I know, codtej. I think I've been hovering on this site too much. Sorry.

Haha, I wonder the same thing. I wonder if sometimes this forum is a trigger?

Cod:

Of course this forum is a trigger. This is why so many WS don't want anywhere near it. They want to "Forget and move on." Who wants to be reminded on a daily basis just how stupid they were at some point in their life?

Who, among females especially, wants to be reminded that their husband has the moral high ground? That is supposed to be for the wives, dontchaknow.


Ok, she gave you the pearl without price, something that was supposed to give her more latitude for imperfections. This is because of the value of virginity in the Philippines. And she has been known to remind you of that from time to time. From her cultural background, this is a perfectly natural thing.

In the Philippines, survival is everything. One does what one has to do to survive. The family and extended family all support each other and blood is indeed thicker than water. It is absorbed through their pores from childhood.

So an exceptionally pretty girl contracts with a Hong Kong bar to provide outcall services for assorted males for a cut of the price and room and board. She sends the money home and hopes to maybe open a small business or find a good husband when she is through dealing with "Too many mens." And some of them actually pull it off if they can stay away from the booze.

Naive.

Deep thinkers they are not. Again, black and white, hero or villain, I was a sinner (Catholic) but not any more, and a tramp to help the family, then the generation of a new virginity to move on through life. I dunno how better to describe the attitudes. Watch some Filipina soap operas for female cultural attitudes.

Oh and almost all of them believe that infatuation is real love. And of course that is a crock since without fail (except in about 10% of the population), infatuation dies with a thud.

Most long term marriages in her country are that way because of economics and family pressure. Sexual exploitation is rampant in the Philippines to include the sale of virginity. Virginity is thought of as a commodity to be presented to a good earner husband to seal the bond or to the highest bidder if tough times hits the family.

Your wife has been in this country to absorb some of our values, but she, like all other cultural imports, will never be able to shake off some of the duck impressions she got as a child. It is what it is.

Let me suggest that your wife is now of an age where she is looking at the rest of her life. I doubt she will ever put horns on your head (again) because that would violate her need for male protection as she ages. Based on that, is she a keeper? Only you can answer that question.

I suggest, although I don't know her, it is likely she regards her year long period of transgression as her "Bad Girl" phase. In spite of no longer being in love with you as in infatuation, she likely feels affection for you, a more real form of love even if not in her world view and I believe there is a high probability of long term loyalty from her to you.

That would be in character for her culture.

And I could be wrong because after all, she is an individual, not a cultural stereotype.

If I can think of more, I will post it.

Larry

Yes this wonderful forum is a trigger, sex with my wife is a trigger, names, words, are a trigger...the freaken air is a trigger...!!!

I do understand your observation on her culture and you are right on. Believe me, I've lived there and I've been married to my FWW for 30 years in July. I know many Filipinas and Filipinos. They are different, and when we first married it prolly was infatuation on both of our sides. She was the first woman I've ever really been with and felt love for, and she the same for me...for crying out loud, she had just turned 17, about a month after I first met her.

I had to ask her dad to marry her...!

As far as putting horns on me, (cucking?), I would think yes she would not try. It was many years ago and she and I both were different people, but she did do what she did, no denying that. Our marriage is forever changed. Even though she was doing the A's right under my nose, and the evidence was bad, she VEHEMENTLY denied anything other than they were 'friends'. I was naive, blind and stupid, yes. I did not want to believe my wife would do what she did. So I, in a sense, buried it for 21 years. When it came out on 26 Aug 09, a lot of soul searching came with it.

Is she a keeper? Well yes, or I would not be with her now. She is very beautiful and has a great body, I am attracted to her very much so still, even after what happened.We have a lot of the same interests, we enjoy being with each other, and doing things together.

At times I am sickened by her and I am very angry with her at times. I have trust issues, and I probably will for the rest of our marriage.

I do know she loves me, and I do know she regrets deeply what she did. I also know she ALWAYS has to add the word, 'but'.....when she admits what she did. That is frustrating because she takes fully responsibility for what she did, but....

Plz post more thoughts if you can, you're helping me realize some things about her I maybe didn't know, or forgot.

I have one question for now.

In your words, you are now two different people, right?

So what does that mean to you about you?

Larry

I did want to follow up with something I was thinking about as I was digging out of the snow. Talking about her A's almost 100% of the time brings anger to her....she gets offended and angry at me if I talk about her screwing 5 guys. She is insulted that I would say that to her...I can bring it up in the context of the rare times we talk of the A's, she hates to hear me say those words.

Your question...well it mostly means to me that since back in the 80's I've mostly matured from being a young man. I've just grown, as my FWW has. I am a better husband I would like to think. I did like to party back in the day. I've said so to the forum.

Let me say this, and this is something the therapist brought out. This was during IC actually. We were talking of my family as a child, a very bad father, a alcoholic who beat my mother. Not a stable or happy childhood for me, very traumatic. When my mother re-married her next husband drank but was a decent man, and I liked him a lot. He was basically a good man and we still talk, but that was from my mid teens until I left at 18 to go into the military.

My wifes family was very stable, loving, caring. They had problems as any family does, but she had a good childhood.

So when we married the only example of what a family for me was my bad one, so I was trying to NOT be like my father...I was doing opposites, as best I could. I didn't have a good example of what TO BE.

So my wife is thrust into this new country, (we had our first child 9 months after we married). She is probably expecting her life to be similar to how her family life was in the Philippines. It was not, and I wished I was a better young husband. She was not perfect and didn't communicate well and had anger issues.

I dunno, maybe a a combination of a bunch of different things led us down this path.

Well, it seems to me that the two of you are very different people than you were then. Another way of putting it is simply:

You are who you are because of what you have done in the past and the incidentals of life's experiences during that time. You might not like some of the stuff you did or that happened to you, but whatever is a part of who you are now.

Same thing applies to her.

We learn in life by family influence, education, what we read, what happens to us, the influence of friends, the decisions we make and sometimes, especially during our early years, by p**ing on an electric fence, or two or three.

You cannot forget. But you can forgive. What she did in her early years, for whatever reason, helped make her into who she is now; with more than a casual acquaintance of what happens when you tangle with an electric fence. Recent events have impressed that upon her even more.

The person you care about now is NOT the person you married then. It is that simple and that complex.

Larry

Yes 'PB', but I really meant I think it was a multitude of things that led to her A's...I fully know I had nothing to do with her decision to have the A's. That was the first thing I learned on the forums....my wife, before I learned that little tidbit, had be believing it was my behavior that enabled her to do what she did.

Yes Larry....this is spot on:

The person you care about now is NOT the person you married then. It is that simple and that complex.


Actually I loved the person before the A's and in recent years. The person during the A's, not so much.

I suppose time will tell what happens to our marriage. Mind movies and triggers are hard on me....visuals of what she did, of NOT KNOWING what she did and having to suppose, those are my burden now.

It's weird because sometimes I feel pretty safe and secure with her, then something happens and my blood runs ice cold when I think of the A's.

Picture yourself astride a razor. The longer you sit there, the more it hurts.

Your EMOTIONAL evaluation is on going.

Your INTELLECTUAL evaluation has probably come to a conclusion.

Which doesn't mean that will be your final decision. And in fact, the reverse may be true.

Now it is that your wife has forgiven herself, but has not forgotten.

In your heart of hearts, are you worried about your own role in what she did? Fugetaboutit. By so doing, you are providing free rent to something that goes nowhere.

As probably the world's greatest pitcher said, "Don't look back, something might be gaining on you."

Leave us look forward to a future. Do you see yourself healing in time and moving forward with someone in whom you have invested all of your adult with?

If you are the kinda guy who needs to have someone with him, why not her? That saves you from taking a risk with someone new. At least it is within the realm of reason she ain't gonna go that route again. And that would not be so with someone new.

Harley teaches that adultery is within all of us. Nobody is immune, he teaches. Uh, this means you too. From the science side of things. we can all be hit with a dose of dopamine infatuation chemicals (Phenylethylamine) and over the cliff we go. Or the entitlement drug.

From an arm's length intellectual side of things, I think I would rather go forward in life with someone who has been inoculated against the disease than someone yet to discover their potential bad girl.

One way to do this is to replace the negative images with good ones: we started in love, fell out of grace, found each other again. She was my first love. I was her first love. Nothing can replace that.

Sometimes I dream about my first love. I would give a lot to see her now. I wouldn't give a flip what she did inbetween.

Focusing on her being tainted by the interlude is just plain not in your best interest. All of her body cells have been replaced every five years. She is not now who she was then. If you had divorced for a while, then found your love again, what would be your mental state?

And so on. Make up your own story.

Larry

Thanks Larry. I know people are currently involved in trying to break up the A their spouse is in, or they are just out of the A and trying to do R. If their A was recent, I would imagine any reasons for the A are fresh, new reasons.

Who we were when the A's occurred are people we both are not any longer. In my heart of hearts I highly doubt she would stray again as I am not the same husband she could not communicate with, (her words).

In a sense I am having to learn to trust her again, and to love her the same way. Unconditional love, is that safe for me again? Its the type of person I am...if I am your friend, I give 110% and expect the same from you. If someone burns me, I may trust them again, but its never the same.

I can learn to trust and love my wife again, but I am not sure, at this juncture, if it will ever be the same, unconditional love.

My heart was broken by her.

Thanks for all of your advise Larry, you are very wise.

Just in case you missed it, Harley, the acknowledged expert on affairs and marriages, has suggested the a marriage of trust is not the way to go. Instead, he recommends a marriage of precautions, sometimes extraordinary precautions.

In other words, trust should be tempered by a somewhat cynical wariness, in my words, not his.

How does that match with your current mindset?

Larry

I just saw Pep's diatribe that you read on another thread. You took it to heart as you well should.

She rites purty

And to the point.

That said, don't run from the future. There is nothing wrong with building on the experiences of a lifetime, even the negative ones. Our negative experience probably teaches us more than the positive ones.

Your wife has suggested you were naive. From her world view, she is exactly right. Look at what Harley says.

I suspect that your biggest mental reservation is based on your thinking she doesn't realize how much pain her infidelity caused you. And that is valid. So tell her if that is the fact.
Larry

Finally, your explanation to her of your problems need to be very, very simple. Remember the "Simple" words of a filipina woman.

It needs to be black and white and very simple. Otherwise her world view is just not going to get it. And that is not her fault, it is growing up in a certain type of culture.

She is not going to try to fix the problem, that is a male trait. But it might just give her an appreciation of your difficulties and might just make you feel better if you think she now understands.

Larry

I respect 'Pep' to the fullest, as I do you. I have learned that a marriage based on trust can screw you up bigtime, if said trust is broken.

For the first month or two my wife didn't fully understand the pain I was in. One day I decided to keep it simple as it seemed I had been saying a lot of things, getting deep.

I said to her that I had given her my heart, fully, completely, and that I loved her with all of my heart, very deeply. I told her my heart is broken now. I had only loved one woman in my life, it was you, I've not trusted my heart to anyone but you. Do you understand, my heart is broken.

At that point she said it sunk in. She said she never knew how much I loved her. I could not believe it. I thought I had shown her how much I loved her, I had said I loved her a million times. But I never said it to her the way I had just done. We both cried.....so you were right, Larry, I did say it to her in simple terms and she understood.

I want to thank you Larry for reminding me of our cultural differences. Being married to her for 30 years, I perhaps need to re-evaluate it all. I've said it before, and read about cultural differences, but I don't think I have really contemplated it as it applies to my marriage....until your posts.

t/j......Larry, you are posting some AMAZING stuff here!!!!...As I was reading along, I swear you reminded me of Schoolbus.....only with more testosterone....

t/j over....

Codtej,

I bumped a thread for you called "Finding the Stages link"....

It contains information on the different stages you will go through in this process. You might find some of it useful.....

Like I have already said, you are still pretty early in this process. And that's okay. YOu will work through each emotion and thought and it will take TIME....(you beginning to hate that word yet????.... :D).

Anyway, you are mourning a loss of sorts. A loss of innocence in your marriage, a loss of trust, a loss of your wife, and even yourself.

YOu are good man and its evident to ME that you love your wife very much....you are on here after all!!!!

And while this place IS a trigger of sorts, you will find that in some ways it doesn't matter, since its whats on your mind anyways.....or at least for me that's how it was.

And I commend you on seeking advice, solace, and peace as you work through this information.....its much easier to run and hide from it....until it catches up to you....

not2fun

You are welcome my friend.

I came back to MB after some years of being away because of personal reasons. A friend of mine over in East Texas is a retired child therapist. And he helps on the ADHD forums. He pointed out to me one day that my understanding of cultural differences might be of value somewhere since I was somewhat jealous (not really) of what he was doing.

So far, my foray back to MB has been well met. I have had the privilege to help a few folks with my particular slant on things and to exchange greetings with old friends.

This is a place where people almost never expect to go. The open wounds are obvious. Yet here we are, the old timers, trying to help. Just remember, you too have something to share, so by all means, share it as you have been doing. Your words and thoughts have value.

Larry