I have cut and pasted something I read on the site.

"The love you and your spouse have for each other is directly affected by almost all of your behavior. This is a point that I will repeat in most of my remaining concepts and Q&A columns. Until now, I have focused attention on behavior that will meet each other's most important emotional needs. When you behave that way, you are caring for each other. But the resulting Love Bank deposits will not do your marriage much good if other behavior leads to Love Bank withdrawals. So to help you gain control over your behavior so that you can learn to avoid making Love Bank withdrawals, I will introduce you to my next basic concept, Love Busters.

Why would any of us hurt the one we promised to love and cherish?

Lack of empathy is at the core of the problem. I was struck with what we are all up against while watching a Star Trek episode. Spock had volunteered to be possessed by an alien presence so that it could communicate with Captain Kirk of the Starship Enterprise.

As soon as it entered Spock's body, its first reaction was, "Oh, how lonely you must all feel."

You see, in the alien world, they were all connected to each other through telepathy so that each one could feel what everyone else felt. They were all emotionally bonded to each other. But as soon as the alien possessed Spock's body, it realized that we humans are all cut off from each other emotionally. And it viewed our state as incredibly isolated and lonely.

One of the most important consequences of our emotional isolation is that we cannot feel the way we affect others. And that creates the temptation to hurt others because in doing so we don't feel the pain we cause. If we were connected emotionally to others as the aliens were, we would be far less tempted to do anything thoughtless, gaining at someone else's expense. That's because in so doing, we would be hurting ourselves as well.

And that's what I always seem to be battling when I try to encourage one spouse to avoid doing anything that would hurt the other spouse. I cannot seem to trigger empathy. Each spouse complains about how thoughtless the other spouse is, without much awareness of his or her own thoughtlessness.

Lack of empathy helps makes thoughtlessness possible. Since we don't feel what other's feel, we tend to minimize the negative effects we have on others, and consider our thoughtlessness to be benign. An angry outburst is regarded by some as a creative expression. Disrespect is viewed as helping the other spouse gain proper perspective. And a demand is nothing more than encouraging a spouse to do what he or she should have done all along. None of these is seen as one spouse gaining at the other's expense, because the spouse who is inflicting the pain does not feel the pain. But whenever one spouse is the cause of the other's unhappiness, one thing's for sure -- Love Bank withdrawals are taking place."

Got me to thinking. I have to take responsibility for MY actions in our marriage, especially the past few years. I was thinking, should I write an apology letter to my husband (who moved out 2 months ago and is in relationship with OW).. saying sorry for the things I did wrong and taking responsibility for my actions. For taking him for granted, for denying him love and affections, for declining to participate in activities, for not appreciating him, etc.

Is that desperate? Or, heart felt?

appreciate any thoughts.

What is your ultimate objective to writing such a letter? What would be accomplished and how will it serve YOUR interests?

Mr. G

I guess I would not consider such a letter as "desperate" as long as the tone and words didn't give him an excuse to say "See? That's why I had my affair!". He had his affair because he chose to violate the marriage vows. He can't excuse an affair/betrayal because of a lack of love/support/appreciation/etc in your marriage.

You can own up to your culpability in creating the marital environment that contributed to his feelings, but you did nothing to make the affair happen.

If your letter acknowledges that the state of the marriage prior to the affair was both of your faults, then I'd say it can't hurt to reinforce this with a letter he can read over and over when he's alone. May serve as a reminder of how much you love him.

All the above is just my $.02 and will get you as far as the gas it will buy.

Good luck.

I think taking stock and culpability for your own poor behavior is a good thing...but I think the timing is wrong from a strategic standpoint if your goal is to recover the marriage.

I want to write the letter to make sure that he knows how sorry I am for treating him the way I did, that I recognize MY part in the state of our marriage. I will not take responsibility for him having an affair, ever. That was his choice.

I want to reach out to him emotionally. I thought it would help him see how much I do love him and am willing to work on my issues, and our issues.

Compose it, then stand back and to see what it really, really, says.

In the aftermath of most all affairs there is usually much regret for stumbling through a marriage and losing purpose. I hope your letter finds its way to give quite pause to both of you.

Mr. G

See, I think this would be a very good idea because he has probably all but given up hope that you are willing or even able to meet his needs. That is why he has written you off so completely.

In order for him to be attracted back, he has to know that you can and WILL meet his needs. I think a well versed letter might plant that seed and cause him to think of you in a new light. Of course, it will take much, much more than that to demonstrate to him that you will meet his needs. It will take ACTION, and a lot of work. It will take a strong focus on becoming as ATTRACTIVE as possible.

And since I greatly respect noodle's opinion, I would want to hear her thoughts on why she thinks this might be a strategic problem and how she thinks this could be best achieved.

thanks everyone for their comments.

I did this...wrote a very lovingly letter I left for him when he returned from a business trip...and during his affair (s).

He kept the letter...and months later when I had filed for divorce? HE USED THE LETTER to prove why I was not a good wife...or at least tried to...said it was MY saying how bad a wifey I was...(insert spew and vomit here!)

So be careful...even though it did NOT fly in court, the WS can use it as fodder to recreate their history with you! Helps with history revision ok?

I am much more in line with verbally saying to one another how you both can heal together...say it...don't write it! DO NOT GIVE AN OUNCE OF AMMO TO A WS ALIEN! they could try to turn it against you. My xh? the loving wonderful man he is, tried to say that my depression (which HE CAUSED AT THE TIME) was why he was leaving our marriage...funny thing though...(and judge said this)...your wife is SANE and never suffered from depression before you HAD YOUR AFFAIRS...HMMMM...

He even told the IL's that I was clinically depressed...yea right! I had barely a touch of depression and it was SITUATIONAL...due to his emotional abuse and his repeated involvement with two QUITE EVIL OW.

Justpeachy, thank you for your comments. Good to have different views.