I'm a little unsure of the abbreviations so please bear with me.

I was a single parent of two girls. Prior to receiving my daughters full time I began dating my wife. She at first had a hard time relating to children and will admit herself that she wasn't very nurturing. She was into her business and not very sensitive to matters of the heart. She would cosign everything I shared, I am by no means talking behind her back. Because of these things she is not to fond of how she once treated me and my daughters. I adored this woman in every way possible. Her coldness took a toll prior to our marriage in 2003. We had been dating since 1997. The truth of the matter is I probably should have not married her with the resentments I harbored. She had declined my hand in marriage several times. There was no proposal. She called me asking about the convenience of a wedding date. I said OK. Not taking it serious, because she had cancelled a couple of times before. Then I got another call saying her and her mother found a dress. I thought about all the wrong things as to why I should get married. Security for my daughters. All the potential we had as couple. Our huge popularity in our community. We went through counseling without my defects our resentments being addressed. We got married with me remaining distant emotionally for our first year. I hold thing in. Even though I knew that change was not magically going to take place overnight. I was upset with the progress being made as a family. I still felt like a single parent. She had lipo prior to our marriage. She told me she did not want children. That changed. I built another resentment because I did not want to start over my daughters by this time were early teens. Then to my surprise something wonderful happened. The birth of my son. All anger, bitterness, any bad thing went away. God gave us a new start. The best 2 months of our marriage. As my wife recovered at home she realized all of her very expensive jewelry was missing. People had come to visit to see our son, but we were both devastated when we find out while she was in the hospital I allowed my daughters to stay with their mom. Their mother brought my daughters to our house, use their house key, deactivate the alarm and steal almost all my wife's jewelry. She wanted them gone. I could not allow them to live with a mother like that. The police got involved, an in order for this case to be documented against their mother I would have to press charges against my daughters and effect future scholarships. So much for the happiness. When bringing my daughters home from softball practice shortly after this, we found a realtor's for sale sign in the yard. This is her hometown. My nearest family is two states over. After seeing how easy it was for her to throw away everything we had worked for, we never bounced back. I shut down after that. I began to develop an EA with another woman. By the way I had all these resentments because my wife constantly put me out. Back then she just did not like the fact she made more money than me. That was it. So when this happened it kicked all those bad feeling up in me. Plus she was able to sell without any consent from me. The house stayed on the market for 10 weeks. She had a change of heart because of an intervention from the church family. By this time I was bitter and emotionally involved with someone else. The house came off the market. I never pressed charges just demand intense counseling for their mother. I never felt connected with my wife after that I did not take for better or for worse seriously, or my marriage. Things got better with my wife and daughters in the hand full of months to follow but not between her and I. After their mom went through her program the wanted visitation to increase which lead to them wanting to move back with their mom. My nurturing spirit spilled over into caring for my son. We decide to separate. During this time with out my wife's knowledge my EA grew tremendously. After a year my EA turned physical. I led her to believe the divorce was on the way. Taking the circumstances into consideration, that is the only reason this young lady ever decide to go to another level with me. All the while I'm still holding on to my wife. She has changed by becoming very active in a new church home. She is very pretty, but her life style did not position her to meet guys. She would have dated but it was church, work, son home. The church she started attend is the when my company does the television ministry for. So my affair was hidden. I lost my place trying to take care of multiple homes. Moved back in with my wife, my affair came to the light. I told my wife. The other woman was devastated as well. My wife initially put me out. I went to stay with her. My wife and I continued to keep in touch despite all of this being in the light. All this over the course of this year. As much as I love this other woman. Who is everything I ever wanted. I still feel like I owe my marriage. I did something stupid with the other woman to get her to want me out. (Stayed out till 4am at a poker game) which is way out of character for me. She did not want me to move she just wanted me gone for that morning. I moved back with my wife. These last few weeks have been hell. I thought I could make it work but I dont have a clue. My wife understands and knows it wasnt going to be easy. I just cant be around her because I am constantly thinking about this other woman and wanting to go back. I'm so tired of hurting everyone including myself I need a solution fast! I apologize for a drink of water with a fire hose. Thanks in advance.

Can you break this up into paragraphs? You'll get a lot more people willing to read this if you do.

Just want you to get the most help possible!

The only solution is the end the A and go No Contact for life for starters...

Some questions:
How long has the A been going on? When was the last contact?

How do you know OW? Coworker?

5 years, Yesterday. OW=Coworker. I cant seem to rekindle any feelings for my wife.

Well, things are only going to get worse, not better, if you continue to work with OW. Is she married as well?

Are you ready to rebuild your M and make amends to your W, the victim, in this mess? (this is a yes/no Q)

HopelessJohn,
Do you want to try and recover your marriage or do you want out?



Reading your story seems to indicate communication in your marriage was very poor. You both seem to be conflict avoiders. You're going through withdrawal from affair. By going to another woman you never gave your W a chance to work on improving communication or help improve your M. Withdrawing from her and the marriage isn't going to help you become a better person or father. You have a lot of work here but the question is how far will you go? It takes time to recover a marriage - mine took two years. Have you considered a phone consult with Dr. Harley? Is your wife open to working on a program to help recover the marriage?

Gg

Nope, he's still taking hits off the crackpipe. He still works with her and he saw her yesterday...

John, you CAN rekindle your feelings for your wife and have a passionate romance - IF - you put down the crack pipe. That means never seeing or speaking to the OW again even if it means leaving that job.

Is the OW married and if so, does her husband know?

Does your wife know about the affair?

CAn you send her here to us?

Well now :(, while continuing contact with OW, you'll get nowhere on any kind of decision with your marriage. How sad for you and your wife - who at least didn't go to another man and was willing to stay and try to fix marriage - same can't be said about you.

Gg

MelodyLane-No she is not Gg615-you are so right.
How does one find that willingness, to do what has been suggested in this thread. Have I just made my bed hard and need to lay in it?

How do I send her to you?

You need to end contact with the other woman. period.

Then you can start to work on the marriage. Remember there was a reason, an attraction that prompted you to marry to begin with. Start there.....

John, send her to this thread and have her sign up here so she can post.

I am still not clear on my questions:

1. is the OW married?

2. does her H know what you have done?

3. does your wife know about the affair?

1. No
2. N.A.
3. Yes, in spite of me and the OW staying together for almost a year, my wife still wants our marriage to work.

Hopelessjohn,
You need to talk to both women and make a decision, if you decide to work on your marriage then you need to tell them both this is what you decided.
Then you will do everything possible to make that work, this means that you will not talk or see the OW at all, you will need to get another job so the contact of seeing each other every day doesn't happen......
Then you work at rebuilding your marriage, filling each others needs, being the partner the other can trust and believe in........
You must be totally transparent......
I would suggest that you live by yourself while you work on yourself to see why you are doing this to these women, jumping from one to another, you are being selfish and mean, playing with their lives and hearts.......
You married your wife, start respecting that and her.........
Having an affair is so wrong, this is your problem, get some help.......

How old are you?
How long were you separated from your wife?
What needs does OW meet for you besides sex that your W does not?
blessing

John,

First off, the OW is a whore. No ifs, ands, buts about it. I don't care what you led her to believe, she decided to have an affair with a married man hoping he would leave his wife and kids for her. That is the definition of harlot. OW is no good. I want you to understand that regardless of what happens between you and your wife, the OW is not great, she's not everything you ever wanted, she's a manipulative husband stealer who will only cause more pain to you and your family in the future. If she has no problem stealing your wife's husband, she'll have no problem stealing another woman's husband when (god forbid) she's married to you, things aren't great, and the opportunity presents itself. Find a new place of employment, cut off all contact with OW for life (change phone number and email to keep her from dragging you back in), and then get some counseling and decide what you want to do with your life. Yes, your marriage was dysfunctional before, but that doesn't mean it can't be fixed. Leaving your wife for this OW won't be a functional relationship. It's already dysfunctional. You will just repeat the same patterns and mistakes with this new woman or any other woman until you get yourself fixed.

Yes, OW is no good. She is also a loser. SHe wasted 5 years of her life after you, when you could not committ to her nor to your M. This indicate she has very very low self worth and will represent a huge problem to you should you chose her.
The solution is not outside...is within.
You will not solve your problems by falling in love with new people...you will increase them. You in fact said that your life now is h@ll.
If you continue on this path you will make it even worse.
You are a father and a husband..that is who you are. Your place is in your M with your wife and kids. Nothing else can make you happy if you do not have this base in your life.
You need to do a lot of inward work and come to terms with yourself and why you hurt people (and ultimately why you hurt yourself).
blessing

So what's the plan?

Are you willing to get another job to save this marriage??

No! He needs to quit his job, write a no-contact letter to OW, have his wife approve and mail it to her. He does NOT need to talk to OW about his decisions about his marriage. She has no input and she doesn't matter.

John, please send your wife here so we can help her too.