easy to talk to.

MT has been busy getting the house ready to sell. I'm not sure if she came home to work on things or decide to work on things, or whether she's just here to shut things down.

So I talked to her about that last night. MT says she doesn't know what she wants to do, she's just taking things a day at a time. She said while she's doing this she wants us to spend time together to see if there is anything between us. Sounds nice. I has to ask, well when was the last time you were in contact with OM. "Oh, about two weeks ago, we text messaged" It was no big deal she said. Oh well, NC letter number 4 down the tubes. Guess there's really no point in sending another one.

I kept my cool about it, but I was amazed that she would bring this up and not so much as even comment on how cruel it is.

But she insists our M troubles have nothing to do with OM. She fell in love with him, so that's that. It must be quite the ego boost for OM to have my WW, who is nearly half his age, unable to control herself when ever he waves his hand. MT also explained that she has no intention of being with him, because she is never going to get married again. That's why she loves him, because he is okay with that. She loves him because he doesn't care how she treats him? This guy is playing her so much, and she just can't see it.

Anyway, back to the grindstone.

Last night, MT and I talked.

Basically what came out of it was

1) that her new job was never intended to be our hometown.
2) She did not really want to end contact with OM and doesn't know if she is going to.
3) She Wants to "start over" and doesn't know if she wants or can do that with me.
4) She doesn't want to feel awful anymore
5) She wants to have the freedom to do whatever she wants to do.

Can't say that any of this is something I did not already know. I'm glad she is being honest about it.

My question is, is this some kind of fog talk? I know she has had contact with OM, but they are definately more keeping in touch. Is that enough to keep people foggy, or is this just how it is.