This is the first post that I can find that mentions the possibility of infidelity in Hilltopper's marriage, and it is Hilltopper who mentions it. In his next post he goes to to say that he spied on her phone.

What did I miss? Hilltopper, why did you blast this board for causing the outburst you directed at your wife?

Thought you would find this interesting, Hilltopper:

"I don't trust my wife completely and she doesn't trust me, and that's why neither of us have ever had an affair. Lack of trust does not make spouses paranoid and miserable, it makes their marriages safe." Dr. Willard Harley

And he talks in the infidelity video (on the home page here and on youtube) about a lady that was upset with him for making her paranoid after reading his book "His Needs Her Needs How to Affair-Proof Your Marriage"... He basically says that you SHOULD be worried about an affair because unless you are protecting against one (boundaries, transparency, having an integrated lifestlye, meeting each other's ENs, etc) you WILL be the victim of an affair.

If your M is not in a good place and you are lovebusting each other, now you can't really blame that on us, can you? You two need to own your actions and lovebusters and get them under control...not blame them on other people.

anyway, hope you two will stick around. I think the MB forums are awesome and could really help you! Good luck!

I agree and I am resentful of my needs not being met, my wife knows this and will no doubt read this which is fine. All I can do is speak from the heart and let my wife know how I feel. I thought a lot about replying to these posts and although I have a part of me that wants to "keep the peace" and not offend her, I know the right thing to do is just be honest and see if we can come to some agreements on what is important in meeting each other's EN's.
I don't think my wife treats me like a doormat and does whatever she wants, I do however think that I neglected her EN's for so long during the first part of our marriage that she had to find alternate sources to find them. That would be her friends, running, etc. She is running right now in fact, but she let me cuddle a bit with her this morning before she left so its a small victory. She gave up wanting to meet my EN's but I really think I started it! Either way we know where we stand and although it will be a lot of work I am excited at the possibilities.

I'm not gonna justify that response. Read the entire thread, you can see some very clear cut advice to "get snooping" among other things.

Hill, I can't find what you're talking about. Regardless, snooping on an emotionally distant spouse is never a BAD idea. You're just supposed to keep quiet about it instead of blowing up and accusing them of things you are merely suspicious about. I don't know how you approached it, but if my H asked me why I'd put on clean underwear, I'd simply tell him.

Well said Kilted. I can't get my needs filled elsewhere and frankly I don't want to. I do feel neglected and I think not only are my needs no respected by my wife, I think there is a lot of society in general that feels husbands should feel wrong or guilty for wanting sex from their wives, no?

Alone time is tough with three kids but I'm committed to making this happen. My wife and I had a discussion about EN's getting met more quickly. I think there is a disconnect here. I see stopping LB's and meeting each other's EN's as something you do immediately because we both have the ability to. Feelings of deep love will come later of course, but for now we both can make a conscious choice to do what is necessary right? I'd like some input here from anyone about the subject.

My wife IS withholding sex from me, she said this was just a typo so I needed to point that out, not to have anyone take sides, but because it is relevant to the meeting of EN's that is all. On the flip side I've admitted to intentionally not meeting her EN's specifically because I felt an inequity which is just as wrong and selfish. I can see "running time" being your own time and I'm ok with it. What I'm not ok is with the argument from my wife that she "doesn't have time" to do this frequently. If she has time for running and a variety of other things then she has time for me, she just chooses not to. We discussed this last night as well and I think she knows how I feel about it. On top of that I've never had a problem with any of her activities and I will likely get behind her a lot more with them if and when many of my EN's are met, you know?

This is true, I debate well and my wife not so much. It is a big reason communication can be so tough. All she needs to know is that I don't ever mean to make her feel silly or bad about herself while discussing anything. She has said countless times that I make her feel stupid with my tone. I'll be honest I have a hard time seeing it, but the fact that she says it means its there one way or another. I can work on this more with immediate feedback when it happens I think.

Thanks I made this point earlier. Alone time is tough, but not if we make it a priority in our lives. If it becomes a priority it WILL happen.

I want to reread what you wrote. She LET YOU cuddle for a few minutes and now she's off running. This is what I call living off crumbs. This is her putting her selfish wants before the marriage.

I will say that I'm very fitness minded. I applaud those that keep fit and healthy. However, here is key time that you two could have that alone time talking, touching, cuddling, loving each other.

So she�s out running while you�re sitting wishing she�d spend more time with you. More than likely you�re going to hate it when she goes on those runs and it�s going to become a source of conflict. And what happens if you decide you want to do something at 5am for yourself? Then what? Then you two have a big fight about who gets to do what because you both feel entitled. I used to run off and play indoor soccer. However this was taking time away from my wife and from our time to connect together. When she brought up that she wished I�d stay home to hang out with her, I�d get mad. The problem here is I wasn�t looking to accommodate our marriage (POJA)�the marriage wasn�t a priority. I mean, I was just going to go and play an indoor game for an hour�what�s the big deal?! After I/we got on board with both of us looking at what we can do to improve the marriage, one of the things I had to do wasI change my indoor soccer playing time to really late at night on the nights she had been working long shifts and would be passed out and I�d be sitting on the couch doing nothing. So I changed my recreational activity time to one that didn�t take away from time for us.

Here�s what I would do tonight. Both of you tag team and get the kids in bed together (my wife usually bathes them while I clean up the after-supper kitchen mess). Then fill out the lovebusters sheets and discuss them together. Be honest with each other. Do not get mad at what the other person says�how they feel is how they feel. It is what it is; it isn�t right or wrong. The purpose is to stop doing things that irritate each other. But if one of you or both of you get mad about what makes the other person mad, it defeats everything. Then if you have time fill out the ENs stuff and discuss that. And finally schedule your 15-20 hours of alone time together.

The solution is for both of you to jump in this head first. I know you�ve heard it before but call Steve Harley at least for a couple sessions.

Wow this might be tough to hear for my wife. Independent behavior can definitely harm a marriage, I never thought of it that way. I admit that my wife probably began doing other things in response to me not fulfilling her EN's during the first part of our marriage. Although her instincts tell her that she "needs" to do this stuff, I think the plan here is to minimize it and focus on getting some Undivided Attention with each other asap! In my book this means focus on us first and when appropriate and there is time left then run or whatever, not the other way around.

Melody,

I'm not sure what comments about my wife's body you are referring to you. I can assure you this is not a problem, I think my wife and her body are incredibly sexy as do others! Its not a matter of opinion of my wife being attractive or not!

In regards to your comments about my wife getting away with mistreating me and stopping this bloodbath, that is friggin intense. This is not a "see I told you so moment" for me to point out to my wife. I just think it makes it that much more real to have an outside perspective on what is going on. I've given up many times already and I'm scared that one day I won't want to pony up again, in fact terrified. I don't think my wife is "working hard at pushing me away" is she? That doesn't make any sense, why in the world would she want to do that?

I agree with you actually now that I think about it. The problems are coming to a head because I'm forcing the issue. Yes it is uncomfortable for both of us but I don't think anything would get resolved had I not explored this all. As I've said before this doesn't make me less culpable in the marriage for where it is today and in fact doesn't really matter. We are here now and that is all that matters.

Yes you are missing something Sugar. I was confused by his comment about infidelity and thought he was referring to my situation when he was really referring to his own, that is all. I'm not blasting the board about the decisions I made all on my own to investigate infidelity at all, that was my doing. What I'm concerned about is a fairly quick jump from an unhappy marriage to a possible affair. You all have more experience than me, I took the advice, and checked it out. I think the jump to infidelity if nothing changes after a few months might be more appropriate is all.

Ok maybe I was keeping the peace. My wife will likely reply with a "whats the big deal" so be it. I want to make an immediate change in our lives to spend as much time together as possible period.

Women don't respect men that just keep the peace. You need to let her know exactly how unhappy you are. That you want a better marriage...a great marriage. That you want to become a great husband.

Let her read through the rest of this thread. Then ask her to create her own thread. It really helps when we have both the husband and hte wife posting seperately.

Are you saying that her lovebusters along with the fighting is drawing you CLOSER? How would you characterize it?

She's prob not intentionally pushing you away. But her continued behaviors and actions are pushing you away.

It'd be good if she posted her because we'd see both sides of the fence.

Just told her now that I "stewed" at her running for 2 and 1/2 hours while I sat here with the kids. She told me "we'll spend time together then fine!" Hardly the attitude of someone that really wants to. She told me I was the cause of her not wanting to spend time with me. This is friggin bad news man, she displays behavior of not being will to do what this takes for one reason or another. Melody Lane is right, the way this is going she is gonna push me away until I leave her, she'll be in an apt with all three kids that I visit, etc. But hey, at least she won't have to deal with me wanting a better relationship, what a pain that is! What kind of a selfish jerk am I for wanting a better marriage? I'm gonna be honest at every point of this day and every other day. Its gonna be rough because I have issues with how she treats me pretty much all day. There is no concern for husband in this relationship at all. A couple of kisses and a peaceful day yesterday isn't enough for her to leave me with the kids for 2 1/2 hours this morning on a run. Its my fault for telling her that I thought she shouldn't go. Its also my fault for not telling her it was ok to go to bed cause she was tired and not read the workbook. I was honest with her just now and she looked at me like I was an alien. I told her I didn't care about anything else we do as long as we get to spend time together while the kids are all napping, reading this forum, talking, cuddling. Her attitude was clear, SHE DOESN'T WANT TO SPEND TIME WITH ME! She'll do it to keep the peace but unless I initiate or force the issue it simply won't happen. I hope she reads this and I hope she does her own thread, and I hope she takes this deadly serious because I'm not messing around anymore. She can learn how to meet my EN's and stop the LB's and I mean like today or I see no future for us at this point in time.

That is a good start! You can start by asking her what it would take to make you more enjoyable? Are you unpleasant to be with? Ask her what she would like to do the most when you are together. Ask her what you can do to make your time more enjoyable. This is the kind of open, honest communication that will help you both become more attractive to spend time with.