I just found out that my husband has been communicating w/ another woman. He says it was not physical, but i do not believe him from what I found. I have already forgiven him, as I cheated on him a few years ago too & he used this site to save our marriage. He seems stand-offish & distant to me now. I have poured out my heart & asked him to please stay & he says now he just doesnt know what he wants. I need help to save my marriage. In April, it will be 17 years of marriage & i dont want to throw it all away. Please help me!!

Welcome to Marriage Builders.
Read about Emotional Needs (ENs).
Identify his top ENs and do all you can to meet them.

Read about Love Busters (LBs) and eliminate them completely.

Don't talk relationship/marriage talk to him right now.

Is OW married?
Do you have children (if so how old)?
How did he meet OW?

Thanks for the reply. Yes other woman is married. She also has a young child, and we have a teenage daughter. My husband told me I cannot tell her husband about the affair or contact her, or he will leave me. He says they do not need to be involved. He asked me to go to the MB weekend to try and work on things. His actions however do not match his words. He will not even wear his wedding ring. When I asked him why he just said its in a safe place and things are not right yet. I am so confused by his behavior that I am at a loss. He still wants to be sexual, but I feel very weird about it, as I know he had a lot of sex with the ow. I am concerned about my health because I don't know if he protected himself. For all I know she could be pregnant or have an STD. He is even on this website asking for help and most people have told him that the ow husband should know.

Our daughter is almost 16 and very smart. She knows there is something going on. She has been very angry with him lately for the way he is treating me. She has become very protective of me. Her and I walk around on eggshells because we cannot read his mood from day to day.

I am beginning to question where to go from here. Thanks for your help.

Jgirl

Tell the OW's husband right away, and don't tell hubby you are going to do it. Of course he is probably reading this now. So tell.

I can't believe that a marriagebuilder betrayed spouse would turn around and do it to another man. I've read hubby's posts but didn't respond.

Then tell your daughter about the affair. Teens deserve to know.

jgirl, the most important thing you can do to save your marriage is to expose it to the OW's husband and do it SOON. Today if possible. Affairs thrive on secrecy and your H knows this. This is why he threatened to leave you if you exposed him. He knows you will ruin his affair. But, if you don't ruin his affair, you are more likely to be divorced.

Your marriage can survive his temporary anger at being exposed, it can't survive an affair.

Expose the affair to everyone, everywhere, starting with the OWH. Call your H's parents, your parents, close friends, family, your children. Your daughter desperately needs to be told. Kids can deal with the truth, they cannot deal with the truth.

Exposure is like chemotherapy to cancer and you are harming your marriage by keeping this affair secret.

Dr. Harley: "I'm in the process of rewriting "Surviving an Affair" to add information about plan B. Some of the main points are as follows:

Whether in plan A or B, the world should know about your husband's affair. All of your relatives, your friends, your children, and the licensing board for your husband's lover. In some states a licensing board will revoke a license if a counselor is having an affair with a married person, client or not. This is because it's well known that affairs hurt families, especially children. And counselors know better than to have an affair.

The reason for the wide exposure is not to hurt the unfaithful spouse, but rather to end the fantasy. Your husband's secret second life made his affair possible, and the more you can to to make it public, the easier it is for him to see the damage he's doing. Keeping it secret does damage, but few know about it. Making it public helps everyone, including the unfaithful spouse and lover, see the affair for what it really is.

<snip unrelated>

When I first started recommending openness about an affair, I wasn't sure what would happen. But I did it because I knew it was the right thing to do. Now I know that for most couples it marks the beginning of recovery."

Hey why not take out a commercial on the 10 o'clock news...Make up some flyers and have our daughter hand them out up and down the neighborhood and in the school.

Yeah, kids have a right to know about there parents affair....absoletly brillant...How about we start taking donations right now for the years of counseling that will cost... I just love the genius posters on here that have a paragraph of the situation and start providing MUST DO NOW rec's.

Specifically for my wife...
There is no affair to protect...I have confessed ALL the details to you.

It's now your choice to work on rebuilding our marraige. Considering the affair is completely over. Were here together and looking for the future, whatever that beholds. Taking the path of further exposure is your choice. However, I will see this as only taken as a vendictive action aimed to inflict even more damage.

Yes, I've been in your shoes as a betrayed spouse. Exposure was explained to me by Steve Harley as a tool to end an affair. Let me ask you. Once your affair ended, did I continue to beat on you by telling everyone about what you had done? Why! Because it as counter productive to building our relationship.

Something else to ponder....
FYI- Straight off the opening forum page...

Please Note: With the exception of the Marriage Builders® Weekend Private forums, the advice offered on these forums is offered by your peers - it is NOT professional advice and should not be taken as such. If you want professional advice, please look at information about the Marriage Builders® Coaching Center.

JGirl, your husband's fogbabble is evidence that he is trying to PROTECT HIS AFFAIR instead of your marriage. He is trying to keep the door open for he and he OW. He is the LAST PERSON who is qualified to say what is best for your marriage.

Please follow my advice and expose to the OWH ASAP. That way the OWH can watch from his end and your H will not be as free to pursue the OW.

Marriage Builders very much advocates exposure to the other BS and the children.

Dr. Willard Harley - WHO IS A PROFESSIONAL:

"I'm in the process of rewriting "Surviving an Affair" to add information about plan B. Some of the main points are as follows:

Whether in plan A or B, the world should know about your husband's affair. All of your relatives, your friends, your children, and the licensing board for your husband's lover. In some states a licensing board will revoke a license if a counselor is having an affair with a married person, client or not. This is because it's well known that affairs hurt families, especially children. And counselors know better than to have an affair.

The reason for the wide exposure is not to hurt the unfaithful spouse, but rather to end the fantasy. Your husband's secret second life made his affair possible, and the more you can to to make it public, the easier it is for him to see the damage he's doing. Keeping it secret does damage, but few know about it. Making it public helps everyone, including the unfaithful spouse and lover, see the affair for what it really is.

<snip unrelated>

When I first started recommending openness about an affair, I wasn't sure what would happen. But I did it because I knew it was the right thing to do. Now I know that for most couples it marks the beginning of recovery."

TJ - Mr. Fallen -

Why do you think the OM shouldn't have the information that his wife CHEATED on him?

None of his business?

Inflict more "damage" to who or what? The affair? Because it will not "damage" the OWH to know what you have done to him. But your affair with his W did "damage" him and he can't protect himself from you and his wife if he doesn't know. He needs to know what you have done so he can protect himself from you and get STD testing.

It will not "damage" your daughter to know the truth about what has happened to her family. Your adultery has "damaged" her family, and knowing the truth will lessen the damage you did. Lies do not make children happy. Kids can deal with the truth, not lies.

It will not "damage" you to face the consequences of your actions. Rather, it will help you see the affair for what it is. That is therapeutic.

So, where is the "damage?" I don't see where it "damages" your victims or even you. Exposure to your other victim and your DD would be beneficial, not damaging.

The only thing it will truly damage is the AFFAIR. Is that a problem for you?

Sorry Mr. FH, but you are waaaaay foggy or still in contact. Either way, your W has every right to contact OWH and should.

You are a day or two out of contact and in the book SAA, Dr. Harley specifically says that the BS's should work together to ensure NC.

Dr. Willard Harley, a "professional":

"Keeping it secret does damage, but few know about it. Making it public helps everyone, including the unfaithful spouse and lover, see the affair for what it really is."

Please be honest with your daughter. You know in your gut that it's the right thing to do.

In recovery it will sttrenghen all the relationships.

I found out about my own mom's affair from a neighbor, wow, not very honorable was it. Honesty with your daughter will go a long way. She is a young woman, not a child.

My own 15 year old daughter is sitting next to me as I type this. She knows what I did, and had the right to know this also. She is an amazing young lady and she knows we will tell her the truth about relevent issues in our lives.

As far as your H not approving, it's not his choice!

If H is threatening to leave, maybe you need to show him the door. It will hurt, but it will stop him from playing this silly power and control game.

The great thing here is everyone has an opinion.

People that propose life changing solutions based on a sentence or paragraph worth of background into a situation are themselves being irresponsible of there own actions.

I suppose it's really easy from behind a keyboard looking into a computer monitor...

At the end of the day eveyone comes here for support. Some offer plans of action instead. Ultimately it's up to each of us that come here for that moral support and decide what plan best fits.

Well you should understand by now that secrecy is an enemy to your R. Your secrets, and your WW's secrets is what has undone your M.

It's obvious that you don't understand that yet, and perhaps your WW doesn't either.

You should understand that you reap the rewards of what both you and your WW have sown.

Devastation in the worst form..............Yup.

Where you go from here is really based in the humbleness of the two of you to God's commands.

Put up a wall if you wish, but you will regret it, and your M will become even more vunerable. Don't miss this last chance to show your W that you are both vunerable.

Do what you have to do and both of you humble yourself to your weakness.

All Blessings,
Jerry

And that is just YOUR OPINION. The "opinion" of a falling down drunk who is high on the fumes of his affair and is in no way qualified to lead the recovery of his own marriage. The drunk should not be driving the car, in other words.

Jgirl, I would strongly urge you to just drive to the OW's house and knock on the door. NOW. Tell both the OWH and the OW that you know about the affair. Your H is scared to death of this exposure for good reason: HIS AFFAIR IS NOT DONE.

I suspect that his fear of you contacting the OW stems from some lie he has told her about you. For example, he may have told her you "separated" or getting divorced. That is very common.

Keeping it a SECRET allows him to continue in secrecy. You can deal a blow to the affair if you expose it like this.

But you need to do this NOW because your H is reading here and he will likely FOREWARN the OW. The OW will then tell her H that you are some jealous wackjob who imagines her H is cheating. Then when you do expose, the OWH will think you are a nut.

And don't think he won't do that to you. He is scared to death you will ruin his affair and is probably sneaking out to the garage as we speak to call the OW and warn her so she can pre-empt you.

AMEN....
The ultimate driver for our "marriage" car is God. The rest of us are just technicians and team mates working for a common goal of our "marriage" car.

Appears we will continue to disagree about what level of disassembly of our marrage and family is needed before a possible restoration can begin.

what was that strange sound???

JGirl, your H is gaslighting you and I would implore you to take my advice and get this affair exposed before he pre-empts you. He is in damage control mode and you had better be quicker and more strategic.

Please don't bring God into it. You just got done commiting adultery, and are hiding the fact from a betrayed husband. Better to repent and let him know the sin you commited against him, his family and child before you start claiming that God is driving your decisions.