Here is a dark truth that I am loathe to admit.

I am pretty ambivalent right now as to whether or not I want this marriage to continue, even though I still love her very much. In a cruelly objective analysis, there are benefits to either decision.

I have always felt so strongly about personal character and moral integrity, that its hard not to see her as weak right now. She is good person with a very large heart, and the truth probably is that she just made a horrible mistake and is now honestly trying to atone for it. So I feel like I am being cold and unreasonable by throwing away the chance for reconciliation because of my own feeling of moral superiority. The more I read though, the more I see this a common reaction for the BS.

Thats why I won't contact her command. It won't seriously hurt (don't get me wrong, it will hurt, but I won't feel like my life is over) me to walk away from the marriage. At this point, I'm willing to try reconciliation because of the memories of how much fun we used to have together. We still have fun and things are going well, but there is the ever-present shadow of infidelity looming over it all.

Andrew, I don't think you are being proactive enough. She won't get kicked out of the Navy for exposing to her command. She'll get kicked out of the Navy if she continues to contact OM after exposure. There have been plenty of situations where this has happened on this boards and that has always been the case.

Also expose to OM's GF AND family. You don't want this OM trying to sneak in again and start things back up. You need to cut him off. Of course his your WW thinks his girlfriend is crazy. That's what he told her to suck her in. That's the oldest play in the book. Tell your opposite sex friend how unhappy you are with your significant other, get her feeling sorry and other emotions for you, and then reel her in. He wasn't going to tell your WW how great of a girlfriend he has as he tries to bed your WW.

Don't underestimate the pull your WW has to OM. He's going to try and convince her that they can be "friends" again, and then he's going to try and pull her in again. She probably is a friendly person and wouldn't turn away anyone trying to be her "friend," but she's too weak to stop it at that point. If you are serious about saving your M, you will address this threat AND MAKE TIME for MC. If she doesn't have time for MC in her current job, THEN SHE NEEDS TO FIND ANOTHER ONE. That just tells you that you are not her top priority, and your spouse should ALWAYS be your top priority. Also, you can get phone counseling with the Harleys, and it is better than any MC you could find. You need to make MC a boundary that she must respect if she still wants to remain married to you. Do not take no for an answer. You don't have any kids, and if you aren't going to walk away from this and you are going to invest more time and emotion, THIS NEEDS TO BE ADDRESSED NOW! Otherwise, you'll be back here ten years later, only now, children will be involved.

Oh, and your WW is still lying to you. At the very least she blew him. That I can say for certain. She breaks down everytime she talks about it because she doesn't want to talk about it because she has to lie some more. Demand the truth. Tell her you KNOW she's lying and you will not drop the subject until she discloses EVERYTHING about their relationship.

JMWC95,
Thank you for your very candid response. I honestly do appreciate it. It strikes a chord because while I may not believe she gave her body to him, oral sex could be conceivable. She has never balked at doing that for me.

This weekend, I'm going to sit her down and explain that there are too many blank spots to the story. If she can't give me a complete summary of start to end with all the feelings, meetings, and physical contact in between, then I will give her a couple hours to write the whole thing out. I need to make her understand that until all the ugly little truths come out, I won't be able to accept her story.

I'll also talk to her about WHEN we are starting marriage counseling again. Not if. She can't just take another job, but I will force her to make time in her schedule for it. We will find someone who does weekend or late evening work if we have to.

Thanks again for your brutal honesty. Its necessary.

You should do the disclosure in a MC office with an MC that you have talked to and teaches MB principles.

Also, since there is no physical proof of adultery, disclosing an "unprofessional" relationship would likely not lead to any dismissal, but would make the Navy keep a close eye on them and keep them apart.

Andrew,

Disclosure is meant to seek help in ending the affair. It is not for revenge. IF your W's affair has ended and no contact has truly been established, then the need to expose has been removed.

However, IF OM keeps trying to contact, you simply call him and explain to him your next calls will be to the JAG and his girlfriend. YOu expect to hear of no more attempts at contact nor find any.

I appreciate your reluctance to cause the end of your W's career, but you MUST realize that it will be her and OM's affair that ends her career, NOT you passing the information on to JAG and his/her commanders. Your W needs to be made very aware of the fact that you WILL disclose any further contact and affair IF it occurs. AND, it will be her fault for making the choices she made.

It does sound as if she is trying to recover the marriage and I hope you and she take the time to read the articles on this site. They will be eye opening for several reasons but perhaps the most eye opening aspect is how COMMON affairs are right down to the WS saying exactly the same things whether they be male or female. In short, there is little special about an affair and she needs to come to realize this.

Must go, but hang in there and work on recovery. It will take you awhile to truly recover, roughly 2 years. I would strongly suggest that you and your W read the articles concerning love busters, especially concerning disrespectful judgements, DJ's. Also read about the policy of joint agreement, and radical honesty. Finally, read the four rules for a good marriage. Very lowkey and full of common sense.

God Bless,

JL

Well, I sat the Wife down last night and we had a nice conversation about how I was feeling. I wanted to be very clear about what I was saying, so I wrote a long letter out and had her read it in front of me. Basically, I just told her that I did not feel that our tactic of "act like it didn't happen" was a viable long-term solution. Even though I was happy with what she had been doing to show me the EA/PA was over, I had to raise my concerns before suppressed emotions came bursting out. I know that she still does not want to talk about it, but we need to get all the details out into the open, demystify it, and learn from it, and what we were doing was turning it into a dark, little secret that we both were afraid to mention.

She read it and agreed with what I had said, but also said a lot of the details I had asked for escape her. She looks back on what happened and can't really explain what was going through or head or why it seemed like a good decision at the time. I think I did an ok job of explaining how thats common and how affairs are very similar from case to case. I also told her what the "fog" is, but I'm not sure if it had a positive impact or negative. She is going to take a few days and right out the narrative I have requested.

I'm also going to call today to schedule our next MC appointment. After that, I need to send a note to the OM and tell him that his next attempt at contact will be met with a package of information going to his division officer and Commanding officer. Don't know whether I should call him or send him an email though. Lastly, I need to find out if he is still living with the girlfriend and make sure she knows the details too.

She also caught me checking her phone last night. She doesn't hide it and I haven't seen anything on it. She didn't criticize me checking or get angry, but I could tell it bothered her. I tried to explain that trust comes back based on her actions and my independent verification of her actions, but I could tell she was upset. Sometimes, I feel like she expects me just to 100% trust again since the affair is over. The good news is that the books I ordered, His Needs/Her Needs and Surviving an Affair arrived yesterday too and I have started reading SAA.

Still, even though I know that this is all a step in the right direction, it dredged up a lot of negative feelings and I'm feeling pretty low today.

Andrew,

Your story strikes a chord with me and I wanted to share how I handled the OM. It is one of the things I'm proud of the way I handled it and the outcome.

My wife admitted to a limited PA (no intercourse) during a girls only vacation, followed by about 10 days of an intense EA with emails, texts and long intimate phone calls. The OM lives 500 miles away and worked at a prestigious private prep school (that apparently guards their reputation, and I saw that as leverage, much as you can use the Navy).

When I discovered the A and confronted her, she confessed everything and although it still remains incredible that nothing further happened, all of my independent checking appears to confirm that fact. She also agreed to break all contact immediately and overnight I learned as much as possible about the OM (its amazing what is readily available on the internet with just a little background info) and concocted a plan. Here is the email that was waiting on him at work the next morning (I sent it from her laptop and attached it to a email string between them, so he knew I had the goods):

BEGINNING OF EMAIL:

This is (my name), it seems you have been having an affair with my wife, (W's name).

I suspected something was wrong, found these emails, confronted her and she confessed EVERYTHING in detail. This could be your lucky day if you are willing to reply to this email, make one phone call and then break off ALL contact immediately. (W's name) has asked me to allow her to stay and work through this and has agreed to never contact you again.

I have hard and electronic copies of all emails exchanged between you two, and will have been able to retrieve all deleted text messages (both incoming and outgoing) from her cell phone shortly.

I also have your:

Full name
Home Address
Wife’s name
Children’s name
Place of employment
The Headmasters name and contact info
Cell phone #
Office phone #
Home phone #
Email address

…and I have the names and contact info of 5 private investigators within 10 miles of (OM's hometown) that I will be interviewing later today.

Here’s the deal…(W's name) and I have both called in sick today to put this matter behind us one way or the other. You have until 3:00pm today to respond to this email confirming its receipt and writing a narrative confessing to your participation in the affair including complete details from when you met in Cancun to the subject of your last phone call yesterday and any plans for future meetings. I love my wife very much, but in order to forgive her, I must know that she is telling me the whole truth and nothing but the truth and that this affair is OVER. This narrative will be used to confirm her story. After you reply to this email you must call us on our home phone (our home phone number) and both of us will be on the line. The purpose of this is for you to hear from (W's name) herself that it is over and for you to never attempt to contact her again. Then you must agree to these terms to both of us.

If not, all of the evidence I have will be delivered by private investigator in person to your wife, employer, sons, and possibly others. I am not playing games. Let me be clear…if you don’t reply by 3:00pm today, or if you don’t call, or if you ever attempt to contact (W's name) again after today…I will turn your world upside down as you’ve done mine. (W's name) has also agreed to not answer any phone calls after today and save their history, and will not reply to any email or text messages and forward them directly to me.

I will also call and leave this same message on your cell phone and office voicemails so there can be no mistake of its receipt.

These are my non-negotiable conditions. You do as I say, and we will become just a memory for you without ever contacting your wife, etc. Anything less, and I’ll bring your whole life crashing down around your ears. You have messed with my family and I will not stand for it.

May you burn in the firey pits of ****** for the pain you’ve caused my family.

END OF EMAIL

About 9:30am he called our home and we both answered on separate extentions. Initially he was a jerk, but after I explained the information I had and my resolve, he couldn't backpedal fast enough. He even confirmed that there was no sex, (OM & W had no possible way to contact each other between discovery and show down to coordinate stories and their stories matched nearly perfectly) and I tend to believe him as he appears to be the type personality that would love to rub it in my face if there had been. It was also helpful for W to hear how easily it was for him to throw her away to save his own sorry [censored].

Its only been two weeks (today) since that show down, but so far, so good. We are now in MC and things are getting better...we still have peaks and valleys, but the overall trend is positive.

I hope this gives you some ideas that may work in your situation. As you know, this is very painful, but it feels good to share that pain with others and possibly help out. Good luck to you.

MyRevelation,
I like the hard line stance you took. Were you bluffing about the old text messages or did you actually have a way to get them? Back when I discovered all the texting, I called Verizon, but they said they are not even allowed to look at the text messages unless I get a Suppina(sp?). I haven't made any follow-up requests since then.

Not a bad idea though to get him to tell me his side of the story. I don't have as much leverage over him though since he is not married, but the Navy could help. Maybe its worth a shot.

Andrew,

Check out this thread on another site. It is where I went first for help. The link is my story from the beginning...before I confirmed the A till today, and all the pain in between. Also, look at some of the technology threads, these guys are some of the best at helping you find out exactly what is going on with your W / OM, but beware, some of these guys are very bitter and not nearly as understanding as those that frequent this site. It can be toxic there if you dwell too long, but there is definately useful information for you there. I looked into the software to retrieve deleted text messages, and my W agreed to let me have her sim card...it is about $100 for the software and a sim card reader...I'm still considering, but feel we're past that at this point. I have the emails and they're much more specific and detailed than you would get on a text message anyway.

FYI - my username is Confused??? and Confused?? on this site as there was a glitch and I had to reregister under another name.

http://womensinfidelity.com/community/viewtopic.php?t=2831

Good Luck!!!

Wow, no kidding, there is definitely some vitriol on that site. I couldn't hang out there too long. People are much more positive here I think.

The sim card reader is an interesting thought. I doubt it would help me since the messages I am talking about occurred in March/April, so they are probably long gone. We text each other a lot, so I would be surprised if they weren't overwritten by now.

I also worry about too much information and at what point it becomes unhelpful. I'd mainly want it as leverage over the OM. I think I might take your tactic though. Tell him that I want his side of the story or else a package goes to his command, and his girlfriend. That will also get the message across that he will never speak to my wife again too.

Andrew,

All I can do is tell you what worked in my particular situation...you'll have to decide how best to handle your set of circumstances, but hopefully this will give you another option to consider.

I agree with you about the quality of people and overall tone of this site is very helpful. I've drawn strength and wisdom from some of the posters here. We have kind of contained those that know of our situation so as to not involve family, etc. in our problems and it has been invaluable to have a place to express my thoughts, concerns, problems and also to share some that I've learned with others enduring the same things.

Good luck in whatever direction you choose, I really do feel I share a common (although anonymous) bond with many of you. Thanks you all.

I really wish I had found this website back in April. It would have been immensely helpful, instead of me fumbling through the healing process and now essentially starting from the beginning 4 months after D-Day.

I dont think there is any reason to worry about the text messages at this point. When I contact the OM, he doesn't need to know that I don't have the transcripts.

Thanks again for the advice, MyRevelation.

Quick update.
We are starting MC again next week, and I am looking forward to it.
I have also asked her for a full written confession of certain details that still bother me, which she will have for me this weekend. I am doing my best to create an atmosphere in which she feels safe being honest with me. I have had no angry outbursts nor have I given her any ultimatums. I have just expressed my desire to have all the same information that she does, so that I can view the A in the same light and we can move forward. Other than that, things have been pretty good. She still gets very depressed when the subject comes up, but I guess thats to be expected. I want to get her to the point, though, that she can talk about it and what she has learned from it.

The last step is finally contacting the OM.
I liked MR's letter and modeled this after his. Tell me if you think this achieves my goal of giving the OM a reason to tell me the truth:

-------
OM,

My name is ________ and I know that you had an affair with my wife from the end of March until April 22nd of 2007. I suspected something was wrong at the end of March when she suddenly became very secretive, deceptive, and withdrawn. I gathered information for a few weeks until I had the incontrovertible proof that I needed of her extramarital relationship with you. This proof primarily consists of cell phone text messaging records (over 250 in March alone) and screenshots of email chains, in which you clearly express your feelings and intentions. Since her phone is in my name, I have also confirmed with Verizon wireless that the text message transcripts (what you two actually said to each other) will be made available to me upon Attorney request, should I so wish it.
The point of this is to prove to you that I have evidence of your affair that shows, beyond doubt, that you willfully violated personal conduct standards of the Armed Services

I confronted my wife with this same evidence the morning of April 22nd. There is no need to go into what happened after that, because you saw the “No Contact” message she sent you. After 4 months of her attempts to rebuild trust and pleading with me to give her another chance, she has recently confessed all the remaining details that she was too ashamed to tell me earlier. I love my wife very much, I always have. But in order to forgive her, I need to be absolutely sure that she is being totally honest with me and that this affair is OVER.

So I want two things from you. The first is a confession of your involvement in the affair. I want to hear in your words the following:
1) When the affair started
2) When and where you met
3) Every instance of physical contact between you and the extent of that contact
4) Any contact (email, texts, conversations) that occurred after her class started

The second is your word that you will never attempt to contact my wife again. No more myspace friend requests, no more emails, no more phone calls. Forget you ever met her.

All that being said, I have NO desire to get involved in your life. Send me an honest account of the information I requested above, and you won’t hear from me ever again. I won’t send the evidence to anyone and your life will go on as though nothing had ever happened.
However, if you refuse to provide me with this information, attempt to lie to me, or attempt to contact my wife again, I will have no choice but to inform your chain of command. I will furnish the information to your division officer, your Commanding Officer, your girlfriend, your ex-wife, your parents, etc… (anyone I can get in touch with). I can’t predict what will happen, but my guess, is that you don’t want to find out either.

The choice is yours. Do as I ask and put all this behind you, or shrug me off and pray that your command thinks as little of it as you do. I send this Friday evening, and expect a response no later than Saturday at 8pm. The consequences of missing this deadline will be as outlined above.
------

I was planning on firing that off to him on Friday night. I'll be with my wife all weekend and he won't have any chance to contact her before the deadline is up. If you think I'm wasting my breath since the affair ended 4 months ago, go ahead and say that too.

Andrew,

I like the tone of the letter, but then again, I would.

Good Luck to you.

Also, regarding the "full disclosure letter" from your wife. Please review these linked threads to hopefully be prepared for some of the fallout that will happen to you after you read about it in black and white. I was warned, but didn't take it seriously. Don't get me wrong, I'm still glad to have gotten the letter ... I just wish I had better prepared myself for the fallout. Please try to learn from my mistakes ... I'd like to think I could help someone else avoid the pain I experienced just YESTERDAY.

BTW - FogFree on these links is my wife, who just started posting here at MB.

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/sho...e=0#Post3297044

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/sho...e=0#Post3297831

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/sho...e=0#Post3298261

Keep us posted on how it turns out, and GOOD LUCK!!!

Thanks MR.
The intention was to have it sound firm, but not overly contentious. I want him to feel like he has something to gain for himself (safety) by being honest with me.

I know that the letter my wife gives me will most likely cause me added emotional pain, especially if it informs me of more physical contact than she had previously admitted. I do think this is a relatively high probability because of the way she described it before. I did make sure she understands that anything revealed after this letter, will have to be treated as another betrayal of trust. So we'll see.
I know it will hurt, but my imagination filling in the gaps is far worse.

The first MC session will actually be just me, because she'll be out of town on an exercise with her new command. I figure that the MC and I could use some one on one time though.

Andrew3,

I do not come to MB Forums much any more. But a friend I made here sent me a message that there was a certain similarity between my situation and yours, sent me a link and suggested I take a look.

Indeed, I feel a need to comment on one of the aspects of your wife’s adultery that has not been addressed.

In a nutshell, your wife is violating federal espionage law. And, if you do not expose OM to the proper chain of command, you also may be abetting a violation of espionage law. In fact, if I knew who OM or your WW are I would have to report them! So will anyone they work with.

One of the terms of your wife’s Top Secret clearance is she is expected to conduct herself ethically and report anyone, including herself (and even you) if her marital or life situations are changing. There are specific agreements she has signed to receive her TS clearance in which she has promised to report any conduct detrimental to the security clearances she has been granted. Affairs are big red flags and fall under this requirement.

I lost several high-level clearances because of my wife’s affair and who OM was. Note that I did not have the affair, she did. Yet I agree with this safety procedure. For all Defense Investigative Services (DIS) knew, and for all I knew, OM was intentionally pumping my wife (pardon the alliteration) for national security information on the off chance I talk in my sleep or something. Or, just blackmail her into asking me about various things. They take this stuff very, very seriously. DIS was doing the right thing based on what I and they knew about OM and the affair at the time.

You wife is even closer to the problem. As the person with clearances, she has a moral, ethical and a contractual (she signed a security contract) obligation to report OM and the details of her affair to her security officer. TS is not something she has an inalienable right to have. Better people than her have been suborned by agents of foreign powers in this exact same way. She may have been targeted, and she will be the last person to know.

You write in one of your posts that you consider yourself to be ethical and, “I have always felt so strongly about personal character and moral integrity…” Well, you need to tackle this issue head-on. Adultery is indeed unethical and immoral. But in your case, your WW is also violating the specific terms and conditions she signed her name to so she could receive access to sensitive national security information.

You must expose properly. Your wife no longer merits a TS. Job security aside, she has already crossed the line and should not be working there. Independent of your marital recovery.

Believe me - you do not want to be one of the people being asked questions by DIS and the FBI when this all goes south.

Two additional observations:

“I have had to attempt to rationalize it and put it into a frame of reference, because I just can't understand how she could do something so crazy. I have always shown her love and supported her, I have stabilized her chaotic life, given her financial stability and independence, and it crushes me that she would risk everything we have for a single parent who is cheating on his live-in girlfriend. This will sound petty, but I read the stuff he sent to her, and he has the literacy level of a child. That makes it even worse, to know that it’s not even a step up for her.”

There is no rational. It will never make sense. It is very much like a drug addiction. Total NC, cold turkey withdrawal, is your marriage’s best long term strategy. And total exposure helps with NC a great deal in the near term. I exposed OM at work and DIS had a series of nice long talks with him. We never heard from him again.


“The last part of the story is that she has confided that she doesn't want to have kids, or more precisely, she doesn't want to be pregnant. She said she had tried so hard to convince herself before we got married that she wanted kids since she knew I wanted them, but she has decided she really doesn't. Again, this seems rooted in self-esteem so I feel like if I cure one, she will want to have kids, but I wonder.”

I heard this too. Take it seriously. FWW said shortly after her affair began that she decided she did not want any more children and that our one DS was enough. I now know she was speaking from out of affair land – a pregnancy would have interfered, of course. But, she never did change her mind. Fifteen years later we have had no more children – all due to her mindset at the start of her affair. I suspect your WW will not change her mind either. Make this part of your decision.


With prayers,

That is some pretty powerful information Aphelion. I'll have to look into that. I know the person she had the brief affair with had the same clearance because he had the same job (I think it works like that), but I'm just a civilian so I may have the clearance levels confused. It definitely bears further investigation.

As far as the kids stuff goes, once we have full disclosure in the office of an MC and move onto what conditions created the environment for her to choose to have an affair, we'll be on to the kids issue. If she still doesn't want kids, there is no point going through the pain of recovery.

Andrew,

Ap is telling it to you straight. I just signed yet another form of that sort this year. It very clearly states that any changes in marital status is to be reported to the local DIS office. It does not mean automatic loss of clearance but it will sure be checked out by the DIS folks. Believe it.

I think you need to understand that this is NOT an optional thing.

Please think about it. As for the kids, if she says she doesn't want them...believe her. You MIGHT be able to change her mind temporarily, but what is likely to happen is that she will resent any child you have as well as you.

God Bless,

JL

Talked with my wife this morning a little about her clearance. Its a Secret level, not TS. I mentioned the DIS issue and we'll talk about it more tonight. Thanks very much for the information, but I'm hoping no action will be required here.

The kids will definitely be a sticky issue. We have spoken a little about it since she has come out of the fog, but I'm waiting to really discuss it once we get back into MC.

Just Learning raises an excellent point here:


My thoughts exactly. Kids are never to be used as a bargaining chip in a marriage. If both couples aren't 100% in agreement about having kids, then you shouldn't have them. We'll see what happens in the MC office though.