Hi Everyone,

About 4 years ago H and I went through a literal hell. I had thought that we were in recovery until recently (past 4 mos. or so). I found that he was again talking with my ex-friend with whom he'd had an EA with. About 2 months ago he got on to facebook and started with that, looking up old friends etc. He began spending more and more time on it, staying up very late after I'd gone to bed and the like. So last weekend something in my wifey radar went bananas. I came down to our home office and picked up the telephone, hit redial and a female answered and said "Hi Sweetie!" I shuddered and hung up on her. Within seconds she called back and once I'd answered said "I am sorry I've got the wrong #." I replied no ma'am, right number, wrong person.

Turns out she was once a very good friend and first love.

I then immediately downloaded and installed Fchat and recovered all the facebook chat history they'd been doing. This is what really killed me! She asked how we had met and he told her he had a new years eve bash and I showed up. Before the alcohol could wear off he was married with three kids. It isn't wunderland, it sux and he hears her on the love thing it really sux. She asked about divorce and he told her it is an option, just not right now.But he got 3 great kids out of it.

I am absolutely sick inside and cannot even look at him in the face. He says it was a setup because how many wives track their husbands phone calls and the like. Please give me more credit than that idiotic bold faced LIE!!!

Now he is out of town for work and calling me up telling me he loves me, misses me etc. It makes me literally physically ill to the point of throwing up.


I think that I am not at the point of ending the marriage. This one is so awful, the terrible things that he said about me. Please someone tell me that I am not the crazy person here! Input from former WS's would be great too.

I thank all who can help me because I am now ready to walk out the door after 30 years of marriage. We had been or so I had thought working very hard at R.

Jinxie

I'm so sorry you're going through this. You are not crazy and you need to be strong. When you say "this one was so awful" was there anything else you know of besides the EA with your ex-friend? How he has the gall to tell you he loves you, when he calls your discovery a 'setup'? If he has no remorse for what you're going through, I would be sick too. But did you mean you are "now" at the point of ending it? Or was "not" right. I hope you are in individual counseling, you need to take care of you!

Cabbages,

Yes, this new discovery is now with a woman he was friends with and loved before me. He tells her in their chats that he's always thought of her yadda, yadda. She has been sending him texts which I was sneaky and caught 2. One she said I miss you terribly, I am still thinking of you, and are you okay? Now he hides the phone from me. They are planning a Dec. get together as she lives in Georgia and we're in Wisconsin. He doesn't see what he is doing as cheating.

Adding insult to injury by telling me the entire conversation was a set up. Please! I am in IC.........

No, you are not crazy. He is. They both are. You're the sane one.

Can you give some background on your marital history? Four years ago he had an A with the same person he's talking to now? It's important for how you deal with this whether this is a rekindling of the same A, or whether he might be a serial cheater.

Start reading some of the stories on here, and you'll find eerie similarities to your own.

What you need to do ASAP:

1. Find out if the OW is M. Expose the A to any husband or boyfriend in the picture, as well as any family/friends of her, your WH, or you. Include chat or email messages as proof, anything that is convincing.

2. Read up on Plan A and Plan B, then get started on Plan A.

3. Be patient. This is a long, hard ride, but time is on your side. You will get through this.

Welcome to MB, the best place to be under the circumstances.

I am beginning to believe that I am married to a serial cheater. This ow is from his past, late teens just before we met. I am so glad to have the support here and am considering either having him leave or me leave for awhile. After him saying that I just do not feel comfortable, I feel like an outsider and stranger with my own husband. It is sick.

He doesn't see it as cheating! Over 200 texts in 4 days time with this woman!

jinx,

Expose the affair to everyone in your family, his family, and the OW's family that will listen to you. When you expose, do not let your WH know you are going to do it - it is all to be done at the same time, without any warning to him, and without any apologies or excuses. When you expose, it is NOT done to harm your WH, but to KILL THE AFFAIR. Remember that. Your purpose is to make sure that the affair is exposed to the light of day, because these things don't do well when they are opened up and out of the secrecy.

Get the information about the OW, specifically her husband's name and contact information. DO NOT WARN YOUR HUSBAND.

Expose the affair to her husband. Then, call your family and your husband's family. Then, tell your kids.


When exposing, do not badmouth your husband, or the OW. That is not your purpose.

Remember, exposure is to kill the affair.


Here is one idea as to what to say:


"I am calling to tell you that my husband is having an (emotional or physical) affair with _________. She lives in _______, and I believe the affair began about _______ months ago. Our marriage has suffered from infidelity before when my husband cheated with __________, and we were able to get back on track. I have evidence of this affair if anyone is interested. At this time, I want to save my marriage, but my husband is currently lying to protect the affair. In order to save the marriage I need my friends and family to help discourage his affair behavior, discourage his lying, and to support our marriage by helping both of us through this very difficult time. I know that my husband is a better man than this, and we can survive this affair - but we cannot survive having a third person in the marriage. You all can help us by being a friend to the marriage, and an enemy of the affair.




If they ask specific questions about the other woman, give her name and location, and tell them that she has a FB account and they can direct their messages to her via FB. They can direct their affair questions to your WH - but right now all you want to do is ask for marriage support, and friendship for that.

You will see love from your true friends. The rest of them can go to.....well,,,,, you know where.


SB

When you tell your kids, just be calm and clear. Tell them that their father lied when you confronted him, but that you have evidence that they can see if they choose.


He will be ANGRY when he finds out that you exposed the affair.

Your marriage can survive his anger.

It cannot survive his having another woman in the bedroom.

Sorry you've had cause to find your way here, Jinxie.

Lots of people somehow don't regard an emotional affair as "cheating." They're totally wrong about that, by the way. EAs lead to PAs if left unchecked.

Read all the info in the yellow box on the right-hand side of this site.

The advice you are getting re: exposure is crucial. The mere probability of imminent exposure is all it took to end my affair (once my OW's husband found her out by means of a private investigator). It's possible that your husband may be a "cake-eater" -- someone who's not really motivated to leave the marriage, but who is happy to indulge opportunities to establish emotional intimacies outside your marriage when opportunities arise. And as long as he could conceal this, it was cost-free for him.

Your first task is to raise the cost. Gather convincing evidence and then blast it to EVERYONE whose opinion matters to him. Don't warn him in advance that you're going to do this. The purpose of this exposure is to rip off the veil of secrecy under which affairs thrive & without which they often die. Don't expose in small increments; expose massively, widely -- "shock & awe." Yeah, he'll be angry; but so what? It might put him on the path toward fixing what's wrong in him (missing boundaries) and helping to save your marriage if that's what you decide you want.

And then, if you can, find out who the other women are and track down their relatives/friends, etc., as best you can (for a small fee, PeopleSearch or similar services can get you helpful details), and expose to those folks as well, so that there's pressure on the affair from both sides.

Until you kill the affair(s), it's more difficult to save the marriage if that's your choice.

Exposure will destroy this affair, I always ask my husband wheels "why didn't you expose earlier?" Because I KNOW that it will KILL IT DEAD ON IT'S TRACK!

People who you need to expose to

Parents (both sides)
Kids
Family (sister/brother/cousins/etc)
Friends
Work
OWH (if she is married)
OW friends/family

Good luck!

Wow, Jinxie. I'm going through the same thing--32 years of marriage--the OW even lives in Georgia. Her name doesn't happen to begin with a Y does it?

Wow, I thank you all so very much for the input,support and advice! I have found that this woman is married, unhappily. Even though she lives in another state WH doesn't get how this is cheating and constitutes an affair!

This is going to break my children's hearts. Our sons really look up to their father and respect him. They are going to be devastated for sure, again.

Meggin, no her name begins with a "P". I remember meeting her before we had actually married and knew that they had a very close friendship but had at that time never actually been a couple. Now I am finding out that they realize how stupid they were. Makes me want to gag.

He is coming home today from his business trip. Each night he calls and every day texting, telling me how much he loves me and misses me.This morning he said you could at least aknowledge it even if it's to tell me to frick off. I just cannot answer him or respond in any way that is nice because I am so hurt and angry. I really need to get myself together and decide what I am going to do. If we are to stay in this marriage then he seriously needs to dig down and figure out what is making him do this repeatedly. The are always EA's. He doesn't get that because there is no sex doesn't make it any less damaging or hurtful.

Jinxie

Have you decided when you are going to expose this affair? The longer you wait the longer you are enabling this affair to continue, you need to understand that affair thrive on secrecy so once it's out and EVERYONE knows then the fog will lift and they will see the reality in things.

Also the OWH MUST KNOW ASAP! Like the DAY you found out this was happening.

I just wanted to tell you how very sorry I am that you find yourself here. I am still in recovery, but trying to offer my support to newbies coming on the site like was offered me when I first showed up. Its a long and bumpy road, but I am healing slowly but surly and so can you!!

HU

"The are always EA's. He doesn't get that because there is no sex doesn't make it any less damaging or hurtful."

My FWH felt the same way. Almost a year later he not understands how hurtful these types of As can be. It took a while for him to understand but the thing that helped him most was us reading Surving an Affair. After reading how an A starts he better understood how his EA hurt our marriage, me, our family and him.

Hope this helps give you some hope.

Expose swiftly, and all at once. OWH needs to know because that's what is right, but he can also wind up being one of your best allies. Even if he doesn't work with you directly, his very presence will be pulling her in a direction away from your WH.

So WH thinks he was stupid to pass up OW the first time? There was a reason, and probably a very good one, not that you can expect him to realize that right now.

Take everything he says with the whole blasted saltshaker. Nothing he says about you, his feelings for you in the past, or anything about your history together, will be true. It will all be filtered through his scrambled alien mind.

Are you ready to put on your game face and begin Plan A?

When I hear, "It was 'only' an emotional affair," it always makes me think of this:


Three guys have sex with the same woman on the same day. She ends up pregnant. All three guys realize that they have a chance of being the father. Finally, the DNA comes back and identifies the bio-dad. The other two say, "I wasn't to blame."


Really?????? Or was that just......good luck, or bad luck?
Or an odds game?????


The three guys had sex and only one got the positive reading on the 'dad' test.

An emotional affair is simply an affair that didn't "result" in a positive reading on the 'sexual intercourse' test.


I don't see much of a difference. The same "CHEATING" HAPPENED.



SB

Yes I so agree with you, it is still cheating. I think it is just a way for some wayward spouses to justify it in their own minds. Like this isn't harmful. Jerks.

When are you exposing?