My wife is heavily involved in an EA with an old BF from 20 years ago who lives 600 miles away. I know she really wants to stay in our marriage but she cannot let go of this other person, whom now she only knows in the virtual world. She talks to him and texts him all day every day but they have not seen each other since school.

I have told her its him or me but not both, so she has been trying to emotionally detach herself from me for the last month now. Again, I know she would rather stay, but I think any more pressure from my end would push her out. She is a very prideful person so if she leaves, and realizes her mistake, her pride will most likely prevent her from coming home. I love her to death and I know she will not be happy with this person.

Any suggestions on how to turn this ship around? She will not commit to our marriage while she is still thinking about these feelings for him. Her own family is telling her to put her family first but she gets constant, sometimes hourly pressure from the OM, who is also married w/ kids.

I have "Surviving An Affair" and have tried to read the first 6 chapters to her but she won't have it. Claims she is not having an affair since nothing physical has happened. I am afraid if I begin to detach coupled with her detachment from me, that she'll be gone in a week.

She is not thinking clearly. I need to save her but I can't get through. Help!

Have you exposed her EA to the OMW?

You can not make her clear it. She didn't develop it overnight and it is unrealistic to think she will snap to and 'get it' any time soon.

Work the MB program...plan Aing and eventually plan Bing and hope for the best.

You can't make her participate in reading and understanding MB now either. You have to do all the work for now.

That's just the way it is.

Get all the proof you can then expose OMW. Save the documentation somewhere safe.

NJ

I think you're not supposed to do any relationship talk at this point. It will drive her further away.

Sorry you are here. Expose to OMW if u haven't yet.

And 600 miles away.
Not too far.
I'd go there in PERSON and tell OM in front of his wife to STOP engaging in a sick secret emotional affair with YOUR WIFE.

If you cannot do this in person, call OM's wife and tell her what is going on.

OM will back off if he's busted.

According to my wife, the OMW already knows everything, supposedly they are in process of splitting now.

Don't believe what your wife says (part of the fog).

Go straight to the OM's Wife and tell her and get her version of the truth.

He is LYING through his teeth. Regardless, this is the hardest part for a BH. I don't know if I could deal w/ it. It has to be so tempting to give a ww the finger and say well, "HAVE A GOOD LIFE!". But this is MB, so I would plan A your rear off and move to plan B(Deep and Dark) if A fails. I would tell anyone and everyone what she is doing. YOu have all the chips moving to your side of the table. You could probably rape her financially since she is so fogged out. Good luck! Dude

And you won't be able to begin to get her to even start thinking clearly until after you've thrown cold-water on her affair-fantasy through exposing it, and making the costs to her of continuing her affair greater than the enjoyment she feels from the drug-like addiction of her affair partner.

First, you've got to expose it to the OM's wife. Contact her directly and make clear to him that you won't stand for her husband's continued contacting your wife. Exposure is the surest way to end an affair. It's what ended mine.

How is he contacting her? On cellphone or computer accounts that your income is helping to pay for? If so, put your foot down. If your name is on the accounts, cancel 'em.


It's not fair to you that you have no comfortable choices here, but you need to make the best of the uncomfortable choices that are before you. You say you think she "really wants to stay in [y]our marriage", but you're afraid she'll bail out as soon as you start cutting off the oxygen that's feeding her affair. Well, how do you want to live? Do you want to live with a wife who's in an active affair (and make no mistake, and emotional affair is an affair just the same, and will probably lead to a physical one as soon as opportunity for contact arises)?

If you've read SAA, you know what you need to do. Expose. Try to meed her needs. Try to keep your head about you while hers snaps back (hopefully) in the direction of reality. I understand you're worried that in her affair-addled state-of-mind, she might try to bolt. But if you've exposed to the OM's wife, then where's she gonna bolt TO -- to a guy who might be on the verge of getting kicked out of his own house & having a big chunk of his income going to his own ex-wife for alimony & child support, if OM's wife kicks HIM out? Then, chances are your wife's Prince Charming won't be looking so rosy to her.

Oh!

And it is crucial you DO NOT TELL your own wife when you are going to expose to the OM's Wife. It is hard to keep that info internally when we are used to telling our spouses everything BUT do not let her know you are going to talk to the other man's wife.

Stop trying to educate her and educate yourself.

You have no control over her, only over what YOU do.

Read up on and be sure you understand Plan A (Short synopsis in the Musings thread in my sig line- go to page 1 for the start)

Identify her top Emotional Needs (ENs). You can accomplish this with out her having to complete the questionnaire or give you any feedback beyond what she has already given you throughout your marriage, since the things she complained about in the past probably point to what she felt was missing. Begin to unilaterally meet those top ENs as much as she will allow you to without feedback either positive or negative and in spite of feedback either positive or negative from her. Don't do it for short term reward or acknowledgment but simply in order to meet her ENs thereby making deposits into her Love Bank (LB$).



Learn to identify those things that you do that amount to Love Busters (LBs). These are things that will destroy feelings for romantic love for you in your wife. Learn to control all such actions on your part. Simply get rid of all Love Busters so that you are not constantly having to make up for the things you have done that might cause her to draw away from you.


Do NOT look for signs that you are getting through to her or expect a pat on the head every time you don something right. Simply meet her ENs, avoid LBs and have no expectations as to whether or not you are getting through to her.

Contact OM's wife and let her know what is going on. Do this as soon as you can develop a plan of how to accomplish it. DO NOT involve your wife in this process in any way, shape or form. Do NOT threaten to do this or tell her you will do this or hint that it might happen unless certain conditions are met, JUST DO IT...

After you do this, also consider who else you might need to expose this affair to that could support your efforts to save your marriage. Formulate a plan of attack so that this goes smoothly, suddenly and without reaction to what your wife will do in response to each and every exposure. Rest assured that she will be very unhappy when you do this. She will call you names you never knew she had in her vocabulary, say that she was thinking about reconciling with you but that your involving others has ruined any chance of that, that she could never trust you after you did such a thing, that you had no right to involve her family, his wife or any of the others you might tell about the affair and a bunch of other stuff that you need to just ignore and have no response to other than saying that you are fighting to save your marriage.

Meet her ENs
Avoid Love Busters
Have no expectations

You will not educate her into coming back to you and ending the relationship with OM.
You will not coerce her into coming back to you and ending the relationship with OM.
You will not force her into coming back to you and ending the relationship with OM.

You might be able to entice her back to you and convince her to end the relationship with OM.

Make yourself a better choice than OM. Do this by meeting her top ENs and avoiding LBs.

Make the relationship with OM more costly than she is willing to pay (expose to OM's wife at once and others as they may be useful in your effort to save your marriage.

Before you can FIX the marriage, you have to save it. Work on saving it. Fix it if you can save it. If you try to fix it before saving it, you will have nothing left to fix.

All you can FIX right now is YOU.

Make YOU the best YOU that YOU can become.

Meet her ENs
Avoid Love Busters
Have No expectations

(are you seeing a theme here?)

Welcome to Marriage builders. Sorry to see you here, but considering the circumstances it is a great place to be.

Read up on Plan A!
Develop a specific plan.
Implement your plan.
Execute your plan.
Stick with your plan.
Let nothing distract you from your plan.

Mark

And say it is all true, that the OM does know about it already, and my wife will surely find out about it, will that not automatically be another big strike against me? I tend to garner a bunch of them, even though I have done nothing.

I so wish she would just come around, but you are right, this is too mind-numbing for her. She can't wait to get on the phone with him.

Call the OMW anyway. I'll bet she'll be very surprised to hear that her M is over.

What about my kids, do I tell them Mommy is astray? I know the book says that they need to know they are not causing the tension and my 11 yo is certainly feeling it. Wife adamantly does not want them to know she is doing this. She wants them to think we just can't live together any longer. I don't want to turn my kids against her, that would be counter productive. What do I tell them?

There's your answer -- you've stumbled upon it in your own words: By doing nothing, you're racking up strikes against yourself. So act, decisively.

Your problem is the affair.
You have to fight the affair.

The affair is an addiction. It is not "like" an addiction, it actually involves the same chemicals in the brain as smoking crack.

Your goal can't be to avoid making her angry; it has to be to end the affair.

You can't demand the end of the affair.
You can't make her end the affair.
You can't teach her to end the affair.
You can't punish her into ending the affair.

Make remaining married to you a better choice than continuing the affair.

Fix what you can fix. Fix your half of the marriage.

At the same time make the affair untenable.

Once the affair ends and she has completed withdrawal from the feelings she gets from contacting OM the fog will begin to clear. If you stand up for her and your marriage and fight for her by standing strong for your marriage in the face of the affair, she will someday realize that you are her hero.

You are afraid to make her angry. She is in love with another married man and is also destroying his marriage and family. How much worse do you think you could make it?

If you doubt that everyone arrives here right where you are right now go read the threads of almost anyone in the SAA forum or the archived JFO forum.

Mark

ETA: Read the first page on my Musings thread: click here

Thanks Mark, your post was great help. Everything you said is so true. I can't control anything she feels.

Building up myself is my only real option.

I had typed up a 3 page letter to her this morning explaining God's plan and how she is flying in His face, but I think I'll just put that in the drawer for now.

One more (growing a pair here so pardon me for all the questions), but should I confront the OM also or is that just fruitless?

Skip the letter!

You can't educate her into ending the affair!

I don't know if confronting OM will help or hurt your cause. It could go either way.

You cannot come across as needy, pathetic or whining. OTOH, you can't come across as threatening unless you are willing to come to blows which could land you in jail. If you are going to confront OM, simply ask him his intentions toward your wife and be done with him. Let him know that you will not step aside and let him take your wife away from you.

But before confronting him, expose to his wife so that he can't spin to her that you are a jealous nut case.