I don't know what to say. I have finally started to not talk about the A's or cry, or get upset. I am generally not in a sad or funky mood. Its like I don't care, I have no feelings over it any longer.

The flip side is I feel as though I have no feelings for my wife now. I do not know if, or how much I do lover her? I just don't know. Maybe its temporary, I do not know.

She had to be the one who said I love you first, then I'd usually always return it. Lately she has not been saying it, (not sure if she is seeing if I would say it first or what), but there has not been many "I love yous" being mentioned.

Sex? Well its been ok but none for 3 or 5 days, can't recall. I feel when we were having sex, I felt detached at times. I can't say we were making love, (I am finding it difficult to say that right now, it does hurt a bit)....It just doesn't feel the same, emotionally, when we have sex, (notice not saying making love).

So I do not know what I am saying in this post, I just feel what I shared with you guys. I dont know if it means anything.....but I am sort of maybe scared of the feeling of being indifferent about us or our future.

Codtej,
Five? 5?? 5! Fi-ive!? FIVE?

Please tell me why you want to recover this? Children? You love her? YOu want to love her? Is she that hot or pretty or entertaining or meets your needs so well or a great cook or ?? What do you want? Until you have a goal you have nothing to work on. If you and her want to have a goal of becoming one and meeting each others ENs then lets talk because these people can help but first we need to know WHAT DO YOU WANT?

IMHO, five A's is not recoverable.

Listen, cod. What you have been through has been likened to horrendous crimes. As a survivor of a horrendous crime, it is not unusual to run a gamut of emotions. I suspect you are mentally and emotionally exhausted right now, and your mind is protecting you from pain by trying to run on neutral. And that's okay. It really is. Embrace yourself, and love your mind for trying to protect its most important asset - YOU.
Cod

Plus side they happened 20 years ago. She has not strayed since then.

Negative this cloud of doubt has been hanging over you for 20+ years.

Now that you get proof August 2009, What you have suspected is true. You are now six months past D day. Time for the anger phase to come in. You are made, you ask yourself why recover. Doubt the last twenty years. Confused.

Sit back for the next six months and try to work through this phase. At that time your head will be less ruled by emotion and more by fact.

I am only 6 months into this nightmare of a life, but as of the last few days I have been feeling the same way. I think I am just emotionally worn out, and will back on the rollercoaster soon. I notice the more days we spend apart, the more I begin to adjust to life without her. On the days we are together, the magic comes back, but then reality sets in when we go back to our won homes again.

Codtej,

You have been lied to for 20 years, it is going to take awhile for you to dig back out. On top of that it took your effort to get to the truth.

My wifes "EA" was 20 years ago and I wished I was were you are, but my wife is equally incapable of admitting to fault. So I'll have to keep playing the angles. One of the more ugly aspects which I picked up on about a week ago, is that there may be an OM2 from the same time period, but he was a one time PA, he however is worse than OM1.

God Bless
Gamma



Gamma

Thanks for your replies, 'bigpicture', yes FIVE, FIVE guys, not ONS either....I dunno what I want, thats the problem. We don't really have 'children' that are an issue. They are older, 20 is the youngest. Why do I want to recover, do I love her?

I really don't feel I am sure if I do love her. I thought I did. It was weird, right after Dday, I thought I loved her a lot and we did some serious HB. I said I love you to her 20 times a day, or more. I think maybe it was because I was trying to convince myself? I thought I wanted to recover our marriage, but now I am not sure, its more like I don't care, really. Or not sure.

She seems to want to recover, I am not sure if I have enough left in me to do so. She wants to recover but only as long as I don't make her uncomfortable...maybe I am tired of that too.

Yes Five is a lot, and the recovery part being impossible may be not far from the truth.

'MarialBliss', thats an interesting observation about my mind running in neutral right now because its exhausted...and tired of being hurt and in pain. That is a great point and I agree because I am tired of being hurt, but I am not about to just 'get over it' as she wants.

'The Road', your post says it all, but you know what, she has not picked up a book to read anything on the subject of what we are going through. She doesn't do the internet. She didn't listen to the CD's I gave her on the Five love languages. She says 'common sense' is enough and all she needs. Uggh.

Thanks all.

One simple question for you Codtej....why do you settle for her crumbs? We all have one life to live and it goes by in the blink of an eye!! If she is not willing to truly repent and accept your gift of forgiveness and work on an amazing recovery TOGETHER with you then what are you hanging on for?

Food for thought...

She is willing to repent and has said sorry and I think she means it. But she doesn't want to open up her A's, or only in limited amounts and will share only what she wants. As I've said before, she uses the her going back to the pain she had back when she had the A's as a control device...controlling my emotions.

codtej,
So sorry for your pain. You should consider a MB weekend or contacting Dr. Harley. You CAN recover from this, but you obviously need some help. Keep reading and applying the MB principles.

Codtej,

I could have written your post. I have been contemplating this same thing for quite some time, but seriously especially the past couple of weeks. We are coming up to 3 years of d-day #2. Not second affair, second discovery after he told me it was over. At first, I threw everything I had into rebuilding. Like a lot of others, I was stupid and took on a lot of responsibility for his A. Of course, because he told me it was all my fault.

I am wondering why we are still together. Do I still want to be? Am I afraid to be on my own? Are we just comfortable with each other? Do I love him? I don't know. To some extent I think I do. The thing I am not sure of, if it is the love that he deserves to receive, or for that matter that either of us deserves. Then I wonder if this is how it is supposed to be after 25 years of marriage. He was never very forthcoming with information, is that part of the problem? Had him do a lie detector test and he failed miserably. We went to counseling, the counselor told me to run away as fast as I could. I didn't take that advice.

Do I think he is in another A? I don't know. Don't think so. Just don't like the fact that I can't trust him. I think if he is or if he ever does it again, he will be more careful, ie, no cellphone usage, etc. The thing I feel that bothers me the most is, well, I feel almost like I am his penance, his punishment for his affair. He said after, sorry, I really didn't think you would care this much, sorry I hurt you so bad. So I feel like he is just staying and being a martyr.

We aren't really all that old. He is 45 I am 47, yet sex happens about every month to every month an a half? Guys, come on, help me out here, is that normal? I know I am pulling back, I can feel it, I think I am afraid to totally give myself to him again because then he can't hurt me as badly as he did, but then I think that makes this suck for the both of us. Then I think would it be different with anyone else? Can I trust anyone again? Would I be better off alone than feeling like this? Financially for me it would be bad, my salary isn't the greatest, after being out of the workforce to raise kids, but seriously, I can't use that as a reason to stay.

The past month or so, I have been becoming more and more depressed, trying to figure out why. I just have no energy for anything, don't care about much. Just feeling pretty empty. I have tried talking to him about what I am feeling and the response I get it "Christ, am I going to have to pay for this for the rest of my life?" It isn't like we have ever really talked about it much. Right after the first d-day we talked, but most of what he said were lies, after the second d-day, a lot of [censored] and I can't recalls.

Wish I could just figure out wtf to do, but then I think just the fact that I don't know what to do, really gives me my answer and I am just afraid to take that step.

'SW', you could remove yourself and insert me in your post. Its the same feeling. And my 'wife' says the same thing about having to pay for this for the rest of her life, and how I have not forgiven her, etc. I rarely at all ever talk about A's as it causes probs. She says providing the details I THINK I want is not productive and won't help, so she knows whats best for me, obviously.

So I'm like, ok, well then I am not healing the way I think I need to, so screw it. As 'maritalbliss' said, our heart kicks in to its protective mode of not caring, or pulling back. My heart needs a break, my emotions need a break, or I will break. It's like a circuit breaker, and it popped and I do not know if I want to reset it, nor if I need that system right now, (hope you guys get my aviation analogy, ha).

There is an old saying that crosses cultural lines almost everywhere: The one who cares the least controls the marriage.


This is called a LOVE BUSTER. It is disrespectful.

COD: Have you read all of the basic concepts on this web site?

If you haven't, please do so. Once you have done that, you may have the words to handle this situation for yourself. Or not, as the case may be. If you still don't have the words, say so.

I also encourage you to buy two books and read them: His Needs, Her Needs and Surviving an Affair, both by Willard Harley. Common sense will not solve your problem, but knowledge will. She is trying to rely on common sense and that is not enough.

There is no reset button in life. But there is knowledge if you seek it. My suggestion is that you put matters on hold until after you get the knowledge you need to take control.

Larry

There's another saying:

Common sense is not so common.

Common sense, in codjej's situation, would dictate that continued secrecy about a secret affair would result in continued distrust due to secrecy!

Larry, you are exactly right on your first line, and it crosses cultural lines, IMO. I've heard that a few months ago and I feel its true, maybe I am trying to subconsciously do it..? She already is doing it, and always has held that trump card.

I have not read all of the basic concepts here, no. I have been meaning to.

I have also wanted to buy those two books, but I am thinking why should I..? She isn't going to read them, I am getting tired of doing all the 'lifting'. If she thinks common sense is enough, then screw it, I will use that concept too.

codtej

�Yes Five is a lot�

Yes and No!

Five OM one time each

or

One OM five times

Which one is worse?

I have seen from reading here on MB that no matter what the situation it can always be looked as thank God it could have been worse.

BH1 My WW had an affair with OM

BH2 You call that a WW, mine had two OM

BH3 You guys don�t know nothing my WW had three OM

I think no matter what the number is there is a coping mechanism that allows us to see it could have been worse.

I�ve seen BH�s here complain the same way with the number of time the WW did the OM.

At least it was only one time to nine to ninety nine. When the BH�s decide to recover they say thank God it wasn�t twice, ten, or one hundred.

Then as painful it can be to hear that a WW had been doing the OM for years, and one of your kids is an OC. And, as bad as that would be to hear there have been BH�s that were able to recover.

However the decision to recover has to be what you want. As Ann Landers (the real deal not these new age Dumass�) said back in the 1960�s are you better off with WS or without WS.

I think your recovery has stalled because of your need to know what has happened and your WW won�t discuss the affairs.

Have you done any counseling?

Would your WW consider one phone session with the Harleys?

For some BH�s never knowing what happened will always haunt them even twenty thirty years after.

'TR', I do know what you are saying, and I agree to a point. I know this wasn't what you were saying but it was 5 OM, multiple times each, so it wasn't 5 OM one time each, just say'n

We have done some MC, but the therapist was the same one I had done many IC's with and she knew me very well. The therapist seemed to be only concerned with me realizing the state of mind my wife was in and trying to get me to understand why she would have her A's...I wasn't getting it.

She did help me out a lot in IC...the therapist did pick up on my wifes controlling and anger issues after 2 MC's and wanted to see her in IC...my wife was having none of that.

I am going back to IC on monday, for myself.

The Harleys, I am not sure, I have to ck the costs. And you are exactly right about your last sentence. I've read from many on here that said the same thing, and have lived it. Yes, we have stalled and I agree, it has something to do with what I need, or need to hear....I NEED things from my FWW, I am tired of hearing her say what she needs....just tired of it.

That is a cop out Cod. And the purpose behind reading all the stuff is so you will be carrying a gun to a knife fight.

The more knowledge you have, the better able to handle her stuff and you are more in control of YOURSELF.

There is a lot more to the books and basic concepts than just your current situation. It is knowledge that will follow you around all the rest of your life. After all, relationships are a part of life and the more you understand, the easier it will be for you now or the future.



I am acting as your friend COD, and that means telling you what you need to hear.

Larry

No Larry, I would expect no less from you, or others on here, I appreciate it. I know its a cop out, but I really am tired of doing all the freaken lifting man...why do I have to do it all???? I didn't screw five OW...?

I didn't have intimate relations with FIVE OW, date them, dine them, go to the movies with them, and do them, multiple times then come home and look my wife in the eye when she said "I love you" , and say, "good, keep it that way"....and when she asked for sex I didn't say, "maybe later" knowing that I had just had sex with another woman. I didn't cover this up for 20 plus years and over the years when she brought it up I didn't say, 'we were just friends' and when it finally came out I didn't say, 'you pushed me to do it'...I didn't ruin my marriage I didn't break her heart like she did mine.....I freaken didn't do that crap man.....I am having a hard time typing this.....i gotta g outdide

"'TR', I do know what you are saying, and I agree to a point. I know this wasn't what you were saying but it was 5 OM, multiple times each, so it wasn't 5 OM one time each, just say'n"

I'm not keeping score on your case. Only that everyones case could be worse.