Wow, I wish I had found this site a year ago.

To make a long story short...my wife had an EA with an aquaintance of mine. It was really more than an EA, as kissing on multiple occasions was involved, but she ended it before it became sexual. In fact, this was how I found out, discovering the frantic barrage of e-mails they were sending to eachother (she was definitely upset and became careless as a result) when she was trying to explain to him that she couldn't have sex with him and that she needed to end it, and his responses that it was okay and he'd wait for her to become more comfortable (oh, how touching....), escalating to him becoming mean and vulgar with her, calling her a tease and worse and then her telling him to never contact her again or she'd tell all.

Well, I found the e-mails, confronted her, she confessed to an EA that lasted four weeks, that started when her dad's cancer became terminal and ended shortly after he died. I confronted him as well, and he confirmed the start and ending times, as was confirmed by the e-mails I discovered. I got a half-assed apology out of him, but I got the impression he really didn't feel bad. I feel he was absolutely trying to steal my beautiful wife.

I travelled extensively during this time, but I tried to be supportive of her when I was home...I know she was going through a lot watching her father suffer. Appartently she needed a shoulder to cry on when I was gone and that was how her affair developed.

Needless to say, when I found out I was enraged, did things I shouldn't have done, said things I shouldn't have said. She was hysterical and begged me to forgive her. I stayed in the house as did she, and we promised to rebuild our marriage.

For the next year, she did everything she could to make it up to me....we had sex every night, she was affectionate and loving, she took care of the house and the kids by herself and pretty much let me have the upper hand in all the decision making. I took it all as her restitution to me, and I did very little for her for her in return. She bought books for us to read, at least a dozen of them, and she would stay up at night reading and high-lighting and leaving them on my nightstand for me to read. I didn't read any of them.

Instead I seethed...internally seethed at her betrayal and then exploded at her when she'd reach out to comfort me after noticing something was wrong. This vicious cycle lasted about a year. I knew I hadn't treated her properly before her affair...I knew it, but I couldn't change it...I also knew I hadn't been treating her properly since her affair, but I couldn't stop myself from lashing out, from saying horrible things, from reducing her to tearful sobs to get my satisfaction. I was a jerk, but, in my mind, her EA justified my behavior.

A couple months back she began to withdraw from me emotionally and sexually. I would see her reach her hand out to touch me but then pull it back and let it drop to her side. She stopped smiling at me.

She won't look at me anymore, won't make eye contact. She talks to me but looks away when she does. She doesn't reach for me in bed anymore, but will suffer my attentions if I insist.

So, now that well over a year has passed, I feel myself coming out of my depression, and I am ready to resume my life with her and I am ready to start actively rebuilding my marriage.

But, it appears she has other plans. She told me last week that she well and truly does not love me anymore, and does not feel she is capable of giving me one bit than she already has. In fact, she told me she hates me.

I went looking through her purse last night, and found a business card for a divorce attorney, with an appointment scheduled in two weeks.

So, my big question....

Can I make her stay, and can I make her love me again? I realize I have not done things the marriage builders' way, but I am willing to try now. I have read through the site, and have read about meeting her needs. I tried to find the book she had from the Harley guy but when I asked her about it she told me she threw all the books out two months ago. I know, not a good sign.

How do I turn things around with her? Seriously she is ready to bail on me...

Wulf...

Why don't you prove you are serious and call up Steve Harley and get his assistance in developing a plan for recovery? That might show her that you are finally serious enough to give you a second look.

In the meantime, here are a couple of books that can bring you up to speed:

1. Surviving an Affair

2. Fall in Love, Stay in Love

go check out this video: http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi6806_inf.html

Do you think she is involved with someone else again? If so, you need to find out who it is and expose.

As Mel says, get reading and start doing a stellar plan A. That plan A will be good for you no matter what happens between you and your wife. It is a plan to make you the best person you can be.

Can you look at the emotional needs questionnaire and figure out what her needs are? Then get going on meeting the needs that she will allow you to meet.

Yes, you can recover your marriage. It is possible but you need to put in the effort to make it happen.

You can save this!!!! You have ton of work to do, get your [censored] in gear!

Your ACTIONS need to PROVE to her that you are serious. You need to shower her with a Tsunami of how serious you are. The $$$ you pay for the Harley's counseling are nothing compared to what divorce costs!!!!!

Do it NOW. Every day you waste is a ticking time bomb. Her Love Tank is empty, you better get that Tsunami in gear.

PS. You can never MAKE her stay. You need to make her WANT to stay.

Beowulf, how willing are you to surrender your pride?

You have given free rein to your emotions and, no doubt, verbally abused your wife, which would normally be enough to cause advice to your wife to divorce you. It is complicated by her EA, which was also uncalled for, but the issue is now the same as it is for her affair...you cannot change the past. There ARE consequences to all actions.

So IF, and only if, you are completely serious about wanting to fully forgive your wife and to seek her forgiveness of your actions, can you HOPE to be able to have a shot at saving your marriage.

So let's start with the "first step" that you need to know. You need to read up all you can about Plan A behaviors, Love Busters, Emotional Needs. You will find lots of information on this website about them. You need a crash course in the changes that you need to make in yourself BEOFRE you can even hope to put the brakes on her plan to divorce and move on.

Learn also about your Taker and your Giver, as they will be crucial to you so that you will know how to respond, because recovery will not be easy.

But, if you are willing, truly willing, you can START now and hope for the best. Understand that as much as you may not trust your wife right now, she has no trust left in you regarding your reaction to her affair and no trust that she can be forgiven, in love, and a successful marriage be rebuilt.

She read, she tried, you didn't. The "shoe," so to speak, is on the other foot. She tried, and finally reached the point where she accepted that nothing she could do would ever result in your forgiving her.

So here is your first task, if you want it, and you probably won't like it. You need to take her to dinner somewhere quiet and either there or somewhere alone later, you need to let your emotional guard down and tell her what you feel, how you screwed up and were irrational, how you forgive her and how you heartfully want her to forgive you for the abuse you showered on her this last year. Tell her you have found this site and many others who have worked through similar problems and have emerged with not only a recovered, but better and more loving marriage. Also, just in case you a typical "in control" type of man, it's okay to cry. The emotional dam you've been hiding behind has to burst.

Tell her you don't want a divorce, you want a chance to change your behaviors and your emotional responses that need to be controlled, not vented at her.

Tell her you love her despite everything.

Do NOT expect a "miracle response." It can happen, but it's unlikely. What you want is agreement, no matter how feeble, to try to save your marriage and to let her see through your actions that your words are not just "words" but are a result of REAL CHANGE and growth.

Post often, the road will be rocky. Do not try to "go it alone.

As was previously recommended, contact Steve Harley if you can afford to and get some good, direct, help.

IF your wife agrees to trying, then find a good, trained, Marriage Counselor for JOINT Marital Counseling, not Individual Counseling. Be sure that the counselor is committed to saving marriages.

If faith in God plays a role in your lives, consider spiritual counseling also.

God bless.

Okay, I get the idea. I bought Surviving an Affair at lunchtime today and read through most of it sitting in my car.

I realize I have royally mucked up the last 15 months of my life with her, and have crapped on all her efforts to reconnect with me. I am a jerk.

After my lunchtime reading, I went to the jewelry store and bought her a new pair of diamond earrings...I bought her a card too, about forgiveness and building a new life together. I just gave them to her, but they both sit unopened on the kitchen table. She asked me why I was being nice to her....I told her that I love her and tried to hug her. She didn't return my hug.

I am absolutely certain she has not resumed her EA or started a new one. We work for the same international company, and after her EA, I stopped travelling and transferred into her building. We drive in together, have lunch together, drive home together. I have access to her computer at home and at work; I have access to her company issued cell phone records and also all the phone records at home. She is rarely out of my sight. Today she stayed home with our sick daughter. Other than situations like that, she is always with me. In fact I don't know where she got the time to find an divorce attorney...one of her friends must have set her up.

I just find it unsettling that SHE is the one who had the EA, yet I am the one finding myself in the position of having to kiss her lovely backside and otherwise try to worm my way back into her good graces.

It just doesn't seem right to me.

I get the concept of it all, the Love Bank, etc...I want to be nice to her and meet her needs...but I still get so mad.

But I do really want to keep my wife, so I guess I have to swallow my pride and try.

Thannks to all for the advice. I think I have a lot of work ahead of me....

Here is the thing, Wulf, her affair does not entitle you to abuse her. You can stay mad all you want, but it will probably mean the end of your marriage, as you can see. You have every right to be mad, you do not have the right to abuse her.

That being said, here is an article about Dr Harley's view on forgiveness. He believes in just compensation:


http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi5042_qa.html

Beowulf - it ISN'T "right." That isn't the "point."

Here is the ONE question that you need to ask yourself and honestly answer it to yourself: Do you want to be right or do you want to be married to your wife?

Don't gloss over that question. You are here ostensibly because you THINK you want to save your marriage, or perhaps it's just because you are afraid of losing your wife and you don't like to lose. Whatever the reason, you need to begin by honestly answer the question IF you really do want to save your marriage and have a marriage of love and equality.

I haven't even started talking about forgiveness yet. But it is clear that you may have some problems in that area too, as you really don't seem to understand what is important to your wife. So let's just talk about ONE example and see if you begin to get a glimmer of just how much YOU are going to have change your thinking and behavior if you DO want a wife...the wife you currently have.





Wulf, "things" are NOT the way to your wife's heart. "Things" send the wrong message, that you want to "buy" her love. I suspect that like most men, you have a hard time understanding the emotional makeup of women and emotions tend to "scare you," especially if YOU (not some card) have to talk about your feelings.

What you did would ordinarily be nice, but you and your marriage are way beyond "nice things" being the answer. This is about YOU. Yes, I understand that your wife was the one to have the affair. I also understand from what you wrote that she ended the affair and tried very hard to learn and do the things that would help to recover your marriage. You, on the other hand, used the affair as an excuse to give free rein to venting all your feelings and emotional onslaughts on her to beat her into a pulp of goo that had no self-respect or right to anything. Would you treat an employee that way? If so, you are not an employer that I'd care to work for. If not, why do you think your wife had to "stand there and take the crap you wouldn't shovel at anyone else? Because she is your "property?"

The TRUTH is that you have the right to a divorce based upon adultery. But she also has the right to a divorce based upon your own "marital infidelity" of "over the top verbal and mental abuse."

So let me rephrase your question for a minute, so you can perhaps ponder it from a different perspective:

"I just find it unsettling that [color:"blue"]HE[/color] is the one who had [color:"blue"] uncontrolled anger and lashed out in a year long campaign of verbal and mental abuse[/color], yet I am the one finding myself in the position of having to kiss [color:"blue"]his[/color] lovely backside and otherwise try to worm my way back into [color:"blue"]his[/color] good graces, [color:"blue"]but never to be truly forgiven and an equal in the marriage.[/color]"






Beowulf, don't bother trying. "Trying" is fake and self-serving. You've been doing the "self-serving" thing for the past year. You also don't have to "swallow your pride," oh poor pitiful you (sorry if the sarcasm hurts, but I want to "get through to you). This has nothing to do with pride the way you are using it. Marriage is about surrendering yourself to your spouse, about CHOOSING to honor your vows, about forgiveness (and keeping the threefold promise YOU make when you forgive someone) because no one is perfect, about LOVE, in all of it's definitions.

There is no "try." There is only DO.

No trial marriages, no try to recover but keep a divorce in the "back pocket" if she doesn't do what you think or want her to do. Nothing less that 100% will do. Marriage is not, contrary to what many think, a 50/50 deal. It is a 100%/100% deal.

So you are a self-proclaimed "jerk." Do you like that or want to remain one?

Are you afraid? Are you afraid you may lose her anyway? You may, but you certainly WILL if you do not choose to make needed changes in yourself. So what do you really have to lose, your wife or things that make you undesirable to any woman?

Recovery from adultery, and your own abuse of your wife, will REQUIRE doing something that scares most men....looking inside and looking at what is really important to you. If anything (other than God) comes out of that introspection as being "more important" than your wife, then get a divorce and don't make any changes in yourself. But if your wife comes out on top, then you better start asking yourself WHY would she want to remain to any man who has been behaving as you have PROVEN to her is the "real you?"

It IS the "real you" that we have been talking about. The changes we have been discussing are changes that affect who the "real you" is. Are you happy with who you are now? Or do you think there may be some things that need to be changed permanently?





Wulf, your words are meaningless, as are the things and the cards you think can "stand in" for you. This is a SOLO deal. Only what you DO will begin to lend meaning and truth to what you say. She has learned that what you have said is false, and that your anger and lack of forgiveness is real. You taught her that. Now you have to teach something new. But if you think "swallowing your pride" is the answer, then you are setting yourself and your wife up for a "lose/lose" or a "win/lose" situation. What has to come from recovery efforts is a "win/win" solution. That is what everyone here is going to try to help you to achieve.

But it starts and ends with you. It IS your marriage. Just because we have been through the sorts of things you are dealing with doesn't mean that you have to accept or implement anything that might be advised or suggested to you. At the end of the day, you will live with the choices you make today, and the next today, and the next today. That's because all anyone can "control" is their behavior, one day at a time.

If your goal is a recovered, loving, marriage, then it's time to start really DOING what needs to be done.

Or are you afraid that you'll be seen as weak and begging?

I don't know your faith, or if you have one, but may I suggest that you find a Bible and read 1 Corinthians Chapter 13. What you will find there is a description about what love IS, and how one acts in love.

Remember this, if you forget everything else, love is first and foremost an action verb. "Feelings" come later. That is also the essence of the Love Bank and meeting our spouse's Emotional Needs.

I suggested dinner and a heartfelt talk earlier. You responded with trinkets and a card someone else wrote.

Recovery of a marriage in trouble is NOT about "delegating." It's about personally doing what needs to be done because no one else is your spouse's spouse but you. It is YOU she wants and not a repeat of what the marriage WAS like before. She wants, and I hope you do too, a NEW marriage that is the same in that the two of you are still married, but different in that you both learn new skills in servanthood of each other and in communicating in openness, honesty and truth....all from a loving standpoint, not a "superior position" standpoint.

Keep posting. You need a sounding board for your feelings, thoughts and ideas. You need a place to vent from time to time, because you WILL still feel anger because adultery IS a huge offense. But like "tempered steel," we often gain strength by first going through the fire.

God bless.

Fopreverhers is RIGHT on target! And Meldoy also...

I was gonna say the exact same thing. Do NOT try and hug her when she is in this state... Listen, I am a "hugger" touchy feely kind of person so I know EXACTLY how hard that is, cuz I been there done that. You will push her away.

Also no gifts... way too early for that. And do not expect her to be nice right away, or accept them graciously, or at all! You have a year of being an [censored] to make up for, and you have 2 weeks to do it. You need to burst the emotional dam and open up to her and show her a tsunami of remorse.

She will probably reject it at first so be prepared for that. Keep doing it anyway. and again, and again...

FH is absolutely correct.