I found out about a month ago that my wife is having an affair. I've implemented plan A and am working on my LBs and ENs the best that I can.

Meanwhile, my wife is still involved in A. We are still married and living together. We have one child together and she has two other children from previous marriages that I support and love.

The other guy seems like a decent fellow and from my monitoring, he has already had doubts about continuing a relationship with my WW.

I decided to email him a letter stating my intentions and appealing to his conscience to end his role in this affair.

Will anyone please proof read this letter and let me know if it sounds okay and also whether this is a good idea or not? Sorry it's so long:

*************************************************************
J,

I am reaching out to you because I believe that you are a good person and want what's best for my wife, V, for you, for me, and our children. Please hear me out. First of all I want to say that I am not at all angry at you. In fact I've made it a point to pour out my heart to God for His highest blessings for both you and my wife and myself. J, I don't blame you for wanting a relationship with V because she is such an amazing person in many ways. The purpose of my email is to try to encourage you to do what I feel is best for all of us, including yourself.

Let me first say that I blame myself to a great degree for the affair that is taking place. I contributed to the environment that brought my wife to feel like our marriage is over and to contemplate getting emotionally involved with another man. I honestly never thought that V would even consider doing something like that because of how sincerely she told me that she HATES infidelity in any form and that she would never do that. On top of that, it defies everything that our religion teaches and she and I both have strong testimonies of that.

Looking back on the experiences in our marriage, I realize that I should have taken things so much more seriously. I swept problems under the rug and downplayed them. To my eternal regret, I didn't face the problems for what they were and treat them with the seriousness that they should have been treated with. Only after discovering her affair was I truly struck to the center of my soul with the searing pain of the realization of my mistake.

Since I discovered the affair, I've gone through a couple of phases. First, I wanted to run away as fast and as hard as I could away from the overwhelming pain and suffering and file for divorce. After the initial shock, I came to my senses and took responsibility for my contribution to the situation. I realize that we have a family and that I am a father to three kids and a husband (albeit fallen one) to my wife. I say father to three because I have treated G and W as if they are my own children and loved them as best as I could. I know that they love me too and have come to depend on the stability I've helped to provide in their life by providing for them and loving them. I have decided that the only rational sane choice is to fight for this family to survive and not become another statistic.

I've been fighting by addressing my failures as a husband. I didn't work hard enough to meet my wife's emotional needs for love, conversation, affection, openness, etc and to eliminate things that are detrimental to our relationship such as angry outbursts, disrespect, and judgmental behavior. I'll be working on these things for the rest of my life but I've been taking a crash course in these aspects to do everything I can to show my wife that I am trying and changing. I've also been meeting with a family counselor to work on becoming a better husband.

I've also done a lot of studying about affairs: how they start, how they end, how to survive an affair, etc. Please see http://www.marriagebuilders.com for good solid info about affairs. I learned not only about how affairs affect the betrayed spouse, but how they affect the wayward spouse AND the person the wayword spouse is having an affair with. Everyone hurts. Obviously the betrayed spouse suffers but also the wayword spouse and her other man. The wayword spouse suffers because she knows deep down that what she is doing is of the lowest evil in this world and it is hurting her spouse and her children. I've read that wayword spouses are often suicidal when they realize what they are doing. The other man hurts because his relationship with the wayword spouse is based on dishonesty and he may realize that he is contributing to the breakup of a family.

The wayword spouse is described as being in a fog during the affair because she is not thinking logically about what she is doing. She is caught up in the other person and it is often described as an addiction because it has physiological aspects. She almost can't help herself because the other person is meeting her most important emotional needs. During this time, there is nothing a spouse can say or do to convince her that what she is doing is not beneficial to anyone. Statistically, nearly no affairs succeed into permanent relationships and all the betrayed spouse can do is improve him/herself and work on the things that caused the wayward spouse to leave until the affair ends a natural death.

J, I am willing to fight for my spouse for as long as it takes by treating her better than I ever have and by working with gazelle intensity to fix the behaviors in myself that caused her not to want to be with me. I am willing to do it because I love her and I love our son C and I love G and W and I love our family and I love God and I love you.

J, I can not stop you from being with my wife, V, if that is what you both want, but I know there is nothing that I can say to V to make her think logically about what she is doing. In an effort to do what I feel is right, I am appealling to your sense of goodness and honor and as one father to another. I am asking you to please end all contact with my wife, V. I know this is not what you want to do but please consider the following:

1) You are contributing to the break up of a real family with a husband that knows he is guilty as well but is willing to do ANYTHING to save our marriage and family. You will have to live with that for the rest of your life if you continue to pursue this relationship before a divorce is finalized.
2) Affairs rarely lead to sustained long-term healthy relationships between the wayword spouse and the other person.
3) The longer this affair continues, the more pain that will be suffered by all involved.
4) You are setting an example to your own children by what you do now.

J, if you truly love V I believe you will end this affair and cut all ties with her. If you truly love each other, you both would not encourage the other to do things that are evil and wrong. An affair hurts everyone whether they realize it now or not. If our marriage ends in divorce, then I feel the time is appropriate for you to pursue a relationship with her and it will be done the right and true way. I don't know you, but from what I have picked up here and there from V's comments, you sound like a good and decent person and I would be happy if you and her ended up together if our marriage truly and completely ends in divorce. But please know that if you pursue a relationship with her in any manner before such time, it can only end in disaster because it is a relationship built on dishonesty in the wake of the destruction of a family.

J, I know I can't force you to do anything and the decision is yours. But regardless of what you decide to do, I wish you the very best and I respect you for your role as a father to two beautiful children and as a good respectable person. I will continue to keep you in my prayers as well as V and our family.

Sincerely,

E
**********************************************************

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Erich
Me - 32
WW - 31
OM - 29
Found out about affair 9/08

Hi Erich,

I was just checking in and found your post.

Are you sure this is a good idea?

Have you done any exposure at all?

Why do you think this guy is a "decent" fellow?

Charlotte

HAve you considered posting this on GQ2, it gets more traffic and there are some very good letter critiquing vets over there.

That's an excellent idea, lil!

You can ask the mods to move it, Erich. Just click the "notify" button at the bottom of your post.

Charlotte

This letter is far, far too long.

Try something like....

Sir
I am attempting to reconciliate with my wife during a difficult time in our marriage.

Your liaison with my wife has proven obstructive to this process.

I would kindly ask you to help the reconciliation by refraining from any contact with WW for an indefinite period.

Respectfully
Erich

Waste of time. If he had morals, character, he would not be having an affair with a MW.

Best to expose this affair. Tell WW's parents, her siblings. OMW, if he is single his GF, and his parents.

I concur.

erichh,

You might mean well but toss that letter. You have no reason to explain yourself or your M to POSOM. It's only been a month, you will be angry with OM at some point. While your W is responsible for bringing this garbage into your life, OM is a low life as well.


WTF? :crosseyedcrazy:

Are you serious? Sorry but this letter makes you sound like a [censored]. Expose!!!

Thanks for all of the advice. I've decided not to send any letter to the guy. I started to think that if he really did back off, it could end up looking like a "noble" thing for him to do until we're divorced. I guess I'm kind of thinking it's better for them to wallow in their own filth until they both get sick of each other or something.

I've been reading "Surviving an Affair" and it hasn't mentioned anything about "exposing" the relationship to friends and family and my counselor recommended not doing it. Unfortunately, I've already told too many people. I told a mutual friend of ours last night and I told him not to tell her that I told him this stuff and the first thing he did was email her about it, wanting to know more details from her. I was rewarded with a nice outburst from her tonight where she told me that she definitely is filing for divorce and looking for places that she can move to with the kids. She said that her affair has no effect on her decision to divorce because our relationship has been over for years now. She told me that no matter how nice I am to her, she'll never come back to me and that I had better stop trying if my hope is to get her back again... She said that just because she is being nice to me doesn't mean that she is considering being with me again. She said she wished she never married me, etc.

Well, our relationship has been dead for a while but she never thought of filing for divorce until Prince Charming came around...

She told me to quit telling her that I love her because she doesn't believe it. (I've been trying to show a lot more affection by calling her every day from work to leave a voice mail telling her that I love her)

Basically, I'm going ramp up plan A and continue to tell her that I love her and continue to leave little notes of appreciation and give her little gifts, etc to show my affection for her and continue to avoid all love busters and just stick with the plan.

I see her anger toward me as an opportunity to show her that I really do love her even though she may be mean to me. It may even work to my advantage because isn't it harder to show love to someone if they are rude in return and make it completely clear that they want nothing to do with you?

But it is discouraging and difficult. I really don't expect her to ever come back to me but I feel like I have to give this all that I have so that I know for myself that I tried to save our marriage and that hopefully I'll take what I'm learning now into a healthier future relationship.

You're right. The guy is a scum bag.. I don't know what I was thinking. Yikes...

Unfortunately, your counselor has given you bad advice. Most counselors fail in infidelity cases[and marriages] because they just don't understand the mentality of the wayward spouse.

Exposure is the most potent weapon you have against an affair. It would be tragedy to bypass that powerful weapon. Affairs thrive on secrecy so exposing them ruins the fantasy aspect. Dr Harley very much does recommend exposure.

Good exposure targets are spouses, WW parents, OM's parents, children, employers, etc. Your children, especially should be told everything about the affair and given moral guidance.

Exposure is probably the most important part of Plan A.

One thing that Dr Harley has recommended is having a VISIT with the OM and shaking him up a bit. Ask him what his intentions are for your wife and tell him you intend on fighting for your marriage and will have him hauled into court to give testimony under oath about his affair. That might wake him up a bit.

p.s. when you visit the OM, leave your pistol in the car.

Wouldn't that just reinforce his and my wife's idea that I am the bad guy?

Wouldn't the bad guys be the ones who are having the affair? Exposing is a virtue, having an affair is BAD.

See mgolfer71's thread and grow a pair:

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2147274#Post2147274

Don't hand your W over to OM on a silver platter and let your W destroy your family without even making an attempt to save it. Whatever you do, do NOT let WW take your son away from your home. You do not want your child exposed to scumbag OM and their A. Your WW is NOT a good mother right now and has no idea the harm she is doing to her children.

Plan A is not about smothering. It's about your WW seeing the changings that you are making for you to be a better person an husband. This is to get her to start thinking that she could be happy with you. Notice and recognizing does not happen right away.

Telling your WW that you love her is being smothering, clingy, and makes you appear weak. These things are a big turn off to women.

Wow, I haven't finished reading the thread but I am beginning to feel convinced that I should expose to everyone. I've been Mr. Nice Guy for the past couple of months since I found out about the affair. Is it too late to play the "exposure card?"

I have digital pictures of my WW and OM kissing in bed. I even have a video I took from her computer of the two of them faces to face flirting apparently before the act. Is it over the edge to send these pics or even the vid in an email to her 16 siblings and parents? (She is #11 of 18 kids, that's a heck of a lot of exposure to do...)

So, from what I can gather, I should expose without any warning to my WW and that the general rule of who to expose to is anyone who can help influence the WW to stop the A. I would include her parents, the OM (I don't have any info about his family), and her closest siblings. My WW has a tagged.com page (similar to facebook and myspace) that has several pictures of her and him kissing and lots of goo-goo gaa-gaa I love you crap on it. I was thinking of including a link to her page also to fully expose every cobweb of their nasty affair.

It does feel kinda vengeful and cruel to do that, but I think it would be very effective in ruining the fantasy. My WW is very close to her family and I think she cares a lot about what they think about her.

Her parents don't have email so I would need to call them. They live out of state and I have rarely even spoken to them. I've only met them once. They are awesome parents though and they will put the fear into her I'm sure. But she is so prideful. She was extremely rebellious growing up and is still a very prideful person. I fear that she will just want to divorce after this, but it may be the best thing if her character shows that she is unwilling to change and feel bad for what she's done..

I have another question. I have never told her to stop having the affair because I felt that it goes without saying that I think the affair should end. But I think I have been way wrong here. I always thought it was unattractive to make demands, but this is an affair. So, should I tell her to stop having the affair before I expose and threaten her with exposure, or should I expose to just parents and OM first and then tell her to end the affair or I will expose further?

Also, one sad thing is that our marriage wasn't very good before the A. We have slept in separate rooms for years and have not got along much, so I think that when I expose, it will just push her run for divorce without giving me much of a chance to implement a Plan A. Although over the past few weeks, I have been trying Plan A and my wife has admitted that we've been getting along better recently although she's still fully in her A...

Does this info change anything about the way I should expose?