I wrote on this site at the beginning of March about taking a polygraph and needing advice about it. I had posted a question on that thread but with all of the computer problems of 2 weeks ago, it was never added to the thread so I just figured I would write a new thread and question you vets and other WS's.

My A started 2-8-08 and ended 3-26-08. It was a PA. I had lied to my husband for nearly a year about the details of the A... hence the 4 d-days. As of 3-3-09 I wrote down all of the details of the A, not caring how they made me look, how they hurt BH, or how they hurt me. I needed to get them out. My BH knew that I had been lying and it was time to get them out in the open. Everyone on this website told me that I needed to be honest and get everything out in the open but I didn't listen. I was a selfish coward and thought that me keeping additional details of the A was better for us then to actually tell BH what really happened. I am in the process of writing an apology letter to BH. I had wrote him one before but I don't think that I had put my heart and soul into it. Here is where we are at now and where I need help.

My BH has problems with LB's... anger, yelling, drinking, name calling, many would say to the point of mental abuse. Have I yelled and screamed back, yes I have. But at what point do you say that is enough with the LB's? When he gets really heated I am scared. What do I do? I have walked away from the confrontation, but he follows me yelling and screaming at me. He has broken down a door to a room that I was in trying to get away from the LB's. He says he doesn't feel good saying what he says and how it affects me. I know that my lying for over a year has not helped the situation but do I deserve this? I don't know what I deserve anymore so that is why I am asking. He calls me some of the nastiest names anyone can think of... so bad that I can't say them here. I just need advice on what I should do.

Lindz, you may have to leave and/or call the police if he gets violent again. That cannot be tolerated. My suggestion would be to not yell back at him. Don't escalate the problem.

There is no excuse for his violent behavior, but when you abuse someone the way you have abused and assaulted your H for so long, they tend to act out. Just don't sit there and take it. Take action to protect yourself.

In the meantime, he needs to get counseling for post traumatic stress disorder and anger management. When someone has been abused this long, the anger can spiral out of control. He needs to get help.

CAn you send him here to us?

But the first step is to STOP fighting with him!! It takes 2 to fight. Let him know you understand his anger and pain and will listen QUIETLY to him but you will leave the next time he screams and calls you names and will call the police if he smashes up the house again.

You also need to remember that while you don't have to tolerate abuse, your H is this way as a RESULT of your abuse. You cannot rape a person over and over again and then expect them not to lash out at you. Try and be a little more sympathetic of your victim.

You are right about I do probably need to be more sympathetic to him and what I have done to him. I do try and sit and listen to him but when the yelling and name calling gets so elevated, I try to protect myself.

Why is he yelling? ARe you withholding information from him again? Are you being sympathetic and forthcoming with the truth? Or are you being cagey and defensive with him?

I don't know why he yells, calls me names, etc... No, I am not withholding info from him. Even though he accuses me every day that I am, I am not. I do not feel that I am being defensive with him until after he starts yelling. He starts talking about the A and then it just leads into name calling and yelling. When the A talk starts, I answer his questions. I try to stay as focused as I can and I am open and honest with him. But, when the yelling and name calling starts, I take it for awhile and then I get defensive and that is when I yell back. I understand that I put us in this situation but does that mean I deserve the LB's?

If he becomes violent or keeps verbally abusing him. You may have to just leave him. If I can explain something about what your husband is going through. The PA you had, and the consequential lying for a year, have basically left him a shell of what he was. His displays of pain and anger are in direct correlation to how much he loved (loves) you. If he didn't why would he still be there? But as each lie was found out you brought him back to the day of discovery. He has PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder). He now has been suffering this day of discovery for a year now. It's like the movie ground hog day. The drinking magnifies this a hundred fold. As I said, you may have to leave him for your safety. You may even have to call the police. I will be so sorry to hear that happen. Your husband is like a horse in a burning barn. When a barn goes up in flames, some horses will run back in to the burning barn, because that's where they believe they will be safe. Right now, you are your husbands burning barn. He wants to run to you, for love comfort and to feel secure. Yet you are the one who is putting him through the hell he is going through. He needs to reconcile in his mind and come to terms with the fact that you are both pain and comfort to him. He just hasn't been able to do that yet. There is no way around this hell, you both have to go through it. But he needs to stop drinking. Is he on meds? He needs to be. You may need to go to alanon, to find out how to cope with this. I hope that you guys make it. You said:

I don't know what I deserve anymore so that is why I am asking. He calls me some of the nastiest names anyone can think of... so bad that I can't say them here. I just need advice on what I should do.

Know this, regarding his verbal abuse, you do not deserve it. But you are the cause of it.

Did he deserve to be abused? Please, lets not play the victim card, its very inappropriate.

I would explain to him that you will answer his questions, but you will not endure name calling, yelling or wall smashing. Get his agreement beforehand that he will end the conversation and LEAVE THE ROOM if he feels his rage coming up. Otherwise you will have to leave the house. And if he starts smashing walls, etc, lindz, then you need to call the police.

You don't have to endure this treatment, but I am concerned that your attitude might be triggering it. If you are playing the victim card, withholding, being nasty, etc, he will be triggered. The key is to set the parameters before the conversation starts.

And you may have to just separate if he can't control his temper. He may not be able to overcome the resentment. If you abused me that badly for so long, I could not control my temper and probably would have punched you out by now. just being honest...

Did he deserve this abuse?

But you did hold back info until this month. You are the boy who cried wolf. You have been eaten by your own wolf.

Hi Lindz,

have you acknowledged the fact that YOU have caused the pain he feels? Have you sat with him and told him that YOU take full ownership of the havoc and devastation YOU have brought into your lives?

You might find his anger subsides when you own what you did, and when you show true remorse. An apology letter probably won't cut it especially when you have written one previously which proved to be meaningless.

I can tell you that I no longer have AO's as a result of my FWH's A, and it's not because I don't sometimes feel anger about it. The reason is simple. I now don't have AO's because I see the real pain in my FWH's face because he acknowledges the fact that HE has caused this pain in our marriage. I see the pain he feels not for himself, but the pain he feels for me. I choose not to have AO's because I care for him and love him, and I hate to see him in such anguish.

I only got to this place when I knew that his selfish behaviour had stopped, and when I knew that he was putting ME first, and not himself. The funny thing is that when I saw him truly putting my needs above his own, it made me want to put his needs above mine. We are now in REAL recovery.

You have a lot of work to do, but if you really want to heal your H, you can. Good luck.

WW - 31 (me)
BH - 32
A 2/8/08-3/26/08
NC 4/21/08
DDay #1 - 4/21/08, DDay #2 - 4/25/08,
DDay #3 - 3/2/09, DDay #4 - 3/3/09


Mel is giving you good advice as always.



The best way to predict the future is to look at the past and patterns within the past:

Look at your signature line:

You had two d days in short succession early after the affair. You withheld information from him for a year, then had two more d days in short succession. If he is a logical, rational human being, he would be aware that the pattern is that in another year, you would give him another couple of d days, one right after the other. How can you assist in helping him feel safe that this will not happen to him?

The best way to predict the future is to look at the past and patterns within the past....His angry outbursts are dangerous to him and to you.

I think the AOs have been pretty well addressed by the previous posters and the advice has been exactly right.

I ask the question again. Have you taken the polygraph? Do you still have information you are witholding from your H?

AM

I am a long term, repeated WH who probably has no business jumping in here, because my BS and I are early in healing and recovery. But by some miracle, driven by our original love for each other, we are now making major progress. The key thing I might be able to offer here is that angry outbursts are a huge love buster and, no matter how deserved, are a form of temporary insanity. Recovery cannot begin unless they stop, even though you are are the WS. If your BS wants to try to save the marriage, he will learn how to stop those. It is not easy, because he is in unimaginable pain. AO's withdraw huge numbers of love units out of your bank, and the simple fact is that your A would not have occurred if you both were meeting each others emotional needs, protecting your own vulnerabilities, and avoiding love busters, like you did when you were dating and fell in love long ago. If your BS wants to save the marriage, then he will consciously make himself try to stop AO's and can learn how to do that by counseling with MB. Beg or borrow the money, if necessary, to do joint and individual phone counseling with Marriage Builders, if you are not already.

LB's..... Oh I was the king of LB's, I have said thinghs to my WW that I never thought I would utter to another human before this all started.

I was lucky enough to find this site years ago and learn about LB's, howevr it didn't change things they way I thought it would. If your H is anything like me, his LB's are a defense to the hurt and pain. It's a bad one, not the right approach, but it happens.

As for not holding back information, your H does not believe you, in his mind he thinks it's all lies, he is certian that if you withheld this much information fron him so far, there must be so much more. If it is so easy for her to lie to me at the drop of a hat what is the chance she is telling me the truth now. You must find a way to talk with him in an open honest way that get's through to him. For me talking with my WW, every smile or smirk when talking about the A killed me, and I would call her on it, why did you have a smile on your face when you said that. She didn't have any idea her body language would give away her lies. I thought her lies made me LB like crazy, in the end though I let myself LB like crazy, I was trying to hurt her as much as she hurt me.

To this day I have no trust for my WW, I hope you can rebuild some with your H, and I hope he can rebuild some with you.

In his mind he is looking harder for all the lies, as his world has come crashing down around him.

GM, you are exactly right. My concern is that this will not be well received coming FROM HER since she is the one who caused his trauma. That is much like the rapist telling his victim that he will not like her if she doesn't stop kicking him in response to his rape.

But such a message could come US, other board members. And I would like very much to have the opportunity to tell him that. I think he would be more receptive hearing from us than her. I HOPE.

lindz, I hope you do send him here so we can help him.

p.s. lindz, since he is having trouble believing you, why not volunteer for that polygraph?

Ummm...wasn't there an entire thread devoted to Lindz taking a poly? I thought that was supposed to happen weeks ago?

Yep. Go for it.

I have volunteered for polygraph, did the research, and offered to schedule it. I was told by BH not to schedule it. It has not been done yet. Not because I don't want to but because he hasn't given me the "okay" to schedule it. I have an excellent idea of the questions he still thinks I am lying about... would you just schedule it and submit those questions to the examiner? I want to take this test for him and for him to have the "passed" results. I think it will really help him.

lindz0225