My STBX has started up a "new family" with an OW. They've been "just friends" for over 10 years, were co-workers. DDay was two years ago, I asked him to leave and he ran straight to her. Their affairmily consists of her two kids with the husband she left for him and also includes our daughter, 40% of the time. His straight-laced, conservative parents fully condones this live-in, convoluted situation, even though our divorce is not final. OW is pregnant. Everybody's happy.

His parents' ability to condone my STBX's infidelity and, in fact, celebrate it, sent his brother into a depression. He tried to tell them how wrong it was for him to leave his wife and child for a coworker, but they yelled at him. He began to feel that if he continued to complain, he would be ostracized from the family. So, he left it up to his wife. She has told them over and over how it's against God's law to cheat. She has refused to let their kids around OW and her kids. For two years, she has fought the fight, while her husband has told her to stand her ground.

And now, apparently, he's cheating on her. I see all the signs: for two years he has slept in the kids' bedroom, and they haven't been intimate for six months. He has barely spoken to her for that long, won't touch her, and stays out late "playing poker" with friends. Playing "poker" is right.

She does not believe he's cheating on her, and refuses to look for evidence. Instead, she gave him a choice about a month ago to either work on their marriage or leave for a while. He chose the latter. He says he doesn't know if he wants to be married anymore.

He lives in their house half the week and takes care of the kids, while she's with her parents. When she lives at the house, he goes to live at an unknown location. She has decided to give him an "allowance" to help him pay part of the bills, because he makes less than her.

I have told her that she is setting up a status quo, where he will automatically get 50/50 time with the kids in the event of a divorce. She assumes that he'll live in town, but I have cautioned her that he could move 45 min away (as my STBX did) and her kids will be stuck with the travel, to and from school. Further, he could be living with someone of whom she does not approve - like an OW who broke up their marriage - and who might not even be working, while she is paying spousal support. She doesn't believe any of this is possible.

I'm all for dads to have their rights, but they have two young kids and a judge might award her significantly more time with them, if it weren't for the status quo she is setting, allowing them to adjust to 50/50 time. She is also preventing a judge from seeing her as the primary caregiver, which means he can move them far away from her with an OW.

Right now, she is feeling hopeful: he says that he wants to spend 90 days apart, and then after that, they can look into options for counseling.

I think she's making a huge mistake by agreeing to this. I think he wants to make sure she doesn't take any divorce action that will favor her before he sets a status quo. I also think it will give him time to make sure his new thing is working out, and if not, then he has a fallback girl. I think at the end of 90 days, she will receive her divorce paperwork, and an offer to attend a session with her therapist to help her through their breakup, not a marriage counseling session. My STBX kept offering to visit my therapist with me and it never sat right with me - I found out later that once a therapist sees both parties, she can't testify on your behalf.

This guy is getting tips from my STBX, but she won't believe that. I'm not sure what to do.

Have you sat down with her and gone through the MB website?

Well, maybe you should just tell her about it. Probably not a good idea for the two of you to commiserate together...just sayin'.

See if you can get her H a copy of Healing the Shame That Binds You. He's stuck in a dysfunctional family dynamic and obviously was the scapegoat role in their family. Hopeless. Helpless. Never right. No wonder he got depressed. Seeking destructive choices is natural in his position, unless he gets help for it.

By all means, she should NOT be agreeing to either this 50/50 arrangement OR paying for him to live elsewhere. Good grief, how dumb is that?!

Maybe she could tell him she won't agree to anything until the two of them do 3 phone sessions with the Harleys.

Are these folk Christian people. If so, does their Church know about these activities?

Thanks for your replies! I appreciate them.

Catperson: You are absolutely right that the family is very dysfunctional. It's like a bad TV movie from the '80s. Time has afforded me with enough space from the situation to no longer suffer their damages. However, my sister in law is still very close to it after just a month's separation. She was a big support to me after my STBX and I split, so I am curious about your advice not to "commiserate" with her. You hit the nail on the head about paying him to live somewhere else - I haven't thought it about it that way and will share that thought with her.

Imagine: My STBX and his pregnant mistress wear wedding rings and take her kids to church every week. She had to agree to start going early on in order for him to stay in a relationship with her. She used to refuse to go with her husband because she said the church is full of hypocrites...and now goes with the biggest one ever. I go to church every Sunday - a different one, of course - and sometimes I remember to pray for them. The church is full of imperfect people, like me. So while it flabbergasts me that they can live in complete and utter defiance to God's Word and yet sit there appearing to listen like other people who are actually trying to learn, I pray that some day a sermon will get through to them. Not because I'm sitting around waiting for WS, but because that would be the biggest miracle ever. And because my daughter wants to start going with them every other week. Yuck. I don't want her to be a part of that situation.

Oh, and yes the parents, his brother, and his wife all go to church.

She is making horrendous strategic mistakes, starting with taking the "word" of a liar. Her H is having an affair and wants the "90 days" to spend with his OW unimpeded. In order to get some freedom from his wife he told her this lie. Just think about this logically. If he truly wanted to work on his marriage by getting counseling, wouldn't the logical solution be to work on the marriage now? But that is not his suggestion because that is not his true goal. His real goal is to get his wife off his back, shut her up so he can have his affair.

Is she a teachable person? If she wants to try a strategy that really works and she will listen, send her here and we can help her develop a sane strategy. Her plan is a disaster that only serves to faciliatate the affair and harm her legal standing. There are no guarantees, but her plan is guaranteed to ruin her marriage.

Imagination, the book she needs is SURVIVING AN AFFAIR.

My gist is that he is looking for a way out of the M. So the 90 days could become permanent as he might procrastinate and say he needs another 90....
If you want a chance at getting this clown back follow Melody's advice. Of course nothing is guaranteed but either way you will come out stronger
blessing

Have you talked to the church elders about what your H did? Have you told them that it's starting to involve getting your children to pretend they don't care, by getting them to attend church under false pretenses? If it were me, I'd be going TO that church, and talking to every single person I meet and telling them what your H is doing.

*sigh* It's a very slippery slope when you start meeting up with people just to discuss this topic. You can easily become...indoctrinated so that this topic becomes its own beast. It can lead you to stop seeing things analytically, and just become emotional and one-sided. In other words, I want both of you to remain logical about the situation, not emotional. Hope that makes sense.