It's been almost 9 months since dday and I feel like I'm still on the rollercoaster. I suppose to an extent this is normal (at least based on the posts that I have read here) but it is nevertheless frustrating and at times depressing.

The short form of my current story is that it seems that my W just doesn't get what I am and have been going through. It almost seems that she is incapable of feeling empathy towards me (or interestingly to anyone else in her family but very empathetic towards friends and even strangers). That is of concern not only in my current situation but also as I think ahead to growing old with her and wondering if she will really be there for me if I become ill, infirm, etc.

We attended MC for awhile and it seemed to be more help to me than to my W, perhaps because I am more comfortable talking about these things than my W. But our progress stalled and our other responsibilities intervened and we stopped. Not sure how it would be received by my W if I were to suggest that we resume.

I have struggled quite a bit with the status of our sexual relationship. My W has always been somewhat passive in bed, and other than a couple of times immediately following dday, that continues. She has always said that SF is just not that important to her, that she doesn't think about it and that she probably would be happy if it happened only once a month or so. Pre dday I thought I would have to accept this but now I find that I am unable/unwilling to do so. Her A lasted three years and included numerous meetings in hotels for the expressed purpose of SF and explicit phone conversations with OM (something that had never been willing to do with me). So I now often find that I am angry or feeling inadequate or both over the realization that she does have "a sexual side" but one that she is not willing to share with me.

Another issue is her continued relationship with her BF who was complicit in hiding my W's A from me. I have made it clear that I will not associate with her BF and my W has cried over my position on this issue. I feel that of the 4 people who had knowledge of the A - my W, OM (who was a "friend" of mine and my S's coach), and my W's two BFs - I have no interest in interacting with any of them but my W. I am open to the possibility that I am being unreasonable but I don't think so. I feel like part of the reason I find myself in this situation is that I didn't respect myself enough to enforce boundaries and I feel that my self respect now demands that I stay away from these people. Would be interested in other POV.

Lastly, my W said something the other day that makes clear that she is still hurting (or pretending to because it serves some purpose) from an incident that took place when she and were dating. Basically, a couple of months into our relationship I considered reconciling with my previous girlfriend and was unfaithful to my now W. This was more than 20 years ago and long before we became engaged but still I appreciate that I was an [censored] and I have apologized many times over the years. Sometimes it has seemed to me like a convenient justification for my W's bad behavior. In any event the point is that this is an unresolved issue that I think needs to somehow be resolved in order for us to recover.

Sorry for the long rant. It's been awhile since I posted and maybe today - my 20th wedding anniversary - has caused me to want to get some things off my chest.

My wife has a toxic friend that is pushing her to leave. If, and thats a big IF, my marriage improves, I believe that I would not welcome her into my home. Unfortunately, I doubt my wife would cut her off entirely.

IMO, you have every right to make sure that this friend gets the boot. She is an enemy of your marriage. At this point, however, since recovery is obviously not complete, your wife will NEVER give her the ax. But, if recovery continues to inch better and better, eventually, she may see it. Sometimes loyalty amongst friends knows no right or wrong. Youre in a tough position, one that I know too well. The vets will come shortly, and will advise you. I can almost guarantee that they will tell you that an ultimatum must be given to ax the "friend". ANd I agree that she is poison to your marriage, but it is something only your wife can do. Its really gonna be out of your hands. Good luck man. Don't beat yourself up over something that happened 20 years ago. While it wasn't the coolest thing to do, you WERE NOT married and I believe she is simply bringing it up as an excuse for her infidelity.

Hey TIM,

Good to hear from you ... but sorry that things haven't improved much since you last posted.

FWIW, I established a boundary of NC with toxic BF, which would have been deal breaker for me and it has held. FWW (FogFree) even took it upon herself to send a NC letter to her friend. I really doubt you will ever feel comfortable with them remaining friends ... but only you can make that call for yourself.

Also, I agree that her continuing to bring up the incident from 20+ years ago is just her trying to justify her actions, with a little rewriting of history for her benefit.

My best guess is that (like many others here) your M will not improve until you reach the point where you are willing to walk away to maintain your self-respect. At that point, she may wake-up and start carrying her half of the load or she may not ... either way, YOUR life improves.

No toxic friends.

Uh...No toxic friends....period, done, fini, over!

Thanks for the replies. Interesting that all are focused on the toxic BF. Is this because you all feel that this friendship is at the root of the current recovery problems? Or just that this is something you can each relate to, i.e. it touched a nerve with you?

I don't know the extent to which her BF continues to poison the well but at a minimum I feel that keeping the friendship shows a complete lack of empathy on my W's part.

Candidly I think that my W could benefit a lot from IC (as many of us could) but I can think of no way to convince her of that without major LBing. There are several aspects to her personality that seem so out of the mainstream (at least in my experience) and I am increasingly of the view that until these get addressed there is not much hope for our R or M. It was probably, in fact, these things that lead to the A. She has made much of my LB behavior in the years prior to the A (some of which I acknowledge and all of which I have tried hard to eliminate) but I believe there is so much more to the story. Among other things, she has a strong need for admiration from other men (something she would deny to her dying day) and that is, seems to me, something fundamentally at odds with a successful and happy M.

So between her own issues, her apparent lack of empathy for me and me not feeling desired by her (which as I said is no longer tolerable given what I know about her A) I find that I spend a lot of time questioning whether this is the M I want. But the thought of leaving youngest DD continues to be too much to bear so I carry on.

Hopefully hanging in there will change things for the better but I kind of doubt it. I know myself well enough to know that I will over time withdraw from her if the status quo continues.

Have you read holdingontoit's thread in Emotional Needs? Kind of similar. He had no hope, saw no results, but stayed for the kids. Finally, after all this time, he finally - finally - told her the truth and said he was thinking of leaving her. Bam! Things are finally starting to change for him, she is starting to make an effort. Might be worth the read.

Thanks cat. I have not read that thread but will check it out.

TIM

Personally, I think the toxic BF will continue to CAUSE issues for you as long as their friendship continues. You can be doing a great job as a H, but all it takes is a conversation with toxic BF to undo all of your great work.

You see, its quite likely that your WW has "detached" herself from the pain that she has caused you, which in effect means that she has "detached" herself from YOU, thereby discounting most of the things you're doing to R. Toxic BF holds a higher place in WW's life than you do at this point, because she tells her what she wants to hear, while all you represent is pain, embarrassment and guilt for your WW.

Seriously, I think your life would change dramatically for the better if you established a boundary for recovery of NC with toxic BF and be willing to walk if she won't give up this toxic relationship.

She may even CHOOSE toxic BF at first, but as soon as you're obviously willing to defend your boundaries by asking WW to leave the marital home if she continues to disrespect your feelings on this matter, then, and only then may she possibly retract her head from her a$$ and see what she's about to throw away.

You are rapidly losing any remaining love for your WW, so really, whichever decision she makes puts you in a better situation ... you either have a FWW committed to R (without the influence of toxic BF) or you have removed yourself from the pain and can start over with your remaining sanity.

Tired:

Long time no hear from.

I will address your WW's concerns/comments about your "fling" with your former GF while you two were dating.

"WW, that was BEFORE we married, and YOU had a choice. That choice was to Stay or GO. You decided to Stay. So, debate on that is OVER. I have the SAME choice NOW. I can STAY or GO. Your actions since I found out have me favoring LEAVING. This situation that we are in is unacceptable unless it changes for the better."

And then shut up and let her TALK.

And see what happens.

LG

LG good hearing from you.

In fairness to my W, she did not know about my "fling" (she knew of phone contact but not of the physical contact) until after we were married (she learned of it from me). So her choosing to marry me was done without the complete truth. As you might guess we have discussed this many times over the years. And, much time was spent on this topic during our sessions with MC recently. W said in one session that she should have ended the M when she learned what I had done.

But she did not. And so now it seems that between the lack of resolution (I hate the word "closure") of that chapter in our history and all of the fallout from her long-term A we may be broken beyond repair.

I have often said to her that I would do anything that I could to help her recover from what I did to her long ago but she has always answered by saying there is nothing I can do. And so it goes.

Sunday evening I asked my W how she feels things are going with us. She replied "fine" and had nothing else to say. I didn't either and went to bed about half an hour later.

W and I ran errands, shopped, etc yesterday accompanied by DD6. Last night I told her that I have been thinking that maybe it would be good if we resumed counseling. She replied with an annoyed tone, "why would you say that?". I answered that I feel that she has no feelings for me. Silence. Several minutes later I remarked that I was surprised, saddened by her lack of response and she angrily told me that it was too late to talk (I conceded the point as we had just gone to bed). I asked her when would be a good time to talk and she said this morning.

I don't want to be with someone who is faking it but neither do I want to leave my kids.

Not sure what to expect this morning but I may tell W that I want us to schedule a counseling appt with Steve Harley.

Hi TiM


This rings very true for me as well. For the entire first year of our recovery - I was the one who did all the work. My H just coasted along and would participate sporadically. He simply could not "get" the pain and devastation that the inflicted on me and my needs were not being met very well. He seemed to know enough to do just enough to keep me around.

It wasnt until we started counseling with Steve Harley that my H began to "get it" and get on board and that took awhile as well. We counseled with Steve for nearly an entire year before my H was fully on board.

Its been 2.5 years since d-day and I have to say the last 6 months have been the best so far. My H is deeply committed, works very hard to make us work and is a adoring and loving husband. I would say that we are pretty close to recovered but even with all of that, it is still hard. I still have bad days.

I think the real problem in your M is your W just does not make you her priority and isnt very committed. Its all about her. She sounds very selfish , much like my H had been for most of our marriage.

Counseling w Steve should help you tremendously.

TIM
Did you reveal the affair to the OMW?
NJ

NJ,

Yes, I exposed to OMW and my older children (W very pissed about the latter). My dday saga can be found on JFO if interested.

I am as certain as one could be that NC is intact, but one never knows.

TIM

Tired:

You need a PLAN.

A PLAN that brings you and her back together.

Your little snippet of conversation didn't start a process that can take awhile to go through.

You need to learn MORE of te MB Concepts and what EN's are.

You NEED to be meeting HER EN's. To the point of annoyance.

Then, you can start to introduce the MB Ideas to her.

So that you two will beging to get onto the same page.

Right now, she is disconnected from you and just going along.

And she really doesn't care that you are hurting, was hurt, or that she has done very little to acknowledge and or repent for what she has done.

She may not ever.

But you need a plan.

Work on meeting her EN's first, and then we can work up what should happen next.

LG

What do you do when the wife that can't stand the sight of you DOESN'T WANT YOU TO MEET HER NEEDS. For example, a stupid poem written by someone you despise becomes a work of art when the same poem is written by someone she finds fascinating and worthwhile.

Face it, the WW finds just about ANY action by the BS annoying and childish at this time. Is perseverence the answer?

Heya TiM! I have always wondered how things were going for you. Sorry to hear that they are not progressing as you hoped.

However, I think this is pretty common in recovery, and I'm sorry to see that you have allowed things to wallow for so long.

Your W is sitting on the fence. Still justifying what she did to you, still hanging on to the rewrite of history that allowed her to do what she did. Its a twisted mindset, it has to be broken before real recovery can begin.

In my sit., we had to have a "come to Jesus" meeting just a couple months after D-day. My W wasn't engaged in recovery, she wasn't putting forth any effort. I had to tell her that I was not going to be in a crappy marriage any longer, that we either got together and WORKED toward making things better, making things GOOD for BOTH of us, or we were done. That her simply not cheating on me anymore was not enough. I told her that I did not care how we worked toward that goal, but that there had to be a plan of action, that we were not going to just muddle through. I told her that I did not care what plan that was, but that I thought the MB plan was the best plan for both of us. If she wanted to find another plan that seemed good then we would follow that. She of course had no other ideas.

It worked for me, but who knows how long we would have wallowed had I been willing to go along with it?

The toxic friend issue: my wife had a few of those herself. One was a long time family friend, the other was a newer friend that was a part of a couple we had been associating with for only two or three years. Both of them are pretty much completely out of my W's life now. They forward her joke emails occasionally, and we hear about them from other mutual friends, but there is no meaninful contact any more. I never took a super hard line stance about my W intereacting with them. I told her that I would not associate with either of them. I told her that they, along with her, had lied to me, and that these women, by thier actions, had shown that they were NOT my friends, in fact it was the opposite. I also told her that I questioned how she could claim that they were her friends, given that she claimed to believe that her A was wrong and that she desired to recover our marriage. Really, as soon as my W invested in our recovery, the toxic friends dissappeared. We have never really talked much about them or the role they played, because I don't view them as important. When you argue with your W about the toxic friend, you are distracting from the real issue. You're wasting your time, not because the toxic friend issue isn't important, but because the way to solve the issue is to get your marriage on track, not the other way around.

You would never call someone a friend who treated your W like crap would you? Who enabled and/or participated in the destruction of your family? No, you wouldn't. Why not? The answers are obvious. You understand that your priority is to your wife and your family. Any real friend would understand that as well and would not seek to undermine your number one priority. Doing so would not be friendly, right?

The toxic friend is NOT the problem. It is a symptom of the problem. It is a sign that your W's head is still not in recovery. When it IS in recovery, the toxic friend will dissappear because your W will realize that they are not friends. When you become her number one priority, she will not WANT to be around people that make you uncomfortable or that treat you poorly.

I think it is time for you to decide what you want, and I think you want what so many of us have wanted. You want a good marriage with your chosen wife. You have here at MB a plan for how to achieve that. It is time to tell your W what you want, and how you want to get there. It is also time to tell her that you are not willing to wallow any longer. That you either come together and work towards a common goal of creating a good strong happy marriage, or its time to go your separate ways.

I also want to add that I think the sexual problems you two are having are also a symptom of the broken marriage. As you recognize, she is a sexual being when she wants to be. So you are recognizing and treating the symptoms as the problems, and trying to solve them as such, thinking that "if our sex lives were better, our marriage would be better" and "if the friend were gone, our marriage would be better".

I think the correct way to think is "if our marriage were better, the friend would be gone, and our sex lives would be better".

Hey Tyk - Good to hear from you. Thanks for chiming in. I'll take a closer read at your reply later (I am swamped with work at the moment) but wanted to say that, yes, I hear you. Your advice on this has been consistent from day one.

It is interesting that I have almost suddenly become a bit more angry at my W, after months of what I had been referring to as "recovery" (perhaps prematurely).

When I spoke with W last week, covering all of the points you raised in your reply, I was met with (as exepected) nothing. In the week or so since then there has been no effort on her part to address anything that I said last week. It is as though she is content to muddle along.

Interestingly the thought of SF with her is almost repulsive because I have been stuck anew in anger over feelings she had for OM and behaviors she engaged in with him. And if I can't have that from her I am no longer willing or interested in settling for scraps as I have in the past. It will be interesting to see how W handles this as she has always maintained that I have unusually high need for SF and she always seemed to enjoy being the one who determined when SF happened.

Unfortunately, there is zero chance that I will leave my home or my kids. Instead I feel myself growing more detached from W by the day.

As for her toxic friend, I completely agree that is a symptom not a cause and I interpret her continued relationship with this friend as a sign that my W is not fully committed to me and our M (i.e. the friend is a higher priority than me). I have not confronted W per se (i.e. have not told her she must end the friendship) but she does know how I feel. More and more I seem to be seeing this friend as an affront to me which adds to the anger that I feel for W.

Gee, reading what I have written in this post it seems pretty clear that I am not making much progress.