In theory, this should be true. In reality, the cuckolded husband is always the butt of jokes, in almost every society.

FWIW, I don't know the person who is doing this at the moment. They are choosing to remain anonymous.

I wouldn't be surprised if that's the case. I live in a small community - a secret here is basically something that everyone knows but no-one says that they know.


I'm not an official public figure, but I am well-known in my community.



Correct. I think because of this they know that I'm not going to play the part of typical politician and deny that my FWW was involved in any A, because I would be saying something that I know to be false.

MiM

Couple of things. I am curious how the character assassination campaign against you is being dealt with, hopefully in your favor, and secondly, something you said in NowWhat's thread might need addressing if you have the time.

You gave me a hint there and I attempted to somewhat obliquely tell the guy what was going on. I did the best I could. You may have some ideas, since I think you got it, right away. The OM got himself a trophy. Whoopie. . .


El Camino made some references to that cultural background as well as an extension of it that goes back to what you said with your question relating to character assassination.

All the best MiM, you got here about the same time I did. And much of your situation is the same as mine in so many ways. In my own deal, we reached a point where she wasn't going to go one more step, so I gave up. There were other, compelling, reasons and we divorced.

Larry

It has died down for the moment. It will likely start up again whenever someone who knows feels that they need to "take me down a notch".



That was exactly what was going through my mind.

So, on returning home yesterday from an outing with the girls, "Tangled" gives me a big hug and kiss, and thanks me for "sticking it out" with her and choosing to remain M'd. Turns out she found out via the girls' grape vine that several of our acquaintances and friends were separating, or had separated, or were even vigorously pursuing D this month. What gives? Must be the weather or something...

OR...

It could be that she has reversed her cranial transplant operation and now sees things in the light of day.

Just a thought.

JL

Maybe she found her Midol?

Look MIM. Your wife:

1. Wrecked your sexuality
2. Yells at you every day
3. Lazy
4. Uses you for money and then boinks another man
5. Lies to you constantly
6. Is shady and manipulative
7. Does not, cannot love you and admits she is not in love with you.
8. Has ruined your life completely
9. Had not added much positive to your life
10. Will cheat on you again without a second thought
11. Has no morals, values, or sense of right and wrong.
12. Blatently lies to you, walks all over your feelings, and casually shows you she does not care in any way about you.
13. Pretends to care and appreciate you to keep her place in the marriage.
14. Knows exactly how far she can push you and enjoys pushing you a bit furthur
15. Yells at the kids. They will need 20 years of therapy because of her

If you are to stay with such a human female monster as her, you are quite mentally unbalanced. Perhaps you are caught in that cycle of abuse and your self esteem is so ruined you cannot value yourself enough to get out, away from the abuser. And you do not see clearly what this woman has done to you and is still continuing to do to you. She is working you, man to live off of you, etc. She too is afraid of leaving you becuase you are the paycheck.


I doubt you could ever trust your wife. So I would develop a plan to get other things out of her if you are too afraid to get a divorce.

Make sure she is contributing to the household in every way. This will keep her feet in the marriage.

1. Ask her to contribute financially to the family
2. Ask her to contribute domestic support for the family
3. Ask her to do yardword.
4. Ask her for many other things
5. Ask her to make out a budget with you and stick to it
6. Ask her to refrain from any more outbursts against you and the kids.

I would make it clear there are consequences for not contributing to the family.

The point is, if you are busy asking her to do things and contribute, you are also "putting your stamp" on her and letting her know she just cannot live off you and then disrespect you. It is all about respect. If she knows she can walk all over you and THEN BOINK ANOTHER MAN!!! Well, then you have 15 more years of living with a monster you helped create by not being assertive enough.

A lot of that list assigns attributes to my FWW that are very exaggerated and in some cases very very wrong.

If it was a transplant, it didn't last - things were quickly back to the "new normal" as of Saturday evening. She was actually a bit more short-tempered than usual, in fact. It was good while it lasted .

All, just a quick update. A few days ago, at a small convention, who should be bounce into but the OM. It was a small gathering, he was with friends of ours, and it was basically impossible to avoid him.

About an hour or so after we returned home, my FWW asked me if I wanted to speak about anything (when she tries to start a discussion like that, it's usually about the OM or the A - she wants me to be the one to bring the specific subject up). I said not really, as I don't think that there's anything that could be said that would lead me to feel any better about the situation (particularly as we'd discussed what she would do if such a situation arose, and she didn't do anything we discussed). There was a bit of DJing on her part after that, but I made it clear it wasn't something that I wanted to discuss (especially not with her in that kind of mood).

Later on, I asked her how she felt, running into the OM again, and she replied that she felt "uncomfortable". Now, to the uninitiated, one would likely take that response as being based on how she felt about the OM and leave it at that. However, knowing how I've been misled by my FWW's comments in the past by taking them at "face value", I asked her why she felt that way, and she said "because she knew that I would be feeling uncomfortable in that situation". In other words, no insight at all into how she she currently felt about the OM, grr. From past experience, I knew that further digging into the issue with her would be about as rewarding as trying to dance with a bramble-bush, so I dropped the subject at this point.

I guess I could assume that she felt totally indifferent about the OM (hence her focus on how she thought I might be feeling in that situation), but I know the kind of trouble those assumptions got me into in the past...!

MiM,

OM...he was with friends of ours

Do your "friends" know what happened?

I'm having that struggle with my wife now, OM4s daughter sent my wife a thank you card for being so nice to her father, I want to set the daughter straight but my W is dead set against it. In the past she has told my W she views her like a sister!

When the people on the sideline don't put 2 and 2 together it can be really painful.

God Bless
Gamma

No. At least not officially. I didn't know the MB techniques back then, and the A had basically ended by the time I found out. Thinking back on it, I should have exposed anyway, at least to her office.

A quick update. At the moment, I feel that things have been slowly going downhill again, and I see that some of the older LBing and distant behaviour that I used to accept pre-A is once more returning. In fact, the LBing and distant behaviour recently reached a point that I started having serious doubts about the future of our M and also began to wonder if she was once again starting another "secret life" with someone else.

I think I used to ignore it pre-A because I placed a much greater value on the trust in our M. Of course, that trust was destroyed when she chose to have her A, so now that the behaviour has returned, it's now a lot more noticeable.

We have been planning to do some much-needed renovations to our home. After spending two sleepless nights thinking about our plans and the current state of our relationship, I IM'd my FWW yesterday (the only method I know of communicating with her and being able to get my point across without the conversation devolving into DJs and the like, or me being accused of saying things that I didn't say) and informed her that I was no longer comfortable with proceeding with such a significant financial investment (which will be primarly paid of our my pocket), considering what was happening in our M at the moment. I also indicated why I thought I thought that our M was once again in trouble, that I was beginning to feel that I was being "kept in the dark" again, that the LBing she was putting me through felt the same was what she was doing to me during her A.

Her first response was that I was stopping the plans to punish her. There was no initial concern or even acknowledgement of the reason why I was putting the brakes on - that I thought our M was getting into trouble again. We continued IM'ing for awhile, during which I was accused of "going through phases", and I'll keep "thinking whatever I want to think, no matter what she does", etc., etc. Perhaps I was lucky that she had to leave before the fireworks really started to go off.

We'll have to talk about our current situation again soon. Perhaps tonight. When I got home last night, she didn't mention a word about our earlier conversation. But I did get a hug later on when we were lying down in bed. First one in over a month.

I found out a day or so ago that one of my relatives came home to find his W gone and all of her clothes and other belongings missing (presumably taken with her). One week before Christmas . They have not been M'd for more than a few years, but apparently the M had been going through some problems for at least the last year or so (I don't have all the details, but apparently his W is a WW). I haven't spoken to him yet, so I'm not sure how he's taking it. I am tempted to introduce him to this site. At the very least, it may help him get through what is likely a very trying time.

He will certainly get help here, MiM.

What about your own situation? I have only just read your post from August - I must have been abroad when you made that one. Have things changed at all?

MiM, you are one of the people that came to this site during what some of us have been referring to as the bad old days of MB. I have read your history, and it doesn't seem to me that you were ever taken through Dr Harley's programme.

Do you feel that you have been in a genuine marital recovery? Your wife even posted here for a while. Did your ever use the Marriage Builders programme day-today in your marriage?

MIM,

Send him here, if he understands MB it will be the best Christmas gift ever.

God Bless
Gamma

I'll send him here when the opportunity arises. I'm likely to meet him today, and I'll mention MB.



We seem to be in a sort of "holding pattern" at the moment. My FWW isn't a big MB fan (no surprise there), but understands some of the principles. I try to practice them when I can, particularly the avoidance of love-busting. Meeting ENs however is proving to be difficult. I have some theories around that, but I'll wait a few days before getting into that. Today I'll be spending most of my time with friends and family.

I thought I'd post a little update. As the "Subject" says, I think our M can now be considered as "sexless". Basically we have not had SF since early August last year, when she returned from a trip overseas. We tried, but to me it just didn't feel right, and I have not tried or even approached the subject since. To be honest, I'm a bit turned off at the thought of it, but I'm not sure why. She doesn't seem to mind - she did tell me that SF (which I interpreted as "SF with me" as she apparently did not have the same hangups when with the OM) was not one of her "needs".

Otherwise life seems to be Ok at the moment. We have the odd argument as most M'd couples do, and our lives are a bit more independent than I'd like them to be, but that's about it. Frankly I'm not really concerned about the lack of SF at the moment, but I'm concerned over my lack of concern, if you understand what I mean.

Do you spend nights apart, still?

How much UA time are you two getting?