Look, I know she's done bad things. I'm not trying to defend her. Just to help you see other people's perspectives. If my husband did everything you do for her, I'd run the other way, too! Even considering what I have now. Where in that equation does she act like an adult? Honestly, I'm not trying to bash you, cos you're obviously a great guy.

BUT. You just can't do that much for another person without them feeling smothered - or controlled.

If you ever get to the point where you are working on your R again, or another R, just pull back. Let her take care of the kids. Herself. School. Work. Family. Turn on her own shower. Her own ironing, for goodness sake! Seriously, no disrespect, but yes, this IS controlling. Just like my H, who did not ask if I wanted him to take over my weeding, you did not ask her if she wanted you to turn on her shower. Maybe the first time, but the 50th?

I see so many men who do this much and think the woman should be thrilled, but you're just taking away her ability to be her own human being. Does that make sense? Would you want her pouring your cereal, putting your clothes on you, tucking a kleenex in your pocket, calling your boss to tell him you're having a bad day so be nice, telling your brother to quit bugging you...all the little things in your life that you handle on your own? Of course not. But you sound like you've been taking away all those little things in her life by doing them all for her.

You turned her into a little princess on a pedestal, and no one can survive long like that. It makes people hate themselves. Which may be why she felt the need to go out and do something bad - to prove to the world how hateful she is.

Cat,

This is a TJ, sort of, but my advice to you is to sit your H down for a talk. Tell him exactly what you're feeling and why you feel that way.

Do it in a way that doesn't attack him.

His heart is obviously in the right place. I can relate to your H because I could see myself doing similarly.

Let him know that doing household stuff is no favor to you. But this is common man behavior. Bill Cosby does a whole routine about how proud men can be over doing common household stuff.

A kind word, where you pull your H aside, look him in the eye without anger and simply say, "Sweetie, I'm trying to tell you what I want to do and you're not listening. I want to stay home and take care of house stuff and I need your help to have the kids get it done."

Women would get so much out of taking this direct approach rather than dropping hints and brooding.

It's going to take some "training" but you have to be willing to do it with kindness and love and not anger as in "Damn it, you're not listening to me! I said I want to do x!"

Help him see it. He's likely willing to listen if you simply grab his face gently, look in his eyes, and communicate what you want with love.

TJ over.

AW3, keep your chin up and be strong on a plan B if you're going to do a plan B.

Yes, but what you don't know is that she DID ask that I do all of those things and did point out the times that I didn't. I did realize at times that she should do more for herself, as well as me and the kids. However, when I didn't do those things, in a few days the conversation was always, "Do you REALLY love me? You USED to turn on my shower and fix my coffee. You USED to iron my clothes and get the baby up. etc.etc.etc."

I'm no fool. I know how she should've felt with me doing those things. She manipualted my kindness and caring both to her advantage, and now, to my disadvantage. You can't have it both ways...

I'm confused, then. Is she just a gold digger? Some kind of mental problem? Just plain spoiled? The only woman I've ever met who wanted to be treated that way was a big spoiled brat from a rich family - and not a nice person.

TJ - thanks, pom. Doing just that is the topic of my whole thread. I'm working on it.

aw3,

It sounds like your WW has personality issues that need to be handled by a pro.

You may be totally at a loss for fixing this problem and it is one she will have to do herself.

I can relate to a lot of what you have shared.

Best of luck, but this may be a problem you will never figure out and understand. There's something broken inside her head, and you won't be able to figure it out. Ever.

Accepting that will set you free. Logic doesn't apply to her.

Spoiled is probably the operative word. And, just as in the case of over indulging parents, I do feel that I can only blame myself for this. I have always truly just wanted to care for and love her. I never intended for my perceived motivations to be twisted into a dependency/control relationship. How can a person be angry at you for doing ALL of the things they had asked and expected you to?

Perhaps she did feel trapped. I can't understand why, but I know that I did what I could to keep her happy. If she had/has EN that I've not been fufilling, I would never have known it. If finances were an issue, she has already opened her own checking account and is about to rent her own place. She is certainly capable of providing for herself, she always was, she just allowed me to handle things because it was convenient.

Maybe now you see why I am so confused by all of this. And, yet still, the A's are the biggest issue! Why she has felt the need to invole OM, I don't know. I think it's just for her own comfort and to give her confidence that she can do all this and not worry about ever being alone.

You cannot figure out the illogical behavior of your WW. It will never happen.

You won't find a logical conclusion as to why she acts as she does. The logical conclusion will come if you have a professional examine your W who tells you, "She has a personality disorder" or whatever she may decide she has.

Why did she cheat? Who knows. She's a wayward of the worst kind, which does it regularly with no regard to the consequences to those around her. She can't be helped until she decides she needs the help.

You are wasting valuable time and brain cells trying to figure her out.

Guess what will happen if you take legal action. She'll blame you for facing the consequences of her behavior. YOU will always be the bad guy despite the fact that it is her behavior that led down this path.

Cat,

I do not mean a DJ but I have really wondered for months why you post here. Not that your advise is not sometimes sound but you have never experienced the devastation of marital infidelity and I guess I just assumed that you had an awesome, MB pricipals following marriage. It does not seem that you or your husband are practising those principals. How O&H is it to not even try to tell your H and D what your needs, desires and expectations for your day are?

This was a totally different Mother's Day for FWH and I. This year I was able to finally tell him after 14 years of marriage that just because he sees Father's Day a Hallmark created holiday does noy mean that I feel the same. I like to honor him on Father's Day but this year after swallowing my pride and telling him my feelings according to MB, he picked up the ball and ran with it.

JMHO
Say

Exactly! OM is just a placebo to make her feel better about decisions she has made that she knows in her heart are wrong. My unexpected reaction to this will hopefully help her see the good that is in me, rather than only the bad, though I know it will take some time. She had expected me to act out only in anger, bashing her publicly and seeking to alienate her from her own world. She expected me to BEG her to come home and promise that I would change, once again, anything about me she wished to R. She expected me to call all of her friends and ask them to "try and talk some sense in her." She expected me to be miserable and isolated in a lonely state of depression.

While the state of depression thing is certainly true, I am trying not to let her see that. I have not been negative about her to anyone, only telling them that I'm confused by her actions and that I still love her. She has alienated and ostrocized herself from her former life and the people in it. She chose this path, mostly alone, though with some assistance by the OM. She must live with it, now and forever. Regardless of R, the scars of what she has done may never fade.

SHE has to want to get better for herself, just as I have said about me! It's just like an alcoholic, admitting the problem is the first step to recovery. I do know that her mother has suggested therapy to her, she only insists that nothing is wrong with her, only me(though she can't offer any specifics). Until when or if the day comes that she is willing to examine herself, R is not in either of our (or our children's) best interest. I am just praying that she will, at some point, look in the mirror and wonder what SHE could've done differently.

AMEN Saynomore!

Look, a lot of us guys are cynical about the hallmark holidays. I hate Valentine's in particular.

But stressing how important something is to YOU is good and you see the results?

I've experienced this with my relationships in the past where I greet something I disagree with with silence and the other person assumes I agree.

That's not the case at all, as you can see.

Good on you for letting your feelings be known.

AW3, we keep threadjacking. Sorry!

This shows how you're broken in your thinking. Please don't get me wrong, I've been guilty of it as well. YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT SHE'S THINKING OR WHAT YOU THINK IT IS SHE WANTED YOU TO DO!

You will go nuts thinking this way and just need to accept that you can not figure her out or can not predict or say how she expected you to behave.

Doing this will be the first step in helping you be stronger as a man and start you on the road to heal, regardless of whether or not you stay together with her.

I do realize that I over-analyze things and assume that I know how to fix anyhting that is broken. However, this has taught me that I know NOTHING, and that SHE must desire to "fix" herself. Problem is, right now I don't know if she sees herself as broken, especially with OM still in the picture.

Sorry, TJ here.

say, no offense taken. I've been through the ringer here already for daring to post when I haven't experienced infidelity, so I'm not going to apologize. I happen to feel that there are many ways to approach a problem, even one as devastating as infidelity. In my opinion, people's actions can nearly always be broken down into psychological aspects, such as FOO issues, programming, developed fears and patterns, coping mechanisms. For example, assuming aw3's wife isn't truly crazy (and I'm beginning to wonder), what she has done can probably be traced to a lifetime of dysfunction and mistakes. I'm sorry if people think that by bringing that up, I'm trying to lessen what she has done. I'm not. But people come here looking for solutions. And I truly believe that you can't fix people (or situations) without understanding the psychology behind what they do, no matter how heinous the crime.

And fwiw, it's because I do have such a screwed up marriage that I have taken the last 30 years to learn what was wrong with it (and me) and how to fix it; 30 years of reading and studying everything I can get my hands on. So while I can see ways for people to make changes in their own lives, the life I was raised in did not prepare me to do the same for myself. I'm now old enough that I don't want to continue living this way and am trying to gain the courage to take care of myself. But it comes very slowly after 50 years of not doing so.

I started my thread just for the purpose of trying to gain the courage to be O&H with my H. And fwiw, I have told him; I've even told him while in the throws of depression and desire for suicide and marriage counseling, but he has conveniently forgotten all that because I don't keep it up as an issue. Again, it's all about me protecting myself. Even you said yourself it took you 14 years to tell your H the truth. I was raised never to tell the truth, never to speak up; it's a hard lesson to overcome. And I readily admitted here today that what I did yesterday was full of mistakes. There was more to my story, but I already made it long enough, and was just trying to point out the futility of thinking you know what your spouse is thinking.

You may not have the same experiences I do, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't welcome your insight into my own problems. I find it odd to think that only people who have walked in your shoes can advise you. There is so much more knowledge and wisdom out there to be gained than by shutting off anyone who hasn't suffered your distinct pain.

I'm sorry if I am offending those of you who feel the same way, but you're welcome to put me on ignore if you think I am ignorant or harmful. I have studied the concepts here and I believe I am doing a pretty good job of providing the same advice the rest of you would give when it comes to exposing, protecting oneself, plans, etc. When I get it wrong, I admit it and apologize. What else can I do? Stay out of your sandbox? What if I had the one key thought that a poster had never thought of, that allowed that person to make a breakthrough? Just because I've not been cheated on (that I know of), I have nothing to offer?

CP, post on this thread as you see fit. You do have some things in common w/ my W and might have useful insights. First, you ARE a woman, and it sounds as though your marriage is less than perfect. Welcome to my world. I am taking much of what I read and applying it, some things I must ignore. HOPE is something I choose to retain.

Hope is good.

Do you have any insight into why she is the way she is? Her past? Any problems there? Can you get more info on what she's been thinking all these years from family or friends? The more you know, the better plan you can prepare.

aw3,

No one, and certainly not ME, is suggesting that you tolerate a 3rd affair in your marriage. You had biblical grounds for divorce 10 years ago and you have them today. I do not know HOW many ways I can say that YOU ARE NOT TO BLAME for your wife's affairs. Period.

The impression I get is that you want your marriage to recover. I am merely suggesting and "suggesting" is the operative word here, that the problems may be different than you think they are.

As you point out, I am NOT a professional. There is a disclaimer at the beginning of the discussion forums where The Harleys also make clear that advice given her is NOT professional unless otherwise noted.

Have you read SAA yet? When I read it,shortly after D-Day, I found it difficult because I felt that somehow *I* was being blamed for something that my H had done TO me. As I read farther though and thought hard about what the Harleys were saying, I realized that what they say is that it takes TWO to recover and that even as a BS, I had to seriously examine MY behaviors and work on EVERYTHING concerning my marriage. I had to examine SOME ideas and throw them out, but I WAS surprised at some of what I have come up with that I DO need to work on.

MB, to me, is about BUILDING marriages. Your wife is not here. We can not speak to her. We can only speak to you and you are the one who has asked for help. Right now, you are marriage building alone. For those of us who have been betrayed, that is usually the norm at the beginning of recovery. Unfortunately.

"For insight, here's how Sunday would typically have gone at our house. I would have gotten up around 7 and prepared breakfast for the family. I would've gotten her up (with a kiss) later and enjoyed our meal together with the kids. Then, as she began to get herself ready for church, I would've picked out clothes for all 3 kids and ironed them for the day. I then would've shaved and showered and picked out, ironed, and put on my own clothes. During this time, she would still be preparing herself for church. Once she decided what she wanted to wear, I then would have ironed her clothes for her. We then would ve gone to church together, arriving late of course because of her delays, and spent the next few hours together doing our "church thing." ...Is this enough, do you get the picture? Weekdays were very much the same. I get up at 5:30 and get the kids ready for school. I sign all of their homework papers. After they've caught the bus, I get her up around 7, having already fixed her coffee and turned on her shower. As she was showering, I would get the baby up, dressed, and ready for her day. I would then iron her work clothes and talk to her as she got ready, not leaving to take the baby to the sitters until she had departed for work. Evenings were similar as well. My point is, what is controling about any of this?. She would be nominated for wife and mother of the year had the roles been reversed."

I do though take exception to your last line in the above quoted paragraph. In the society WE live in, mothers who do as you described are most often called co-dependent, controlling and even LAZY because they do not earn enough money. Unless she was also the head of a corporation somewhere, she WOULD NOT win any kind of mother or wife of the year award. I find the implication truly insulting.

In this society, a man who does what you describe is considered a saint BECAUSE he is doing something that appears to be non-traditional. Personally(and this is ONLY MY personal view,) I believe that each partner should do what they are BEST at and enjoy the most, even if it is non-traditional. It just doesn't SOUND like that is the case with you and your wife. Again, I am certain that I could be wrong. I have only been trying to suggest an approach that maybe you have not considered in the past but might consider now.

MB is one of the few places where I have seen a mother's true value ,because of her DS efforts, extolled. I AM NOT SAYING THAT YOUR DOING THE ABOVE IS CONTROLLING. Really, I am not. I am asking you to seriously consider YOUR motives. That's all. Really. As I have said before, if this does not apply to you, all the better. Control is usually a matter of motives, not just actions. If your motives are not controlling, then my words do not need to mean anything. I wish you could hear my tone of voice to understand how genuinely I mean that.

Forgive me if I have caused you any more distress during what is SURELY the most difficult thing you have ever had to endure. It was never my intention.

Blessings to you,
WH2LE

Basically, I have known her since she was 12. Her mother left the home one year later, which was devestating for my W. She did not speak, except casually, with her mother for nearly 10 years! She was left at home with her dad and 5 year old brother. She was allowed to date me at this VERY young age (I was 15), and I took on way too many roles in her life. I took her to school and back, I took her to church, I and my family fed her, I even bought many things for her with the little money I had. I had far too much freedom with her from her father and I WAS very controling then! I am ashamed at how adamant I was that she do as I wished all of the time.

When she was 16, she began seeing a much older (32) man and broke up with me. We didn't speak for over two years. During that time, she stopped seeing the 32 yr old man and starting dating her boss where she began working who was 36. After some time, she says that he encouraged her to contact me "just to be certain" that I wasn't indeed the one for her.

We immediately reconciled and were married less than 90 days later. I stopped controlling the adolescent areas of her life that I had previously. On her 18th birthday, we got our marriage license and planned a backyard wedding at her dad's. Less than 2 years later, the first A took place with our pastor at the time's son. She accused me of pushing her into his arms due to my excessive drinking, even accusing ME of an A (never happened!). I stopped drinking (not ONE DROP since), forgave her unconditionally, and life seemed to reach normalcy for the next 10 years.

The rest has already been chronicled here. Here previous EA with another chaplain at work, as well as her current one (PA?) now. I have confessed my faults here and to her, but she still only sees things as my fault. I've always let it be that way, so why should she see now as any different? She says that I will never change, but has yet to see ways that SHE might change.

I realize that it would seem that things were doomed from the beginning, but I can't just flip a switch and stop loving someone I always felt that I was meant to be with. I think my upbringing is in such stark contrast to hers (in church, no D's, loving home, etc.)that she has now chosen to accept hers as reality and mine as fantasy!

W2E, You couldn't possibly cause me any further stress at this point. Just to clarify: We both work daily and contribute financially, I just have taken on the chore of bill-paying. I see what you're saying about the "traditional" mother and didn't mean to sound insulting. I didn't look at it that way at all though. I just meant that, a mother who works AND does all of those things is held in high regard. Do you know how many times I have been called "Mr. Mom?" W reveled in all that I did and even bragged about it to her friends. Many a husband has come to me and told me that I was making them "look bad."

We are all speculating as to what's going on with my W. I may NEVER know what happened, THAT is what makes this even more difficult. She HAS NOT communicated anything specific to me...I'm not sure she knows, she is just off to (what she hopes are)greener pastures. She did say in an email that "if I had listened to her at all in the past 2 years" things would be different. I thought I had. I changed the things about me, FOR HER, that she asked 1 1/2 years ago. I am willing to do the work and to change whatever is necessary. She is the one that fled and is not communicating. I have tried! She has not yet looked in the mirror.

AW3,

I can relate a lot to what you posted about how you help in the house. I was the one who got up on weekends after working all week. I was the one who fed the kids while she prepared herself for 3 hours to go anywhere.

I was the one who got up in the middle of the night or got the kids ready for our outings.

She would get on my case for not having the diaper bag ready after she spent 3 hours bathing getting dressed and doing makeup.

Soooo....

We must accept that men like us simply married women who don't appreciate what we had to offer and we must find women who will appreciate those contributions.

Now, Cat....I shake my head in a little bewilderment. I don't care that you haven't experienced infidelity and are on these boards. There's much to be learned here to prevent it.

I do, however, see that you yourself could be vulnerable to an A because of how unhappy you are with your H, who is likely unaware of how unhappy you truly are.

You see, we as men assume all is fine and dandy if you're quiet.

You might be angry inside, ticked that he simply can't see how unhappy you are.

Us? We think, "Well, I guess that fit she threw yesterday has passed since she's not talking about it now."

You, on the other hand, very much have that conversation in mind and are brooding about why HE doesn't get it or address what you talked about yesterday. If you try to bring it up, we might be surprised and say something like, "Geez, you're still mad about that?"

It's a Mars vs Venus thing.

It's not that we don't care. It's that we simply think differently or minimize what you feel because you're not complaining any more.

I can assure you that if you broke down and truly showed how you felt that the first person at your side with concern on his face would be your H.

And perhaps it isn't him who is broken but you. Perhaps you need to accept your husband for who he is rather than who you want him to be. Doing that will make you a lot happier.

A word of wisdom from my college roomate:

"You can't squeeze orange juice out of a lemon."

Think about that when dealing with your spouse. You can't make them into something they're not.