hiker
it was after i sent my H an e-mail in response to his wanting us to file taxes together so he wouldn't owe $5,000

i told him that if he came home i would file a 6 month extension to give him time to work on our marraige BEFORE i would file as husband and wife

or he could continue to live as though he is single and i would file seperate....

OW resonded instead of my H...telling me my H loathes me and will never come back to me and that they are soooooo happy and building a life together

i ignored her

I wouldn't believe it if I were you. Either she is trying to discourage you from thinking or acting to try to save your relationship or she is jealous of the feelings your H may still have for you.

Good for you, eav. I wonder if OW knew he'd asked you to do this before she saw your email? Heh.
Mulan

very interesting discussions in this thread

thanx
an

mulan and hiker

i was advised by Jennifer harley and mimi to make the answer to my H request about taxes personal and loving but to show that i would only act like his wife if i WAS being treated like his wife....

OW read the e-mail while he was out of town. she may not have liked reading about our romantic times together. she responded..........



my H had not been sending me e-mails that "had not gotten through" in fact he had still never admitted to me that he was living with OW...he had told me he was living alone

maybe this was when she did discover that he had asked me to help him with the taxes

all i know is that he went ahead and filed separate... he borrowed the $5,000 from somewhere

i'm sure she thought my H was loaded when she met him....he had a brand new truck, a corvette, a big beautiful house with a big yard and an inground pool, and money to spend on the nice things in life

but she ended up with a guy who had to trade in his new truck for a small used one so he could afford to make her mini-van payments (she works part time for hourly wage IF she is till working at all) the corvette was mine.....and i got the house and everything in it

oh yeah....he bought her a house....a HUD house

the OW had also called and left me several lengthy messages telling me "how she hoped i would someday get past what happend and find happiness like they have" and telling me how much in looooove they are

but....the e-mail and phone messages from OW stopped by the beginning of April and i haven't heard a word since so maybe things are better between them or maybe they both fell off the edge of the earth

who knows??

this is a ROMANTIC affair...the worst kind

he's given up everything and she has also...including her 4 children (unless one or more are living with them now-and if so...that's a big surprise since my h never wanted and doesn't like children)

but the affair still sppears to be going strong <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

eav,

That is a pretty pathetic e-mail. I see it as being all about the OW's insecurity. If all was really going so well why bother e-mailing you at all?

i thought that also but considering it was 6 months ago and not a word from them since.....things must be going better

oh yeah

in July i did get some harrassing phone calls from my H because he wants me to forget about the remaining terms of our separation agreement because he doesn't have the money to follow through on them and he says "i should let him move on with his life"

so it doesn't sound like he's beating the door down to come home

it looks like OW's got nothing to worry about

Wow! I knew it was prevalent but didn't think it would be that prevalent. Its definitely something to take note of (as scary as it is) for someone like me who is in the dating divorcee pool. Its likely 50% of my potential partners may be cheaters. That's frightening!

I'm starting to think it hasn't been such a bad thing that I haven't started dated much... <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />

Miker

Miker, Forwarned is Forarmed. Most people are blown away by discovering their S has been unfaithful. It's something that always happens to someone else. We cannot get our heads around our S being capable of that kind of treatment of us. So now that you know, you have the option of being on guard and never being complacent as to the possibility of it happening - and working that bit harder than you might otherwise have worked, to prevent it.

AN

Maybe. Who really knows? But it really doesn't matter. Start planning your life without him. If he comes back at some point you'll have a decision to make, if not, that's fine too. He doesn't deserve you and you shouldn't settle for less than love with commitment.

It's going to be tough starting out from ground zero, but you can do it.

The actual probability should be less than 50% for you, because there are fewer women adulterers than men (something like 40 percent women against 60 percent men).

Couple that with a naturally higher failure rate of second marriages, then add a higher still failure rate for blended marriages (with step children), and it sounds like you better be well versed in family relations to maintain a good marriage!

Hiker45,

This is an interesting thread. Statistics and studies are always interesting, and can sometimes help to put individual situations into perspective. But they are also easily slanted, and can be deceiving.

For example: I cheated on my H. The affair is over... has been for a little more than a year now. But I'd say our marriage is still shakey. If we D, I wouldn't say it was BECAUSE of adultry. I doubt my H would either. More like, the affair was the catalyst that finally forced both of us to take a good, hard, honest look at ourselves and our relationship.

But I wonder... if we were Pittman's clients... would he put the hashmark that represents "the failure of Mr. & Mrs. Cookie's established first marriage" among the 6,995+... or would he count us as #6?

hmmmmm....

--SC

smartcookie,

Pittman's statement about waiting for the sixth case of divorce without infidelity as a cause is an exagqeration for the purpose of the magazine interview. In Private Lies he says his experience is that 10 percent of the divorces were due to causes other than infidelity.

How was your marriage prior to the affair?

pittman's book has really helped me to understand romantic affairs

and caused me to fear that BOTH my h and OW are romantics since they have thrown away everything "for love" and bonded together "against the world"

it's been soooo long, i fear the affair is never going to end

and it is awful not knowing anything!!

eav,

I understand how you feel. There isn't much that can be done except to take care of yourself and plan your future without him.

Even if your H and the OW break up, it doesn't mean he'll come back to you. If he did, are you sure you would want him?

In the quote, Pittman specifically limited his statement to "established first marriages." I do not believe it was an exaggeration, but rather a statement of his experience. If you eliminate all second and successive marriages, as well as those first marriages that end within, say, a year, because the parties were too young, too drunk, or too stupid, etc., I think his experience is very typical. The only other reason I have ever seen people divorce for is abuse - substance or physical - and in many of those cases the abuser or the spouse is unfaithful as well.

In Private Lies, the qualification Pittman uses is "long term" marriages. He doesn't mention whether they are second or third. Somewhere else he classifies long term as being five years or more. He doesn't define "established."

So it's kind of tough to draw comparisons between the magazine interview and the book, other than to say that very few marriages end for reasons other than infidelity.

And I definitely believe this has a lot to do with the fact that one spouse thinks they have someone else to run to after they trash their marriage.

Hiker,

I certainly hope he wasn't exaggerating to make the magazine article more dramatic. That would be unethical.

I have no doubt that infidelity plays a role in a large percentage of divorces. But 6 out of 7,000 seems inflated to me. And I guess I'm just wondering what criteria he uses to decide that infidelity was THE cause of all those failed marriages. I mean, if a WS leaves the marriage "for" the OP... that's pretty straightforward. If the BS files for divorce right after D-day... I'd say that's pretty straightforward too. But if an affair ends... and an attempted recovery fails and leads to divorce... that would seem to me to be a gray area in terms of "why" the marriage failed. Just thinking out loud...

You asked how my marriage was before my affair. It was pretty bad, and had been for about 6 years. It has been awhile since I read the basic concepts here, but if I remember correctly, I'd say my marriage was in what Harley refers to as the state of "emotional divorce". (Is that one of his terms, or did I just make that up?) Anyway, since the affair, my H has been pretty wonderful. But I'm having a hard time "coming around".

--SC

smartcookie,

So your husband has been pretty wonderful . . . you are having a hard time "coming around."

What does that mean? Still have feelings for the OP? Worried that the marriage will fall back into the rut prior to the affair? Not "in love" with your husband? Miss the passion of the affair?

I'm asking these questions strictly out of an interest to understand why some couples do not reconcile even after the affair ends; please don't be insulted.

About Pittman: I think if you read enough of his writings you get the impression that he has an interesting sense of humor. I think his "waiting for the sixth case" is just his way of lightheartedly conveying that very few marriages end up in divorce for reasons other than infidelity. It was, as I understand, a statement he made in a telephone interview.

Perhaps if you got divorced now some people might say that infidelity was indirectly responsible. Your marriage was bad for six years prior to the affair and apparently neither of you sought divorce then. The affair occurs and (hypothetically) you get divorced less than a year later. Your view is that the affair forced you to take a "good, hard, honest look" at your marriage, but others might say the affair trashed what was left of your marriage by destroying either your desire or your husband's desire to recover it.

That's strictly an outsider's view though. Only you would know the real reasons.

I'd also say infidelity was the cause SC.