Hi all: I am a 46 yr old wife of a 45 yr old man. We have been married almost 20 yrs and have 3 grown children and 13 yr old son still at home. My husband had acted bizarre for months when he announced last Sept. he didn't want to be married any more. He stayed at his dad's but then came home so we could work on our marriage. On Christmas I discovered receipts for gifts that I never received and when confronted he admitted he was in an affair for a year with a woman he'd met on a sex website. There were 2 prior women but this one he liked and had plans to set up housekeeping. They communicated almost daily thru emails and IMs. She lives in a town 50 miles away. On the 27th of Dec. he left me for her but then called on New Years Day begging to come home. Said he felt their relationship was wrong and he should be in our marriage. I let him come home and we are in counseling and he swears he has stopped the relationship 'cold turkey'. He sent her a no contact letter to which she proceded to call him at work begging her cause. She is divorced and had made plans of a future with my H. Now the problem. He is adamant that I NOT contact her. Says she doesn't want a scene but I feel the need to contact her and tell her we are working on this marriage and she needs to stay away. She has been emailing altho he gave me the password and I check his email. My question is: Should I let this woman alone or should I phone her and make her aware that I know who she is and the affair is over for good?? I feel like he is still trying to protect HER and I question whether he is finished with her since this past Sunday I found her work, cell and phone numbers in his jeans pocket. Any help will be more than welcome here. I tried to check the website articles and found nothing regarding contacting the paramour. (yep, old fashioned word). Thanks.. ~wadeallie

Wadeallie, I would call her up. She probably doesn't even know about you and your children and her ignorance leaves the door open for your husband to resume his affair in the future. My H's affair ended the DAY I contacted the OW because she thought he was separated.

Dr. Harley counseled a woman in a similar predicament this way:

"It appears that your husband's lover may not be too interested in him, and that would work to your marriage's advantage. I would encourage you to (in a nice way) ask her to leave your husband alone, that you love him, that you love your children, and want them to have a mother and father who love each other. It's not in her best interest to break up your family, especially if it would become her family some day. She would be eternally hated by your children."

Best wishes
Willard F. Harley, Jr.

I would also let her know if she doesn't stop harrassing you and your H that you will take out a restraining order against her.

p.s. I also would suggest that your H change his email address and stop taking her calls at work. He is the one who needs to stop this contact. If he does not respond, she will likely stop.

Thanks MelodyLane. I am so afraid that with valentines Day coming up and the 1st year date of their first meeting, she's going to do something and I don't want to be blindsided.

Have you addressed this issue? He had an affair with someone he met on a SEX WEBSITE. IMO there are others he is not telling you about. Did you get tested?


He is not finished with her he just went underground and didn't cover all his bases. I want you to know I am not a vet but I think they would suggest you go look at spying 101 and start snooping. Do you have the note? Does he know you found the note? Make sure you copy those numbers and anything else you find out about her and keep them in a safe place. Do you know the site he met her on? I think a keyloger is in order here.

MelodyLane,
This one got my radar up. He met the woman on a sex website. The affair was a year long. I think there are others. People go to those websites for casual sex.

Yes..he confessed there were 2 others prior but this one "clicked" and he was seeing her as often as he could for a year. What was troubling was the fact that he emailed her regularly and even spoke to her daily at his lunch hour at work. Her emails comment on how good the sex was even before she knew his full name. I really don't know how people can do something like that!! I have copied every email she sent him and those he sent. (He didn't realize that you need to empty the trash can on Yahoo to delete things for good.) Yes, I gave him the paper with the phone numbers on it and made a huge production out of it..but not until I copied the numbers. I'm not totally stupid! He let me shred the paper and said that 'old habits were hard to break and that he had carried her number for so long it was habit.' I am unsure because for all the time he invested in their relationship, how can he go cold turkey and never speak to her again? No wonder I am confused.
And YES, I have been tested and for now everything is clean.

wadeallie

install a keylogger on the computer...
insist on no contact letter..
insist on new cell phone...

and seriously doubt that he has gone cold turkey...
this ending is less than 40 days old...

it's most likely your husband had not officially stated no contact..which is why she is frantically contacting him..

tell your husband for his sake, as a decent man, out of respect for her, and the fact he dogged her as he dogged you........he MUST write a no contact letter that you see...and send...
clearly defining his working on the marriage..and his wish to end this all from this second forward

otherwise are you sure that he's not just there out of fear; out of the tying of loose financial ends to decrease potential losses...giving her the story..I have to go back temporarily to fix some things...etc

who care about his demands...

your boundaries...

no contact letter
new phone with her not having a new number...and you having access to all passwords etc

key logger...unknown to him....

and the right for you to contact her if she continues contact after letter..

dollars to donuts if you contacted her today..bet you'd find out that they are in contact....

plan A
plan B

not interested in what he wants you to do in respect to contacting her..
not interested at all

ARK

I think what is troubling is that your husband was (and may still be) cruising sex sites for casual sex! Are you sure he isn't still looking at those sites. I am all for rebuilding a marriage but this one worries me because you are at great risk for an STD. You may have tested clean before but what if he has contracted one after you were tested?

Well...that didn't go well at all! H told me OW called him at work yesterday. You see, he canceled his Yahoo acct and when she tried emailing him a message, it came back as 'undeliverable'. She said she was worried so called him. He told her he was fine and listened to her cry her love and lonliness but he said he did not tell her NOT to call again. You see, he promised me and counselor that he'd tell of any contact from her. So, last night I called her. I told her that ALL contact had to end and now! She argued that I had won, he was back with me, but I needed to be compassionate to her pain and let her speak to him regularly to ease her pain. I told her "NO". She was surprised that he told me she had called. Then she says how I don't know anything about her and how can I make decisions about her. Then I shocked her because last week I went to her neighborhood and saw her house (I never would've gone to the door). I told her exactly where she lived and that was from Googling her name, and I figured out where she worked from emails, so then she accuses me of stalking her! I just call it evening the playing field because she's had knowledge of me for a year with where I work, where I live, my kids, etc. and here I was ignorant of her existance. The conversation ended with her screaming at me and I got sick of listening to her and hung up. She said she was going to call H today at work to see if he really knew I had called her. Imagine the gall! So we shall see what happens. H says she gets frightened easily and that I may have scared her with all my knowledge. I just want her to stop pursuing my husband! So as for now, I had no sleep again last night and have been sick this morning from my nerves and it still goes on and on...

And as for the sex sites, the only computer he has access to is here at home and he's only on while I am here and later I always doublecheck his viewing history. Those were the conditions to his coming back and he seems to be following them now.

He can delete the history, that is why we suggested the keyloger. If there is a will, there is a way.


This comment sickens me. He is showing sympathy for her at the expense of your feelings.

I get upset also by how he keeps trying to protect her feelings and keep her out of this. He has claimed that he pursued her in July when she tried to break it off and that was part of her argument also as to how she was a victim but I'm not buying it. She claims to have told him to go home and work on his marriage but if she actually gave a darn for my marriage..she would've picked up the telephone herself! She also argued that they never included me in their casual affair so why was I including her now. I told her I am his wife and she is included because she's the one who stepped between me and my H and every conversation he had with her and every sexual encounter was one taken away from me. He gave her the attention and comfort that was mine as his wife and by taking them..she is completely involved now. Besides..if she weren't involved, then why the heck won't she stop contacting him?

Your HUSBAND is the problem here, NOT HER.

wade, it is entirely up to your H to end this contact. She would not be contacting him if he did not accept her calls. It is NOT ENOUGH for him to "be honest" about her contacts, he needs to MAKE IT STOP, even if that means getting a restraining order against her. I suspect your H is not discouraging her, which is why it has continued.

He needs to be more concerned about YOUR FEELINGS than hers.

What is your H willing to do to make this stop? His continued contact with her is destroying your marriage and making it impossible for you to recover.

Do you know if she is married?

We had a marriage counseling meeting yesterday and she said the same thing. H told how his phone is not thru the switchboard but dials directly to his workstation and he can't control when she calls. Counselor says he gets a thrill when OW phones and they both get a rush from talking and if our M means anything, he needs to be firm and demand NO CONTACT. She called yesterday to confirm that he knew I had spoken to her. Says she's scared of me. H had to calm her and convince her I would not show up on her doorstep. I don't think she's ever had to deal with what happens after being discovered with a married man. She's been surfing sex sites herself and having who knows how many encounters but with my H it lasted more than one time. She apologized to me on the phone but then tried to act like everything was okay when she begged compassion for HER pain. NO..NO..NO. Counselor agrees. End it all now. Phone calls. Cards. Emails. No Communication whatsoever. I hope H can follow thru. He is doing well so far with the counselor's advice but we shall see.

Are you also using the material here on MB? Have you filled out the Love Buster questinonaire so that you both know what NOT to do to each other? Have you filled out the Emotional Needs questionnaire so you can BOTH make sure you're providing what the other needs, so that he won't feel the need to seek out such websites?

Your M will never get better or be safe if you don't invest in fixing such things. Consider the questionnaires a shortcut to what the MC will have you do. Save some money by going ahead and working on that and then report the progress to the MC so she can use it to help you even more.

All he has to do is HANG UP when he hears her voice and she will quit calling.

This will stop when he stops.

MC was firm with H that he needs to stop OW from contacting him by being firm and hanging up on her. He says he will try to be firm because this keeps going on and on. MC said it won't stop if OW has even the tiniest bit of hope.

As for the questionairres, we have been filling them out and talking them over. Right now we are doing the Emotional Needs one and H finds the questions very revealing. The questionairres are opening up all kinds of communication between us.
Thank you for all the sound advice. I sure needed it!!
PS: Thankfully our health insurance covers counseling so it isn't costing us $$.

Had a rough night last night. Those mental images of him with her altho I don't know what she looks like, get stronger in the dark. He has apologized for the pain he's put me thru and says that our marriage is where he wants to be and he loves me, but ya know..he told me he doesn't regret their love. Now that's what really hurts!