MEDC...I have changed because I found the one worth changing for...

While I do not wish you any ill... I am going to tell you that I am going to bow out of this thread at this time. I do not believe in, nor condone affair marriages.... nor do I or most others on this board feel that it is appropriate to come here seeking counsel for a marriage that started as an affair. Your relationship with your H gives credibility to affair relationships where none exists. BS that come here do not wish to be confronted with this kind of stuff. WS that come here wondering if they should end it with their f-buddy, do not need to see that... hey, it worked out for MM... it could work for me.
And remember.... if they cheat with YOU... they will cheat on YOU.
I wish you luck in whatever you decide to do... but I hope that you have the courtesy to understand how your presence on these boards would be very upsetting to some.

MEDC

Well I guess with that tidbit of news I had better find myself somewhere else to go. Just be assured if I had met him first instead of last I would have probably been married only once. And my past is hurting my present again with you and the people here. I have at least told my stepdaughter...NEVER , EVER DO ANYTHING THAT COULD COME BACK TO HAUNT YOU AND THE BEST WAY TO GAUGE THAT IS DON'T DO ANYTHING YOU WOULD BE ASHAMED TO TELL YOUR GRANDPARENTS.

I just wish now I would have learned that a whole heck of a lot sooner, then I wouldn't have had to come here at all.

I've been there done that want to move on but my past won't let me, I keep tripping over it.

Thanks

MM57,

You're not alone.

I believe you've reached the point in your life when you truly want to change...so your life will change.

Like Longhorn, I strongly suggest counseling...Individual Counseling from a marital counselor. I see you having the belief that finding the right partner is the answer...not being one. That humans are replaceable.

MEDC said "most" and I don't know where he gets his data. However, you would be open to a lot of attacks if you stayed here. I respect your choice, either way.

There are other marriage sites on the internet...SurvivingInfidelity.com, alturtlecounseling.com, to name two I have experience with.

I see you as brave and as honest as possible right now. Great combination. I also see, because of my own experience (very similar to yours), a lot of self-deception which I believe you are unaware of...which is why I shared what I understood of your beliefs and how by choosing those to live by, you will continue to recreate and re-experience a lot of pain, torment, and sorrow.

I know you can be free of recreating...you have that choice.

In my prayers,

LA

Honestly LA I thing she would be more at home on gloryb.com myself.

I am sorry but somehow I fnd it hard to believe I am not alone. I believe this site has told me that my feelings aren't valid because this was an affair marriage. The relationship I left was a result of consentual sex and a broken condom. I got pregnant and he wanted to do the right thing and marry me. I figured I could do worse, and it got worse because he didn't want any of the commitment of marriage. I guess I should have stayed for the child's sake.

And to correct one other thing you told me LA. I am being a good partner but because it is a 15 year old affair marriage, do I have no right to want to honor that commitment or try to save this marriage because it was doomed from the gitgo?

I do appreciate the websites you suggested LA at least you are concerned enough to give me some alternatives. However, somehow I think BK's suggestion is probably derrogatory, but I haven't checked it out yet !

As you say people can change if they want to change, so to believe the once a cheater always a cheater mentality, kind of makes marriage counseling for infidelity redundant. If people didn't want to change and correct past mistakes no one would be here, now ould they?

(I tried to post this last night before you replied MM57, so I'm going in order)

BigK,

I think you are seeing some of the same beliefs I did. We choose our beliefs...they change our lives. Salvation isn't in actions...it's in our choices of what we believe and live by.

I sincerely believe MM57 is at a life changing threshold right now...and I'm not one to get in the way of what took God a long time to bring to her. She's my equal. I made similar choices, believed similar beliefs and experienced the consequences of those repeatedly.

I ask you in all sincerity, how can I not?

I respect her choice...I did not say I was proud of her. Do you know how terrible that feels to be portrayed that way?
Do you believe that to express, to share, is support? And support is automatically approval? If that be the truth...how can we ever get to know anyone, if we by understanding are condoning? Is that God's plan for humanity, really?

LA

MM57,

"I am sorry but somehow I fnd it hard to believe I am not alone. I believe this site has told me that my feelings aren't valid because this was an affair marriage. The relationship I left was a result of consentual sex and a broken condom. I got pregnant and he wanted to do the right thing and marry me. I figured I could do worse, and it got worse because he didn't want any of the commitment of marriage. I guess I should have stayed for the child's sake."

When I say you are not alone, I mean that there are others who've made your choices, had your beliefs, acted from feelings...didn't see their own choices. Not bad or wrong or unworthy.

I believe we all are worthy, whole and complete...that's how we're made by God. He didn't make no junk in my book.

<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

"And to correct one other thing you told me LA. I am being a good partner but because it is a 15 year old affair marriage, do I have no right to want to honor that commitment or try to save this marriage because it was doomed from the gitgo?"

I'm do my best to not state predictions...when I said that leaving this marriage would re-create another like it...I meant that until we stop making the same choices again and again (from the same beliefs) our lives don't change...'cuz we don't.

When I said I respect your choice to either stay here or go, I meant I know only you have that power, to choose. My opinion is that this is a marriage building site...and because you post, want to change, are being honest...and if you are willing to own your own choices...well, then you meet my own requirements for sharing with...you are human, right? The typing tipped me off.

See, I see shunning as punishment...which would be amends (like jail is putting away) for destructive choices. A way to atone, to become new through ownership. Some might call that repetentance...and turning away from a belief...that others complete you (meaning you're missing parts), though it does feel like it (I remember), is changing what you believe.

Like earning love...do you believe you earn others' love? Then you would work hard at being a good partner to earn their continuing love...is that what marriage is? Would you consider that earning love means that others must earn yours?

How about if you earn love, you earn punishment? And others earn your punishment?

These are the beliefs I began examining inside of me when I came here and read lots of threads...they were proposed, talked about...and someone said, "Love isn't a feeling, it's a choice. We choose who we love and act from our love. Not earning."

Shared with...opinions...you take what you want and leave the rest. As you can see, I'm having a really difficult time right now of taking my own advice.

I suspected I would get called on my post to you...I had read your thread at work yesterday and planned on posting to you. When I got home and read MEDC's post on JustJilly Begin Again thread...I told myself...I felt afraid to post to you. Now, I believe I've gotten pretty brave in the last three years...which is fearing and choosing to act, anyway, holding myself to my own code. Now I'm wondering if I am self-deceiving and reacting and holding others to my code? Like fear is my dare drug?

My post to you was directly from me...I believe you know that. As a person who has been a BS and a WS, I believe you can appreciate the fear MEDC has that BS's will feel hurt seeing you getting help when you represent the OW they are fighting against for their marriage.

I understand you believe that being separated gave you permission to date and have relationships. That's not a really clear line to follow...until you're divorced you remain married. And you're not alone...I thought as long as I didn't want to be married anymore, I could date. And we had an inhouse separation. Another way I found I lied to myself, bent permissions to meet my desires, and kept getting really cruddy feelings as a result.

"I do appreciate the websites you suggested LA at least you are concerned enough to give me some alternatives. However, somehow I think BK's suggestion is probably derrogatory, but I haven't checked it out yet !"

I didn't spend much time on that website. It's for Formerly Other Women (FOW) to post...and I went there when I heard there was such a board during my WH's A and again about six months into recovery when I was obsessing on his OW.

"As you say people can change if they want to change, so to believe the once a cheater always a cheater mentality, kind of makes marriage counseling for infidelity redundant. If people didn't want to change and correct past mistakes no one would be here, now ould they?"

Well said. I believe BigK believes anyone can change, make the choice to stop being an AP...and I believe he considers you in an A marriage, therefore, continuing affair partners (AP) until you divorce and do not remarry.

I am trying to figure out all I believe...I'm kind of in chaos right now...what I do know is my opinion does not come from fear (There but for the Grace of God go I)...'cuz I went.

And life with real lines, adult beliefs to act from, not reacting to my feelings and judging my "goodness" and "badness"...leaves a lot more time for evaluating if I'm in line, acting from love...not giving to get, or tit for tat.

Which is why I say, you are not alone.

LA

where did she say she was separated?


these were her words. nice try though.

MM57,

There are a few reasons any H would not believe you won't cheat on him:

"he was also with XGF 15 yo's mom at the time..we weren't looking for each other just found each other."

This is one of them. Just found each other. Your WH broke apart a family and you yours because you both chose to believe this undeniably more than friendship. There is no trust in saying, "But you're it!" because this has been said several times before and ended in divorce.

This is not saying you don't mean it...I believe you believe you won't...what you have here are no marital boundaries or personal boundaries. If you will read Surviving An Affair and Fall in Love, Stay in Love, you'll realize that it isn't who WH is...or who you are...meeting ENs outside the marriage will lead to inappropriate relationships, affairs and what we call the wayward fog...which is really inside out reasoning...full of justifications.

"Something much more undeniable than friendship surfaced, feelings like we had known each other all our life and deeper level feelings I cannot even dscribe."

If you read "Getting The Love You Want" by Harville Hendrix, you'll understand you weren't destined for one another, are not soulmates or special...and this belief...that it's not who you marry, it's who you are which make marriages thrive.

Boundaries in Marriage by Cloud and Townsend...this is an awesome book, IMO, easy to read. I didn't know boundaries, either...I do now...please choose to study and listen to what resonates inside you...read and study and be open.

Your WH can fear from projection...because of what he's doing...and he doesn't have to be having a PA...he has had A's...he goes to fantasy to self-soothe, change his feelings...not healthy, not real...and he, like you, may say "it just happened, wasn't looking for it" again. Until he changes his beliefs and sees where A's are pure choice...no one on earth can make him have one...they can't be fallen into if you don't go to fantasy...and that living large is living from your code, not scrambling to find your next feeling fix.

"Long before sex ever entered the picture. It may be part of the reason he feels the way he does"

Oh, you already caught that. Sorry.

"..but if he understood what our commitment means to me, then he would know not to worry."

No one can read inside you...even the greatest writers cannot communicate what it feels inside themselves...and feelings cannot be trusted. We get false feelings from false beliefs.

Actions are how we rebuild trust, demonstrate commitment (not just state it) and boundaries are what I hear you saying you could define and implement to assure him of your half of the marriage.

This would take you pondering all the ways you fell into relationships...your beliefs...why you thought you were incomplete (read John Bradshaw's Healing The Shame That Binds Us), when you may have well been looking for parts of yourself YOU disowned or lost along the way...and saw them in him, when they were in you, all along, too.

"I have tried to tell him, show him, there just aren't words to express it."

I agree. By writing down a timeline (we had to a resentment timeline, so I usually suggest doing that, and for you, write one for your whole life...do it chronologically) which owns your choices in each of your marriages. Then WH will know that you get it...you are not the same...you see your power, know your power and your limits and get the totality how your choices changed your life. Even when you didn't think you were choosing...or chose not to do something. All choices, all the time.

You can't make him do this...this would be something you do for you...would you like to heal all those layers on your many wounds? Would you like to experience life as a whole person, well loved, accepted, considered and respected?

It's a choice.

LA

LA...Thanks for going out on the limb for me...& thanks for all the great stuff, you really know how to make a person think. I have been doing alot of that the last few days anyway. MEDC words are harsh and maybe he is right and I am getting what I deserve and have basically asked for by the choices I have made. I don't know.

And by saying I feel more complete, I mean that I can handle more tough times when we are together, both of us can.

In my other marriages, I did try to work on those before they ended too even though I was alot younger. Two of the situations I had to get out of in a hurry...the alcoholic one (was finding myself not able to handle his refusal to accept his problem and needed to get my son and myself out of that situation before I lost it completely)and the abuser one he was 6'8" and 325 lbs i was 5'8" and 125) and someone had asked earlier how long had I known these peolple before marrying them H1 over 2 years, H2 about 6 months, H3over 1 year, H4 over 1 year. After that I swore I would never get married again. Guess I should have stuck to that decision, but after almost 3 years with H5 and a wonderful relationship, we decided to get the piece of paper that solidified our commitment.

Like I said before I am not a terrifically physically attractive person and why these people felt I was cheating on them is beyond me, almost all of them accused me of it, especially H2 and H3. I do have an easier time talking to people of the opposite sex and maybe that is too much for the average male to handle. I have never had any really close friends and never went out even platonically with any of the men I worked with & talked to. And for the past 25 years I have also worked in a heavily male-dominated field, but they knew that when they met me.

As far as being separated and dating, most of the grounds for divorce here in SC take a year, so I didn't exactly hop out of one bed into another.

I have tried to SHOW myH as best I know how, my love and commitment to him. I think part of him sees it and part of him doesn't want to see it.

I have found some online counseling and registered for it and have started the exercises etc...I have also invited my husband to join me, (and he might because it is anonymous and won't be gossiped all over town) if not for our marriage, for himself to see if he can lose some of the demons that are holding him back from being a good partner. I have given 110% of myself and I know he has held back a good bit of himself for fear of getting hurt again and as soon as anyone raised any doubt, rather than try to disprove what he heard, he just doubted and started building his wall of protection. Maybe he will or maybe he is scared to find out what he is really like. I know I need to find out what I am doing wrong and fix myself, MEDC did make that perfectly clear. Although trusting anyone else to say I love you is going to be tough. I am pretty sure I can still believe it from him, if decides to try.

LA if you want you may PM me so you will not get blackballed from here, if you think of anything else that may be helpful.