This is a repost from another thread:

OK... In a nutshell: My wife had a brief (month and a half) affair three years ago after 12 years of marriage. I found out, we addressed many of the issues in our marriage, went to counseling and read His Needs/Her Needs, among many other things. I would say since then I have experienced a closeness with her that I never have before.

Over the three years I've had bouts of anxiety and periods of hyper-vigilance and mopiness. This has also caused periods of corresponding love-busting. When I got like that it would wear seriously on my wife. Sometimes these bouts would last a day sometimes a couple days. And then i would be back on track and we would move on. This summer, because of work-related stress Ive fallen back into some negative behavior-- clingy-ness, baby-ness, moping, suspicion, checking her emails and complaining. I feel like a recovering addict who's fallen off the wagon. I've been noticing how it's worn on her, but I didnt think it was so bad. I would say my behavior has been consistent over two months. Generally once a week flare-up of some kind, with me being "weird" or down or non-trusting and turning to her to make it better.

Last Friday night we had a blowout over my jealousy, suspicion and negative behavior. She actually stormed out. As has been the case, my behavior was totally unwarranted. The result was she just reached a breaking point... She told me she was tired and unhappy and that I'd worn her out to the point that she didnt care anymore and thought it was best to end things. On further discussion she said she didnt feel "in love" anymore... she pinpointed a steady, steep decline to a few months ago. She was very firm that she didnt want to "work" on anything.

This threw me for a horrendous loop. I felt like I'd been diagnosed with a terminal illness-- the life drained out of me. I was enraged and heartbroken for about 24hrs and then I got my crap together, remembered my His Needs/Her Needs training and started a gentle but firm course of action. Without being clingy or weepy I:

1) apologized for my behavior and acknowledged that I had become the source of her unhappiness. I told her she has deserved 100% of my trust at this point and that over the past three years she had done NOTHING to betray that. I took total responsibility.

2) I pledged to give her my total trust and vowed never to go into her personal emails or facebook account again.

3) I told her that I had come to this realization of how much I've been dragging her down and I asked her to give me time to demonstrate the change. If she felt the same way after a period of the "new" me, then we could talk about divorce.

She agreed to this. She said however, that she wouldn't be fake about her emotions for the sake of peace. I said "That's great"

That was earlier this week. So far, I think things have gone pretty good. I feel good about trusting and not succumbing to my fears. I've been engaged and non-mopey around her. Nothing fake, just keeping things friendly and as "normal" as possible, talking as we normally do during the day about life, work the kids, etc... We kissed the other night and have done so several more times. Last night we held hands while watching TV. She wants to go to the beach tomorrow, which I found cool. She has sent me several cute and sweet texts messages. Nothing profound like "i love you", but positive stuff.

I am still in love with this woman and believe I can make deposits, to bring back the feelings of love in her. On Monday i was despondent, today I am hopeful and working to make steady, consistent deposits.

Any advice from people who have been with someone who said "I'm not in love anymore"? Any advice on my approach with this?

Thanks all!

Treadwell,

Has she been open and honest with you and answered all your questions, or does she avoid talking about the affair?

A ONS is a brief affair, a month and a half is quite a bit of time from an emotional perspective, and often the emotional part of the affair was quite a bit longer.

God Bless
Gamma

We went thru every detail of the affair in the early stages (first six months) She even wrote out a log with dates, times, etc...

After that period I was always wanting to know peripheral details and she obliged. Phone bills, ATM's, emails and behavior all backed up her account. Then the questions turned to "how did he talk to you?" "did you laugh a lot?" etc etc... She answered those. But past a year, on the advice of our counselor, it was time for me to move on or... not move on, i guess.

Basically i recognized, about a year in, that my persistent questions from every microscopic detail were not helping me recover. They were enabling fear and anxiety.

Treadwell, a couple of different things are happening here. First off, you should be snooping on her. If she has a problem with that, then you have a problem. She should be so transparent that this is not an issue. Addionally, she should be not be doing thing that trigger your suspicions such as carry on opposite sex friendships, going out with the girls, having secret email accounts, etc.

Those are very basic steps towards ensuring there is not a repeat affair. If she is not taking the steps to protect your marriage, then you have a huge problem and your reaction to this will not be good.

You will be continually triggered until she practices safe boundaries.

Additionally, her affair should never be brought up again. It is a huge lovebuster to continually bring it up.

However, if she doing things to trigger you, then that needs to stop.

How well has she affair proofed herself to protect you from a recurrance?

And secondly, I would actually USE this program. It really does work, but you have to actually USE it in its entirety. It cannot be cherry picked.

If you follow these instructions scrupulously, you can restore the love in your marriage: How to Create Your Own Plan to Resolve Conflicts and Restore Love to Your Marriage

Also, when was the last time she saw or spoke to her OM in any way?

Treadwell,

Was OMW informed of what happened, one of the things which still kills me about my W's affair, was that I didn't go to OMs then girlfriend.

God Bless
Gamma

I disagree with snooping. These are different approaches. Early in the affair when trust is completely broken-yes. At some point one must move past this snooping phase for your own sanity. Trust is essential to your own well-being. To chose to stay with someone you dont trust, THREE years down the road, is not healthy. By the way, I have agreed not to go in anymore, but she has said if I ever want to go in to her email or FB for ANY reason, she will log me in and allow me to look. She has been wanting this mutual trust with email for about a year. I have broken it, time and time again.

She has not done anything since to betray my confidence or trust. But keep in mind, we're three years in. The boundaries have been solid.

Three years. She broke it off a full two months before I found out. It began as a rekindled High School friendship with simple chat and laughs and reminiscing and then drifted into something sexual. He was single "bad boy".

Once the sex started and his conquest was complete, his desire for chat and friendship came to a screeching halt. She found her emotional account veering into the "red" fairly quickly. She felt used, trashy and depressed and tried to get back to her life and forget about the whole ordeal quickly.

Ok, this is the problem, Treadwell, you have a mixed up view about trust. Blind trust is what got you in this mess in the first place. You have a right to know every thing she does when you are not looking.

Snooping is a protective measure that any sane spouse should take to protect his marriage. It is not "untrustworthy" to snoop, it is untrustworthy to have secrets, lie, and commit adultery. Since she had an affair, she should NEVER KNOW about your snooping unless you find something.

It was too much trust that led to the affair the last time, so doing the same thing again will not avail you much. You should not trust your wife.

Obviously if you have to ask her to "show" you something, you won't know what she is doing when you are not around, which renders your looking absolutely useless.

It is not a lack of trust that ruins marriages, but a lack of boundaries. If your wife is demanding secrecy, then I would suspect that she has something to hide.

Treadwell, here are Dr Harley's views about the importance of snooping. I will also add that snooping can save your marriage by relieving your anxieties. That is because you are confirming her truthfulness independently:

Coping With Infidelity

Why does the perpetrator of the crime get to set the limits here? Obviously something is making you feel unsafe. When this happens you go in to her email to verify that you are not being betrayed again. When you confirm that there is nothing going on - a deposit has been made in your love bank for her. If she encourages this behavior and lives openly with you, even more deposits are made.

However if she reacts with irritation and anger - massive withdrawals are made. This creates the negative cycle you describe. You wonder in the back of your mind - why is she upset? could she be hiding something? For your own self protection you begin to withdraw - and in retaliation she withdraws as well.

The solution is NOT for you to stop checking. She has betrayed you. You will always have the fear of another betrayal. She has irrevocably changed your relationship. This doesn't mean you can't be more in love and happy that you were in the past, it just means that you have to have a new set of behaviors that reflect the reality in which you live.

You shouldn't have to ask permission to see her email or FB. She needs to recognize your snooping as an opportunity to make large Love Bank deposits. She should welcome your snooping. The fact that she doesn't - the fact that she pushed for what you call 'mutual trust' indicates that she maintains some flawed, wayward thinking. THAT is what is triggering you, my friend.

Yes you will probably drive yourself mad if you obsessively snoop as you felt compelled to after Dday - however, as you have seen, you still have the occasional need to verify that she isn't about to drop another bomb on you. That is HEALTHY and perfectly ok.

I'm sure it isn't a frequent needs, but it is one you MUST be able to satisfy when you feel it. Otherwise you wind up right where you are right now.

Personally, I don't think there's any NEED for this 'mutual trust' your wife seems to crave. I have all my husband's passwords and can get into anything on his computer whenever I want, and vice a versa - and we've never dealt with infidelity. We just realize that COMPLETE transparency CREATES intimacy.

Does "mutual trust" mean SECRECY? That is sure what it sounds like to me. Her demands for secrecy are what are keeping you triggered, Treadwell. There is something wrong here. People who have nothing to hide, don't hide:

Coping with Infidelity

Well, for the sake of accuracy she has allowed me complete access to her email for three years.

My desire to stop the snooping habit-- and it became an almost OCD habit for me-- was that I felt a boundary was being crossed with myself. Every time I went in and snooped, anxieties were opened anew-- just from logging in. I would log in, get incredibly anxious and uncomfortable with myself, find nothing and then log out. This habit was like picking at an old emotional scab for me.

Healthy trust is never blind and certainly not an on/off switch. Trust is a light fader that gets brighter or dimmer depending on circumstances and behavior. Trust is never absolute and is certainly conditional-- even in relationships that havent been marred by affairs. But you MUST trust firmly, at some juncture-- be it three years for some or ten years for others-- or you are tormenting yourself.

Bingo! This is exactly my thought, too. Her secretiveness, defensiveness [accusing him of "breaking her trust"] and anger is all a huge red flag. This should concern him very much.

I find this very puzzling. Anxious about WHAT? When I snoop on my H and find that he is faithful and true, I am not anxious, I am REASSURED.

So, what causes your anxiety?


I think part of the problem is that you have unrealistic, romantic views of trust that are harmful to marriage. This is a big source of the conflict in your marriage. You are trying to adopt a very unrealistic standard of inappropriate "trust" that only serves to keep you in anxiety and fear. I can see that you actually feel inappropriate GUILT for snooping, which makes me suspect you have been gaslighted.

If you had been snooping on your wife all along, she would not have a started an affair. It was too much trust that led to the secret second life that led to her affair.

So no, in a good marriage they do not "trust firmly," they PROTECT FIRMLY.

Was this simple chat through FB or email? If so then she needs total transparency to these accounts. Enough said.

Is it possible the anxiety was not so much about what you would find, but an anticipation of your wife's reaction to your snooping? I find it odd that you would be anxious. If your wife was being open and honest, if she was living transparently and helping you avoid triggers, if there was no fear of her anger or retaliation from your snooping - you shouldn't have been having this reaction.

Your checking her email would be reassuring, you would be confirming something you already knew from your wife's behavior - that she is trustworthy. The fact that were NOT reassured indicates that there is something NOT trustworthy about her.

There is something that she is doing that is untrustworthy, and it is triggering you. Instead of snooping for confirmation of nothing wrong, you're snooping in expectation of FINDING something.

That is very troubling.

Though I guess it's POSSIBLE the act of snooping is triggering you itself, for some reason I doubt it - as it seems pretty contrary to most BS behavior post Dday and through recovery. Of course if someone knows different I defer to their experience.

Treadwell,

I saw some points in your post I would like to comment on.

As has been the case, my behavior was totally unwarranted. The result was she just reached a breaking point... She told me she was tired and unhappy and that I'd worn her out to the point...

Does she blame shift the affair to you, it sounds like she has you wrapped around her finger.

We kissed the other night and have done so several more times. Last night we held hands...Nothing profound like "i love you", but positive stuff.

Are you saying she has not had sex with you since the affair and avoids affection? I'm sorry to say that may indicate that while she is with you physically she still longs for some of what she had with OM.

God Bless
Gamma

Suggestion: if you feel anxious logging in, then simply slap a keylogger on her computer [eblaster at spectorpro.com] and have the reports sent to a secret email address that you can access from any computer. You can program the keylogger remotely to send you reports as often as you like.

Even turn it off for a while and turn it back on. This will give you the security that she being faithful and since she won't know about it, you will have no conflicts. This will help you feel less anxious about her online time.