Couple more things...

Go buy some new, sharp looking shirts. Buy some new, DIFFERENT cologne or after shave. Always dress sharp, be clean shaven and smell good. Look and act like a million dollars.

Have an air of casual indifference to her "bad" behaviors. Tell her you view her "going out" as bad, in that your desires are to have her open up to you as to HOW you can both improve your contributions to a healthy marriage.

Don't leave her with any impression that you are clingy or needy. She wants a MAN. Strong, silent, confident, good looking and attractive in every way. Not a sniviling, whiny, emotional, wimp she can run over at the drop of a hat.

There is some role playing involved, but as she feels you drifting away, she'll be drawn to you.

Goofy stuff, I know, but it play to their biggest weakness.....YOU were ALWAYS going to be there for her, even now, as a "safety net" in case the OM is NOT the "soulmate" she thought he'd be. She STILL wants you there for her.

But she doesn't know how to return. There's a little matter of pride, and shame, and guilt, and sadness to over come. But all those feelings are too overwhelming for her to handle all at once. She is mind-boggled. You have to create the notion in her mind that she can return, and you won't crucify her...and you can't, or she'll run away.

Do all you can to spend time with her, and during that time, build a bridge of communication where you can express to her that yes, you are really shaken and hurt by her actions, but...there is a way she can return, and yes, there is a way for the marriage to be reborn.

Lovebusters are the #1 enemy of making this happen, so despite all else, maintain your cool at all times. The "casual, cool, indifference" is as much for YOU as it is your WW!

SD

Yeah. That sounds like areally good idea. I'll have to go out and get some new stuff this weekend. She's a big girl. She can make her own decisions. I'll let her know what I think the best thing to do is and then just don't even let ****** bother me.

Cubed, glad you are still working at this!

Truly, make a game of it. Experiment. Use your imagination. Remember, this is more like an "illness", an addiction than anything else, and it's not necessarily life and death. Maybe for the marriage, but not for either of you personally. Some Waywards are too far gone to reach. Some are not. There is no clear cut prescription or set of directives to help a BS through this nutso time period between "alleged" NC and the start of recovery, and there are no "clear" definitions to exactly when that happens.

So have fun with the trial and error process, and be creative in your thinking. Provide as many suggestions as you can get by with in regards to spending time together. Think of things she "used" to love to do with you...concerts, fishing, rollerblading, travel, whatever, and make every effort to entice her to do those things with you. The more face time you have, the more comfortable she'll begin to feel in you presense.

Choose your moments to discuss your marriage carefully, and tread cautiously in those conversations. NO Love Busters.

You will have to re-train yourself to react differently when she prevokes you, and she will. You have to always think, how do I put a positive spin on "this"?

Also, give yourself a break. Take mental "time off" from working on saving your marriage. Go play golf, racquetball, go bowling, fishing, whatever. Spend time with trusted friends where you can relax and recharge your batteries.

Keep us updated...we're pulling for you. I'll look in this weekend some and see how you are doing...

SD

Alright. Last night I had to help a friend move into his new apartment. I got home around 9 pm. She's in the computer room with her friend messing around with their myspace pages.

Her friend leaves and we go to bed. We're laying there and she says "screw it, let's just have a baby". This really caught me off guard.

I told her that now isn't the right time to do that but that I do want to have a baby with her. I told her that I wasn't sure about her commitment to the marriage right now. SHE SAID THAT SHE DIDNT UNDERSTAND. I calmly explained to her that her going out until all hours of the night to bars that the OM is likely to go, that her refusing to call me, that her blatant disregard for my feelings, did not indicate a strong commitment to this marriage. I told her to put herself in my position and think about how she would feel about everything that has happened.

She got really upset but I think something clicked in her where she now understands what she is doing to this marriage. I tried to comfort her but she said, "you just told me how shi++y of a wife I am, sorry if I don't feel like being all cuddly."

She's upset right now but I think this is good.

Now is not a good time to have a baby....

Believe me, I know. I just don't know why she thinks it is.

..........No kidding. When my EX and I were having issues years ago.....she popped the "lets have a child". After the baby was about 2yrs old.....she started her mess again. She popped the "lets have a child" thing on me again. When this child turned 1, she started another affair. It was over then. I wish I would have waited (nothing against my kids.....love em dearly).....but having them at the time was just her way of trying to make herself feel better and love me. It didnt work.

Well, I think she is really looking for some way to really make a connection with me again. I know a baby is not the way to go now, but it does make me feel a little better about everything knowing that she at least wants some type of connection here.

The best way to make a connection with you is to stop doing things that are not good for the marriage- needing space, visiting a bar where OM goes, things like that. She could
also start posting on MB, fill out the emotional needs questionaire and start working on the marriage.

I think she's saying that as an attempt to make herself happy. She thinks if she has a baby it will help the internal conflict she is feeling inside. She more than likely feels like she has a hole inside and something is missing- so she's tried to fill it up with OM, with going out with her friends and now it's having a baby.

I think she realizes that now. At least I hope she does. She'd been hounding me before the A for a baby. I think she knows deep down that a baby isn't what we need right now.

What I'm trying to say I guess, is that, last night at least, she understood that what she had been doing is destructive.

Maybe you can tell her that you want a child as well, but you want to get things right between the two of you before you bring a child into this world together, so you can spend the next year working on your relationship with a MC and then re-evaluate whether or not you are ready to start a family together then.

I think that sounds like a great idea.

It does sound like a good idea. She doesn't want to go to a counselor though. She thinks it costs way too much and doesn't think that they do anything anyway.

Do you have insurance? It only costs about $30/session with my insurance. Some employers have an EAP program where there employees get 3-8 visits for free. Make that be a BOUNDARY and CONDITION for having a child. If you WW doesn't go to counseling nothing will ever change.

Yeah that sounds okay to me. The whole baby thing I don't think is an issue right now. I don't think she was really pushing for it. I think she just might have thought it was a way that we would have to be normal again.

WOW! Labor day weekend. Let's see here. Saturday night. There is a band we wanted to see playing at a club in our town that night. We go there with a couple mutual friends to watch. My wife gets a phone call from another friend saying that OM's friend is coming up as well. This guy isn't a bad guy, I'm not sure if he ever knew about the A or not. I tell my wife though if OM shows up that I'm going to smash his face in. She INFORMS me that no I will not and that if I do she won't be leaving with me when I get kicked out of the club. This pisses me off to no end. How dare she tell me what I will or won't do when I see this piece of trash. I inform her that yes I will be kicking the crap out of this guy if he shows up and yes she will be driving me home.

Luckily for OM he never did show up that night. I did have a long conversation with my wife's friend that night. Apparently quite a few people knew about what happened including some of my so-called "friends". This made me feel incredibly lonely. These were people I trusted to tell me about these kinds of things, people that were supposed to look out for me. I feel betrayed by everyone now. The only person who showed and balls about this was my wife's friend that night. She was the only reason my wife told me about the A in the first place. She told me that she saw OM and really ripped him a new one.

I guess I see now what true friends really are. They're not the ones that support you unconditionally, they're the ones that have the balls to tell you that you're making big mistakes and hold you accountable.

So on Monday I read about the first 1/3 of "love must be tough". I was out doing yard work, came inside checked the internet history and saw that she had been to OM's myspace page again, I confronted her, she tried to come up with some BS again, so I just left the house. She called me and asked me to come home to talk to her. I told her I wasn't going to listen unless she was going to tell the truth. I got home, she told me that she didn't know why she went to his page and that she didn't send a message or anything (keylogger confirmed this for me) She said she didn't know why she went there. She started crying and begging me to stay with her, saying that she needed me and that she is so sorry for what she has done.

She checked his page because she is going through withdrawal. Many keyloggers can block access to certain websites. Myspace is NOT a website that you want waywards to have access to.

Personally Ive never understood why someone would want to smash the other person, when the spouse is the one that allowed the affair to happen. Even if the OP did pursue the spouse......it was the spouse that opened up to the affair.

JMHO.

I agree that she doesn't really need to be on myspace, but she can just access it at work. She does this daily. I'd rather her have access at home so I can see what she's doing on there. I have her password anyway.