Oh hun you will go mad, thats too long for you to deal with him sleeping with both of you.

At least we had the pretence that he wasn't sleeping with her. It was never openly admitted till Dec when the world blew up here.

Then it was my way or the highway.

If you can hold it together this weekend, write the plan B letter, change the locks and go dark.

There are others who will go through the details with you. I don't do that kind of help, leave it to the vets.

There is no way I could have done that, respect lady.

Thoughts are with you and I send you good energy.

Oh my I cannot believe how many people seem to have such similar stories. I also cannot believe how many best friends are involved. It's sick.

No doll, it's not sick, it's actually very understandable if you think about it.

You choose a partner you love for a million reasons, you choose friends you care for for a million reasons,

of course they are going to have points of connection. If it's your BF then they will likely see a lot of each other.

It's poor boundaries that make the rest happen. A lack of respect for you and for themselves.

Opportunity + time + justification = affair.

Stop beating yourself up, it's not your fault hun, it is however an opportunity for you to learn.

Read lots here and in terms of healing yourself, have a look at anything by Deepak Chopra. He made a difference to me and the way I saw things.

Remember, you can only change you. You can't change him. But maybe when you change and get to access the powerful woman inside......he will have to run to keep up.

I am a goddess and he is lucky to have me in his life ....... make it your mantra.

Stick it on a mirror and read it every morning.

Be good to yourself and listen to the vets!

Thinkin of you today

Thanks for the advice. I have decided that Friday is it. If he can't fully commit to saving our marriage after Friday, I am done and I will proceed to Plan B.

I am cautiously optimistic at this point, but I will not let him continue to disrespect me. I am also requesting a sit down with the three of us to settle once and for all that she is nothing more than the OW to him and that she is NEVER to contact him again and vice versa.

It is my time to be strong!! Also, is there a schedule somewhere for the MB weekends?? I want to make that a requirement for me to stay as well.

You ladies are amazing!!!

OK well done Dancer.

Now instead of keep T/Jing AEK's thread, do you have one of your own??

If you do plan to sit down with WH and OW then can I suggest that you have someone there for you. Otherwise you risk it being 2 against one. Even up those odds.

Otherwise you may run into nightmare territory when you have to manage them telling you how much they lurve each other while you vomit into the sink.

(err yes that was one of my nightmares.....bad memory that one)

He needs to commit or walk away and then a Plan B from you.

I think the MB weekends are now online, Mel is the best source of info for that one.

And yes the women are amazonians here. No one should disrespect us............ever!!

I will let the vets chime in here, as I havent done NC myself. But I think sitting down with her is a bad idea (did I understand right that's what you meant?)

Goes against the message of no contact, to sit down and have contact with her - its almost like letting them say 'farewell'. It sort of gives the affair - sorry adultery - the status of a relationship. As I understand it no contact has to be more swift and brutal. He has to agree to send her a no contact letter, one he writes saying he no longer wants to have anything to do with her. You must approve the wording and I think you also ensure it is delivered to her. Vets will advise you on the content etc,

If he refuses NC go into Plan B. Stay in Plan B until he tells your IM he will do NC

Dr Harley has written about the no contact letter think its called 'how the affair should end' - have a look while people take their time replying here....

It's not just a bad idea, it's a CATASTROPHICALLY bad idea!!!!!!!!

No sit-downs. No farewells. Just NC or nothing.

Thanks and Sorry about the T/J!

I do have my own thread but I can't remember what it is called.

Dont worry about using my thread.... I am interested and learning all the time. I would say a 3 way meeting would be hideous NC all the way...

I have become friendly with a friends husband. He has helped me through a tough time at school. I admire him but love him as a friend. However he wife us getting little tetchy about our friendship. Never want to offend her as I would never do what has been done to me. Never. Should I cut contact with this guy? I think so.

think you answered your own question honey!

Heading towards dirty waters there, keep your side of the road clean.

"Love him as a friend"? You should not be capable of saying this!

This closeness should never have happened. As a married woman, you should have barriers that prevent friendships with men from ever developing. Workplace friendships are a very common route to affairs.

I am upset for that wife. She should never have been put in a position where she is bothered by another woman's friendship with her H. You and I know what a horrible feeling it is to realise that our Hs have a relationship with a woman that is private to them.

Even if you were a single woman you should not have done that to a married woman. As you are married yourself, you also should have had higher standards for yourself.

What did your friendship consist of? Did you go for coffee or lunch alone with him? Did you talk to him alone about your work issues? Did you email or text him privately?

I am glad you brought this up here. Please don't be put off being honest by my comments. I am trying to get you to see that even though this relationship was probably a long way from an affair, it was very wrong.

SEk, please read the first post from this thread: Anatomy of an affair: how it starts . You will see that it is actually a very short step, for married people, from a friendship over a common interest with a member of the opposite sex, to an affair.

Many people on this site have had affairs in their marriages that started with a friendship at work, at a leisure activity such as a book club or at church.

Don't do this. Don't start such friendships. It is very difficult for a married person to see the boundary between a friendship and an EA until well after she has crossed it. After that it is easier to adjust the morality than to change the behaviour.

We tend to think that because we are married we would never do such a thing as have an EA - silly! And because the other person is married, this doubly applies. If we have been victims of an affair, this triply applies; we would NEVER get caught up in one ourselves because we have personally experienced the pain that an affair causes. Therefore we are safe to have friendships with members of the opposite sex.

That rationalisation is the first big mistake. If anything, BSs are more at risk from friendships, not less. We are VERY needy and susceptible, because our needs have not been met in our marriages, we have been dealt the biggest love buster possible by the affair, and our still wayward spouses are not stepping up to the mark of filling the gaping hole caused by unmet needs.

AEK1,

Wow. You are the last person I would expect to hear this from. You know first hand the pain and devastation it causes to have a third person in your marriage. Whilst, I believe that you are not someone who would do this to another ... you have.

Your post sounds like you and your friend's husband have discussed your friends displeasure over your relationship. Good grief, AEK1.

I think it illustrates just how important those boundaries really are and just how easy it is to cross them when we let someone else meet our ENs.

What is missing in your recovery. Talk to us.

Absolutely. You are allowing a married man to meet your needs and you are meeting his. Neither one of you have appropriate boundaries. This is how affairs begin. As Dr Harley states, as soon as one need is met outside of marriage, the others are soon to follow. If you care about this person at all, you will end all contact with him before you fall in love with each other and wreck his marriage.

Indeed, as this is Dr Harley's site, I should do him the courtesy of using his own example.

"Next morning as Alex caught the 7:30 commuter train he greeted Harriet and Fred, who also worked for his firm. As Alex opened his morning paper he remembered his empty noon schedule. "Hey, you two," he called out. "My lunch partner's out of town today. Either of you free?"

"Sorry," Fred told him. "I have to be across town." Alex looked at Harriet, a tall, willowy woman, studious and plain. "I'd love to go to lunch with you," she answered brightly.

I haven't seen her in a while, Alex thought. Harriet had gone to his high school, and they'd lost track of each other for a few years, until they started working for the same company. Their friendship rekindled several months before, when they began working on the same team, installing a new computer system. Once they'd completed that, though, Alex's responsibilities took him to the fifth floor, while she stayed on the seventh.

"You know," Alex told her that day at lunch, "I'm kind of glad Charlie had to go out of town today."

"Me, too," she agreed, smiling. "I've missed you since you went downstairs. We should have done this sooner."

"Yeah. Working on that project was the most fun I've had in a long time."

"The system's really proving itself, too. Float time on orders has been reduced to almost nothing."

"That doesn't surprise me." Alex chuckled. "Why, with you and me on that job, it couldn't fail."

As they left Alex and Harriet made plans to meet again next week. Soon the midweek luncheon had become a regular part of their schedules. Once Harriet gave Alex a book on computer programming, and a few weeks later he responded with a modest but lovely bracelet. As he gave it to her at lunch her face lit up. Leaning over the table, she kissed him gently on the cheek.

"Harriet, I have to be honest," he told her awkwardly. "I'm getting awfully attached to you. It's . . . well, it's more than friendship."

"Alex," she responded, her voice low, "I feel that way, too."

"I've never told you how I feel about Elaine. . . ."

"And you never need to," she reassured him.

"But I want to. I've never been able to talk to anyone about it before. I'd like to now."

"Then go ahead. It's okay."

"When I married her, I didn't realize what I was letting myself in for. I thought we shared a lot of interests, would spend a lot of time together, but all that dried up within a year or so. Now she does her thing, and I do mine. She doesn't like me to talk to her about work, and she complains I don't earn enough money. Half the time, when I get home at night, its like walking into a madhouse. . . ."

Harriet listened in sympathetic silence; afterwards he stopped in at her place, "to talk."

The next morning, when Alex awakened in Harriet's bed, he thought how pretty she looked. He kissed her bare shoulder and smiled as she opened her eyes. "Hi, handsome," she whispered.

"Hello, beautiful.""

How to Survive an Affair

Dear sweet Lord AEK what the h#ll were you thinking?

Of course this male "friend's" wife is upset. Her antannae are up and she senses something wrong because WHAT YOU ARE DOING IS WRONG. That is how just about every dang affair starts.

You "love" him as a friend? Um..the use of the world love is a bit precarious to me imho. You are clandestinely meeting this "friend" and he is confiding in you and you in him, he is MEETING SOME EN'S in you and that is definitely WRONG.

Look, I have guy friends too. But they ALL KNOW MY DH AND HE KNOWS THEM AND HAS NO PROBLEM. There is also no secrets at all. And I keep good boundaries. No personal talkey talkey really. If their wives know me, they like and trust me. If I am friends with a guy, then I am FRIENDS WITH HIS WIFE TOO.

If he's having lunches w/you, long talks, it is definitely headed in the direction of affairsville. If you secretly long to talk to him about "something" at the end of the day it's headed to affairsville. If you just find yourself wanting to hear his voice or talk out some problem, then it's headed to affairsville. If you find yourself being "judgemental" or even the teeniest bit nasty about his wife finding displeasure in you being around her husband, then Houston, YOU have a problem.

You are skating on thin ice.

APOLOGIZE to his wife, and stop this insanity at once. YOU know what it feels like to be betrayed right? It totally sucks. Don't make her hurt too. And don't fall into the fog of a revenge affair. NO amount of pain is worth hurting somebody else. And you only have your good name and reputation in life, so don't screw it up.

His wife has EVERY REASON to be wary of you. Unless she is a mutual friend and is INVITED ALONG to the lunches or she is already a friend, then of course she has good reason.

I'm gonna be honest here. If you tried this with my dh, I'd do more than be "techy" (your word). I'd be knocking on YOUR door and having a serious talk with you. YOu wouldn't like it either.

If you even care only about yourself, you will go NC at once. If you care at all about him, you've gone NC already.

Brava for having the courage to bring this here.

I agree, shows you can be honest with yourself

I'm not surprised his wife is getting tetchy - she rightly sees you as a thread. End the friendship AEK1 and apologise immediately!!