You know, JMak, you keep telling me what your wife says she wants, but what do you want?

What are you doing to fill her top ENs? What Love Busters are a problem for you that you repeat over and over without giving them any thought? What can you do to change your own behavior to try to meet her ENs while overcoming Love Busters?

You can't make her do anything. You can't make her let you meet her ENs any more than you can make her a poodle.

What you CAN do is make yourself the best JMak that you can be and see if that guy isn't attractive enough to her that she is willing to engage you again.

Remember that there are no magic bullets or incantations that will turn this around for you. Your marriage didn't get to the point of your wife wanting to walk away overnight and you can't turn it all around overnight either. It took years for your marriage to fall apart and it might take a few years to rebuild it again.

Avoid being needy, clingy and moping around trying to get her to show you a sign that she is willing to work on the marriage and just work on your half of the thing. Make your half of the marriage the best it can be and she MIGHT decide it is enough to try again.

If you talk to Steve he might be able to help you get a plan and part of that might be a way to get her to talk to him as well.

Mark

So my wife and children are back in our home state for the month. She and I talked some the night before they left. Out of nowhere she tells me that if her dad were to say she should stick with the marriage then I'd have my wife back. She trusts his judgment that much. As we were talking some more and about her conversations with the ex-fiance, she said she told him the same thing - that if her dad thought she should stick with it then she would. Talk about flipping my head around...

Now I can't stop thinking about whether I should be contacting him, to reach out to him.

Gonna be a long month. She's at her family cottage where she'll be talking to her three siblings about us. I can't stop thinking about that she's probably already told her brother who picked her up at the airport.

I want to improve myself, I just don't know how. Don't know where to start. I'm still going to counseling so some of this will start next week. In the meantime, it's hard not to just hang around, clean the house, watch tv...

JMak,


ABSOLUTELY!

Unless of course your history with him is such that he would rather see you dead beside the road than taking care of his daughter.

SHOW HIM your new improved self and let him know the things you have done and are doing to show better care for his daughter and let him know that you want only to have a growing, happy and healthy marriage with her for the rest of your life. Maybe inform him that you have even begun looking into a plan to restore the love that has taken such a hit in recent months and are willing to work hard to make the marriage better than either you or your wife ever dreamed.

JMO without know how he might receive that.

Did you ever expose the affair to him, BTW?

Mark

She has told me that he's been an advocate for this marriage. When she said that I'd have my wife back if he thought she should stick to it it was in the context of being nervous talking to him about her and I. And that I should count it as a plus that she'd be talking to him as he's been supportive of working on the marriage.

I told her that I'd thought about contacting him and she asked about what. I hemmed and hawed not wanting to upset her. But she didn't seem to be miffed about me talking to him.

I can't show him anything. I can only talk to him. I can only share what I've been doing.

I have not exposed her EA with anyone in her family. Figured it would piss her off and push her further away.

Thanks, Mark!

I want to be the best person I can be. I just don't know how to do that with a wife 2500 miles away and being so sad about the position that I am in.

So I'm not going to contact him, yet. I think she should be the first to talk to him about us. That it would be unfair of me to give him a heads up and try to talk to him first. I think she'll be seeing him this weekend, so if I decide to reach out it'll be next week sometime.

So very hard this past week - wife and kids left to go back to our home state for the month last Wed. This has been planned ever since we started talking about moving out of state.

Been very sad without my wife and kids at home, very lonely. I get angry and upset at times, too. We never really talked about how often we would communicate while she was back home and I get upset when she doesn't text or call to let me know how the kids are doing, she's doing, to have the kids say goodnight.

This past wkd her whole family was at the cottage where she was staying so I get that it was busy, kids up late, etc. But I still get upset.

Yesterday she had to call cuz her cell phone died and she wanted/needed my help to get a new one. I handled it. We did talk for a bit about the kids, her sis's bday party, who was at the cottage, etc. She also asked how my weekend was and was happy I had some fun.

It's just that I sit here wondering when I'll hear from her. She's at the cottage by herself now with the kids and I think why can't she text me...send me some pics of the kids, something. In the back of my head I'm constantly thinking that she's texting the OM or texting an ex-fiance that she's been in touch with.

She wasn't very responsive to texts from me before she left and I don't want to piss her off and seem clingy by texting her now to ask how things are going, how the boys are, etc. I don't know what to do...

I don't think she's had a chance to speak to her father about us, yet. I texted my sil yesterday and it seems she doesn't know the whole story, yet, either.

It's only been a week ...

Talked to my wife tonight...started out as an easy conversation. I called to share some stuff about work after she txtd me about seeing a FB about a good day at work. Talked about work then about how fun the kids are having back home with family. Then she just dropped on me that she had tried txting the OM. That she tried txtg him despite not having his number. She knew the area code and last 4 digits but not the prefix she tried three diff numbers she thought might be right and didn't get a response. She then said she fb'd him a msg.

She said she wanted to tell him that a mutual friend was not going someplace that the OM thought he might go see the mutual friend. She said she thought it just a courtesy and that was it.

I asked why she told me and she said because I requested she be open and honest about her contact with him. I replied that the request was operative two and three months ago and that I was confused she would be open and honest about it now given that she's said she's through with the marriage. She replied that I said if she were honest about it there wouldn't be a problem with the contact.

I feel like she's manipulating my comments to her that had she been open and honest all along that I wouldn't have had such a problem with the contact. But that's not operative now...she said she's through with me. why would choose now to be so honest?

I told her that I didn't think I had a right to have a problem given our current state of marriage. I asked her it she thought it mattered if I had a problem or not. She said, with a tone, that no it probably didn't. I could tell she was frustrated by the conversation.

Why even bring it up? I told her this sucks because the conversation became ackward and she apologized for even bringing it up. I replied that I didn't have a problem with the contact and that I appreciated the honesty but that I was still dealing with the hurt of their relationship and confused abouit why she should bring it up now.

As I write this I think I'm realizing that I failed to respond properly. What do you guys think? Part of me thinks I shouldve just accepted her sharing it with me.

I hate not knowing how to communicate with her...

We then talked abou mhe loves watching the kids be around her family and that she really misses her family. So we talked a bit about thinking about moving back home. She said something about me being a stay at home dad and her taking a teaching job. I told her if it was something that's important to her that we should really think about it and both be enthusiastic about doing it. I kept couching things as we. She then said that I was making assumptions about what she wants and about where would be. I told her she said me being a stay at home dad and that's all I was thinking. I don't think she believed me, though.

I could use some insights here, please...

TIA!

Is the OM in your home state?

No. He lives quite a ways away. I don't think that she would meet him anyway. And I don't think I'm deluding myself about that Its weird...I believe that their communication was not sexual. Some innuendo, but nothing overt. She explained that their conversations were easy, no drama.

I get that it was an EA and she was getting attention. That it was easy. He was neutral, not judging, not solving anything for her.

But it was inappropriate and she recognizes that.

I would love any insight, advice, or just thoughts. I'm not really talking to anyone else about this, except my individual therapist.

I did chat briefly with a new friend who was in a similar situation a few years ago (they were basically splitting things up). He did talk to his wife's dad about their situation and that seemed to help them get on the right track.

I want to do the same but I'm stuck at whether I should. It doesn't seem fair for me to inform him about his daughter's decision to leave the decision (I don't know if they've talked or not). But I do know he plays a big role in her life, has been supportive of our marriage and has encouraged her to stick with it to try to find a way to make it work.

She did tell me she was nervous about speaking to him. That if he thought she should stick with it then I'd "have my wife back".

He and I have never talked about my marriage with his daughter.

I wonder also if I should talk to her best friend. Her friend I think has been supportive of my wife wife in all of this, at least I don't think she's been eagerly advocating divorce. My wife told me she mentionedshe was in touch with the OM to this friend and she responded by noting that she too also had a past bf she could not talk to because of the temptation, because it would not be good for her.

I guess I'm trying to reach out to others to help me save my marriage...is that appropriate in the instances I've noted?

I just don't know...

Wait I'm confused? have you not exposed the affair? Her dad should already KNOW about your situation.

If you want your marriage to work then you need to expose it to EVERYONE!
Family
Friends
Co-workers
Neighbors
OMW
ETc..

Why have you not done that?

Well, one, she sent him a fb msg explaining she could no longer talk to him. She told me about the FB msg and I saw it. In the FB msg she told him she was making dramatic changes in her life. Though she did try to talk to him on Friday.

I haven't exposed it out of fear. And because she says it was merely a symptom of larger problems in our relationship. It also doesn't seem to be affecting her decisions now to end the marriage.

It seems vengeful, too.

I feel like if I do expose it she'll become even more certain of wanting to end the marriage, that I am trying to hurt her rather than help us.

I don't understand this concept. Help me learn about it, please. Am I thinking normally about this?

I mean, she said she's done with us, what right do I have to expose this?

.....we need a nice big thread with all the quotes on Exposure....

Exposure is your #1 big gun against this affair. It is the MOST effective tool you got.

You have EVERY right to expose this - this is the preservation of your family we're talking about.

Exposure will make her angry, but your marriage can survive anger, it cannot survive her affair. Exposure is like an intervention. Painful, and will fill the addict with anger, but NECESSARY for recovery.

ML has some great quotes on exposure. I'll see what I can find.

Oh - and she isn't 'done' with you. If she were done, the papers would already be filed. She is trying to rationalize in her mind why it is ok to be foolin' around with another guy. She's constructing a fog of rationalizations around herself so she can sleep at night.

This isn't 'done'.

This is an affair.

The rules you think apply, don't.

I'm gonna go find some info for you.

I would appreciate any further info, advice, insight. I think my situation is a little different and that it may not warrant the exposure process I've seen described. Tje communication that she described to me was more along the lines of how ya doin, whatcha up to, some talk about our marriage and his, and a little sexual innuendo tossed in. She did express that part of the interaction was a sexual temptation. I didn't ask her to elaborate and she didn't offer.

I se that as different from the other EAs here where the two ppl were talking about a potential future, overt sex talk, etc. Hers was more frienddly, as she described it...it was an easy convsersation, he was neutral and didn't judge, and no drama there as there wouldve been had she and I been talking.

Am I being na�ve or foolish?!

JMak, I am in a similar situation right now, and while I first thought it was not an affair, I found out all to soon that it was as soon as I installed a keylogger on her computer. I have been tracking e-mails between her an OM since last week, and believe me it is painful to read those words back and forth between them and not say anything about it. I am waiting to get the real intel, and gather intel on OM friends and family in order to fully expose the affair. Whether it works or not, I have to do something. I can't sit around and watch my marriage of 6 years with 2 young children go down the drain because some EN's went unmet. Filling the LB again can be done rather easily I think once enough deposits have been made to get her out of the negative balance so she'll let me try. But as long as the OM is still in the picture, and he is making deposits as well, it is a very uphill battle. The affair has to be exposed to be broken.

I just started reading His Needs, Her Needs today. Great book that I think will put a lot of things into perspective for you. Strongly recommend you pick up a copy.

I am sorry you are experiencing the same pain that I and others are going through. But come back here often for support. I am here all the time and everyone wants to help you save your marriage.

Good luck

SteveinJax

Yes!
I see some serious wishful-thinking all over your thread.
Your wife is having sexual fantasies about OM (and admitting this to OM!) and is sending "racy" pictures to him and you still do not want to believe that there is affair???

I do not believe a word that she is telling to you about "not sending" or "almost sending" or "saving only in drafts" affair letters. Have you verified this? Have you snooped to find out what is actually going on?

I can guarantee you - much more than your WW lets you believe.

So my problem is how do I make deposits when she has checked out, expressed no hope and no willingness to work on this, and without pissing her off/smothering her?

Any suggestions re: which book(s) I should be reading given my circumstances?

Marriage books
Anger Mgmt books

What would you recommend?

Highly recommend His Needs, Her Needs and Surviving and Affair by Willard Harley.

I am just about done with HNHN, absolutely will open your eyes!!! Have read first couple chapters of SAA, and trust me you will learn a lot. There are several threads wheels, Melody, and others can provide on other good topics as well.

Love Busters by Dr Harley is another one. Just got in the mail yesterday, but have not started it. Recommended to me by the folks here.

I understand exactly what you mean about how to make LB deposits when she has already checked out. Right now I don't think there is a lot you can do about that. Need to focus on 2 things... exposing the affair, and avoid love busters. You can read more about love busters on this site, and I recommend picking up a copy of the book.