That will give us time to help you develop a strategy to make this as impactful as possible. Your instincts are right on.

In the meantime, SG, whatever you do, don't give your H a heads up about any of this. Start taking his calls and be as sweet as possible. Don't let on that anything is wrong. No lovebusting, just pleasant, pleasant, pleasant.

Do it. I did this when I found out about my wifes affair. I notified all the men on her list that she would no longer be contacting them. She was caught in an affair and will be devoting all her energy to saving her marriage.

A facebook exposure is very effective, but please do it on the same day you do the rest of the exposures. We can help you do this in the most effective manner and help you write the exposure letters.

I couldn't get a hold of my chaplain - my voice is cracking anyways. I'll get a hold of him after I drink some tea and eat soemthing.

Smiley, The folks there who are telling you do not go to the command have no idea how to save your marriage. Dr. Harley does & he says that Exposure is a key component in saving a marriage with infidelity.

As far as you & the kids being the ones who suffer because his need for money while forward-deployed is minimal - His Command has discretion over that. If you explain very clearly what you & the children's needs are financially, they will work with you.

Part of what keeps military wives enabling their active duty husbands is the punishment to him often also means punishment for the wife & children....loss of rank and pay. (This is part of what kept me quiet about my situation until the day I decided that I would not keep quiet any longer.) But the other cost is SO much higher...He could stop your access to the $ and direct it towards her anyway. Have you thought of that?

Affairs are sweet because they are a secret. Take that secret away from him & do it the right way. If you choose Facebook exposures, do it the same day (or after) you approach the Command. The people here will help you write something up. They have mad skillz But the Command is key. Please remember that. I KNOW you're scared about going to them, but it works.

And please don't tell him you're planning to Expose.

Awesome post, Chris! So glad you are here to weigh in.

SG, just so you know, we got the idea for exposure to the commander from a board member, Mortarman, who is a JAG officer and a member of MB who saved his own marriage from an affair. He directed many ppl here to report the the commanding officer and saved their marriages.

Would that it had helped ArmyWife. She went to command and nothing happened. I remember mortarman, good guy.

Larry

My heart is hurting so much right now.

I have just spoken to the Chaplain that I've been dealing with. I told him that I am leaning towards going to Command. He asked me why and I told him the best way for this Affair to end is to expose. I learned this from the book he gave me and from you wonderful people here. I feel like he is getting no consequence for his actions. While the chaplain isn't going to tell me what to do he is going to tell me what he has seen happen many many tiimes and what will happen.

My husband is Deployed.
His command is going to do the bare miniumum of punishment- what is already stated previously.
They will issue a no contact order that they cannot enforce.
While I do have some emergency funds to help with the financial blow for the first few months where they cut his pay in half, his paycheck will still be lower.
He does not need much funds to make it there so really other than make a mess he will have no real punishment.
the ones who benefit the most from his pay will.
They will do the miniumum punishment and then move on from this because they do have other matters to focus on especially since they are just newly deployed.
Also I have to think of the long term, if his paygrade goes down and we do get a divorce then what I'm entitled to also goes down.
If I do go to the command I need to strike when the iron is hot, within 2-3 weeks. If I wait longer than that then they are going to be wondering why I was okay with having this information before and why bring it up now...they are going to question my motiviation to pursuing this investigation.
My WH will continue to contact her whenever he wants by email and phone if he wants.
Since he is not in the states he cannot physically go see her anyways so basically it's not a big deal with the Army.

So basically ONCE AGAIN the only ones hurting from me going to the Command is ME and my KIDS???

My WH has told me numerous times before of when a spouse does go to command that she's stupid because the consequences affects her mostly especially if she is financially dependent.

I know this is not what I wanted to hear from my chaplain. He did want to get in contact with the chaplain in my WH unit and with my permission give him the details of what is going on. That way he can talk to my WH and have it still be confidential, meaning he will be going to command with this information.

Advised me to not do the facebook thing or have any contact with her whatsoever.

I feel like I am stuck either way and I can't do anything about it.

I realize exposure helped but were their WS deployed???

yep! They all were.

So, just to be clear - The Chaplain is saying to you - Do nothing...No exposure to facebook or the Command. He will contact the Chaplain in your husband's unit and have that Chaplain talk to your husband confidentially?

Is that correct?

If you are going to take the advice of an army chaplain over a clinical psychologist who has long, successful experience in resolving infidelity and those who have saved their marriages this way, then why ask us for our advice? Do you know that Army chaplains come to DR HARLEY for help in their own marriages?


If you are "stuck" it is by your own choice.

SG, I emailed a friend of mine this AM who is married to a guy who is a big time commander of a major base here in the US. Without giving a whole lot of detail, I asked her the hypothetical. What would your husband do if he found out someone in his command was having an affair and they were about to be deployed.

Just got the email back from my friend. She said that he would make the guy's life completely miserable, bust him down as far as he could go and do his darned best to minimize the financial impact on the wife/kids.

I know this is not scientific and I am not associated with the military so I have no idea how much leeway each commander has. My friend seemed to think that in this regard, they had some amount of leeway and discretion.

Smiley,

He is NOT a relaible source for information. His comment was 100% self-serving.

The consequences will not necissarily come from command. Think more social networking, and long term consequences. Those who support marriage, and have influence in his social network, will be the people who will most likely disapprove of his actions. If it is someone like a coworker, or a parent who he looks up to, then it will affect him greatly. The pay cut does hurt you, but in the long run it will be more consequential to the WH. Anyone can budget around finances, I was ready to downsize my home car, and everything in order to support my kids if my WW decided to take them someplace. To me money comes after my marriage and family.

I'm sorry, smileygurl, but this chaplain does not know what he is doing.

The notion that your H "will not get much punishment" misses the point entirely. The point of exposure is not to "punish" anyway. Exposure ruins the FANTASY. Most workplace exposures NEVER result in "punishment" anyway. But they are DAMN EFFECTIVE because it is no fun to get high when everyone is watching. It RUINS the affair.

Your H is in a fantasy addiction much like that of a crackhead. Exposure has the effect of bringing in a crowd of people into the crack house to watch the crack heads get high. It is no fun getting high when everyone is watching with disgust on their face and you are forced to explain. Like Dr Harley says, exposure blows away the FOG that insulates the affair.

Secondly, we have had affairs killed in ONE DAY from facebook exposures. Those marriages are already in recovery on this board. No guarantees, but this guy clearly does not know what he is doing.

frustrated.......

And they do.

I believe that Smiley needs to be calm & rational...approach the command with substantive info about what kind fo expenses she and the kids have. Explain that her goal is to save her marraige and be there for her solider to provide a stable environment when he returns, etc, etc, etc.

This is exactly how Mortarman, a JAG officer, and other commanders have handled this situation. They make sure the family is taken care of and kick the soldiers [censored] to kingdom come. Often they issue no contact orders that they most certainly do enforce.

In our experiece on this board, the commanders have been very accommodating and compassionate to the betrayed spouse.

Basically that's it. Do nothing.

Maybe it's time to use some of my Emergency funds to call Dr Harvey.