Hello Sugar, I have to say that I tried to examine how they had contact through work and couldn't understand why it was so 'impossible'. It seemed to me that the contact between Irish and French labs could be sorted by him pulling out of the project which is only starting so it's not particularly difficult. The main problem seemed to me that she was desperate to maintain contact and he didn't want to push her away (hence the title of my thread) Her parents do not live in our village, they live about 20km away in the Parisian metropolitan area.

WH must be interested in breaking contact and then we can explore opportunities together. I've already offered to go for a year's sabbatical elsewhere etc etc but he's not interested. I suggested that he might ask Agnes (the third party on the project they worked on til recently) to take over his role of professional mentor and he thought it was a good idea but then didn't act on it at all. Sorry but I honestly can't see what else I can do if he's not interested.

I am writing this with only half a mind at the moment. My youngest sister had a car accident last night and I've spent the night in A+E. She will be OK in the long run but she has a serious gash on her forehead (I could see her skull and her tearduct was exposed. I'm not particularly squeamish but I had to leave after a few minutes as I was going to faint.) She almost lost her eye but the doctors assure us that she'll be OK. She will be transferred by ambulance to Dublin in about an hour or so for an operation so that a plastic surgeon can sew everything back. I will be accompanying her in the ambulance so I'm not sure if I'll be around very much for the next little while.

Thank you for your support, love to all of you.

Tully

SugarCane, I think Tully will be able to answer your questions much better than I can, but it might be useful to contribute my own knowledge of the academic world.

I'm not an academic, but I work with an academic scientist (not physics) to publish information and papers on the web.

A paper, once published, and especially if it's 'successful', becomes part of the domain in that scientific field. It's often known by the names of the contributors, so that people will be referring to 'TullyH/OW' when they discuss the paper or refer to it in other papers. The two will be linked in people's minds until the paper becomes obsolete.

The contributors remain permanently linked by the paper - requests to access the data used will be addressed to both, and as far as I'm aware,TullyH and OW will need to communicate in some way to discuss whether they comply with such requests. If they're asked to speak about the paper at conference, having both of them there would be a natural expectation - although often only a subset of contributors will 'present'.

So I think that complete NC would be almost impossible to achieve, even if Tully's H left his current field of research.

There's another factor that I think needs to be considered. The small world of academic/scientific specialisations is a hotbed of rumour, scurrilous gossip and rivalry. Academics know quite well the abilities of their peers, and can work out who contributed what to something like this paper. It seems probable from what Tully has said, that the peer community is aware that the OW is not up to the standard of Tully's H, and that she has to some extent been 'carried' by her mentor. The suspicion that he would help her in this way only because he was sexually involved with her will have been doing the rounds for months, I suspect. It doesn't destroy the value of the paper, but it won't do much for the professional reputation of Tully's H.

Whether Tully's H has allowed himself to think about this consciously, I'm quite sure he's aware of the danger if only at a subconscious level. It's vital for him to frame the collaboration to himself as honestly professional, with OW seen as a competent person who pulled her weight. Tully's leaving for Ireland, I believe, would have confirmed the general suspicion that the 'professional' relationship really wasn't innocent, which would explain his desperate need to bully and gaslight Tully back into the marriage.

This is a man caught between a rock and a hard place. If he does what's needed - and what Tully is insisting on - to recover the marriage, he will confirm to his peer community that he has acted foolishly and unprofessionally. If he maintains his 'innocence' in the hope of retaining professional credibility, he loses the marriage and a close relationship with his daughters.

It's a classic 'Schnarch' situation ('Passionate Marriage', by David Schnarch*), where a person faced with choosing between two unpleasant actions, tries to avoid the unpleasantness by making their partner provide a third choice, to the partner's detriment.

Tully is resolutely refusing to provide that third choice. Good for you, Tully.

Tully, I don't believe he wants the OW. But I think his main thinking right now is how to keep his professional reputation intact, whatever that takes. He thinks he's fighting for his life. He just hasn't realised that his life is more than his work.

{{{Tully}}}}

TA

Edited to add: very sorry to hear about your sister, Tully. Sounds very distressing. Take care of yourself and her and don't worry about anything else.

* I get that dratted name wrong every time!

Hi Tully thoughts & prayers to your sister hope all goes well up in Dub.

TA sounds like she's right inside his mindframe

The thing for him maybe exactly that, in his position he values respect of his peers.

To be proved a fool (which he's doing to himself) is prob in his opinion unimaginable. But he is intelligent, he is just forgetting completely to think beyond his immediate situation.

He gets the kudos for the paper, he has made the single stupidest biggest mistake of his personal & professional life to date, everyone knows it, and so does he.

Perhaps a tack might be to show him a little guidance... that he can overcome this setback. That the Harley system has helped many very successful people to overcome their mess.

That his actions won't define him, how he continues from here on (now that is in the open) will.

He seems to be striving to be seen an honourable man (yet we fully know his actions weren't those to date) perhaps he can't see the way to a better situation.

Best wishes.

You did not misrepresent tully.


I have a problem with this MB concept as well. To me, it would have added insult to injury. It was bad enough that FWH had an A and did all the hurtful and evil things he did behind my back but if he could then continue to do so right in front of my face and not give a damn, our M would have been over. That's me and I know everyone's tolerance and situations vary. OW was not in close proxity to us, my H very quickly realized what a royal [censored] he had been and that OW was a nasty human being as well. Plus I busted FWH balls from the get go instead of sucking up the anger to avoid LBing. That made a difference for me and I even think to our recovery. I already had so much resentment for H's A that I could not handle anymore.

I'm not saying that continued contact is necessarily the end ofa M. However, I do think it's important to point out that the BS will clearly have more resentment to deal with when contact is continued or when the WS isn't remorseful. Fog or no fog, the actions of the WS hurt.

Black Raven (and Tully, when she is able to post again), I think an awful lot of things about recovering from infidelity are almost impossibly hard to do. It takes a huge amount of personal growth on the part of both spouses, but if both of you can manage it, the recovered marriage is not the real reward - the true prize is the strength, stamina and maturity you've had to acquire to get there.

If there are young children involved, then making the supreme effort to build up the muscle and climb the mountain is well worth the trying.

The trouble is that, in most cases, only one of you is motivated to start the climb IN THE BEGINNING. The BS has to set out on his/her own, in the hope that the WS will wake up and start putting in the effort at some point. You're working on yourself while the WS is sulking, whining, feeling sorry for themselves and acting like a martyr. That's a really tough time.

You know, I think that's the turning point in most marriages here that get through - when the BS sets out on the journey on their own. Setting boundaries, refusing to be gaslighted, being clear about what they want, taking their own audit of personal weaknesses and dependencies, becoming a strong, clear-thinking person. When the WS 'gets' that this is happening, they either start shaping up, or they run away.

Either way, the BS emerges a bigger human being.

Not one of us would have asked to be hit by infidelity, any more than we want cancer or the death of a child. But the big crises that hit us are the best opportunities we have to grow in character and integrity.

Goodness, to listen to me, you'd think infidelity was a good thing! It's not, absolutely not. It's the worst of 'growth opportunities'. But it is an opportunity, and growth is never painless.

TA

Tully and sis

You're both in my prayers.

And in mine, tully. Love and hugs to you both.

Dear b_r,

There have been a couple of interesting discussions of the issue of dealing with a continuing affair. Although not the main issue, both threads touch on the effect that such continuation has on recovery. One thread is Mark1952's "Plan A or kick 'em to the curb?" and the other is Looking4's "Differences between WHs and WWs?" (The former is still active, while the latter is currently on p4 or so of this forum.) There seem to be more successful examples of instant NC where the WS is a wife, on these forums. How did you get your WH to see what a "royal [censored]' he had been when so many of us feisty women failed?!

I first came across Dr Harley's articles on the web site in January 2007, but only got hold of SAA when I was in the USA in summer 2008. Having heard it recommended so highly for so long by posters here, I was rather underwhelmed after reading the case study of Jon and Sue. Dr Harley offered this as an example of a marriage recovering well from a worse-case scenario; a drawn-out affair and no apology or remorse from the WW. The WW, Sue, went back to the marriage after her AP dumped her. She had at first left her children, then taken them with her, then moved back into the marital home and kicked her H out (as far as I can remember. Certainly there was a lot of painful back and forth for the kids). There was no expression from her, in the book at least, of her horror at what she had done to them or Jon. Her H had walked in on the APs having sex in his bed, but because he had never really stopped loving Sue he was glad when she came home, even though she was boiling with resentment towards him and grieving the loss of her AP. As they followed the Harley programme (time, care, EPs etc), Jon's resentment faded quite well. After some time had passed, Sue started to have feelings for him again.

That, as far as I can remember, was the recovery success story. It didn't seem like much of a recommendation to me.

However, I do accept and understand when posters here say that it does not matter how the affair ends, that it is what is done thereafter that counts. If both the BS and WS work on recovery, the new marriage will be good. I can see that if you want that good marriage (because you still love FWW, or you had 10 good years before the affair, or you want to give your children security with happy, united parents, etc) you, the BS, will have to let go of resentment, stop fighting over the affair and deal with the present and the future, no matter how bad the past was (as long as the affair is really over, of course).

I can't understand how anyone does this. I completely failed to let go of resentment until, more than 3 years after D Day 2 2005, I was able to put into perspective things my H, his OW and her H told me about the affair, and I saw some of their old emails. These combined sources showed me that my H was never as drawn into the affair as OW had been. It was only when I was able to see evidence that I had not been second choice that my resentment substantially faded.

It does not make recovery much easier when you change your perspective and realise that you are dealing with an unprincipled freeloader, however, but that's another topic!

Dear TA,

Thank you for your post. I think you have explained very well how hard achieving NC might be.

I work for an academic publisher, although in the books division, and in social sciences, so there are some differences between what you and I have been able to observe.

In social sciences, many books and papers are published and most quickly become obscure. This is even more true of papers published in quarterly journals. In these, there will be several papers and book reviews in one edition, and there will be another edition along in the next quarter. Few papers, even in high-status, refereed journals, make a lasting impact on the research community. A well-received book will have a much bigger and longer-lasting impact on a career. In social sciences, academics seem to publish slightly altered versions of the same paper in journals and edited books, to keep their publication rate high and their reputations refreshed. My observation is that one well-received paper is only a start for OW, a young researcher, and only one step in tully's WH's established career. It might define her, and without H's support she might not thrive, but it won't define him.

Things might well be different in the natural sciences, where breakthrough research carries far more importance. However, I don't think that the linking of the two people in other people's minds means that contact between them will be necessary. And do requests to access the data need to be discussed each time? Isn't there some principle by which data is understood to be available to the community? What happens when scientists fall out over non-affair matters? Is their data no longer accessible?

My company has a successful publication from 1999 aimed at undergraduates. We should like the joint editors to update it. However, one editor found the other extremely difficult to work with and does not want to repeat the experience. It is disappointing for us that they cannot work together again, but their individual research goes on. They still publish and attend conferences; they just do not address this successful book. If tully's H is invited to discuss the paper at a conference he can decline. He will soon have other projects that he will publish on and his conference participation will focus on those. The academic world is well used to feuds and fallings-out; these provide good gossip for a while, but careers go on if the researchers wish them to.

Academic can indeed work out who contributed what to a paper. It seems quite common for PhD supervisors to help their students get a publication boost by collaborating on a paper. In my experience, it is not seen as unprofessional for an established person to give equal credit to a less established person who probably did not contribute equally. Neither is it unknown for breakthrough PhD research to be published with the supervisor's name on it when they did little or no work. I've known junior researchers to express great anger at their supervisors for demanding joint authorship as a price for continued support.

I'm just trying to say that scandals over authorship, refusals to work together again and rumours over affairs happen all the time, and to very highly-established researchers, but this is a normal part of the academic world. Careers are rarely ruined as a result.

In a different profession, my H chose to go to work one day and tell his boss that he would not travel again. He asked to be allowed to remain in post until he could find another job in the organisation, but he would not travel because his marriage was in trouble. His British team, that he was leader of, and all his international partners had to be informed, and it was very awkward for the "marriage in trouble" explanation to be be known but not fully explained. They must have all work out instantly what the phrase meant, but he chose to put up with the embarrassment. When he found a new internal posting it was at a lower grade, on a lower salary.

I'm not trying to say that he faced the level of embarrassment that tully's H faces, but it was humiliating for a while. Such humiliation can be ridden out. tully's H can publish on his other projects. I really don't believe that saving his marriage means professional suicide.

I agree that recovering from infidelity leads to much more than a recovered marriage. I realize that in many ways I'm perhaps "luckier" than most that the fog lifted very quickly, I had a remorseful H, and his A died on D-day. I hope that every BS personally recovers, with or without their spouse because no M is worth losing yourself over. Pretty much agree with everything you said.

I have never posted my story, perhaps one day I will, but in a nutshell I held a mirror in front of his face (not literally) and DJed all over him and OW and nuked them both while playing devil's advocate at times because he couldn't argue with what I was saying. There was no manipulation involved because I really didn't want to recover my marriage at first. I was ready to mop the floor with him. My main motivation for breaking up his A and exposing was because I didn't want skankho around my children in the future and I wanted a better man for a father to my kids rather than the lying POS they had then. Like the military, I wanted to break him so that he had nowhere to go but up.

FWH knew he was an [censored] on D-day. I think all waywards have to know they are asses to a degree even pre-DDay or else they wouldn't have hid their As in the first place and come up with the twisted justifications. Given FWH's own messed up father, it didn't take much for him to see the light. His father was a cheater and FWH thought his father was a loser, ahole, moron...pick a description...so take a hard look in the mirror my DH. FWH knew his A was wrong and I didn't let him forget it.

I agree Sugar especially with the last two sentences. Still dealing with the resentment but it's not nearly as bad as it used to be. I had asked a question about forgiveness and it touched on the issue of resentment as well. Got some insightful answers:

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/ubbt/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2115802&fpart=1

No matter when the A dies, there is still the issue of getting disclosure if the BS wants/needs it. How willing the WS is to disclose the requesting info also takes it's toll on the BS as well as the details themselves. Affairs suck!!!

SugarCane, I can only speak to my own narrow experience, and for all I know, I may have hit on a particularly flouncy part of the scientific community.

I've been involved with several requests for data use, and it's always meant contacting all the other contributors for permission. In some cases, there's bad feeling between contributors, and contact is frigid and formal. I've not known anyone to refuse to communicate, though - I get the impression that would be seen as unprofessional. The data BELONGS to the authors (for example, thousands of readings or x-rays or medical records), and they often are reluctant to allow that expensively collected information to be available freely.

But Tully's H may not be in the same position. My experience is mainly medical/biological, your is in social sciences, and there are differences. I think we need Tully's input in order to get the details clear for her H's field.


I entirely agree. It just involves a bit of humility and riding out the embarrassment, as you say. I commend your husband for his strength of character to do it.

But I think it probably does seem like professional suicide to Tully's H. He seems to me to be someone who has a deep need to see himself as irreproachable. He's clinging to the concept of his A as something noble and good, the kind and wise teacher helping the clever, vulnerable student. In his warped view, it's TULLY who's the bad one, because she's seeing something dirty in his 'pure' relationship.

I would be surprised if this self-image didn't extend to his work also. In that case, something big would have to change in his mindset for him to live with the idea of himself as flawed and something of a fool.

Tully, hope your sister is recovering well.

TA

Hello everyone, I'll try to make this quick as I've just got back from Dublin and I should go to bed soon as I've slept very little for the past two nights.

Firstly my sister is doing well. They discovered a hairline fracture in her neck and we were worried about that but they now think this will be heal just fine over time with a neckbrace to protect it for a few weeks. She just got out of surgery and her facial wound is sown up and looks good. She had a lucky escape and it's been a worrying time for us but all is well.

So back to WH! TA has understood very well the situation. I thought this comment was particularly perceptive.
After I hung up the phone to Steve Harley before Christmas, it was something that niggled at me. I think that Steve was assuming that WH's indecisveness was due to his inability to decide which option was the 'best' option for him but I think that this isn't quite the case. It's more like what TA is saying. I would also add to this that WH is a man who has a particularly bad problem with dealing with his emotions. I've said before that I've always known that he had a problem in this area; it's not that he's emotionally stupid but I think he is emotionally illiterate. He feels emotions but he doesn't understand them, just as the illiterate may be intelligent but writing is just black squiggles on a page, my WH has no way of translating and understanding the churning emotions inside him. For 20 years I have been his reader and in some ways I liked this (I know, I can see now that it was really not a good idea) because it made me feel important and essential to him but instead I should have taught him to read.

Anyway, while I agree with your assessment here TA, I'm not sure that the objective impact on his career is as seriously negative as you imply (although as you rightly point out it's possible that it appears so to WH). Sugar is right in that even with a collaboration on papers, contact can be avoided. And a change in direction or topic in WH's research is both possible and even might be desirable for him. Several of WH's colleagues are already aware of the A (although he doesn't know that) and it's not particularly affecting their relationship with him although they are now avoiding any meetings, collaboration etc that might put WH and OW in contact with each other. But WH doesn't know this and seemed to believe before PB that knowledge of the A would be very destructive to his reputation. At the same time he argued that if he left me to go to OW that this would have a lesser impact. Black-raven, I agree with you and your reaction but I tried to do this too but it seems to me that your H was more receptive to your arguments than my WH ever was. Strangely, I think that the thing that I found most destructive of my love for WH was not the A or even the continuation of it but his denial of truth and logic no matter how obviously presented and his refusal to consider my perspective in the situation.

In the light of all these comments I asked the IM who works as a researcher in the same organisation as WH but in a different field, if she could see any serious professional obstacles to NC with OW that I might be missing given that I'm not a scientist. She doesn't think there are any but she feels that WH does not want to continue his A with OW and that he truely believes it is over between them even though he also said to IM that if we divorced he would later turn to OW to try to have a relationship with her. IM believes that WH doesn't want to commit to NC for the following reasons:
- pride, doesn't want to 'give in'
- doesn't understand that 'professional contact' is a problem and so is annoyed that I don't trust him to allow that
- a complete inability to empathise with my position

I would add to this list that he subconsciously doesn't want to 'face the mirror' and will do any amount of twisting to avoid it.

Basically I believe that the best thing I can do right now is to continue in a situation where WH must make the decision. ( I think this is what TA was saying too) It is much easier for me to continue with the current status quo than it is for him. He is alone with no friends or support. I don't know what the situation is with OW at the moment but she must be putting some kind of pressure on him to decide too. I don't want to make things too easy for him by holding out morsels to tempt him to take baby steps away from the crossroads he is at and on to my path. I want a firm decision made by him. Either way. It will be good for him in the end. I can handle losing him if he doesn't choose me or choose on time and I would rather that than an acceptance of a de facto decision made by me. I am thinking that I could continue like this until June but I would like by then to know where the girls are going to school in September and I would like to get a place of our own to live and I can only do that when we sell our house in France.

If this is true - then might not that same stamina and maturity (and courage) be acquired even when the marriage is not recovered?



Holy smokes!
EGG ZAK LEE


yesssssssssssssssss

Yup.

We might be sisters .... I had such a similar experience - except - I DID make H stand (nekk'd) in front of an actual mirror while I told him what excrement he was ... not my most noble moment.

Like you, I also was ready to walk from day one.

By the way I would like your advice on this email I wrote in a moment of anger and insomnia last week. It's a letter to OW which made me feel good but I've hesitated to send it. Maybe it's an email I should send after WH has made his decision one way or the other. Any suggestions?

If you send it - do it in public.

A blog?

notable post girlfriend (not this one - da udder one)