So, I am starting my own thread so I won't be t/j anybody elses..LOL.
LIttle bit of background.
I had an affair with a co-worker in 2006. My H knows about everything as he was the one that caught my e-mails, messages...etc.
There has been completely NC since Dec 2006. Unfortunately my H does not want to work on our M.
I thought I had done everything to work on my M but this past X-mas the Lord revealed to me that I needed to spend more time with my family.
I believe the Lord for a restored M. I have faith that he doesn't fail. That He keeps his promises.
I guess this is not a good day for me...and I have the need to vent here.
I know I have to work on my budgeting the money and on different things that I have been seen on this past few days.
I know my sitch might be a little different than others as I am not in an active affair and at this point I am the only one wanting to work on our M.
What else can I do to help my M heal without asctually asking him what he needs to heal? (he won't tell me)
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Angie

Will he go to counseling?

Will he come on here?

Will he counsel with the Harleys?

We went to MC when I was active on the affair, of course it did not work. I guess he got disappointed because he stopped going.
After the A ended I explained to him that it did not work because the A was still going on that it had nothing to do with the counselor, but he refused to go again. H
He has build a wall between me and him does not want to do anything.
He does not go to church, I asked him about the Harleys and he refused. I do not know what else to do.....only what I had said earlier (about school)

Angie

Ohh, and he won't come here either, I know (because I caught him) one day reading some thread here but I don't know which thread he was reading or if he was just snopping on me.

Thanks very much for your advice!

Angie.

That is over one year, not bad, not bad at all. That is the greatest gift that you can offer your husband. He is not obliged to accept your gift and let me add this. “There comes a time when you are no longer obliged to offer it.” There comes a time when you are allowed to seek happiness, without him if necessary. Your transgression of over a year ago caused an avalanche of pain for your husband. I can think of nothing worse than an act of infidelity. You may have betrayed everything that was important, your husband, your family and worst of all, yourself. But he should not be given the ability to punish you for the rest of your life. This is not a life sentence.

It takes both husband and wife to recover from infidelity. Virtually every single post is designed to guide both partners into restoring the marriage. The best course of action for any wayward spouse is to reaffirm their integrity by focusing their love within the family, husband and children. If you have done that for this past year then you have answered the bell. But if he refuses to re-engage in the marriage, then the marriage has NO chance.

I think it is incredibly sad that some betrayed spouses will never entertain the idea that they could ever forgive their spouse of adultery. Perhaps your husband is one such individual. There are a great many betrayed spouse who will NEVER allow a second chance. There are even more that say they are trying to recover but never really give their marriage a chance, so stricken with the hurt of betrayal.

It may be time for you to forgive yourself. Only you really know the answer to that question. I suggest that you keep the above in your thoughts but continue to push to have him re-engage in the marriage. At least for a little while longer, don’t give up yet. Push for reconciliation.

Mr. G

I don't think he is this kind. He is incredibly stubborn. You know the type of person that thinks his thoughts about this issue are the true....I know he knows inside of him that there is hope for us. But I also know that he is very afraid to let me in back into his heart again.
I guess my question for you Mr. G or Mortarman (Or any other man) would be.....why is he still here with us??

Angie.

That's a good start... But how does your husband know that there's been no contact?


Have you written a NC letter to the OM?

There's a lot of pain that you inflicted on your husband... When you get bit by a dog you have a tendency not to reach your hand out to pet the dog anymore...

TRUST... That is one big thing that has to be fixed... You can't make him trust you...

But I think you can do some things on your own to start to build that bridge of trust back up... Maybe he'll see those things and start to build that bridge from his side as well.

A No Contact letter is a good start....

Complete transparency is another....

Spending 15 hours a week together...

Accounting for where you are and who you're with every single minute of the day...


What deceptions did you perpetuate when you were wayward? Hiding phone calls... Texting... emails... credit card purchases...

Giving him total acess to these things will go along way toward building that trust.


Can we get some more details about your situation... are you living with your husband? Who was the OM? A co-worker perhaps? Do you have kids? How long have you been married? Etc...


Have you told your husband EVERYTHING? (Have you read Josephs Letter?)

Just a few suggestions... I'm sure there are some people on here that have much better advice than I can offer.

Here's a link to Josephs letter...

It's in the "Just Found Out" forum

Josephs Letter.

Why is he still there? Because he is your husband, and somewhere inside him, he knows it. His problem is he isnt in touch with the Lord (thus no guidance for him) and he has no other outside help. So, he is stuck in his rut.

Did you read the link I have below...especially about wives? Do you undertand your role in the marriage?

Well, when a BS spouse won't share their ENs and LBs, the WS can probably look over the last five years of arguments and figure out where the rubs are.

And be presistent, nu human is going to resist an effort aimed at fulfilling their desires for too long.

Any chance he is straying?

Amazin,

Thank you for replying. I will try to answer all of your questions.
It's been almost 2 years of complete and total NC, so I do not know if a NC letter make sense at this point.
He knows it because he read the last e-mail where the OM was dumping me for good.
I have been transparent since then. As far as spending 15 hours a week, that is the part where I think I'm not doing too well b/c I work full time, I go to school and I am doing my internship in a shelter for battered women. So I do not have much time for anything else.
I let him know everwhere I go eventhough he sometimes doesn't care (or acts like it)
During the A I used to carry my cell everywhere I go, even to the shower. Now, I leave it everywhere, I do not hide myself to talk to anybody, I hardly text anybody, he has complete access to my email accounts and I even told him that I was posting here.

The OM was person that conveys himself as handsome-intelligent-I-know-what-you're-going through-and-that's-why-I understand-you kind of guy.Well, we were working at the same company.

We are living together, we have 3 kids. DS 17, DS 13, DD 4. We have been married for 19 years.

Yes, I have read Joseph's Letter. I would loooove to tell him everything. Another important thing is....when he found out we tried to work on our M, and he did not questioned me much...it did not work as I was pretty much foggy. I left to go to my mom's for the summer vacations.
When I returned home, he had changed his heart and said he did not want to work on our M...Still we started living together as a family again....I was still very foggy and continued the A.
After he found out the second time (Dec of 2006) he never asked anything again.
He says he doesn't want to know anything...and is very closed minded. I know he has every right to do this....but it's been 2 years.....is this normal?
I hope I have answer your questions......
Thanks for the advice.

Angie

No, I haven't read it..and that brings me to the other question I had. How can I be the best Godly wife I can be? How can I become the wife that he needs?
I will read it with my ears, mind and heart open.


Mike....do you mean cheating??



A.

Angie Posted most of this on your other thread and then saw you are now using this one .... sorry

I am a former cheater like yourself. I cheated on my H.

It doesn't matter why really because there are no excuses .. none .. however knowing some of the reasons why I choose to cheat also helped me build a plan to enable me to demonstrate to my H my commitment to HIM and the M again.

I left the workplace where it happened .. no if's no buts I was gone. Being in Gov it was a bit easier I could transfer to another Department ok. That meant my income could still help the family.
Did I give up a career .. you betcha ... and I don't regret it either.

I told my very angry H before I did it .. Job Change ... and then after ... even if all he did then was grunt sceptically. Well I wasn't the most honest person was I.

Because my H is away so often I blog every day all of my actions.. talked too, when how etc. ..especially to men and even here on MB... he has complete access to my life. NO MORE SECRETS

My email or facebook or myspace for family contact and photos I have fully open to my H .. he has the passwords and id's ... even here on MB. OPENESS

I apologised repeatedly ... however you need to be careful here so you don't become "Mrs I'm so Sorry' .... better to do this a few times a week when it seems appropriate ... like when he glares at you or when he's visibly angry or cold towards you.
My DH angrily told me one day he didn't want to be married to Mrs I'm so Sorry and get a back bone. Which sparked a right old Barney between us .... he actually smiled after that... he wanted HIS wife back. So carefully balanced here.

I let him vent and swear at me about me ... But I did not allow him to abuse me that's NOT acceptable ... its a fine line but an important one ...... but well if he called me a SL*T ... I agreed as I had acted as one .. because I did. I really really tried not to cry at these times but to calmly admit YES I did those things and I was wrong. I think this helped him to exercise his justified anger and helped me to begin to understand the depth of hurt I had inflicted on him.

so there are various ways to continue to show you are working on the M ...... counselling for you ... being able to show him you are working on the how and why you cheated and what you are doing to ensure that it never happens again

Well I see you did mention Dr Harley to your H but what about printing off some of the key things in the basics and leave it for him to look at????

In some ways its like a drop of water wearing away a mountain ... you can't lecture him or educate him just like he couldn't with you when the A was in full swing.

My guess is he has 'given up' and is in depression. If you can spark his interest in MB as a place for him to come to... MB can be very helpful for him. Though you may need to undertake a firm solid promise to not read his posts unless he invites you .... keeping this promise would also show him you ARE committed to the M and want to remorsefully repair the damage you caused. Of course breaking that promise would have the opposite effect.

So these are some of the ways you can begin thinking about to begin the process of restitution for your actions. It will take time.... longer than you may think .... it may not end up saving your M even so ... but then nothing else is working right now is it?

so working gloves on Angie and get moving

AW

Aussie,

I know...I have to work..LOL...
I do not have accounts like Myspace or Facebook...I do not surf the web..actually before finding MB I hardly get online.
So he has access to everything. Like I said...I once e-mail him and let him know that I was posting here and what was my ID.....
I never get any replies to the e-mails....but I caught him reading one of the threads here.
I have nooo idea if he stills reads.

See what gets to me is that he has become hostile and withdrawn
since about six months ago....before we used to have SF pretty often, we used to take showers together, we used to talk a lot more than today. He used to be much kinder to me....but all of a sudden everything stopped!! WTH??? Why??
I asked him and he said that he did not want to give me false hope, that he was here exclusively for the kids and that is all.

I have no idea what happenned???

I like your idea of printing some info from here and give it to him....
He started reading SAA but got mad and told me that Dr Harley said everything could be restored when BOTH of spouses wanted to work on the M and that he did not want to.
As far as being in depression, I don't think so, I have researched that because I am studying for counselor and have suffered from that myself..but I could be wrong...he has become secretive about a lot of things himself.

Thanks AW.
I get myself to work ASAP

Angie.

Hi Angie,

I'm glad you are reaching out for help on here. You seem to be getting some great advice and support.

I know how deeply you love your husband and hope for the M to recover. I'm praying for you sweet lady..

well while I don't like to suggest it ....




could he be in a revenge affair .... EA or PA himself now?

Getting angry at SAA is so much like a WS reaction... however not being a BS I cold be wrong .... what do you BS say on that out there????

My sister brought this up to my attention. Theres a thread here on "signs" of an affair.
I was reading it but found it difficult to tell.
He does carries his cell all the time with him. He sometimes goes outside to talk on his cell phone. But I sometimes justify him by thinking that he is doing this on purpose, you know....trying to prove that "if you were able, I am able too".
He fits alot of signs on that thread, but for me it's hard to tell cuz he has become withdrawn from me....we don't have a normal relationship...so it's not easy to discover.....should I snoop?

Angie

IMHO If you suspect, you should snoop.....

I personally have no desire to see anyone else... And a healthy response for me is to be faithful. If I do get a divorce I still wont see anyone romantically for at least a year after....

With that being said... Dr. Harley said in SAA that the biggest threat to the marriage after the affair is the betrayed spouse.

Do you still work at the same place? You said it was a co-worker...

It doesn't matter what the OM said in a letter if you're still working in the same place together. Again ... A trust issue here... You decieved your husband about having an affiar with a co-worker. In his mind it's hard to tell what is truth and what is a lie. In his mind a letter from the OM saying it's over could just be one more deception... Something the OM and you cooked up to decieve him once more... If you're woking in the same place as the OM you need to leave... any contact with OM at all is hurting your husband...

Aussiewife said she changed jobs... That's a big deal... It shows that the Marriage is more important than the money...More important than anything else.

Angie ... IF you are in the same work place ,,, even if the OM has left .... your H will likely NEVER accept you are telling him the truth.

You see its not only the OM himself ... its the environment that helped assist the affair.

My H even said it didn't matter ... BUT after I moved to a new building... a new job .... our recovery advanced a lot quicker... you see even unknown to him.. my H was waiting to see a solid sign from me that I was committed.

If my H had ever got a message from the OM saying it was over he'd have burnt it & assumed the OM & I had set it up between ourselves. As far as my H was concerned .. I only lied once ... when I spoke.

However yes I think you do need to snoop on the affair question. A BS is very vulnerable as he or she is seeking affirmation that they are desirable... comfort and admiration .... and right at this stage .... WE the XWS are not their favourite person to get those things from right at that time.

A BS MAY also goes through a type of PTSD which can be expressed in a number of ways ... commonly bizarre (to us because we are not seeing what they do) behaviour ...drinking... drugs ... remoteness... and lets be blunt .... whoring around.