Gack1,

I just get a little concerned when posters start comparing situations. I know stretch123 was saying he wishes his WW was more amenable to reconciling and working on the M. I pray that she will be one day. I can't even imagine the pain. I think you came close when you said it's like the death of a child. In a way there has been a death, the death of the M as we once knew it. Now a new relationship must be born out of trust and honesty if it's possible.

Our MC's wife is estranged. I noticed that the MC isn't wearing a wedding ring. I can't ditch the MC. BH trusts him totally and has male bonded with him. The MC is very supportive of BH and gives him a safe place to vent. Right now, BH is full or rage and anger. BH's emotions are like a roller coaster right now. I know he needs time to sort out his feelings and to decide if he wants to reconcile or not. He may choose not too. I don't know. This is the hardest thing we've ever been through, shaken to the core. I can only take it one hour at a time. I'm reading the MB articles and learning all that I can. I know how folks feel about the MC but right now, he is a life line for BH. We can't ditch him just yet. MC is not forever, but it's helping right now so we will continue until BH doesn't feel we need it anymore. I've already introduced him to the MB website and invited him to come here to the forum for support.

FF, I would try and get him here as soon as you can. The reason is because most marriages do not recover from affairs.[only 20%] They stay together, but very few ever recover. They limp along for years in a crippled marriage that is worse than the pre-affair marriage.

That is where you are headed if you don't use this program. And counseling will not save your marriage. What will save your marriage is completely changing the dynamics of your marriage and restoring the romantic love.

Marriage Builders is completely different from any other program in that it rebuilds the romantic love in your marriage. It is not about peaceful co-existance or good "communication" or conflict resolution, it is all about falling in love again. People who are in love don't get divorced. People who are in love forget the pain of adultery. I don't know of any other program that does that. In fact, most programs and most traditional counselors will tell you that restoring romantic love is impossible. That is because THEY don't know how to do it.

I understand that your H is benefiting from talking to this man, but that is not going to recover your marriage. That is not a plan. Please don't leave your marriage in his hands, and whatever you do, DON'T TAKE BABY STEPS. "Baby steps" will not recover your marriage. Only a real PLAN will do that. And right now you have no plan. Hope is not a plan. And having no plan is a plan to fail when it comes to adultery.

Don't be complacent about the recovery of your marriage. Get the book Surviving an Affair along with the Five Steps to Romantic Love workbook and start doing this program NOW. We can help you through this because many of us have gone through the counseling and/or the MB programs. You can also write and call Dr Harley FREE on his radio program and he will help you through this.

My suggestion is to make a plan and present it to your H. He needs you to lead the way on the recovery of your marriage and render aide. You are the doctor, he is the patient. The PLAN OF RECOVERY is your medicine. Show him you want this marriage by bringing him a PLAN.

MelodyLane,

I get what you're saying and I agree. I do have a plan. My plan, when BH is ready, is to read Surviving an Affair together. Then to revisit Love Busters book and start builing up the love bank. I don't want to limp along in a sexless M. That's what got us into trouble. We needed help years ago. We have limped along the entire M. Now, that the bottom has fallen out, we have a wonderful opportunity to use everything on the MB website to recover. I plan to do just that. But it will take time. It took us a long time to spiral into this crisis and it will take time to recover. My BH is invested in the M and he wants to stay married so we both are starting with the same goal. I'm very grateful and fortunate to have this as a starting point. We need to affair proof our M and restore the romantic love. If we can restore sex too, that will be great. Since we are both physically ill, that may be different from when we were healthier. But we're not dead yet! Thank you so much for your pearls of wisdom. I am grateful for you sharing and I hope to be a better W as a result of your pearls.

FF, keep in mind that you have a short window of time to start on a plan and restore the love in your marriage. Otherwise, you will fall back into the same old patterns. And I guarantee you that if your H does not have a viable plan to restore the love quickly that resentment will overtake him. There is much here to resent and you might be able to avoid that. Having a plan avoids that path. It doesn't take that long to recover at all. In fact, if you started now, you would be well on your way to romantic feelings within 8 to 12 weeks.

If he has decided he wants to stay in the marriage, there is no reason to wait.

Hi MelodyLane,

I appreciate this insight. The stress of the discovery has caused BH to have 3 severe nosebleeds this past week, two of which he had to be taken to the ER via ambulance. So we haven't have a chance to really talk about our plan. BH says he wants to take FMLA and go visit his folks in AZ for about a month. I'd like to start next week after his follow up visit with the ENT on Tuesday. BH told me he loves me and want to remain married. BH also said that "he is going to put the A where it needs to go and never speak on it again." I was surprised. It seems like it's too soon. We have to affair proof our M as part of the Recovery agreement and the other MB tools.

BH told me that he appreciates all I have done for him this past week that he has been sick and struggling with his health problems. This is a major factor for us as I'm retired due to disability and he is very ill too but continues to work outside the home. BH doesn't want to retire just yet. BH and I need to work on reducing our stress levels. I'm almost certain the disclosure triggered the nosebleeds. He hasn't had one in over a year. We are on a roller coaster. I'm trying to go one day at a time. Today, now that I'm back from the ER, I'm exhausted and plan to take my meds and rest up.

Thank you again for sharing your thoughtful reminders and personal experience. I'm glad the forum is here.

I think you understand this approach will not lead to recovery. You M will limp along and die from a thousand cuts. I know that you understand that. But you are just fresh from his D-Day (very proud of you for exposing yourself btw!! Kudos again FF! You have shown some real personal strength. He will admire you for this someday.)

Getting a MC he trusts to vent with may seem fine for now. But when he gets emotionally stable, and the shock wears off, I bet he will want a MC with a "PLAN" to get you to recovery.

Most MC's have no plan at all. So.... read the SAA book together. Read it twice. There is a lot to learn.

FYI - most friends, family members, acquantences and even licensed so called professional MC's have no skills to help you. Friends & family especially may mean very well because they love you. But they aren't equipped to help. This is very complicated and confusing. But you can recover and develop a marriage with deep, DEEP Romantic love.

Hang in there FF. Nothing sounds out of the ordinary right now. Everything you are experiencing is in the range of normal IMHO.

If you aren't working on a "PLAN" in the next couple weeks... we on this forum will get very worried. You need a plan fast. Your BH needs to get stable and he will suddenly start thinking clearly and working on this (reading, talking, listening, learning)

--Are you both on any anti-depressants or anxiety meds? Go see your Physicians now!
--Have you given him every detail he wants? Total visibility? And does he do the same?
--Listen to his pain. He has a ton to dish out. It goes away and lessens as he shares. Believe me. (In my sitch... I am still compartmentalizing pain and anger b/c WW is not ready to hear it... she admits she knows it will come someday.)
--Keep on working on a plan. Do not force it on him (LB - DJ and not POJA.) But since you seem more stable right now... start developing plans that you can suggest and agree upon the moment he is ready. It might be soon. (I really hope so)

For me, I was an emotional wreck for about 3 weeks after D-Day. If my WW were committed like you are, I might have recovered sooner.

Also, just know, the work will take time. This is a fight. You are in it together (you are not fighting each other) You are fighting the beast of infidelity together so you can BOTH WIN!

Congrats so far. Hang in there!

Stretch 123

I apologize for the delay in my response. I've been out of pocket for awhile. Since D-Day, it was been a roller coaster. My BH is in alot of pain. It's like we're starting all over again, even though the A was 3 years ago. Last night, my BH lost his temper and told me he didn't want to be married to me anymore and that our M was over. Later he came upstairs to apologize and said he didn't mean it. The MC doesn't have the tools/skills to help us. I see that now. But BH is determined that this is what he needs right now.

BH told me that I need to do more to show contrition and remorse. BH told me I need to beg for his forgiveness. I gave him a card that said I am sorry. I wrote him a letter saying that said I would do whatever it takes to make things right between us. BH says I have not done enough yet. BH wants me to grovel, cry maybe, and court him like we did when we were dating. BH said he forgave me but he is angry. He wants me to pay for my mistake.

We both have chronic health problems. BH has been to the ER twice for severe nose bleeds. I am on an antidepressant. We are both under the doctor's care.

I would like to read the SAA book but BH doesn't seem ready. He is cold and distant. He said he wants to finish the MC first. I realize we need a plan soon.

What else should I be doing at this point to make BH feel better? I'm in pain too from his EA that he had for 5 years. It ended in 2007. What do I do with that? I forgave him and moved on.

This is so painful. It's breaking my heart.

Faithforever

FF,

Meet his emotional needs - fill out one the EN questionnaires, as though you were him, and then start meeting the top five emotional needs you believe he has. He needs to see your changes, and actions speak to changes. Letters are fine, but it takes time and action.

Ask him to delay the trip, because it will NOT result in recovery. Print off some information from this website and just read it to him.....he can have his counselor AND the MB program too. One does not preclude the other (but one is BETTER than the other! )

You cannot get points from him by going back and saying anything about his EA. Your affair is what YOU OWN - you had choices to make and made the wrong ones. Let him know that you OWN it 100%. Referring to his bad behavior and EA sounds like blaming...and that does not work. At some point, and on some level, he will figure out what he did wrong back then. Your job now is to be the example for what to do RIGHT in recovering the marriage

and you are in the place to do that.



When he gets angry, your job is only to ask what he might need. He has said he wants you to beg? What he is asking for is to SEE your remorse - he wants it to be tangible to him. When you are feeling terrible about what you have done

-call him
-write him
-talk to him

and let him know that your waves of remorse ARE flooding over you! He has to hear an apology more than one time, he has to "see" your pain and grief over what you have done.

What he needs to know is that you are human, you do experience this. My own bit of advice is that you want to watch that he does not abuse you using this - because if it "feels like power" over you, he may use it that way. This is not a power issue - it is not a competition for who hurts worse, who was more guilty of an affair (PA vs EA), or who is now holding the "upper hand". Look at the POJA information and offer that idea, too.

At some point, he will come to understand how his own EA affected the marriage. He will learn that in the MB program (probably not in MC). So even if he won't read the information, YOU can use it to change yourself, influence change in the marriage, and demonstrate your changes to him.

He doesn't necessarily have to be here, but it would help if he was. I have done it on my own, because my H won't post here or even read here. I printed stuff off, and left it for him to read.

He has read it, because he was curious what I was doing online, and how I was making changes in myself so rapidly.

It has ultimately helped us, even though he isn't a poster here.

Good luck, and keep going.

Invite him online. Seriously.

I sense a problem... he needs to work on meeting your EN's. If he stands on his righteous betrayal pedestal and doesn't recognize the changes necessary in himself.... well, you may not fight for the M.

Your spouse is not your enemy. You need to fight TOGETHER for the marriage.

This is very, very difficult for the surprised spouse to see. The emotional shock is crazy. In my sitch and many other men here... the WW was exposed and they are fighting and kicking and screaming. Seems odd to you doesn't it? We the BH are doing a lot of heavy lifting and the WW is indecisive about coming back to the M... But my point is... the suprised spouse will take a while to get on board with a PLAN.

I hope he comes here. You have been through a lot together and need to work together. We can help him work on his EN's. There are a lot of other BH here and we aren't soft on each other. We empathize and dish out tough advice too.

Start by printing out MB tools like another poster suggested. With our first MC we did the EN questionnairre in his office. This MC had no plans, limited competance, so we paid him for a few sessions to sit there and share our EN's questionnairres. Perhaps your husband will like it... see the site on the pages and pop in.

get your bh here.

FF, that sounds like a pretty healthy, normal reaction to an assault. His reaction is very understandable. It would be better for the marriage if he focused on just compensation instead of forgiveness. Have you read Dr Harley's article about just compensation? Can't We Just Forgive and Forget?


Courting him like you did when you were dating would probably go a long way in healing this rift. He needs you to render aide and assure him he is wanted. I would bend over backwards to re-establish trust by making your life completely transparent in addition to meeting his needs in a way you haven't in the past.

Will he come here?