I am 46 and my wife and I have will have been married 25 years this fall. I am the only man she has ever been with. I found out a month ago she was having an affair with a man in another city where she freqently did business. It was going on for over a year. I was absolutly shocked. I love my wife and we have an 11 year daughter. She has been truely remorseful and says it was the biggest mistake of her life and does not know why she let it happen still. She even paid for a vacation for them together. That really kills me. She knows how deeply hurt I am and realizes how badly she screwed up. I have gone through deep sorrow and crying. I have forgiven her, because I felt her anguish. She travels alot and it has been tough fighting all the emotions. I actually had a wonderful time with her on a date the other night when she was in town again for the week. But now I am sliding into bitterness and anger. She is on pins and needles and is praying that I will accept her back into my life and try to make things work and think about us and not what she has done. She says she will also accept her fate and understand if I don't want her back. She wants me to be happy no matter what, and knows she took that away from me. She feels she deserves to live alone the rest of her life. The man she had the affair with was someone who she was working with. He fell madly in love with her. He was 10 years younger than her. He even asked about me she said she told him I was a good man and father. She tried to break it off but said he always convinced her to keep it going and would push her guilt away over and over. She said she new she loved me the whole time and he wanted her to leave me, but she could not. She said she was glad she got caught, and feels like a burden has been lifted and has no thoughts of him and says she has even grown to hate him and admits what a fool she was. But now my bitterness and anger are taking hold and I keep thinking, Why should I give her another chance? I gave her everything and she turned away from it. But I don't know if I can start all over again, especially with an 11 year daughter who is my world and what this would do to her. I feel like getting revenge and going out and finding the passion and excitment she experienced. How do I get over the thoughts of the 2 of them, the lies and get rid of this anger. Is it worth it to give my heart back to her? I am usually a gentle spirited person, but have changed. Any advise out there?

Paul, sorry you are here. Ihope some of the heavy-hitters on the board will arrive soon to help you. First though, please resist the urge for a "revenge" affair, as this solves nothing,and makes things worse. Another thing, how will your wayward wife (WW) manage to avoid contact with the OM? Since they work for the same company, has she thought about changing jobs?

There is some literature available through this site that may be helpful to you. Read everything you can.

One thing you have going for you that many on this site would love, is that your WW sounds remorseful. Many we read about are not.

Welcome Paul. I am by no means a "heavy hitter" but your thread title caught my eye.

I am 46. Next Tuesday is my 26th anniversary. We have a 19 year old daughter. My wife had/is having an affair with a co-worker. She left me January 30th and filed for divorce in mid-February. The divorce will be final June 13th.

It is right and normal to feel hurt, used and betrayed because you have been. It is forever wrong to spread that hurt in revenge. If nothing else, just because of your daughter.

Read more here. Get the book Survivng an Affair. Find out more about your wife emotional needs and see where you may need to improve. Understand you both have work to do to reclaim your marriage.

Don't punish her if she is truly remorseful.

Consider reposting this on the General Questions II forum as there is much more traffic there.

Questions:

Are you sure the affair is over? There must be NO CONTACT for the rest of your wifes life with the OM.

Has she been tested for STD's? Believe it or not most affair sex is performed unprotected.

Read, read, read and drop any thoughts of revenge. Your marriage can be healed. That's why you came here.

They had protected sex, but she is still getting checked. There is no contact between them at all.

Good it is being checked. I am dubious if it was all protected.


And there never can be again. This is essential. She can never see him again.


No, you probably have not yet. It will take time.

Does he live out of state?

Is he married? If he is his spouse needs to know.

Are you getting marriage counseling?

Read up on No Contact letters. Your wife needs to send one to the OM even if she says it is over. She must make this commitment. You need to see it and approve it.

Again, if she is truly remorseful do not punish her. If it is true I would give anything to be in your situation.

A session together with the Harley’s would be very good for you both. They can help you understand and cope with your feelings and help your wife understand the depth of your hurt.


Time, patience, and counseling. It will take a long time to get over the thoughts of them together. This seems particularly true for men.

I can’t answer that. Only you can. Again I wish I had the same opportunity you have right now if your wife is truly trying to recommit to the marriage. For a lot of us here, that would be a gift.

Does your daughter know?

Get a copy of His Needs Her Needs. This will help during your recovery.

Are you getting any sense of your wife going through withdrawal from the OM? Understand that affair mentality is very much like an addiction. There is withdrawal.

This is a Poem my wife wrote to me.

Dear Lord,

I hang my head down because you trying to teach me humility

I think of all of those in the Bible that rejected you and you were faithful until the end

I guess I cannot look back and say what if I had not done this

I have to look forward to say how I can repair this

I know the scars will be there forever as a sign of my error

I open my hands and look up and hope that the day will come where I can feel clean

I hope the day will reach me when the sun shines and the clouds disappear

I hope you will be there

I hope that my life will once be a testament to something good

I hope that I can give back everything that has been given to me

I hope that I can affect one persons life so that they learn that what I have done serves no purpose

I see no light right now

I read today that you will withdraw as a test of what we will do

I hope that you have not withdrawn from me for too long

I ache and feel ill to the core of my being

I hope this will someday end

My only hope is that Lord you will show me how to do this

I pray, Amen

Paul,

The poem is very touching and a very nice gesture. I am sure it reflects her feelings right now.

I read your initial post and many thoughts went through my mind. I read her poem and many more of the same thoughts went through my mind.

I noticed that she said "I hope..." many times in the poem. I noticed also that she still travels and that she has the potential to see the other man, does she do business with him? Is he in the same company as her?

What I don't notice is a plan. If you would be so kind as to take the time to read the articles on this site and yes I would like to recommend Harley's book "Surviving an Affair", you will see that he is big on plans. Detail plans with action items, milestones, goals. Why? Because rebuilding a marriage after an affair without a plan is like announcing you are going to lose weight, but don't have a diet in mind, and you really are not sure if you will exercise. In short, it will most often fail.

Your W's affair was NOT an accident. It may have started off innocently enough, but pretty soon there was a plan. It went on for a year. She paid for a vacation with him presumably leaving you with your child while she vacationed with OM. This was not an accident, it was not a mistake.

I take it that you finally caught her, am I right? How did that happen? Do you think the affair would have continued had you not?

You may think I am telling you your W is an evil woman. A woman with no redeeming values. A confirmed liar. I am not. The way out of this mess is right straight through the heart of it. And the path starts with YOU taking a very hard look at the reality of it. The next step is her taking a hard look at the reality of it. THEN, you two start to make plans and these plans include boundaries, and understanding of how she failed to protect herself and the promises she made to HERSELF on your wedding day.

Let's review a few of the things she has said to you.






Do you see any actions in these statements? Do you see any indication that SHE is going to do anything? I see where she wants you "to accept her back" and try and make things work.

I presume you are the one that takes care of your daughter most of the time while she travels. I also notice that she is still traveling alot. How exactly does she PLAN on healing your marriage while she is on the road? How exactly does she plan on making your feel safe, while she is on the road? Does she offer any plan to do anything but blame other people for HER decisions?

Unless and until she begins to think in those terms, YOU cannot rebuild this marriage. As for getting revenge, forget about it. It is not worth yourself respect to violate the promise YOU made to yourself the day you married. You do remember those promises don't you? You stated them to your W that day, but really they were to you.
You promised fidelity remember as did she. What you really did was make a promise to yourself in front of her, your minister, family and friends that YOU would be faithful. It was yours to do, it was your boundary, it was something you would do even if no one was looking. She did the same.

You will find as you post and read here, that you won't have a marriage until she can come up with a plan to protect her boundaries and clearly what she did before was not effective.

Is it worth it to give your heart back to her? Only time will tell. Right now, you have no business giving your heart back to her. She has no plan in place to protect it. Worse she has offered you no plan save perhaps a promise or two of "I won't do it again". Nothing seems to have changed has it? That is what is really bothering you? The only change in this marriage is you KNOW she lied and cheated and she feels guilty. Neither will protect you.

The thoughts of the two of them is another matter. From everything I have read here in the last 8 years or so, it takes time, it takes replacing old memories and triggers with new good memories.

Finally, consider the anger you feel. Very normal. I have post 10's of thousands of times as you can see, and have read at least 10x's that many posts. The anger is normal. To address it you need to know that anger is a secondary emotion driven by primary ones such as: fear, pain, frustration, anxiety, etc. Figure out what is driving your anger, and address that and I think you will feel it lessen.

Finally, I would like to request a time line from you. When did you find out, how did you find out, when did you let your W you knew, when did you two go to counseling (if you have or plan to), and how long has it been since she came clean. You may be surprised to hear this, but the evolution of your feelings, your anger, her reactions and such actually seems to work on a time table. Thus my questions.

Once we know the time table I and others can sort of give you a "heads up" about what might be coming next. There is hope for this marriage Paul, but it will take thought, pray, planning, execution, time and love to get it done. It can be done, it is done here quite often.

Hang in there.

God Bless,

JL

She met the OM when she was working on a contract in the City where she did a lot of business. She now has a new job and will never see him again. I found out because the OM's wife called me and told me they were having an affair. I found out 1 month ago today. She initially denied it when I phoned her right away saying she had feelings for him and that they just hugged and kissed. I believed her but ended up talking to the OM and tricked him into telling me the truth. He then e-mailed her and said I knew everything. She was on a plane to Germany, when she landed she phoned and broke down and caught the 1st plane ride back. She said she had to see our faces to realize what she had done. It's been a bumpy ride and she blames no one but herself for getting sucked into someone who seemed to appreciate her more than I did. Went and saw a counselor and it helped a bit, but I guess the ball is in my park on how easily I can get over the trauma and how easily we can move forward. She says she does not even think of him and just wants to make our marriage better than it was. I'm the one who wants to throw the towel in one day and then the next write her poetry and tell her how much I love her.

Paul,

You are only one month out in this. You are on and will be on the emotional "rollercoaster" for the better part of a year. So strap yourself in. This is part of the process and there are no short cuts. At about 6 months even if recovery is going well, you will find yourself reexamining and becoming angry, it could be around 4 months but usually 6. At about 8 months you will feel "is this all worth it?" assuming that recovery is still continuing. At one year you will still be questioning. Harley claims it takes 2 years for a marriage to heal from an affair. From what i have seen here over the years, he is dead on. It could take longer, but gradually the feelings associated with memories and pictures in your head detach. You won't forget, and frankly you never should, but the feelings will detach. Sort of like a color picture left in sunlight, gradually the color fades. You can still see the image, but the intensity is gone.

At a month in, your feelings are right on track.

Permit me to respond to a few of your comments. You said In your counseling, and I strongly recommend you find a Pro-marriage counselor or even counsel with the Harleys, they really know this stuff, you need to explore WHY she felt you did not appreciate her. It is part of determining needs. If you have not read the articles on this site please read the ones on needs. Harley observed in his counseling of many years that often well intension couples tried to meet each other's needs, but missed the target because they did not KNOW their spouses needs. Worse they assumed they were just like theirs. So there was effort, with little result, leading to frustration, then resentment and finally to some really bad decisions. Make no mistake her affair had NOTHING to do with you not meeting her needs. The state of the marriage may well have to do with that.

I would also like to offer you one of my favorite quotes Resentment will harm you and your marriage, so when you feel it, address it with your W, your counselor, clergy, whatever, address the issues. Don't push them down.


This statement is wrong and right. Only you can heal yourself, that much is true. However, the chances of you remaining in this marriage increase orders of magnitude IF your W becomes active in rebuilding the marriage. That means SHE has to have a plan, and that is where a good counselor, this site, and surely the Harley's can help her AND you. You see ultimately you have to have a plan as well.

So the ball is NOT in your park on how easily you get over this. You don't get over this stuff, you get through it and you will need alot of help from your W.


I really don't believe this. One of the reasons Harley is so strong on NC is because the chances of rekindling the affair are significant with contact. Love is still there. Read up on his love bank view of things and you will see why. The OM had a pretty healthy love bank account when his W blew the whistle on the affair to you. It ended. The account still has deposits in it. She remembers him alright, and thinks of him. Now with time and work on your part and hers, his count will gradually drain, sort of like those monthly fees in a real bank account, eventually they empty the account. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> But, it takes time. I am sure her #1 focus is on saving the marriage but thoughts of OM are there and will be there for years. But, like I said earlier, the feelings associated with the memories will detach, IF you two recover.



Yup, you are right on the money here. Frankly, she has done very little to make you think things are really better, right? You know it so your rational side is saying: "Whoa, she has messed me over and I don't see any reason she would not do it again." And your emotional side coupled with your shared history is saying: "Just a minute now, I love this woman, she was a good mother and W for many many years I owe her a chance. I owe myself the chance at a continued and happy marriage."

I must go in a moment, but one final thing. One of the things you will NEED to know is WHY? Now most people that the WHY is Why did you do this to me? But, more important to you is WHY she did this to herself and HER marriage. What did she tell herself that made it alright to cross her moral boundaries and vows. She violated herself, and did not protect her boundaries, and one of the things that must change to protect her, and you, is that she have a real plan to protect her boundaries. Until she has one, you will NOT be very willing to make much of a commitment to her and the marriage.

Let me end this by offering you an example from my life. I married in my 30's. Had a very active batchelor life. I stood up in front of a church and promised to be faithful. I made a plan. I traveled alot and my plan was simple. I never went anywhere where there was dancing. I dined by myself unless in a group of colleagues. I stayed out of bars or any other place where single women. I brought books with me and read them in my room every night. When computers came a long I spent time working and reading my email at night. Sounds boring, but I knew that the best way to keep my promise was to avoid any temptation as much as possible. That was my plan and it has worked for well over 30 years.

So what is your W's plan? Is she willing to quit traveling and actually do some work on the marriage? How does she plan on helping rebuild the marriage? She does not have to wait for your OK, and frankly if she does you may well decide to call it a day. It is your right to do so, even if you don't want to do so.

You have a young child, you must take most of the care of her, since your W travels alot. I know she is a focus of yours, but staying in an unhappy marriage does her no favors either. The goal is a happy marriage here, and it takes TWO.

Must go, hang in there.

God Bless,

JL

Hello,

I am sorry but I agree with Just Learning. This was no accident. She was having sex with this man behind your back for a year. She paid for a vacation for him and went with him having sex with him while you stayed home wtih your daughter. Again this went on for a year!! If she was not caught you can bet it would still be going on. She has showed you what total disrespect she has had for you and your family. She gets caught and now is in total damage control. If the roles were reversed I doubt she would be so accepting of all of the bull she has both throwing at you. You judge a person by their actions and not by their words and her actions for a YEAR speaks volumes.