I have the book. I have some other CDs for the MB program but not the HNHN book.)

We reviewed that checklist (from your link) already. I agree that maintaining NC is priority 1!

I keep emphasizing to H that we aren't just "getting back together" but that we are looking for a new marriage - a new way of relating. He is definitely on board with that.

One of the primary jobs of a "marriage coach" is to motivate the spouse whom is lessor invested or motivated to undertake the MB process. The "reluctant spouse".


I'm guessing that is your husband. He's just come off an affair which necessitated many rationalizations, justifications and history rewrites to succumb to. He doesn't think your marriage was great, doesn't see how it can get better and doesn't think you'll ever let him live his affair down no matter what he does. So as one of your coaches I think it's great that you are selling him on the program by saying things like:



Other "get on and keep on board comments" to deliver to your (F)wh are things like:

1. Wow...this MB program sure seems to indicate that we'll be having a lot more sex ( SEX sells)

2. This MB program seems to be indicating that we will get to a point where we really never discuss your affair again (which sells against his fear of recovering but never never being able to ever live down what he did).

Anyway...just continue to be aware of the fact that he's kinda early in withdrawal and you'll likely have to "sell" and re-sell him on the MB program while you're working on the program. Try to point out areas of the program that will benefit HIM as well as you. That working this program isn't about his affair it's about FINALLY building the marriage both of you likely wished for as children and young adults. It's about becoming good spouses and thus, good respectable people. An example to your children and to others about forgiveness and redemption. Modeling how good "doing the right thing" can become.

BOTH OF YOU....get the payoff from working MB. It's not a punishment program where he has to delve into his family or childhood issues to figure out "WHY????". Instead...it's like a hurricane relief program that comes in AFTER the disaster you both (mostly him for the affair but accepting your end of the responsibility) created and just bulldozing the old marriage away and rebuilding from scratch.

Mr. Wondering

I have experience that backs this up !

Mr W: I TOTALLY agree! Most of what you said is exactly what I said to H on Saturday. So - I'm learning well! :-)

And I agree...sex DOES sell. lol

Pepper: you learn by doing, right? hee hee (love the ROTFL dude!)

So....H is coming over and bringing some of his things back tonight. We're going to watch a basketball game and have dinner. I will plan on sitting down with him and scheduling our 15-20 hours for the week and see where he is on his questionnaires. We can also reiterate our terms - continued NC and MB program, etc...

Quick update: H brought some of his stuff over last night and is bringing the rest home today. So...he will be fully back home today. We had a nice evening last night. In some ways I keep expecting the other shoe to drop because things are going exceptionally well... All boundaries are being maintained, reconnecting is feeling good and natural, and H is being as gracious as he possibly can be to help me feel comfortable.

Take it as it comes, right?! I've had a few small triggers that have made me a tad uneasy, but that's to be expected. Watching a movie last night the name of the town was the same as OW's name! That wasn't fun. Then, H left his cellphone this morning and came back to get it and I started wondering if he seemed "panicked" over leaving it. I didn't talk to him about the movie thing but I did about the cellphone. He reiterated NC, that he wanted me to be assured, and that I had every right to feel the way I do. This is a BIG step for H! A month ago it would have been a different mindset. We agreed that openness and honesty is the only way to go. I told him that he could be honest if he was tempted to contact OW or vice versa but that it was important not to, of course.

Anyway, I find the more gracious H is, the less anger I have over what's happened. Hurt is still there, but lessened.

Sweet!! The sooner the better.

Good Luck..............so happy.................

Thank you, Mel and Jessi!!!

Move home has been completed and already things feel better than living apart. The together time is VERY important to reconnect, as I am seeing by the day. We are looking forward to Thanksgiving and the kids are glad their dad is home. :-) Heck, even the dogs are glad!

I still have triggers that bother me (of course) sometimes hourly. I find with him home though, I get over them much faster.

I feel that this may be a bit of honeymoon phase so I'm keeping my eyes open. I know we still have much needed work to do. It's nice though, to be able to enjoy some peace for a bit.

We have plans to go see the new Harry Potter movie tonight at midnight with the boys and will have to wait in line forever! We can take our MB workbook with us to keep us busy during the wait! LOL

Recovery is still going well with H. I'm looking forward to having more time to do more "work" on things this week with the holiday. I have class tonight and a major paper due. Hopefully, after that can spend some good time getting caught up on my reading and questionnaires for MB.

Overall the attitude and atmosphere is really good. I do know that H is REALLY trying. He's doing some very practical things to make sure I feel secure and to change what was "broken" in our relationship on his end before the affair. We are spending all of our free time together and he's even making plans to rearrange some things in the house so that I don't feel isolated when I'm doing homework, etc...

Here's my big issue of the moment. H still has not told me he loves me and that makes me really sad. It's not that he's not an "ILY" kind of guy. He used to say it all the time. He's only been home a short time though and it has been about a month since the A truly ended. I'm sure he must still be going through withdrawal even if he doesn't say so. Is it too soon to expect that? I certainly don't want him saying it if he doesn't mean it!

I know it takes time in reconnecting for feelings to come back and be in love again. I feel we have been doing the right things although, we need to do more reading more quickly in terms of the books. In an intimate sense - things are going well. More than well, actually, lol. I do have to fight my mind in terms of memories of things I read that he wrote to OW and the thought of them being together physically. :-( I DID say ILY to him yesterday but not hear it in return: that hurt a lot! Although, given what we were doing at the moment it is possible he did not understand what I said! It wasn't like I said it straight to him with nothing else going on. SO, I'm inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt. Of course, I was mad at myself for saying it. I wanted him to say it first!

Sunny, I would bring that up and train yourself to bring up all your concerns. Here is what Dr H says about that:
It sounds like things are rocking right along!

OK. I wasn't sure whether to bring it up or not at this point as I didn't want to jump the gun if it was too soon to expect that.

I have to remember that this is now about getting my needs met as much as it is about restoring H's feelings!

Yes, things are rocking right along for the most part, so I'm not complaining. I tend to be a good student when I have good teachers and good material to follow! :-)

You are a great student!!

Keep living the MarriageBuilders lifestyle yourself, including radical honesty with the sole exception of exactly how you're monitoring his compliance with your no-contact agreement. False recoveries really, really suck, so that's why you keep up your vigilance for a time. Eventually, you won't feel the need to check on a daily basis, but while you do, don't feel bad about doing so.

And yes, you got it right, he's in withdrawal from his affair. Expect symptoms to continue for up to six months from the day he agreed to no-contact. If symptoms continue past six months, you can be certain he's in some kind of contact with the other woman.

Encourage him disclosing his feelings to you. For several months, my wife and I scheduled "feelings time" for 8:33 every night for about 10-15 minutes. We would literally sit down with one another and say "tell me about your feelings today". This exercise really opened a lot of emotional doors to intimacy that had remained closed because the two of us misunderstood one another's emotions.

Thanks, Mel!

Great advice, Door! Seems hard to get a man to do - talk about feelings every night, lol. I think that'd be great though.

This is great advice from DoormatNoMore! RAdical honesty DOES NOT apply to your snooping techniques.

True! I see it as part of earning trust back.

Hope you and your family have a Happy Thanksgiving. Hope you are keeping diligent on insuring "No Contact". I think getting him home gives you the best shot at a true recovery but it's no guarantee. Without NC...nothing is possible and if he messes up he should be aware that means you are likely done. You were in Plan A for far too long for you to have to endure a false recovery.

It does sound like you are in the hysterical bonding phase....which is good as it gets you through "no contact" but keep working those MB materials and holding him accountable to actually working a plan. Don't allow him idle time...keep him (and you both) moving forward and distracting each other by focusing on the Plan rather than your feelings. Both of your "feelings" will eventually follow your actions.

Again...NO CONTACT and FOCUS ON THE PLAN.

Mr. Wondering

p.s. - I've been following along with some of the events over where you used to post (db) and it's pretty shocking. Dbmod had one of the most outrageous posts I've ever seen on a marital infidelity board telling a BH not to expose because "outing" his wife, though likely to end the affair, would make recovery impossible. Dbmod thought the BH should do nothing and merely "love" her back to the marriage. That was from a MOD. I was shocked. If you see anyone needing real help that is lost in that quagmire over there send them to us here. MB really is the best program on the internet and a desperate BS needs a program not a bunch of posters giving their own opinions and speaking nonsense to them. IMO, Betrayed Spouses don't need options they just need a plan that works and someone to tell them what best to do.

Mr. W,

You are VERY right about no contact. I cannot imagine working things through with H if he EVER contacted OW again. So far there has been none - not even a hint. We've been doing a great job of the 15-20 hours and meeting needs. You're right, however, that we still need to work the materials. Since things are going good right now it would be easy to think we don't need them but SOOOOOO not true. I do not want our marriage falling back into what it was previously because we failed to learn anything from this and just "got through" it. Quite frankly, I don't think I could work through a false recovery at this point either. Never say never, but I think I'd just be done.

We did have a great Thanksgiving! Hope you did also - as well as everyone else here on MB! Needless to say I was more thankful for my family than ever.

This morning I actually got an "I love you" from H which felt really good! He has been doing his absolute best at making me feel secure again in this relationship and to be appreciative of my efforts. I still am having moments when those little movies, doubts, and thoughts of OW still run through my head. I hate that I can recall so easily the things written between the two of them. Part of me wishes I'd never had to endure that but the other part knows if I would've just stuck my head in the sand, the affair would not only still be going on, but growing stronger.

Which leads me to the other "forum that shall not be named" lol. It is a complete and utter joke what those people are now advising over there! Can you believe that nonsense??? I feel so sorry for anyone over there who comes as a newcomer looking for real advice to deal with infidelity! It makes me cringe. Well, worse than that, it makes me sick because I know where that advice is going to lead those people! I can't lead anyone here any longer because I was BANNED for posting my story of how I dealt in my situation! Can you believe that? Shocked is an understatement of how I felt! I said nothing wrong...but you can't mention any kind of exposure or tough love there at all anymore. You can't use the words "Marriage Builders" or "Harley" or "tough love" or "Dobson" or anything else. Insane.

I agree that MB is THE best plan for not just surviving an affair, but working through it to a recovered marriage! People need real answers - real practical things they can do and not just a bunch of opinions. So glad I have all those tools at hand!

I have not gotten solid proof that my husband is having an affair but he already said something like this to our oldest son last weekend while I was away at a religious retreat with the other 2 older children. WH said "I need to talk to you about something and I feel you are old enough to understand it. As you may have noticed mom and dad are not getting along. I drive mom nuts and mom drives me nuts. I wanted you to know what is going on so you are prepared for what may happen in the future." I was PO'd at WH for talking to DS. WH is laying down the ground work (excuse trail) for him leaving. What WH doesn't know is what is coming his way. He really believes I won't tell anyone and he will just be able to leave after telling people we tried but it just didn't work.