Eav...

I vote for #1

I truly believe that is EXACTLY why WH is not coming back to me.

I also feel like my WH has hardened his heart. He shows no remorse for hurting me or his children.
When my oldest daughter wrote him a 3 page letter telling him what she felt ( I haven't seen this yet" and they talked all he did was justify his affair.
When he picked her up at college for Christmas break he actually told her she should be happy for him because he was happy!!!! I don't see any feelings of guilt here. He continues to be in his fantasy world with his MOW.
He also has said to me I don't want to hurt you ant more as an excuse for not wanting to work things out. Although right now he is supposedly thinking about putting our D on hold. I'm not holding my breath. Although if we could make it work I would love to try.

Still

I swear the WS's read from the same script.

My WH told my DD last year... why is everyone attacking the OW? It's not what people think. They are just roomates and if he's happy, why can't DD be happy for him?

Yuck!!!!!!!!!!

Exactly catgirl,
This past summer before I had absolute proof of his A, I knew at least an inappropriate relationship was happening we had gone on our last family vacation. A vacation that we have been taking for 13 years with the same families. It is around the time of our oldest D B-day. She told her dad all I want for my B-day is for you and mom to go to MC.
One day they had a talk and she asked do I have an expiration date on my forehead dad? One that says after 20 years we get thrown away? Also mentioned if MOW ever came around her she would"kill her". He was more upset about the she would hurt the MOW than how much his own flesh and blood was hurting! I tried to tell him she is hurting can't you even see that?
He actually wanted our children to help him move out the weekend he moved!
Can you say FOGG.

Still

the choices that i posted above...are why i'm asking about the feelings of guilt and shame that a WS feels

i think it factors so much into the choice to be willing to to try to reconcile

Eav...see my last post on the Athanasius/Catholic Doctrines thread...See if any of that helps you understand some of it...

I'll be glad to answer any additional questions that you might have! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Mrs. W

mrs wondering

thank you!

i read the post you referred to.

i didn't want to thread jack but my response seemed to fit there also

i will cut & paste it below

as i posted in my replay:

my family and friends all believe my H is on drugs, bi-polar or even crazy! I DON'T believe it. He was always so against drugs!

i think it's just the "evil emotions of the A fighting with his soul"

it was very helpful to read how you felt and what you were willing to do to get rid of those feelings

maybe the guilt and shame is why my H flew into a rage after the A started again....each time i would tell him that i still loved him or that i still believed he was a good man....or that i forgive him

i really appreciate your offer to help.

if you read my reply and can offer anything it would be wonderful! if i think of questions, i'll post them.........right now i'm just thinking but i'll be back

thanks again!

(cut & pasted)

WOW!! Mrs. Wondering

so much that you posted made me think of my H during all of this

my H came from a good, strong catholic upbringing

there had never even been a D in his family...even aunts and uncles

his mother ruled the home with her strict beliefs and she was quite a judge

the relationship that my H and i had was not one that she approved of in the beginning because i was not the person she would have choosen for her son....i was too wild, too unsupervised (she thought we were having S-E-X before marraige) and i came from a broken family...with a history of many divorces, and my father had even had an affair

being with me was the one time my H took a stand against his mother

she "forced" religion upon her children...that's how they all felt about it. church was never a choice. even as adults, if they stayed at her home, they had to go. My H and his brother, after they could drive themselves, would dress up for church and then go sit at the park

i was not raised in a family that believed in much

i had been a christian but went through the process of converting to catholic while i was in college. i never felt the need to be with God in a church....i've always felt he was "in me"

after we were married, my h and i agreed that we didn't feel that we needed to go the church to be with God...he is everywhere.... so we decided that we would go to church, when/if WE had the desire to

we went on some holidays when we were visiting our families, but not other times

strangely, the first time my H start browsing the site where he found OW was shortly after his mothers death.....his counselor said that it was as though the death of his mother triggered something in my H that made him feel free to go against all of the things she forced upon him

before the 1st d-day, i knew something was wrong with my H....he just seemed "cold" towards me....like he had hardened his heart against me....like he was "taking care of me" but not wanting to be with me

and then of course the ILYBNILWY speech.....he said it was because of my depression which had gone on for many years...I WAS going to leave because i believed that I was making him so unhappy

then D-DAY

i threw him out, for the weekend. he begged and begged to come home

[color:"blue"] we went to counseling and he talked about what a monster he was, he talked about the guilt and shame that he felt for what he had done.

He said that he couldn't even belive he had done it! and that he would rather go off and live alone somewhere than to hurt me again....that he never wanted to hurt me like that again. [/color]

he told me and the counselor that all he wanted to do was "love me forever" .

[color:"blue"] he said that it was like looking back at some stranger that he didn't know watching what they were doing and being horrified! he never wanted to be "that monster again"

he told both me and the counselor that OW didn't think they had done anything wrong and would never go to counseling. which brings me back to the quote by Pittman...



[/color]

[color:"green"] he was wonderful.he wrote me beautiful poems about his love for me and his hopes for our future. they were so personal and heartfelt...he searched until he found cards that made me cry....he bought me gifts to show his love....a single red rose every few days, a big gorilla with a heart that says i love you, chicken soup when i was sick....even a mavoda watch (he really tight with money and for years i had always teased him by saying "if you really loved me you'd buy me one!" [/color]

and.....he decided that he "needed" us to start going to church together. When we went, he seemed to have found such peace. he was so serious...in a way he never had been. If i whispered to him he wouldn't answer...he would just give a little smile and put his finger against his lips....he always had his head down like he was praying

we were both trying hard....except that i was having triggers which would cause me to get so angry....i would say such unkind things

neither of us knew how to deal with this and [color:"blue"] he said that he couldn't live this way forever...that if i couldn't forgive and forget we would never heal....that each time i brought up the A his feelings of guilt and shame would overwhelm him....and would destroy us [/color]

we didn't know what to expect when dealing with an A....he thought i had taken him back so that meant i forgave him...why couldn't i just forget.....

we were only in recovery for 8 months. he had started asking me to "forget" the first month

after about 5 months, he decided that he didn't need to go to counseling or to church anymore....that we were doing better..that HE was doing better

i thought we were happy most of the time....we even added a new puppy to our little family

then he called OW and the A resumed (i didn't find out for over a year)

my H started treating me so badly. he was cold, heartless and angry. he shut me out of his life.

when i cried, he left the room in disgust. when i tried to talk to him he coldly told me that i was keeping him awake. he moved into the guest room and began to shut and then even lock the door.

on the rare moments that we would end up smiling together.... he would give a little laugh. look away and then shake his head with a sad look on his face....ending my good feelings about that moment

my mother and sisters thought, and still do think, that he is abusing drugs

i KNOW he isn't

he became like a zombie. Someone who was going through the motions each day in misery. I found SAA and he did agree to do the emotional needs questionaire. As hard as i tried, he wouldn't let me meet any of his needs. he just kept saying that he had "no feelings for me anymore" and that "he was waiting to see if his feelings would come back"....he was "so unhappy"

when i looked in his eyes......he would look awayt, but not before i could see that there was no soul there anymore

then he became very depressed....curled up on the couch, sleeping excessively, calling off work depressed.

he came out of this when he made his decision to move out to continue the A

since then, he has been like a person with "bi-polar disorder" emotions out of control

(my friends and family swear it is either drugs or bi-polar disorder to this day)

[color:"blue"]-he repeatly said that when he looked in the mirror, he wanted to puke, that he was a monster.

-he constantly yalked about his guilt and shame and that it was worse when he was with me.....so he hated coming to the house....

he even said "i can't even look you in the eyes"
[/color]
-crying that he threw everything away, saying how unhappy he still was, saying that he didn't know what he wanted or what he was going to do with the rest of his life (during the first year before OW moved in with him-while he was cake-walking)

-acting pumped up like he was the king of the world....with a little evil looking smile on his face and in his eyes

-smiling as he said things that hurt me and then getting angry when i was hurt

-having fits of rage over nothing and then later swearing that he didn't say the things he had said during the rage

having fits of sadness and talking about reconciliation then later swearing that he hadn't said any of the things he did

(i believe him! he looked so confused when i talked about any of the things he had said)

-leaving messages where he was screaming one moment, crying the next and then screaming again

-threatening suicide if i did anything to stand in the way of what he wanted for him and OW

being so cruel.....telling me he was going to "blow his head off with a shotgun just like my father did)

-then apologies and kindess and little jokes sent by e-mails

-i'm in plan B now but his last attempts at contact were like interacting with a crazy man

many phone calls with screaming rages, ranting, cussing and calling me names, crying then screaming some more

and usually some comment about how he knows it's his fault-that he ruined our marraige-that he was the one who did this to himself

but saying that doesn't seem to make him any less angry at ME!

the last call was in july until i changed my numbers

i've taped them and played then for some friend and family who believe he's now clearly out of his mind

Jennifer Harley says he is still clearly not having rational thinking

me? i don't know what to believe anymore

[color:"blue"] that's why i started my thread about feelings of guilt and shame....wondering how this might play into my situation...could my H be unhappy and wish he could come back but the guilt and shame he feels he would always live with keeps him from doing this?

is THAT is torment now? [/color]

but my greatest fear is that he really IS happy and that's why he isn't interested in ending the A

NOW:

You know it just drives me crazy when someone goes and posts exactly what I was going to say! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/pfft.gif" alt="" />

Just ditto everything for me, would y'all?

BTW, I guess I am also one of those atypical WWs who ended the A immediately and stuck to NC...so what makes us different I wonder...

NOW and MOM

thanks for sharing your feelings

my H felt as you did after the first D-day for most of the 8 months of our "false recovery"

but then contact resumed and so did the affair...

(read my post to Mrs. Wondering above for more details)

mrs wondering

when i read your posts, it comes through in your words how caring, loving and kind you are

it is so hard for me to picture the person that you describe as you talk about yourself and your actions during the affair

it is like you were a different person then

this is exactly how i feel about my h

you help me to continue to have hope in my heart that someday he too, will find his soul again and become the kind, loving and wonderful man i love

I am sorry for what you are going through. I think in my case, the OM was long distance...and he did not pursue once I initiated NC (BH was in contact with OM) so I imagine that made it easier for me to stick to NC (I was being monitored as well). If he had been in close proximity, same town for example, and had tried to continue the R, then things may have been different...I don't know, I may have continued to travel down the same fog filled road. All I can say is that I'm extremely grateful things have turned out the way they have.

Your WH is in deep, deep fog. I can tell you how I felt post A, but there are others here more experienced to advise you how to proceed from hereon. Have you posted a thread asking for input as to what to do now?

Mom

mom

i do have a thread that mimi started just for me <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

i'm in plan B

i've counseled with Jennifer Harley Chalmers who agrees that my H is still completely unrational and out of touch with reality (this is what she says instead of using the term fog)

her advice is to keep waiting in the hopes that the A will end

for some reason, this is taking much longer than many others

Jennifer and I think my H is a buyer at heart.....

but for some reason hasn't taken the steps he would need to in order for he and OW to have this kind of permanace

he's just renting now but seems to long for the security of a buyer

jennifer thinks that OW might just be "renting" with my H and this could be why neither are yet divorced even though they have lived together for over a year now

mrs. wondering

do you have any thoughts to add after reading my post?

it does seem that you are saying the guilt and shame ate away at your soul

how did you overcome it?

what made you decide to?

had your h found this site?

some FWS here have said that the guilt and shame drew them towards their marriage not away from it.

as i believe it did with my H during our first recovery.

[color:"blue"]
but, i believe that my reacting to triggers so emotionally, and allowing the hurt and anger to show, i caused our recovery to fail

my H said that he couldn't live with all of my pain, that by not forgetting and allowing him to forget, i was causing him to feel the guilt and shame over and over and that it was going to destroy us

neither of us knew that this was what recovery is like for everyone.

I honestly thought, i still do, that it's my fault he left again because i couldn't forgive and forget fast enough.

he believed that i should have....and i think that he still thinks no differently.

he believes that he "tried" and based upon my reactions he came to believe that i would "never be able to forgive or foget and he would never be free from the guilt and shame and he couldn't live with that"

i believe this is what drove him back to OW....to escape that feeling (as Pittman said)

his counselor also feels this way

i believe that this is why coming back is something he thinks could never work.

he beleives that he could never be happy and neither would I

in fact, after he left, when we would try to talk about reconcilliation

he screamed at me many times....."WHY would I come back??? You HATED me!"

i always said "i never hated you. I hated what you did. I have always loved you"

looking back, there were times that i felt so angry, so much pain and i must have said things to show it

heck. who am i kidding

I KNOW i did. i could see the pain in his eyes when i said some of the things that i did.

so this is what he still beleives

[/color]

after all of my changes in plan A

all of my kindness and words of hope

all of the plans for a better future where we learn from the mistakes of the past that i spoke of in my plan b letter

this is the truth of it

and i feel so sad, so ashamed and so much blame because i do feel that he left again because i was too hurt, too angry, and too cruel

and he can't ever believe we would be happy together again because of me

i had a chance at recovery with the man i really love, he came back to me broken, sorry, and willing to do whatever was needed to make ammends

and i made him feel so awful about himself and what he did when he really was trying so hard to make it right

i drove him away again and right into the arms of the OW

and that's something i have to live with

i'm trying to figure out how to let him know that i was WRONG but now i think there's no getting through to him because he will never want to chance facing all of that guilt and shame again

still hope to get more responses from FWS

Eav,

I'm a FWS and it hurts ME to hear you blaming yourself. IT IS NOT YOUR FAULT.

Your WS wasn't strong enough to deal with the consequences of his actions. He wasn't motivated enough to research, read and keep trying, no matter how long it took. He made the choice to have the A in the first place.

He took the easy way out because it was easy. A selfish choice.

Please don't beat yourself up for this. The WS chose the affair. That overshadows anything you did or didn't do.

feel free to email me if you'd like, we can talk.

Please take care of yourself meanwhile.

Hi Eav...

I'm sorry, I only just saw this...last check of the boards before going to bed...I will respond tomorrow when I have more clarity and can give your questions the time that they deserve...<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Mrs. W

P.S. Thank you so much for the wonderful compliments in an earlier post here...I truly appreciate it! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Eav,

A couple of observations:

Your husband claims to feel so guilty about his affair that he can't face you, yet this guilt was not so great as to prevent him from having the affair to begin with, was it?

The reason guilt didn't prevent him from having or stopping the affair is because the infatuation/addiction was stronger than any guilt he was feeling (if indeed he was feeling any guilt at all).

What this tells me is that one of two things is happening: either his feelings of guilt are much stronger than his desire to be with you, or he is using this guilt issue as an excuse to keep you at arm's length.

If the issue was really the former, your counselor would be able to set up a program of recovery that would allow your husband to make reparations for the damage he has done; a sort of punishment to pay for his sins that would provide some relief from his guilt.

If the issue was the latter, it would probably be due to some desire on his part to (1) keep the door open to the affair, (2) break up with you in a way that keeps the door open for reconciliation with you down the line, or (3) break up with you while demonstrating some sensitivity for your feelings; in other words, break up and make it seem like it was his fault so you don't blame yourself.

My guess, based on what you have written, is that this is his excuse for continuing the affair while stringing you along. I think the guilt issue is an excuse to maintain the affair. It's a clever ruse that even appears to have worked on your counselor. It's clever, because it's believable and it shines a more favorable light on his reasons for not reconciling ("I'm so guilty for what I've done that I can't live with myself while I'm with you"). Who could fault him for that? And at the same time, it keeps you hooked because it causes you to believe this is an issue that might be resolved in time.

I hate to say it, but this is precisely why Pittman advocates that betrayed spouses should go off and find something to keep occupied while the affair runs its course.

mom

thank you for the kind words

i wish that i had found this site before i made so many mistakes

i think my H would still be with me today if i had not acted as i did when we tried to recover

because of what i did he "loathes me" and says he would never come back to me

i keep looking for answers to why i've done a good plan A and a good plan B and gotten no results

i'm afraid this IS my answer