Looking for some advice.

I’ll start from D-Day so you understand the whole story. I have been married now 19 years, we have a boy 15 years old. I am 42, wife 41. D-day was April13th of 2006. Needless to say the last two years have been nothing but hell. I found out she was having a long term affair on that date since early 2003, so over five years now.

After I found out by snooping in her cell phone bills, of course I got the we are just friends thing, that most of you have heard. Come to find out it was a full blown long term affair. During the last two years she has moved out twice, and came back, only for me to find out that she was still having the affair of course going deep under cover. The OM is married also and lived across the street for most of this time before finally moving and then moving out of state for another job (Not to get away from her, just because of the current economy in the state we have limited jobs).

During these two years I have been through all the post D-Day things that most of you have been through. I have tried to put things back together many times only to find out she was still lying, mostly covering up for him so I didn’t tell his wife.

Last year Aug. 2007, she told me it was over and she wanted to try and make us work again. I agreed although I will confess I have not been the most pleasant person during this time as most of you can understand.

So I gave it another try, I have been suspicious during this time that the OM was still calling at times. But, I didn’t press the issue as I was trying to put trust back in the relationship and really what good would it do me to worry all the time, and all the time it takes snooping is just too much for me.

Well last night out of no where my wife confessed that she has been talking to him, again and has had at least one meeting (supposedly non-sexual) over the last year. She told me that she is through with him and will not talk to him again.

So I guess after all of that where do I go from here, is it worth staying with someone that has betrayed you so many times? She did say she wanted to tell me so I could help her not talk to him, as she does feel she has a strong addiction to him. Not sure how I can accomplish this.

So the question for you experts, is when is it time to move on? Do I give this another try only to be heartbroken again, I was just starting to feel better about the relationship and then this confession came out.

One more thing that may be important, it came out mainly because of the OM wife pressing the issue that my wife had an abortion May 2006 and it was his OM child.

What do I do???

I'm no expert...I just have a lot of opinions on your post.

Since 4/2006, how have you helped your WW to kick her addiction?

What new marital boundaries did you put in place around you both and how did you enforce them?

Was one of them radical honesty? The rule of care, time and protection?

I don't see the radical honesty because you didn't inform OMW.

I don't see the rule of care because you weren't ascertaining all the ways they contacted each other (how your WW's drug was being delivered) and put into place your half of stopping it.

I don't see where you made your marital boundary of fidelity have predetermined, progressive enforcements...steps you take with each contact...and hold yourself to them.

If you had, you wouldn't be asking long after DDay, what now?

Did you think your WW would develop willpower and self-control over night after three years of having none?

Did you do an inventory over your half of the marital environment, including your own LBs and meeting ENs, and own what you did and didn't do...where you bought into her lies for three years because you had a false payoff going (we'll believe others when we want to not know, not deal with reality).

How good have you been to yourself in the last two years? Been in regular Marital Counseling? Alanon or other groups as a spouse of an addict? Did you go to any marriage seminars or work Harley's program?

I ask because DDay means reality day...here's where you lived in fantasy as much as she did...usually, from assumptions. Staying in reality is really, really hard...nearly can't do it alone (like your WW just asked of you)...because it hurts so much...truth does...and it sets us free of fantasy.

Did you report each contact you found out about to OMW? Was she reporting them to you?

This isn't me saying, "Hey, don't you wish now that you'd <blank>?" This is me saying these same steps can be taken now for real recovery. Takes a whole lot of owning what is yours and not owning what is yours. Takes holding reality and saying, "This is what it is right now." Takes WW acting transparently for her own redemption and to free herself from her most painful fantasy life.

Takes you acting transparent with your stuff...your feelings, thoughts, beliefs, perceptions...finding your false payoffs and sharing them with her as the separate and whole person you are...so you can see her, hear her, know her for real, too.

You can't make her faithful and she can't make you unbetrayed. In the middle, though, each owning their own actions and choices...we can thrive in our marriages and they can be better than the years before infidelity.

Remains a choice you make. You can also divorce now as the final boundary enforcement (even if you didn't take any enforcements before) from choice. I bet you'll be right back where you are today in three years, betrayed, hurt and wondering what the heck, though. When we don't get our lessons, we repeat the course.

You have learned so much in the last two years...let me know how you've applied it to yourself, your life and choices...and your marriage. You made the choice to recover your marriage, to not end it on DDay. Tell me why you made that choice and what's different now in you to make it differently today?

LA

surviving, I see you as a big part of the problem here. Please allow me to explain. You have essentially enabled her affair by not exposing it to the OMW, the kids, your families, etc. More importantly, there have been absolutely no boundaries, no consequences, no nothing.

In order to combat a long term affair, all of those things must take place. EXRAORDINARY PRECAUTIONS must be taken in order to affair proof your marriage. For example, the phone should be tapped, so you should know if there is contact. If there is contact, then there should be consequences. Her life should be an open book to you, so that it is not possible for her to carry on a secret second life.

That is how you affair proof your marriage. Additionally, the problems that made her vulnerable to an affair need to be surfaced and corrected. Until those conditions are changed, she will be vulnerable to a repeat.

Sorry you are here, friend.

Since 4/2006, how have you helped your WW to kick her addiction?

She was not in agreement to kick the addiction until recently. I believe you need a willing partner to kick an addiction.

What new marital boundaries did you put in place around you both and how did you enforce them?

I still need to work on them what are some you suggest I asked for help.

Was one of them radical honesty? The rule of care, time and protection?

I don't see the radical honesty because you didn't inform OMW.

The other mans wife was informed, her and I stayed in contact almost daily, she has changed her phone number so I have no way to get ahold of her now. She lives more in fantasy than I do I did not want to help.

I don't see the rule of care because you weren't ascertaining all the ways they contacted each other (how your WW's drug was being delivered) and put into place your half of stopping it.

How do I put this into place?

I work all day I cannot be a baby sitter, I need to give me something better to work with here. I need answers not questions. Give me suggestions.

I don't see where you made your marital boundary of fidelity have predetermined, progressive enforcements...steps you take with each contact...and hold yourself to them.

These boundaries were in place. Why would I hold myself them?

If you had, you wouldn't be asking long after DDay, what now?
I won't even comment on this.

Did you think your WW would develop willpower and self-control over night after three years of having none?

No I did not thats why I said I had suspicion.

Thanks your comments are very thought provolking.

Hi, Melody thanks for responding. I should have put in my post that everybody knows about this affair. OMW her family, my family, wifes family and OM family. So that is not an issue.

Not sure how to set the boundaries, people call phones all the time as unavailable, so it is impossible to track, how do you tap a cell phone? Sure I can see the phone detail, when the bill comes a month after the fact not really much help as they call each other by *67 and not excessively so it does not look suspicious.

What is she willing to do to PROVE to you she is not in contact? how about getting RID of the cell phone? How about switching cell phones with her? How about doing some kind of BLOCK on all unlisted #s and all out of state #s?

Here is a good article from Dr Harley about Requirements for Recovery:

The plan I recommend for recovery after an affair is very specific. That's because I've found that even small deviations from that plan are usually disastrous. But when it's followed, it always works. The plan has two parts that must be implemented sequentially. The first part of the plan is for the unfaithful spouse to completely separate from the lover and eliminate the conditions that made the affair possible. The second part is for the couple to create a romantic relationship, using my Basic Concepts as a guide.

I'll describe these two parts to you in a little more detail.

The first step, complete separation from the lover and eliminating the conditions that made the affair possible, requires a complete understanding of the affair. All information regarding the affair must be revealed to the betrayed spouse, including the name of the lover, the conditions that made the affair possible (travel, internet, etc.), the details of what took place during the affair, all correspondence, and anything else that would shed light on the tragedy.

This information is important for two reasons: (1) it creates accountability and transparency, making it essentially impossible for the unfaithful spouse to continue the affair or begin a new one unnoticed, and (2) it creates trust for the betrayed spouse, providing evidence that the affair is over and a new one is unlikely to take its place. The nightmares you experience are likely to continue until you have the facts that
will lead to your assurance that your husband can be trusted.

An analysis of the betrayed spouse's childhood or emotional state of mind in an effort to discover why he or she would have an affair is distracting and unnecessary. It takes precious time away from finding the real solutions. I know why people have affairs: We are all wired for it. Given certain conditions, we would all do it. Given other conditions, however, none of us would do it. So the goal of the first step is to discover the conditions that made the affair possible and eliminate them.

After the first step is completed, the second step is to create a romantic relationship between you and your husband using my 10 Basic Concepts http://marriagebuilders.com/ca/to.cgi?l=qa080103bc
as your guide. While your relationship may be improving, it won't lead to a romantic relationship because you are not being transparent toward each other. Unspoken issues in a marital relationship lead to a superficiality that ruins romance.

Your nightmares are only the tip of the iceberg. They are but a small reflection of the suffering you experienced when you discovered your husband's affair, and the fear you have that the suffering will be repeated. You have no assurance that the affair is over because you don't even know who the other woman is. You are being asked to trust your husband, who has already proven to be untrustworthy. For all you know, he could be working with her, or you could be going to the same church, or she could be
your neighbor. And since he won't discuss the details of how the affair took place, you have no assurance that another affair will not take its place.

Infidelity is not something that can be swept under the rug. While those who have affairs want to forget about it and move on, those who are betrayed must take very specific steps before they can fully recover. In your case, those steps have not been taken, and as a result, your fear persists. I will send you a complimentary copy of my book, "Surviving an Affair," if you send me your address. It will describe these two steps to you and provide you with a roadmap toward full recovery. But the path will require full disclosure of all details.

Best wishes,

Willard F. Harley, Jr.

entire article

Well, that is a yes and no belief you have there. You do your part...you cannot kick it for her. She doesn't even have to have the desire to kick it herself. You do your half, re-exposure with every contact, being vigilant about monitoring contact...and she then knows she will be found out for doing her drug. Makes it so the drug isn't as appealing until she can see the damage she's doing to herself and others.

Does that make sense?

In Alanon, you learn how your half is really important in all your relationships...and that we cop out saying, "Well, there's no help if they don't say they are addicts." What they believe is theirs...doesn't say we have to believe the same or act from their belief. We do our thing for the marriage, even when we don't want to do it for them.


Oddest thing about being married to an addict is that it takes an addict to be married to one. See the equal power and limits? What I hear you saying is that you didn't put new marital boundaries in place or enforce them after finding out about your WW's long-term affair. That's not me judging you...that's me saying, "Okay, there's your half, too." Because you changing changes the dance that is your marriage. Doesn't change the other person...they may choose the same steps...they will just look obviously out of step with the marriage. Gets tougher to take those same steps (and fantasy allows us to do that).

So I hear you saying, "Okay, maybe I want to do this for real this time, to stand for my marriage." That would be one way of hearing you...on the other, I hear, "Oh, I didn't do and maybe I could do, if I wanted to and knew more, but I'm not sure I want to save this marriage." This is my way of asking you what is your true desire, what choice you're making today, because you could go either way...separate and divorce now, where once you said you'd stay and stand. I think you stayed. I don't see where you stood. Which is you betraying your true desire. And it happens.


There's email, snail mail and billboards, though. Radical honesty is you saying, "I chose to stop exposing when contact re-occured." I think not helping her to stay in fantasy was a healthy choice. We act because of our own code, not because of how others respond. You inform and let go the consequences. Your WW knows then that each contact will be exposed and known. No need for daily contact with OMW...just informing from your own vigilance.

Because your WW's fantasy is more important than OMW's.

Radical honesty helps you heal from betrayal...it's part of WW's real amends...holding herself to not doing what she did by making new choices daily. Each time she had contact and hid it from you, that you found out, was an attack on your marriage and was a boundary crossing. Required you then to take action.

Each time she contacted him and you didn't catch her because you weren't looking, holding yourself to a schedule whether you suspected or not, was you lying to yourself and her lying to you.

Here's what I put into place...and mine was dual protection. Keylogger on the computer, a porn blocker installed, checking his cell phone in front of him, checking the cell phone bills every month and telling him I did...having his passwords (and him having mine) to email and banking accounts...and opening suspicious mail in front of him.

Radical honesty supports the rule of care...because I snooped in front of him in recovery (which still goes on), he told me recently that it helped him to not contact her...and he liked it even thought there's been NC in place for three and half years. See, it acknowledges and validates he chooses the marriage, that he's not hiding (secrets were part of his life prior to his A) and shows I'm aware and invested. I don't snoop behind his back and then spring on him...he's present usually. He's aware and with me in protecting our weaknesses.

What others may see as MY weakness in checking, he sees as a strength, courageous in our marriage. I take his opinion above others...and it syncs with my own.

When she's on her cell phone and you're there, stand with her. Schedule the 20 hours of Undivided Attention and make it your top priority (which makes your marriage your top priority). Do verbal communication exercises twice a week and non-verbal ones three times a week.

Do the questionnaires again...heck, do all three...the EN one, the LB one and the Recreational Inventory one.

Healthy boundaries and enforcements...examples. When I hear myself assume something about DH (dear husband) then my first enforcement is to state what boundary I crossed, why I permitted myself to do so and why and how I won't do it again. Same for contact. You tell her when you've had an inappropriate conversation with a member of the opposite sex...at work, in email, on a board, at an RC you may do on your own...and you own it, say why you did it, and why and how you won't do it again.

You say, "I haven't helped you enforce your personal boundaries and you've crossed our marital ones. Well I did, also. I haven't acted from care for you, for sharing what I know of your weaknesses, even when I've seen you weak and I know I did that because I expected you to be strong all the time in your ongoing, long-term addiction. My expectation came from my pain of betrayal and believing only you can keep me safe so I didn't do my half. I'm doing my half now by verifying your NC and meeting your ENs, eliminating my LBs."

Second enforcement from next contact (and you tell her this in advance), "Each contact continues the affair. Affects all of us and his family as well. When you contact again, I will be there with you as you tell our son of your choice. I will be there with you as you mail the letter owning what you did again to OMW. And we'll talk about why you chose to attack our marriage and harm yourself and others again."

An act of respect and intimacy by enforcing boundaries. Third contact..."I respect you chose to do this. Now I am asking you to move out of our marital home to protect it from your attacks. I am filing a legal separation so you can contribute to the care of our son in child support."

You don't make her anything but a sandwich. You only make yourself do and not do. You aren't bad or wrong...you aren't doing your half and expecting to recover. That's a self-sabotaging expectation. Negates your power.

When you look inward and list all the ways you act from love, would helping her for the last two years be one of them? Talking about the affair, her entitlement for three years to have an A, her resentment, how she creates and builds her resentment and how she lacked respect for her actions harming and affecting everyone, have helped YOU to see your own half, your own power? Respect for herself and talking about your own acts from respect?

Recovery takes stopping seeing each other as enemies and knowing you've been allies in your union, all along. We sure can experience our spouses as enemies when they are actively attacking our union. Feels like they are attacking us...wiping us out, replacing us...she chose you, and the marriage. Didn't instantly give her the tools and skills to be a healthy half...its incremental and takes both of you. Because your half hasn't been healthy, either...or IMO, healing you.

You deserve healing, S40. You're worth it. And only you can do it and your choice to heal together seems to me to be what was missing.

You can have that now, if you choose. I don't hear what your own goal really is...where your ultimate happiness is for you?

LA

I am not an expert. But IMHO..... no. It is NOT worth it.

I don't think there is ANYTHING MORE you can do, either.


Yes. That is the absolute problem with this approach. It takes lots of money, all your time, puts you through incredible stress and grief.....

and the END RESULT is JUST NOT WORTH IT....

reconciled TO WHAT???? a marriage in which there has been years of deception, lies, adultery, and crap? WHO CARES ??? WHO WANTS IT ????

Funny thing...when you act, you don't worry. Because you know you're safe.

When you don't act, then all you are left with is worry.

LA

Ain't that the simplistic truth?

Good advice LA.

I have been doing some research and cannot find any way to block incoming calls by number on a cell phone. Anybody have any sugeestions? You can block text messages but not calls.

Actually,
I found a way.

I took my W's business cellphone and threw it into the ocean.

That worked pretty well.

All blessings,
Jerry

Well its really not that important if somebody really wants to get ahold of another willing partner, you can block calls or throw any phone into the ocean that you want, they will find a way. And it may be more undercover than the previous way.