Schoolbus, I read your post to imsodone in which you wrote about how you changed yourself so that your FWH wanted another chance, and how he cheated again and how you worked on rebuilding your marriage, again after so many years.
Your story was very inspiring - it has given me hope.
It could almost be my story.
My FWH had an affair when we'be been married barely 4 years. He though it was okay, because it was in a different city. I found a letter she wrote (pre-email days!) in which she said it was too bad they hadn't met before either of them were married. I went to counselling, but it was a bad situation. Then I got pregnant, by "accident". We swept our problems under the rug and I though about her every day for seven years. It was another 3 years before I forgot about the A altogether.
This is 22 years later. On November 25, I got a call from a woman who claimed she had been having an affair with my DH since August and, furthermore, that he had had an A with another woman for the previous 3 years. It was, sadly, all true.
Our marriage had not been good, however since the late 90s. Our Love banks were totally bankrupt. Then he lost his job and we started using every LB in the book. He took up running and, of course, joined a running website with a forum. Pretty soon, he was PMing a young female runner from a distant, but not too far, town (about 1 hour away). They eventually met for lunch and soon after, she offered herself to him for his 50th birthday. I don't think he pondered the offer for very long before accepting.
They took ski trips together, both in 05 & 06. She went with him to almost every marathon, 1/2 marathon & 10K. They even ran past the end of our street together once. There were photos of them on his computer, sitting together at race dinners, her in the hotel room, holding hands at the finish line. She hated that we did "couple" things together - was insanely jealous and used every tactic to try to take him away from me.
The killer is, she was also married, with 3 small children (two of whom have health issues) and belongs to a religious sect that would totally shun her if the A was exposed.
FWH told me that they broke up in July 07 and had had no contact since. But I subsequently found emails they sent to each other with words of undying love and cutesy nicknames that were sent as recently as November 25th.
I immediatly changed all his passwords on the running websites and asked him for all his passwords to all his email accounts (he had 5 or 6). He had used technology very effectively to cover his tracks - mostly text messaging on his phone and, of course, his phone co. account was also password protected.
OW #2, is another story. He has told so many lies about her and his role in the A. She lives in another city, too - he had been going there to visit his sick mother! He met her at a high school class reunion and admits to having thoughts of SR with her at that event. Tonight, he admitted to having bought condoms on the way there in anticipation of their first encounter. Previously, he had made it sound like she was the seductress and it all happened in the heat of the moment and that he couldn't say no, because he didn't want to hurt her feelings. What a crock. I'm just sick of the lies.
After all this, he loves me passionately and wants to stay married. He has told me he won't let me leave him, has given me a huge diamond ring and is doing fun recreational stuff with me. I am still in pain, but not lonely anymore. I do see a future for us.
Oh, yeah. He wanted to leave me in the fall of 05, but didn't because I suggested counselling. So, we were in counselling for the better part of the A with OW #1. I could never figure out why he didn't seem 100% committed to the process. Now I know. But it was also our saving grace - if we hadn't been to counselling for 2 years, I would have thrown him out, as I had promised after the 1st A 22 years ago and would be consulting a lawyer.
OW #2 was more of a shock, because I felt, we both felt, that we were making great progress with our marriage and better communication skills. Well, we're back in counselling and he has a lot of work to do on his own with the MC to discover why he did what he did with #2, so it won't happen again.
anyway, thanks for your story and for hearing mine. I am getting a lot of strength and hope from hearing about other peoples experiences in these forums.
