Exactly.

In fact, Bob... be ready for even your genuine attempts to keep ringing her bovine excrement alarm bells. You have invalidated your entire relationship and marital history in her mind and heart. You have destroyed her image of you.

Time, patience, and consistency are your armaments now.

Bob, I am not very good at advice on these boards. But I would like to mention that i commend you for your efforts to better yourself. I know some of the 2x4s you been getting must be hard and how awful you must feel with your guilt and how awful your wife must feel, but stay at it and keep moving forward. I think your doing great considering your circumstances. If nothing else ... you will be a better person in the end even, if you dont get your wife back.

Good Luck!

MrNiceGuy, I appreciate your encouragement as well as others who have voiced it. I know that I am the sole perpetrator of my wife's pain because I betrayed her. I realize that on the thread I don't always say the right things or come off as other members would expect a repenting soul. My whole heart is in this time of gaining an understanding of the thought and actions encompassing what I've done and in taking steps to change habits with the hope I can save my family. The 2x4s are warranted and those who swing them have every right. I welcome all comments because everyone else has experience on the matter and I can only progress from the wisdom. So thank you everyone, and yes, I'm kicking myself for not complimenting her on her outfit last night.

TexasBob,

If your wife chooses to divorce you, please respect her decision and don't try to put YOUR hopes of marital recovery on her. You have inflicted wounds on your BW that will take her years to recover from...she does not need more weight thrown on top of her because you now want to win her back after you slaughtered her. Do right by her because it is the right thing to do regardless of the consequences to yourself.

I sincerely hope you get yourself together. You may still be able to recover your M but so long as you are an unsafe wayward, your wife should proceed with divorce if she chooses.

@TexasBob -

The reason I mentioned the Open/Honest Inquiry and meeting ENs is not for the payoff you can get from doing these with your BETRAYED SPOUSE, but so that you can start to empathize with what your wife has gone through and is going through.

As a wayward you are a person that is thoughtless and selfish. Being able to meet needs of others means that you need to be thoughtful and willing to give.

I must mention that I'm not trying to help you to recover your marriage, but to help you recover.

So I reiterate again, what is your BS top 5 Ens? What is your children top 5 ENs?

It is okay to make mistakes, you're wayward! It is the nature of waywards to make mistakes. IMHO, there is no other worst mistake than to have an affair. So the minute you became wayward it was inevitable to continue making mistakes. LOL!

TexasBob, you are on the right path. I don't normally contribute to wayward threads because I'm not sure if I can help but I see hope here. Of course you are not there yet but I think you might have what it takes to make it.
As for your BS's ENs I would say that the one thing you can really help her with is the children. I know very well how hard it is to work and look after 3 small children. And there is nobody she can trust with the girls like you because there is nobody who loves them like you do. Not only are you providing FC and DS but also you are showing support for her career. Offer but don't impose your help. The fact that you are available at all times to help will show clearly your priorities.
Do fun things with the girls. Take them for bicycle rides. If one of them is too small to cycle, get a seat for the back of your bicycle. I know mine loved that.

TB,
Another thought. Children love routines. It reassures them. Find something nice to do and do it consistently every week eg every Saturday afternoon Daddy takes us for a cycle and we stop for a little picnic at the park. Or he takes us swimming and after we to to the shop and get to choose a treat each afterwards. Make sure it's something you enjoy too so that it's a shared moment of pleasure, not something you are doing for their sake. They will sense that. After you've done it for a while you could maybe extend a casual invitation to BW to join you.

TexasBob,

Thanks for your story, I just read it today. I am on the front end of this story. It has given me the hope of continuing to do the right things without falling into the dark place that I was for so long.

In the first week after confessing to my wife, and to the Bishop, I really felt like dying. I too had resolved to do it...I could see so clearly the pain I had caused my wife, and how deeply I had betrayed her. Fortunately, after getting spiritually and emotionally in the right place, I realized I needed to make myself better - set better boundaries with women, get rid of pride - regardless of what my wife decided about divorce. Speaking form the religious side, restitution is part of the repentance process. In a case like this it is extremely difficult to restore what was lost. But for me, and this may not be what comes to everyone's mind, I realized that the restitution in this case wouldn't be made by my actions, but rather restoring myself into a stronger version of me, with all the qualities that I expected of myself, and that my wife expected of me. It will be a long road, but it will be worth it. I hope you can stay on the right path, and come to realize that as long as you continue to choose the right, and not let yourself get dragged down into depression, you should come to peace with whatever decisions your wife may make in the future.

Tully must not live in the frigid north where our bikes are put away for the winter.

Snowmen, snow balls, snow angels, sledding. Same thing - her good advice translated to northern speak.

Edit: oops. I forgot your name was TexasBob. I was thinking your ditch story included snow/ice.

No, Delta, I don't, although we are going through an exceptional cold spell at the moment. But you got the kind of thing I meant anyway

Tully, that's a great idea. Again we've been seperated now for 6 months and it's been 2 months on the new path. The kids and I are together often and I think bowling with the bumpers and ramps for kids would be fun as a routine activity.

Delta, I'm in your shoes. Although screen name says Texas, we are in IL. Last night's 5 inches of snow gave me an opprotunity to shovel her driveway and a few of my old neighbors. So bowling could be injured year around.

seriously_WS, thank you for your support and I'll keep you in my prayers with your efforts.

Texas, I think you are on the right path right now, but its going to take a long time. Since you have finished reading SAA in a day, you have identified your EN's. Now can you identify for us your wifes En's? It is uber important that you try your best to recognise her EN's and fulfill them.

Also check out the LB's. What are your major LB's that you commit against your wife? Identify and fix those also.

The thing about EN's is that they are not something you can fulfill for yourself. only others can fill your EN's. The number one rule to help strengthen your boundaries is that only your loving wife is allowed to fulfill your ENs. If I am correct then I know you have made a covenant with god and your wife to only have sexual relations with her and no one else for all time and eternity. To help keep that covenant in the future it is important to affair proof yourself (especially now that you are living in another house, vulnerable) by not having anyone other than your loving wife fulfill your EN's no matter how much your taker is starving for them. This is a planned boundary.

Also never put Miracle of Forgiveness down read and reread. President Kimball bluntly represents the pain that adultery causes, and what it can do to a soul and family. Very excellent book because it hits the nail on the head so well that it should prevent any reader from ever having a desire to commit adultry. Also church related, I know what your bishop is telling you and there is no better spiritaul advice you can get.

Pick up His Needs Her Needs, and Love Busters.

Sooner or later you can tell others how to strengthen a marriage and what it means to have boundaries.

It sits next to my bed with the book mark in it where I left off at thoughts becoming actions.

I would list my wife's EN's as:
-admiration
-honesty and openness
-conversation
-financial support
-family commitment
I'm not sure in that particular order though.

Conversation is the easiest need to meet without your WW lowering her defenses. What are her interests? What does she talk to her girlfriends about? Pop culture, politics? Prepare yourself to have an intelligent 15-30 minute conversation with her on one of her favorite topics. Find a way to smoothly work that topic into your conversation and try to engage her. If it doesn't work, try again later with something else.

Continue to help out with the snow and other things around the house. Ask if there is anything that needs to be done around the house (fix a leak, etc.). Whenever you see her, find something to compliment her about, (I like your hair that way, that outfit looks nice, etc.). Don't go overboard. Just something you would have normally said to one of your ride along skanks to compliment them. And I don't think I need to adress the honesty one.

Just reporting in. The girls and I are hanging out for the weekend while mommy is out of town on business. As I picked them up from our house this morning I couldn't help but notice the condition of the house so I seized the opprotunity later to go back and make it so when she returns it's one less thing on her plate. Plus, tomorrow we will start our weekly bowling activity and the kids are excited.

Bob, do you mean you're going to clean her house for her? Maybe it's just me, but if I were her and got back home to a clean house I would consider it a little creepy.

It's just you.

I think it's very sweet.

If I was on my way home, thinking about and dreading all the chores I needed to do, and then opened the door to a clean, neat home I would be very grateful!

I think it's a great idea!

But..from a guy you're divorcing? I dunno...I guess it IS me. I would feel kind of like I was being, I don't know, stalked, maybe.

Did you see that movie with Julia Roberts, where she's being stalked by her neat freak husband, and she opens up her cupboards one day and all of her soup cans are perfectly aligned?

Maybe I shouldn't watch so many movies.