Hi All,

Not sure how many folks are here from my last stint on this site considering it was 8-9 years ago but the advice and help I got here were truly lifesaving. Now I'm back needing advice again.

Short History - Divorced 7 years ago after ex-wife had an affair and started a new relationship about a year later. We didn't get married as we were both affair victims and, if I'm being totally honest, I was more than a little gun-shy but we did start living together. We both have two kids and, as many here undoubtedly know, making a blended family work is a huge undertaking. Long story short there were a few times when we were ready to walk away. One time was last year when I said it was over. We put the house up for sale and were making plans for individual lives and I found out that she was seeing someone else. She had signed up for a dating site and met one guy who she had three dates with. The first was coffee, the second was drinks and I know for a fact there was kissing involved and the third was a party of some sort.

We ended up working things out and got back together and even got married earlier this year. We have been much happier after we finally addressed the core issues instead of putting band-aids on the symptoms. However, it took me a long time to even start to let go of the whole dating issue. I know I had said we were through, but to start dating within two weeks with us still living under the same roof? That was extremely hard to get past, no doubt due in part to my being betrayed before. It felt like a betrayal and for a long time I would find myself wondering what really happened and how far it actually went. I am almost completely certain there has been no contact since, but she has always been reluctant with details saying it doesn't matter now but did tell me about the third date, that it was just some sort of garage party. At the time, she was 42 and the guy she was dating was 30. I had just gotten to the point where I stopped wondering and picturing things.

Then today happened........

She was on the phone with her ex-husband (there is a child support issue that is soon to go to court) and an argument started when he told her she was just jealous because he is sleeping with a 27 year old. She fired back "So what. I slept with a 30 year old." I was at work (still am) so I didn't hear the conversation, she told me about it, but it ripped open the wound I have spent so long trying to heal and ripped it open worse than originally. Why say something like that if nothing actually happened? Why would she even think about that period during a child support argument with her ex-husband? Yes, I get the "sex with younger people" connection, but it still seems like a real reach. I can't make that connection and now I am having an even harder time than before. What really happened? Did it get physical other than kissing (and that's bad enough)? Has she been honest with me? Am I being naive again? If I am being completely honest I have to say I now believe that something more than the kissing did in fact happen.

To make matters worse, he will make sure this becomes public knowledge and my son who actually works for him (small town - long story) will undoubtedly hear of it. Her relationship with my son has been strained at best so this will not help.

I'm full of hurt and doubts and questions that will never get answered and I could really use some advice.

DefCon

Pep, they already got married this year.

Sorry to hear that you are in this mess again. And, yes, I do believe that your wife most likely did sleep with the 30 year old last year when you were broken up but still living together.

Thank you !
Time for me to bow out of this one.

You know that you had told your girlfriend at the time that you were done and you put your house up for sale. You weren't married. She responded by dating and probably sleeping with someone else. When you got back together, she did not admit to how far the dating went. You are married now. What do you want? Do you need her to admit it? Can you forgive it? Will she be safe telling you?

Here's the big issue. This statement is not true. Here is the truth.

We ended up ignoring the issues and convinced ourselves that we were working things out and got back together and even got married earlier this year. We have been much happier after we finally decided to burry our heads in the sand and never addressed the core issues instead of putting band-aids on the symptoms.

You weren't together when she was with this other guy. If you had a problem with it you should have addressed it before you got married. Your issues were so great that you put the house on the market and she moved on. Then in a year you get back together and get married? Doesn't this seem too quick?

The main issues we had were kids, plain and simple. Different kids raised in different families with different priorities and getting everyone to get along and follow rules they weren't used to, made more difficult by the fact they spent time with the exe's with even more different rules and guidelines. It's a wonder they're not all screwed up!

Yes we did work out the core issues, but you're right, there was one that wasn't properly dealt with and that was the dating issue. I should have known better.

BTW, we didn't get back together after a year, we were only "split" for a few weeks and still living together. We got married after we were back together a year.

What do I want/need? I've been asking myself that all day. To start with, the truth although I don't know if I'd even recognize it right now. She is safe in telling in that it would not result in blow-ups or anything like that. I am too old and been there before knowing it doesn't help. Forgiveness if true? I really have no idea.

Pepper! You were here the last time I spent countless sleepless nights on this forum. Trying to remember your story but I do remember we had some great exchanges.

Blending kids and dealing with ex's are a huge challenge - btdt. You were not married, had not made vows to forsake all other, you had cut her loose. You decided you wanted her back after she dated another. You decided that you could work things out and move forward. You married her. You now have a right to the complete truth. Tell her how you feel. Work on ENs - like honesty. She has to be safe to tell you the whole truth. If you find her behavior unforgivable if she slept with someone else when she was single and not officially your girlfriend, that may be why she won't tell you. She probably knows you pretty well. You have been together a long time. You have to be willing to hear whatever she tells you without her being afraid that you will hold it against her.

DefCon,

I don't recall your old story, but I do have a few thoughts about your current situation.

It appears that your W told you about the conversation and her telling her ex she slept with a 30 year old. Is that correct?

So let's discuss this for a moment. First, does your W explain to you why she said this? Whether it was or was not true it was not a wise thing to tell her ex. Does she understand how this could hurt your son? Does she understand that if anyone should know that she slept with a 30 year old it should have been you?

She has now damaged your relationship, she may have damaged her relationship with your son, and perhaps your relationship with your son. How is she going to address this? How is she going to protect you, for if it becomes common knowledge that she slept with a 30 year old, it will not enhance her reputation nor your marriage.

Have you noticed something? I have not discussed whether she did this or not. Here is my view as a 3rd person standing on the side lines. You two were not married, and YOU had announced it was over and put the house up for sale. What she did or did not do was/is none of your business. It may hurt you to think she slept with another man, but you two were not involved at the moment. She has slept with several men in her life, you, her ex, and I don't know who else, why would this one bother you? Think about that.

Now having said this, I do think you need to understand you had no connection to her at the time, she has now introduced this into your relationship and marriage by her statements to her ex. As mentioned earlier, this can have a bad effect and definitely not a positive one. Now you need to know the truth, not because of her "betrayal" of you because she did not. But, because of the effect her comments may have on your relationships with others not to mention each other. You need the truth so you can defend yourself against what her ex may say or do. YOu need the truth to be able to address your son if it comes to that. You need the truth so that you KNOW you can trust your W.

Step back and look at the real problem. It isn't what she did back when you two were not married and emotionally separated. It is was she has said while you two are married and dealing with fragil blended family issues.

Please think about this.

God Bless,

JL

It sounds like you still have issues with the kids. If I have my time line correct you were divorced 7 years ago. You started dating your wife 6 years ago. Did you ever seek help with dealing with a blended family? I can't help you with that part because I have no experience with blended families. I think you and your wife need to start reading here and start talking o&h with each other.

JL, another name from the past. Then there's 2Long, MelodyLane (or is it MelodyLake?),and how many others I can't remember? Thank you for the input, reminds me how valuable this board and the input from users here can be.

As for the current situation, it breaks down into 2 issues for me. First, whether she slept with this guy or not, she did have an intimate relationship with another man. True, we had decided it was over, but we were still living together and the lines of communication were still open. IMO, you do not start a new relationship while still deeply involved with the old one, if for no other reason than respect for the person you are with and what you shared with that person. Now, having said that, this issue was settled back then. She saw it as no big deal and I felt it was a betrayal, regardless of whether there was sex involved or not. It took time and work, but we got through it and, as I said earlier, we have been happier than ever.

The second issue (and the most important one) is honesty. When we decided to give us one last chance, we both swore we would lay all the cards on the table and give it everything we had to make it work. Total commitment, total effort, total HONESTY. Assuming for a moment that she did in fact sleep with this guy, then obviously she wasn't honest about it and it is the deceit surrounding the relationship more than the relationship itself. If true, how can I trust her?

JL, your words describe my feelings almost exactly. Although I disagree somewhat with your stance on what happened back then, what she did back then is somewhat beside the point. It is the damage done by her comments of yesterday along with lies and deceit, if in fact there was any. I personally have had trust issues ever since my divorce and I have worked on them, but this certainly won't help. How do I reconcile this and move past it? How do I not wonder what she is doing while away from me?

We talked about it last night and it started out with the same line - there was no sex involved, it meant nothing, it doesn't matter and what she said was just in the heat of an argument with her ex-husband. I couldn't seem to get across to her how it made me feel, both the situation and her comments of yesterday. After some conversation she did apologize for the comments and said the last thing she wanted was to hurt me and I believe that. So the work on fixing this begins, but I think I'm gonna hang out here for a while this time - you guys are just too valuable.

Suamico, I could write a book on blended families. Probably the most difficult thing two people can undertake, particularly when there are exe's using the kids to interfere with our lives, but we are succeeding in that aspect at least.

Going off topic for a moment, when we were working out our issues, we found a book that was so incredibly helpful to us. We had read His Needs, Her Needs, done the EN questionnaires, but there were a few "bedroom issues" that needed addressing. We bought a book called "Sheet Music: Uncovering the Secrets of Sexual Intimacy in Marriage" It is written by Kevin Leman, a Christian psychologist and it is literally worth it's weight in gold. It goes way beyond the bedroom addressing the issues that start outside the bedroom and find their way in. I highly recommend it.

Tell WW that you want a polygraph because her story changed too mant times that you don't know what to believed what happened with the OM. Then say you know she is motivated to prevent hurting you in what she has told you but the lingering doubts all these years has hurt just as much.

What usually happens after the test is booked the WW comes clean before she has to take the test.

I agree with everything JL wrote. I'm just going to expand a little on your responds to it.

Whether her relationship while you were "on a break" (remember that Friends episode?) was a betrayal or not, you moved past that back then and actually made the commitment of marriage after that happened. You had either resolved your issues regarding it, or you buried them, or you ignored them. Whatever you did, you accepted that part of your past together in some manner. You seem to understand this.

What concerns me is your concern for honesty on her part. Now it's pretty obvious that honesty is a real issue here. BUT - I wonder if there's another angle you should be looking at this.

Suppose your wife is actually being honest with you. Suppose the past relationship was exactly as she says it was. Suppose what she said to her ex was just out of anger and one-up-manship in response to her ex. Suppose that's the 100% truth of the matter. Now, here you are doubting and mistrusting her, simply because of something that happened years ago that was supposedly resolved.

For sure, those of us who have been burned by adultery see it at every corner in the road. We can't help it. Your W's statement to her ex could easily be interpreted as the words of a wayward. Many of us can envision our own waywards saying something similar.

But it quite easily may not have anything to do with waywardism. After all, she did tell you herself without prompting. Chances are you may never have known what she said if she didn't tell you. That behavior alone is un-waywardish.

Maybe what you need to do now is to be open and honest yourself with her. Let her know how this event has sent you into a bit of a tailspin. I believe you mentioned she was also a BS, so she will be able to understand how you feel. Use this incident to help bring you closer together, rather than to drive you apart.

It's not what happens to us that defines us. It's how we react to it. I see an opportunity here. I hope you can use it.

Or it could be she told you of what she said to her XH because she KNEW it would travel back to you thru your son who works for her XH....infact I bet this is the only reason she told you....this way it looks like the perfect "cover" story.

As far as the timeline for her stepping out when you ended the relationship yrs eariler...she doesn't have the same boundariers you do is all. In her mind living with someone at the time isn't a issue to dating another...you can do both....whereas you have a different boundary that says the couple living together should at least NOT be living together at the time either of them begins dating....which I agree with...that would be my boundary too if I had ever lived with a man but I never did that so I could be all messed up here!

I think you both need to find out where each others boundaries are...you may think your on the same page but in reality your not.

I agree with TheRoad....tell your W you will need a polygraph test on this topic as she has changed her story to many times and with your past history TRUST/HONESTY is a key conerstone to the marriage....if I were you I would call the counseling center...get her on board for a session and let THEM tell her she should do this for you....don't you request it...let them do it...that way I bet she is more receptive to doing it. And if she won't and says stuff like you have hurt me so bad cause you don't trust me! Then I would say you have your answer...she slept with that other man....cause if she is a BW herself and she knows that care and protection is of the up most importance then relieving your suffering and doubts should be a easy thing to do with no resentment...it would end this for you both. Also she needs to call her XH in front of you and retract that statement that she slept with a 30yr old IMO....that's just plain awful that she did that.

This would END all the suffering your going thur all these yrs doubting....HTH

"Also she needs to call her XH in front of you and retract that statement that she slept with a 30yr old IMO....that's just plain awful that she did that."

Waste of time.

How is anyone to believe the words out of her mouth even if he is right next to her as she say's this thing directly to the OM?

Was she lying then?

Would she be lying now?

Would she only be saying this to do damage control with her BH?

Then only to call the OM later deny her confession. That she only said what her BH wanted to hear.

Polygraph.

End it for once.

Thanks to all for the input.

First, the issue of a polygraph - We live in Canada and polygraphs here are pretty much non-existent and, even if I could find one, that's a route I wouldn't take. Speaking strictly from personal views, if I got to a point where I needed a machine to test my spouse, it would be time to end the marriage. I need to believe and trust and that trust has been badly shaken but not broken.

Calling the XH and retracting the statement? I think in his eyes it would give more credence to what she said, not less.

She has always maintained that the relationship did not include sex with the exception of her comments to her XH. Was that just some type of one-upmanship? She insists it was but regardless of the intent, it opened an old wound and, as Tab so aptly described it, sent me into something of a tailspin.

She suggested I look up the guy she dated and ask him and that, to me anyway, gives her credibility because I know there has been no contact since she and I got back together.

I think one of the most difficult things for me to come to terms with is a change in myself. I used to be the most trusting guy around, not jealous in any way and always believing the best. Somewhere along my journey through divorce, that man got lost and I don't know how to bring him back.

DefCon,

I don't think you get that guy back. But, really this is not a matter of trust. She told you she did not have sex with the guy and she tells her ex that she did. The fact that this bothers you isn't a matter of trust, it is a matter of receiving conflicting information concerning something that is important to you. She needs to see this.

Finally, let's assume that she is in fact telling you the truth. What she did was at the expense of her family try and make herself feel better. What she did was at the expense of her family try to get back at a man she apparently doesn't like or want in her life.

What I see here is the need for her to reevaluate how she handles herself, her image, and her family. I know this could be construed to be a minor thing and I am sure she feels this way. But, it isn't minor to you and frankly would not be to me.

My guess is that you want to be proud of your W. You want your children, and her children to be proud of you W. You don't want a person that will lie to an Ex and besmirch her reputation to get back at him because it makes everyone look bad except the EX.

She needs to evaluate what she was thinking and understand that you, the children and herself depend on her making good decisions even in the heat of the moment. I think this needs to be a topic of discussion and of POJA when the discussion is finished. She did a poor job of protecting herself and those she says she loves.

God Bless,

JL

I dunno.


Some things bug me about your sitch, DefCon.

First, you weren't married to begin with. While that seems okay to most folks, it says to me, "I don't want a commitment. I am choosing not to make a commitment, rather, I am purposely choosing instead to AVOID any formal commitment, just in case I want to make a quick getaway."

Call it what you want, but for me, after that long of living with a guy, you would think he would know whether or not I was "marriage material" or not - and I don't think it would take that many years to marry me. Then, you go ahead and marry her AFTER this dating deal with the guy, even though you had questions about it, even though you weren't sure you knew the whole story.

You were willing to work through it then. What has really changed? You did not know the whole truth then, and still don't. You knew it was a possibility that she slept with him then, and now .... well..... nothing has really changed except that time has passed and she verbalized it, and

wait

other people know.


That might be more than you might think - that others now know what you have been sort of thinking all along.


Consider that, and how much the opinions of others are weighing on you. Truth is - big deal. Does it change the amount of work you have to do to fix the relationship? Does it change the problems you had with this woman in the first place? Does others knowing really change


anything?


Nope. You still are holding the same tiger by the tail as you were


a year or so ago


when you married her in the first place.

And you still know the same thing - that she probably slept with another guy


WHILE YOU TWO WERE SPLIT UP.


Use the very same MB plan that you would use to actually REPAIR things that you would if this all happened yesterday.

Nothing special, nothing unique. Drag her kicking and screaming to the HONESTY TABLE - whether she likes it or not.

Maybe a healthy dose of Plans A and B will help her truth bone.

SB

JL, you seem to articulate exactly what I am feeling and maybe it's not about trust at all but the conflicting statements and damage done by those statements.

schoolbus, you couldn't be more right about the "marriage avoidance". We were engaged for four years and I told myself and her that we didn't need a piece of paper saying we were married. Once I got honest with myself, I had to acknowledge that it was just as you said - I had been burned before and I needed an easy out in case I needed to make a quick getaway. That was on me and I had to re-evaluate and stop punishing the woman I loved for the actions of another.

We did work through our issues last year, including her dating episode and, no, nothing really has changed. She made a stupid comment that was intended to get back at her XH and ended up hurting the wrong person. Even though what she did then hurt me tremendously, I had to accept at least partial responsibility for it then and I do now as well. I can't change it and I will likely never know for certain what the truth is but I need to find the trust and faith again.

We talked about it and one thing she said to me really hit home - she knew what her dating did to me and, if something more happened, she would have told me and we would have worked through it at the time. One of the reasons I fell in love with this woman and (eventually) married her is her honesty. She is probably the most brutally honest person I have ever met to the point where I have said she needs to tone it down on occasion. She cried and told me how sorry she really was for the comment.

So am I being naive or am I again projecting my own past experience on her again? Since we worked through our issues and especially since we said our vows, we have been the happiest couple around, always together unless we are working - "joined at the hip" as we have been described. A day does not go by where my phone doesn't have a short text like "Good Morning Sexy Husband" or just a simple "ILU" and vice versa. So what do I focus on? The incredible marriage I have to an amazing woman or something that may have happened that, even if it did, I share responsibility for? That's a no brainer.

My wife did something (the comment to her XH) that she should not have done and that hurt me. She apologized and now we move on from it. That doesn't mean I will be blind but I will choose to have faith in my wife.

Thanks, guys. Talking it our here and getting different perspectives really helped.