Married for 15 years and have 4 children. Our marriage has not been great but not terrible either. I love her and care for her greatly. I do everything possible to try to make her happy.
Just found out wife has been having an affair with a married co-worker. She told me this has been going on for 6 months.
She tells me now that from the day we married she never loved me and didn't know why we married. She seems quite sincere about this. She says she is very sorry for hurting me, does care for me, and of course, cares very much for our children and doesn't want them to be affected. She is not a bad person. At this point she does not know what she wants in her life, wether to end things now, or stay together for the sake of the kids. I have told her we can try to work through the affair, assuming it is over with. And we can work on our marriage as I don't believe there was never any love. If there wasn't, our marriage would not have lasted for 15 years, 4 kids, and many good times and memories. But, I am not sure if she is committed to trying to make this work.
What can I do? Does our marriage stand a chance of working?

I suggest, first off you click on the notify button and report this post to a moderator asking hem to move yout post to the infidelity section of this board where you will get a lot more responses.

Next, read all the Infidelity FAQ'a on this site.

Then, expose your wife's affair to all her friends, HR at work, parents, anyone who can help influence her to end her affair.

Her re-writing your marital history is very typical.

If she tells me the affair is ended, should I still expose her to others? She did discuss the situation with a close friend and her parents. I do believe her. As much as she has hurt me, I don't want to hurt her. I still do care very much for her and really want this to work.

OK. Rule Number 1 - if your WS's lips are moving they are lying.

I'll bet it isn't over. If she works with him it isn't over. Revovery is IMPOSSIBLE without no contact.

Have you spoken with the OM's Wife? That would be a good start.

You aren't dealing with a rational person at the moment.

You can't believe anything she says without independent verification whilever she is in contact.

Also, how malicious or advised is it for me to expose this to the other persons spouse? In my anger and hurt I did contact this person (via text) to let them know that I know what is going on and threatened to ruin his life as he has mine. He is well known in the community, married, and has two young children. My hope is that this threat will put a quick end to the affair. I really don't want to contact his spouse and destroy his family, although at this time, I wonder why not?

Contacting his wife is the most compassionate thing to do for his WIFE!

Would YOU have appreciated someone who knew your wife was having an affair to have told you?r would it have been OK for you for them to just keep having sex and exposing you to God knows what diseases without your knowledge?

I sure would have appreciated being told before I discovered my wife's affair myself.

His wife can be your ally in monitoring no contact.

As BigK has said WS's are notorious liars. The only reason I could see for not exposing the A is if you had CONCRETE proof (not from the lips of your WW)that it was over and no contact was in place and your wife committed to recovery.

Without these you can be certain the A continues......

I appreciate your responses.
Actually, I should have mentioned. As of two weeks ago, she is no longer working with him. However, she did spend time with him last week (this is how I found out). I had told her today that all contact with him must stop immediately.

Exposure is critical to ensuring no contact - particularly to his wife.

How long did the affair go for?

6 months - saw that.

"As of two weeks ago, she is no longer working with him."

This is vague. Did either one quit, or are they both working for the same company, but moved to different departments?

Sound very similar to mine although I have known much earlier. Just tonight she wouldn't use the L word! My wife has never kissed me fully, just a peck on the lips. She says she doesn't like kissing. AFAIK she hasn't had an affair or maybe I'm blind. I have posted in the Other Topics of the General forum section. Please be welcomed to post there.

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2166057#Post2166057

Expose to the OMW. Don't tell your WW, just do it.

Don't "tell" your WW anything. She's a WW. "Reason" is wasted on her. Demands won't work. And telegraphing your "battle plans" to your WW for killing the A certainly will not work.

What may work? Look at Plan A and if necessary Plan B.

You are kidding, right? Would you say the same thing if your neighbors bookkeeper was embezzling money from him? How logical would it be to refuse to warn your neighbor by saying:

"how malicious or advised is it for me to expose this theft to my neighbor??"

"I really don't want to contact my neighbor and destroy his family, although at this time, I wonder why not?"

Does that even sound remotely rational to you? The OM's wife is being destroyed behind her back and the only way she can protect herself and potentially save her marriage is if SHE KNOWS THE TRUTH. How can she protect herself from her sleazy H and your wife if she does not know the truth?

Not telling her is the CRUELEST thing you can do to this woman and her children. Exposure is the compassionate thing to do, friend.

Not telling his wife is ENABLING the affair. The affair is much more likely to end if everyone is watching. The OM is not going to leave his family for your wife and will not welcome the trouble. He will most likely dump your wife if she becomes too much trouble.

First of all sorry that i you are here but then this is a great place for someone like you and me. Your situation is so SIMILAR to mine (to me anyway that it is scary) that here is what i think you should do....

1) EXPOSE the A immediately to near and dear. Especially at work place, and OM's wife. Do it NOW !
2) She must terminate her affair immediately if she has not done that already otherwise recovery is meaningless
3) Let her confess everything about the affair that you want to know. Do this by setting a time everyday by talking about the affair and everything else and more importantly opening up the communication. The more you can talk the better. Spend atleast 20 or more hours together
4) Implement Plan A immediately...Lookup this website to understand what plan A is. This also means putting an end to all your Love Busters and changing your behavior. It is actually easier than i thought and i am loving it
5) See if she can see an Therapist to help her get through the emotional conflict
6) 15 years of marriage is a lot to throw away just like that and I dont believe a cr$# when they say they dont love anymore and they never loved to begin with or that they fell in love for the first time and they want to try it out.
7) Be strong. I know it is very difficult time for you but even though i felt very weak and emotionally extremely vulnerable, at times, I was strong in areas such as making sure my wife clearly understood that there will be NC

By the way, how are you handling this ? I cried for several days and the shock is now gone. I was hurting everyday for 5 weeks straight to the point i could not cry anymore partly because the shock was fading and it made be even more strong

READ READ and READ lot of books, also there is great information on this website.

I can suggest other great books out there including Dr Harley's, if you need more

Yes your marriage does stand a chance of working ONLY if you start taking the initiate and stick to your plan. You will need plenty of patience...a lot.

Take up new hobbies to keep yourself busy and do things you have always wanted to do but never had the time or the motivation. This is perfect time to divert that to help yourself and strive towards becoming a better person.

Keep posting if you need to vent or looking for ideas. There are great folks out there who can help.

Thanks for all the responses.
We had a long talk tonight. I am afraid I think I am throwing in the towel. I can not try any more to convince her that there is something there and it makes no sense that there was nothing there from the beginning. She is insistant that from the day of our wedding she did not love me. We were young, I was 23, she was 21. We had a 1 year old child together at the time. She felt I gave her the security, etc. that she needed and that is why we married. But love was not one of these reasons. She is VERY insistant on this. As I look back on our marriage now, I can think of various times where this was seen.
So, we are in peaceful agreement that a separation is best. We are not in a rush for divorce and can hope that a separation may help her "find" what she thinks is missing. She thinks this is reasonable too. I am not very optimistic about this but am prepared for things to end now. She will be moving out leaving me at home with the kids. The thing that kills me is explaining this to our children (ages 5,7,9,15).
In respect for her (maybe I shouldn't have this?) I did tell her I AM going to tell the other mans spouse about the affair. Of course, she is not happy about this saying why am I going to ruin her family etc.. I'm sure she is saying this because of the position she is in. What do I have to lose now anyway? But, I do agree with all of the comments I got regarding this and really feel it is the right thing to do. Thanks to all for setting me straight on this. Don't know why I was questioning this.

So you don't want to try and save your marriage? WOW. Folks don't usually give up so easily before they even try. And I would disagree that "separation is best." There is absolutely no benefit to anyone or anything in a separation except for ADULTERY and DIVORCE.

p.s. don't get me wrong! It is entirely within your right to just give up without trying! You don't even have to explain yourself.

But if you are giving up becasu you wrongly believe this is hopeless, then you are making a huge mistake. This is FAR from hopeless. We have had 10X worse than your situation come back to full recoveries. But normally folks at least TRY.