Hello all, new here.The forum is a bit confusing but I'll get the hang of it.
It's been 8 days since I learned of my husband's affair. I'm familiar w/ this site since I used it 5 years ago when I learned of another affair. Had intense counseling then for many months, turned a lot of our behaviors around, had a honeymoon period. But once in a while both of us slip up into old bad behaviors. This forum says expose but I can't find any articles on it on the website from Dr. Harley. How do I do it? Also this site says try to make coming home pleasant for him, even engaging in sex? Too early for that I'm afraid. My stomach is still in my mouth. Hard initially in this stage of course while I'm still in shock and devastated, again. He's in denial, basically says it wasn't what I think it was i.e. it wasn't a love relationship, just casual, for sex. He's hardly talking to me and says he will when I calm down. So far just trying to remain calm. Told him how hurt I am, does he want to work to save the marriage and he says he wants to. Worried his family and friends will not support me if I expose, or at least they will be of no use, possibly even defend him. Maybe exposure is mostly just for him? Decided to tell our daughter since she is an adult but didn't last time on the advice of the therapist. What next?

Hi wio. Welcome to MB.

You can read Dr Harley own words on exposure Here . You will see that this post comes from the Newsletters forum.

The board will spring to life in a few hours' time. Are you posting from Europe?

Yes, I'm in Europe. I believe my husband may be a sex addict from what I have read on this site. He's very much into pornography and he knows how disturbing I find it. I think he also has people he communicates with for internet sex talk, at least he said in so many words, as if that means it is not as serious, i.e. there's no woman waiting to take my place. I can't compete w/ those young and sexy women. We are married about 25 years and have had a wonderful life except for his "angry outbursts" and my unfortunate reaction but our couseling was mostly about that 5 years ago. This affair is with a young woman in a different country whom he may have had an affair with some time ago. It was rekindled recently and I saw a few of their email exchanges. Although they use the words love and signed their msgs w/ love he says it was a short term thing. Wants to have the marriage and all the trappings but a bit on the side! He even said if only I hadn't caught him! We sent a letter to her together saying to cut off communication, from his email acct. He swears there is no reply but he refuses to show me his email since then.

OK, so I expose him and tell his/our closest friends and ask for help. And they offer nothing? What then? Still haven't done it because I can't see how it will make a difference.
This is at least his second affair. Still try to fight for this? I am at a total loss.

I am familiar with the Carrot and Stick and read many of the other posts, esp Pepperband, excellent help. I will re-read the book HNHN from 5 yrs ago during his first affair. Do I proceed with Plan A even if he is not forthcoming that the affair is really off? Do I really try to have sex with him even if he may be engaging in internet sex chats?

my husband came home, have to sign out. wish someone would give me some help here on this forum.

I'm sorry you're here, waitingitout. Welcome (back) to MB. TWO affairs??? Have there been possibly more? I'm a bit worried about this comment
Did he say this? This is to me one of the cruelest, least sensitive things a spouse can say to the other. Even one who is in Wayward Fantasyland.

Exposing simply means telling anybody who would have influence over your WH. That means parents, employers/employees, relatives, pastors, etc. It means exposing to the OW's family (husband, boyfriend, children, parents, especially!). It doesn't mean a long-winded emotional tirade, it just means a short, to-the-point statement of fact:
Exposure should take place ALL AT ONCE. This is what is meant by "nuclear." That way it doesn't give the WH and OW time to spin their story and tell everyone that you have gone off the deep end.

The other part of Plan A (the "carrot") is just being the loving spouse your WH married. It requires a lot of control and emotional blocking on your part, as you avoid "love busters" (angry outbursts, independent behavior, selfish actions, disrespectful judgments, etc.) and focus on being the woman he fell in love with.

Is that a good start? Please feel free to post here when you can. The good folks here will do what they can to help.

So although we wrote together to his lover in another country I also have her sister's email, should I send a note to her? He had refused to do this. He is sitting quietly at home hoping I will just wait this out and we'll continue, me with my knowledge, him with his ability to have numerous EAs and also additional PAs. I am sure it is indeed more than 2 affairs over the years. It is all making sense now from his behavior in our bed. I thought it was we were getting older! But that was his excuse, just keeping it for use elsewhere!

OK, back to the exposure. I want to find people who would most likely make a difference,is that the correct step? We are a small community and have different sets of friends who do not cross over. As it is, he in a way has isolated himself from many people because he is so busy with his business. But I can call the key friends and his closest family members. He will be furious, I am a little afraid of what he may do. He's never hit me but he fills with a rage as though he will explode. His temper problems were a big part of our counseling 5 years ago when we went due to the first
(of many?) affair(s). He eventually left the counseling and I continued and the counselor said she was also afraid in our sessions.

Should I start a new post? Is that how I can get more people to respond here? It is 9 days and I've still not exposed except our daughter, and I've not told him about that yet. Getting desperate.

But if he's in his 2nd or 3rd affair, plus the internet sex chat, do I still work as though we can save the marriage? He says he wants it, but refused to go back to our counselor, so far. Maybe after exposure he'd relent.

Take a deep breath and examine in yourself if you want to save this M and why you want to? If he admitted to you today that it was x number of affairs, would you be okay with that? I am not a vet on here, but these are the questions I think you need to answer for yourself first. Why do you want to save this M? Be honest with yourself first. Then, whichever way you choose, there will be people here to help you.

If he is not lying he says he loves me. Must have a sex addiction. Our marriage 95% of the time is pretty good, except these last few years, so thought again as last time, we might be able to manage to make some positive changes. Also I am dependent on him econonomically, haven't worked in many years and do not live in my home country. I'm at a disadvantage for finding work here but I think the courts would make him support me. Over the years I've seen it happen that way with other women like me, foreign women here.

of course that 5% is the sex part! He's stopped making attempts and I had withdrawn, big mistake! is there any point? I guess only I know that.

But from this site it seems I am supposed to try to have sex w/ him, with condoms, so that I am not engaging in LB. getting confused since I don't think he wants to stop the internet sex and the option for PA too.

@waitingitout, for the moment, forget what he wants. It seems apparent that what he wants is to be able to cat around with impunity and expect to have you around as "the wife" whenever he wants whatever needs you fulfill for him.

What do you want? Pardon me for saying so, but it strikes me that you're a bit of a doormat if you let him continue to have affairs left and right and do nothing about it.

You can expose until the cows come home. If you do, you must expose to EVERYONE who has influence with him: parents, siblings, co-workers, ministers, etc. From the sound of it, he's just happy to move on to the next one, so exposure might not yield any positive results.

Perhaps you've been in Plan A and it's time to move to Plan B. If you're not familiar with the concepts, read them here.

But it still comes down to what you want. If you want to try to recover your marriage, then Plans A & B are the way to go. If you don't, just start thinking of "Plan D"(ivorce).

I am still shaking, heart pounding. I want to make the right steps that will be effective.

When I learned by reading his email correspondence that the affair happened, confronted him, he said it was "not what I think" which he says means it is not a threat to our marriage. Says he wants the marriage and to grow old together. So if he could stop I could say let's try. But can a person like him stop?

How well I know the feeling! What I don't know from your posts is "effective how?" What do you want?

Before you answer that, please consider that you're in a highly emotional state of mind right now. That's not a good time to make decisions affecting the rest of your life. But you must give a lot of thought to what your goals are.

If you want the marriage to last (with or without his affairs), then go to Plan A. Exposure in this case might shake up one affair but may have little effect on others or future affairs. Or you might want to start right in on Plan B: make him leave, go completely dark, and hand him a letter that specifies what he needs to do in order to be able to come back.

That he still gets some benefit from the marriage, Plan B might just shock him into re-evaluating his awful behavior. I doubt it, personally, but it's one of the possibilities of Plan B.

He is totally engaging in LB, angry outbursts --I never know when he will blow; ignoring me: we don't even sit to have a meal together, says he needs that time to read the news on the internet. I have been left out of that part of our marriage for years. Our counselor said try to at least have b'fast together. He comes home late and I don't want to eat dinner at that hour. So my reaction has also been withdrawal, knowing full well it will drive us further apart but was basically afraid of his angry outbursts.

You still haven't come right out and said what you want. But the between the lines stuff strongly suggests you've reached the end of your rope.

Consider: What do YOU get out of this marriage? Do you want to keep getting it?

Although I was suspicious I did not realize he was engaged in an affair, or as it seems from the emails, a rekindling of an old affair when said OW came here from her country to visit with him. So what do I get from the marriage? Thinking there is a chance to have our good old days? Again have great sex? I want to be that woman he craves again. I still fantasize about sex with him, have told him that, have said I miss the old days, he says I abandoned him first since I've always wanted it less and I try to explain about menopause, that I no longer produce testosterone the wonder hormone which gets me there, BUT, I can get into sex w/ some help. Can he really get back there with me? He too seems depressed but this week angry, sullen, withdrawn since I've learned. YOu said I was a doormat. I did not realize he was having afairs, should have guessed, other than the internet.