YES. At least over the last 2.5 years or so. I wasn't very forthcoming with info at first. But since then, everything is out there. Can I be honest? I wish I had lied. I just don't see the benefit of all this painful information.



I have had absolutely 100% NC for 3 yrs. When my A was first discovered, I didn't fully break it off for a year. I did run into him once, but I was with my H. It's plausible I would run into him but it wouldn't be very often. My H used to make it a point in places where OM would be just to make him uncomfortable. I don't think he does that as much anymore.



He is so fed up at this point, but for awhile it was me sticking up for myself with the namecalling. Then after that, it was me turning him down for sex (again, stuff that is against my morals) or me trying to get a day off from having these nonproductive sexual details conversations.

My H is such a hard man to figure out. I know that he feels that I am lucky that he even speaks with me and that he has gone above and beyond what he feels is required to remedy this situation and the rest is up to me.

I know... that's what is killing me. The thing is, all these years later and despite this terrible relationship we have, I want to recover my marriage so badly. I see the way that he deals with OtHER people and he is such a unique person. He is probably the smartest guy I've ever known, very witty and very funny, and not afraid of anyone or anything. If he thinks he is right about something, he will go to the mat. I wish I had broken it off in that first year.

All that being said, I don't think it's all that big of an issue to my BH. He NEVER talks about it, anyway. He seems only concerned about the sexual aspect. The number of times, the acts, etc. He's told me many times that as far as he is concerned, an A with 10 encounters is 10x worse than an A with 1 encounter.

outofkilter, I would listen to what Mel has to say for sure because she will give you objective, clear, MB advice. I would read all you can here and read SAA. I would also call the Harley's

Bringing another person into your M is never right. Ever. I don't care if you had orgies with the OM. You don't have threesomes with your DH just because you did it during an A. That is stupid. If you have always had a conviction about anal sex, for example, but you consented during your wayward fog, that does NOT mean you go do it with DH. Doing things that make you feel dirty will NOT help your M. And you will NOT find Dr. Harley advocating that.

You have to learn to filter sometimes here. Let people like Melodylane, Pepperband, Herpapabear, Just Learning, etc. be your guide.

BTW one other thing. No way am I going to give him any type of untimatum because there is a good chance he would call my bluff. If he does that, it's a total disaster because I know he would get custody of my child. Now everyone is going to say, "you don't know that", but I will say "you don't know my H", because he will fight until his last breath and then some. The man appeals parking tickets! He is a great father, though.

Believe me, if you didn't tell him it would be WORSE. And there would be no chance for recovery. Not telling him would have added more lies to the mix and I assure you he would have been more angry, if you can even imagine that.

Not telling him the facts about his own life, would be as cruel as your affair. So be assured you did the right thing in telling him the truth. This would be hopeless without it.

Thank you. The reason that this hurt so much is that I want to make sure I never make this mistake again as long as I live. I have to maintain my self respect at all costs in order to live up to that promise that I made to myself.
Husband doesn't see it that way, though.[

quote]

outofkilter, I would listen to what Mel has to say for sure because she will give you objective, clear, MB advice. I would read all you can here and read SAA. I would also call the Harley's

Bringing another person into your M is never right. Ever. I don't care if you had orgies with the OM. You don't have threesomes with your DH just because you did it during an A. That is stupid. If you have always had a conviction about anal sex, for example, but you consented during your wayward fog, that does NOT mean you go do it with DH. Doing things that make you feel dirty will NOT help your M. And you will NOT find Dr. Harley advocating that.

You have to learn to filter sometimes here. Let people like Melodylane, Pepperband, Herpapabear, Just Learning, etc. be your guide.[/quote]

PLEASE make an appointment with Steve Harley. He can tell you what to say to coax your H into recovery.

Your H is resentful of the sex you shared with the OM, but he is destroying your desire to have sex with HIM with his tactics. He needs an objective outsider to point this out to him. Steve can help him get what he wants out of this marriage.

I don't know Melody. I've read a lot of these boards and that seems like the case most of the time, but I have to tell you I just don't believe that in my heart in my situation.

AMEN! Waywards do things they find utterly disgusting when they are wayward. Bringing those things into the present will not help, they will HARM. Your H doesn't understand that he is making you sexually averse by asking you to do unpleasant things in the bedroom. His hostility is causing an emotional breach in your sex life.

Women need 2 things in order to desire sex: an emotional attachment and the prospect of enjoyment. Your H actively strives to negate BOTH of those things. He is creating aversion and incompatibility.

Thanks lurioosi. Glad you chimed in here!

This attitude makes me wonder if you are withholding any pertinent details from him? If that is the case, it would explain his fury this far out. It is unusual to see a BS this angry this far out. How long did it take him to get the truth? Did you play trickle truth with him?

Lying is never the solution to adultery. He has a RIGHT to know every detail about your affair. You have no right to withhold anything from him.

Are you withholding anything from him?

Angel, as a junior member, you need to read a lot more.


She never was in love with the OM. She had a fantasy, and this so-called "love" for the OM is, was, and always will be


vapor.

It is meaningless, built on lies.

huh? Angel, you need to read up here before you post to newcomers. Your advice has nothing to do with Marriage Builders. Separation should only be a last resort after everything else has been tried because it increases the risk of divorce. This poster is here to attempt to SAVE her marriage, not ruin it.

As far as being in "lurve" with the scumbag OM, it was an infatuation along the lines of a cocaine high. An unnatural high that evaporates when reality sets in.

out of kilter,

You've said a few things that I want to respond to.

First, you said you don't see value in giving him the truth and wish you had lied, because of all the pain he is going through.

In some ways, I understand that. As a BS, there are many days that I think to myself that I wish I had never discovered the affair, had never known, and could go forward in la-la-land as if everything were perfect, and I could innocently believe in the honesty and honor of my FWH.

What good would that have done for me?

Without discovering the affair, would it have stopped? No.
Without discovering the affair, would I have had any chance of understanding what was wrong in my marriage? No.

Without d-day, would I:

have been able to get my marriage on a track to openness and honesty?
been able to figure out what we were doing wrong? no
be able to understand his Emotional Needs and how to shift gears when they change? no
have made any changes to my approach to our relationship? no
have ever reflected on how I impacted his approach to me? no
have made any changes to our sex life? no


be stuck in the same marriage, with the same problems, with the same husband who was chasing another woman because he could not and would not ever make the decision to make changes in our relationship?????? you bet.



And by now, five years later, our relationship might be



over



Instead of moving forward with the truth on the table, a new plan in place


and our everyday lives filled with the complete understanding of the truth of BOTH of our lives.

No matter how ugly.




The second thing you said was that your husband said that it bothered him that you were with the OM many times....that to him it mattered so much more. It does, because to most men, it is a fairly recognizable issue that having a sexual relationship with a woman over many times indicates that the woman is BONDING with the man. While the man may NOT be bonding, the more frequent the sex, the more likely the woman will bond to the man.

That's why your husband is very bothered.


Then, you throw in there that you do not want to share with him some of the things you did with OM (BTW I completely agree 100% that you should not have a third party in the bedroom with you). This issue, for your husband, speaks more to a secrecy issue and a protectiveness of the relationship with the OM than it does to a conflict between you and your husband.

Consider that your husband sees himself as competing with OM (whether you see it or not - your husband sees it). So, when you make a refusal to perform certain acts, and your husband believes that the reason is that you reserved them for the exclusive performance of the OM, he feels "less than" the OM. Your husband may not recognize or admit this. But there it is.


There is an approach you can take that does not involve arguing. It is an open and honest approach. Next post.

SB

Dear Husband,

A few years ago I committed adultery with a man who participated with me in a number of acts that, at the time, I thought were supposed to be liberating and would show me to be some kind of woman who was of superior sexual prowess. My mindset at the time was selfish, and I had only one thing as my focus - my own wants and desires. I never gave one thought to anyone else's needs or pain, and not a thought to my future, not to mention that I might ever wake up and realize how wrong I was.

I have no idea why I did those things, because looking back, I know they were stupid, deplorable, degrading, and immoral. I cannot believe I ever inhabited that person's body or mind - it is as though an alien took me over.


The worst day of my life was when you discovered the affair, because my behavior was out in the light. Yet, because I was still locked into myself and my selfishness, I continued on with all of it - the affair, the OM, and the desire to have what I thought I wanted. I continued to lie to have it, despite knowing it was all wrong, and was causing pain. My behavior was, and still is, inexcusable. There is no real explanation, except that it was stupid and selfish.


It took me far too long to stop the affair. It took me far too long to stop lying to you. It took me far too long to tell you all of the details that you wanted about the affair.

Now, you have all of those details. I have told you all of the degrading things that happened between me and that despicable man, all of the things that I did and never should have done. Every stupid and deplorable act, every ugly part of every ugly thing I have done. I hold no more secrets, because I know that any secrets between us only place a wall between us and a great future. I want no such wall. I want only a great future.


There is only one more wall for us. There remains a wall that my lying and your resentment has created. The two of us need to work, as hard as possible, to resolve the pain that this affair has caused you. I know that you still have pain, because you talk of needing to know more sexual details, and you ask for me to do things from the affair with you.

I cannot do some things from the affair with you, because these things remind me of the depth of degradation that I sank to. I am not that person anymore, and I never want to be that person again. Deep inside, I know you do not want to be married to the person who did those things, either. Our love life can be wonderful again, when we agree together on the things that are mutually and enthusiastically enjoyable for both of us. Things that degrade either of us, truthfully, degrade both of us. Together we can find new things to do - and there is a way forward that could be pretty exciting....I propose we do that instead.


I would love to have a marriage that is built on openness, honesty, sexual fulfillment for both of us, companionship that builds our trust for each other again, and a way that both of us can fall in love and stay in love.

There is a way for us to recover our marriage, recover our love, and build the marriage of our dreams.

I have plans to start today. I hope that you will start with me.


Love,

Wife

Hello outofkilter,

Sorry that you have to be here at all, but you have alot of good people giving you accurate advice.

It seems that you are sort of skimming over some things or not disclosing at the expense of focusing on the sexual issue. Quite frankly, it has been four years now since your H found out. Did he have a hand in killing the affair in the first place? Have you two really worked on discovering each others' important EN's (emotional needs)? You haven't revealed how long the two of you have been married, but I just sort of feel there were some issues with the latter pre-A that were not being worked on. Affairs just don't sort of happen - they occur usually because the emotional connection between H and W has broken down, and because of poor boundaries. I also feel that the A IS a big deal to him, and not just the PA part of it. It would be to any man (or woman for that matter)! It breaks trust, and that takes a long time to regain, if you want to.

It seems to me that whatever approach you took to reconcile your marriage failed to make him feel safe in his relationship with you. I am not trying to be harsh here - it is most likely due to the fact that you did not have very good counselors and that you did not have knowledge of anything like MB. Do you guys have much in the way of quality UA (undivided attention) during an average week? It seems like most of the time you have been fending off his questions and advances and that turns into a blowup, and of course more hurt feelings. A vicious cycle for any M. Since all has been disclosed about this, please follow what Melody suggested and end it. You guys have a helluva lot more to focus on than what you did or did not do with someone else.

It sounds like at this point that your M relationship is, in your words, a standoff, and even more that he is sort of holding you hostage and using that to vent his resentment by baching and trashing you. I say that because you seem to have a great fear that IF there is a D that you will lose custody. Why is that?

For all of the above I agree with the others here to seek counseling with Dr. Harley, and to read and uderstand the concepts here. You are in a difficult, but not an impossible situation. Good luck.

Tom

outofkilter copy and past this gift then hit print and give to your BH. But you should still call the Harley's first.

You're kidding, right? Shaken, NO ONE should be obligated to perform sexual acts that they would be uncomfortable performing. This is out of line for her husband to demand. I appreciate his devastation, but this is unacceptable behavior on her H's part.

Totally agree. Most counsellors shouldn't hang their shingle. Reserve the right to counsel with the Harleys. Don't waste another dollar on local counselors. No wonder he was arguing with them - most are worthless at saving marriages.

Okay, who was supposed to be watching the gate this weekend?

Do NOT separate. You separate to establish a separate life. This is NOT conducive to recovery. You stay TOGETHER to work on things in order to stay together.

NOTE TO NEW POSTERS: Always check the number of posts under a poster's 'belt' before subscribing to their advice. Newer posters are not necessarily a good source of advice, as they are newly here and still learning about MB themselves.

Whoa! Where did you get THIS idea? Waywards are not "in love" they are in "a fog". It's about as opposite of love as you can get! It is SELF love!
How many other posts have you made, here???