[b]takes 30 seconds:

OK!

start by answering this question:

[color:"red"]Are you willing to lie/deceive your husband that you love, for the rest of your life?

A. yes
B. no
C. not sure[/color]

It's pretty straightforward

.... ???

Pep

Mom... welcome to MB. I am sorry that you have to be here... but since you are, feel free to use all the value it has to offer.

A few things...

1st... you are feeling bashed and mis-understood from everyone posting to you. One thing you NEED to understand... the people here are posting to you because we care. Do you consider a friend to be a good friend if they just tell you what you want to hear and sit back and watch you destroy yourself? Maybe the caring isn't specifically for you... yet... because we don't know you... but we care about building a new informed world about the destructive nature of affairs. But, I can honestly tell you that when you have shared on here and grown, you become personally cared about as well.

2nd... one of the reasons you are getting "picked apart" is because your arguments don't hold up. On one hand you are saying your M is good and open... that you love your H and don't want to hurt him. And then you say that he has hurt you and he deserves it.
You say that your marriage is honest... but you need to lie to him to keep your "honest" marriage.
That you know what you did was wrong but put blame for what you did on your H.
That you want to stay M'd to your H and could not hurt him but yet seem to have not forgiven him for what he did to you.
That you could never hurt your H by telling him about the A... but really you already hurt him by having the A... and you said in your first post that you think H suspected. Can you see how the arguments just don't make sense? That is ok... for now. That is one of the reasons why you are here... because you are confused and need some help.

It is normal to avoid the conflict, to become defensive, to want to hear that you are a good person... but your future choices will determine this.

My W had an A last year and I also found out at the same time that she had a one-night-stand when we were engaged 15 years earlier. We are getting past it, but I have not begun to process the ONS from before our M... that is because I believe it will be harder to deal with. The fact that my W throughout our whole M was not the person I believed she was and that she could lie to me about it for so long. She says she doesn't even think about it anymore. Believe me when I say that the longer you hold onto the secret, the harder it is to recover... because not only did you make the one mistake of the A... but you compounded it every day that you have lied since.

Telling the truth will be hard. You will go to he!! and back and so will your H. But when it is done, both of you will have the opportunity to be better people. To have a M or life built on a solid foundation. If you continue to lie, there will always be a wall up blocking the two of you to be completely intimate and whole. You may not think about it everyday in time, but it will be there... wondering if he will find out, knowing that you are not honest.

To not tell because your M is so good... says that you are afraid that he will leave you. Do you want to live your life with this fear... because it won't go away, it will just get stronger. You will become more needy and afraid. Get rid of this fear by telling the truth. One of three things will happen... a) your husband will leave you and you can rebuild a better life built on truth. Plus you will know that you might be better off because he was able to lie to you and not find the strength to forgive. b)possibly you will decide to leave after telling the truth and move on to a better you because there is too much pain from the past, your H is not willing to forgive you and/or you no longer are afraid to be better or alone. or c) he will forgive and you will build a better life...one without fear because you will know how strong your bond is... and will have the strength to build greater honesty and intimacy for the rest of your marriage.

This is a scary time for you, but really the decision is simple. Every alternative points to a better outcome if you tell the truth. A life built on lies is not one that I would want to live.

Be truthful to yourself... this is not about not wanting to hurt your H... you already did this. This is about being afraid and protecting yourself. Truth is liberating.

Take care and be courageous enough to keep posting here. The advice is not always what you want to hear... that is because there can be real friends here... people who want to see you succeed.

Shaden

Mom,

There are many websites on the net that deal with infidelity. You have stumbled upon one that advocates that keeping secrets in a marriage will cause more problems than stating the truth and dealing with the aftermath.

Most people here will tell you to tell your husband, that is the philosophy that Dr. Harley, the founder of this board, advocates. This is not a philosophy that is held by all parctictioners of marriage counselling, perhaps not even a majority of them. Some of those folk will tell you not to disclose an affair that is long over. If you want to hear that, then you should probably go to another board. People here are going to say tell your husband, no matter what.

Why don't you look into getting into some local counseling and see what the counselor advises?

If I were your husband, I probably would want to know if my wife had an affair. It might explain a bunch to me about things that I couldn't explain about the relationship.

The choice is yours Mom.

Hi Momx4,

Let's begin with this quote of yours... and let's change your paradigm, okay?

A mistake is putting too much salt in the stew. A choice is hopping into bed with someone other than your spouse.

Before you think I'm attacking you, understand that I had an affair, and slept with the other man (OM) once. Only once. Enough damage to last a liftime... I know this, and so do you, or you wouldn't be here.

Momx4, to me, the VERY FIRST thing you should do is to *accept responsibility* for the damage you did to YOURSELF and YOUR MARRIAGE. The fact that your H doesn't know doesn't even matter in this part of the conversation, because YOU KNOW.

Sit your H down and tell him the truth in the most gentle, caring way you can. If you are afraid for your safety, tell your H in a therapist's office. Either way, you MUST tell him.

By the way, I also was an idiot who didn't use condoms when I slept with OM. I have NO EXCUSES - I was an a$$. My (then)H and I had to be tested for STDs (including HIV) several times over the course of two years. It was a horrifyingly scary and ugly time... that's what affairs do. They're messy, disguisting, humiliating and embarrassing.

Do you want to HEAL YOURSELF and YOUR MARRIAGE? There is only ONE WAY to do that - GET HONEST - with YOURSELF and YOUR HUSBAND.

Anything else is unethical, unfair (to him) and will eat your soul.

I hope you can see that this is not an attack, though I can't 'make you' feel anything. If my words, as someone who has gone through what you have, sting, I acknowledge your pain and offer a solution. If my words make you angry, they deserve and second, third and fourth look from you -- it means *something inside you resonates*... please don't be afraid to look at that.

I wish you a healed SELF and a healed MARRIAGE.

PS: The HepC thing is awful. I am truly sorry for the betrayal of your H's dishonesty and what that means to you and your children.

Shaden is right. The problem with this forum is that [censored] has a short shelf life here. It gets killed pretty rapidly on this forum because we have heard it all and see right through it. And because people here do care - and KNOW what works - they are not going to tell you what you want to hear so you will like them.[some here will, but not many] We are going to tell you the truth however ugly and uncomfortable that may be FOR YOUR SAKE.

Secondly, yes there are other counselors who do advocate lying but that is why they are not successful and Dr. Harley IS. They are mostly failures with a very high failure rate. Most are not even PRO-MARRIAGE and instead encourage divorce at the drop of a hat. I have come to believe that most are useless and don't have the slightest notion of the dynamics of adultery in the first place.

But the basic problem with lying about affairs is that it can't be rationally defended, no matter who advocates it. I have yet to see anyone anywhere who could successfully defend it as a good marriage building tool. So, while others may recommend lying in marriages, it is a stupid recommendation that can't be rationally defended. And that is the bottom line. So, you may be able to find some forum or MC who recommends lying in marriage, but it will never make it right. It only makes that MC stupid.

I'm encouraged to see you back, Mx4.

Are you going to answer Pep's questions above?

Jo

Momx4....maybe you don't quite understand...you already have put him through that. Search and read some of my early posts and what a WW continuing to compartmentalize her guilt about a prior wrong will do to both of the parties. You may seem happy right now, but that feeling is not based on reality. If you tell your husband, the first thing that will happen is a tremendous weight will be lifted off your shoulders. Unfortunately, that weight will be put squarely on his shoulders...but regardless of whether after your admission he stays or goes, him knowing the truth is the only decent action that you can do. He deserves to know. He will probably find out at some point anyway...do you think that carrying around this cancer between you both is going to get any better after some more time passes.

RESENTMENT...that is the most difficult thing that I had to work through in my personal recovery. It wasn't the resentment so much about the choices my FWW made in having an A, but her hiding the truth for so many years, again for her own selfish gain, when given that information, it is likley that I would have made the same decision to stay and try and rebuild the marriage, but in many ways I was robbed of that choice. Think about that from the perspective of a BS and then tell your H. The sooner the better.

NT

I just joined this site today and came across your post. I just told my husband last night about my encounter.

I think that yes you should tell him because whatever went wrong that lead you to make the infidelity decision could and probably will happen again.

I didn't sleep with anyone what I was doing could have lead to that. So, I can't totally relate but from what I've read so far on this site the only way to truly work things out is honesty. Good luck