OK this is my first post on the site and I have a serious apprehension about going to the extremes I see posted here. Yes I have looked at my OW phone to see her past discussions with her OM but all that has led to is pushing her further away and I find it as sin nature on my behalf. It does drive me crazy not knowing but I drive myself even more crazy trying to know every single move!

Ethically I take issue with all the keylogger/tracking devices discussions. I don't know exactly how that method is a "Marriage Builder". I have seen a therapist for about 4 months now and one of the biggest things we have talked about is "letting her go to God". Investigating only sends me deeper into dispair and depression.

I do agree with doing things to deposit into the LB and I have been doing all that. Maybe too far as now I am accused of being smothering and "not like I used to be". I recognize I was not meeting some sort of her emotional needs and part of that has been laid upon my heart by God to transform my innerself.

So the big question is: How does the investigating help "build" the marriage back to a loving relationship?

Lost and Lonely

Welcome to MB, MrA.

I've underlined three points for my answer:

1. I suggest that it is not the snooping that is driving you crazy, but being lied to. Your wife has no right to play with your mental and emotional health by lying to you about the reality of your marriage, and your life, but that is what she is doing.

2. Dr Harley himself recommends snooping, so keyloggers and tracking devices are definitely Marriage Builder methods. His recommendation is why we posters recommend them here. Have you read Dr Harley's articles?

3. Surely it is obvious that finding out the truth is the first step to "build the marriage back into a loving relationship"? How can it ever be a loving marriage if your wife is in love with, and probably having sex with, another man, and won't tell you the truth about that?

Armed with the truth you can either fight the affair or leave her to OM. Without the truth you will not be able to make either choice from an informed basis.

Surely the need to know the truth about an affair is obvious for a spouse? I am MrsAmazed right now, at this last question of yours!

Here: this:

is why you need to find out the truth!

You investigate so that you have as many facts in you pocket as possible when you confront your WW and expose the affair. Waywards have so many ways of gaslighting and explaining things away that you need to KNOW the truth.

You also keep investigating as an extraordinary precaution against the affair continuing, reigniting, or another affair.


Investigating to perpetuate the cycle of discovery/confrontation/promise to change/rediscovery is NOT productive, as you have discovered. The problem is that YOU don't have good boundaries with your WW. You allow her to make contact time and time again while you just take it.

You have no plan. Listen to these guys, they will help you form a plan to break this cycle.

MrAmazed, I am sorry you are in this position. But I have to say that you sound like a very confused man.

You ask why a person would investigate their spouse? So that they can save their marriage when it is in trouble. A betrayed spouse obviously needs to know what the problem is order to resolve it. If a BS did not investigate he can't very well solve the problem, can he?

It is not a "sin", nor is it "unethical" to uncover sinful behavior. It is a sin to commit adultery. Do you think the police are sinning when they investigate drug dealers and stop their crimes? Doesn't that sound crazy?

What happens when you ignore crimes? It only festers and grows. Why would you allow that to happen to your marriage?

Instead of being complacent with your marriage, a better approach is to investigate, expose the sin to everyone and kill the affair. That is how marriages are saved.

Marriages are not saved by sticking your head in the sand. Such a complacent approach reflects a lack of caring.

There are hundreds of marriages that have been saved by investigating. One does not save a marriage by ignoring the problem.

I dont have any evidence nor do I see where she could still be seeing him at this time. Earlier this year yes, I saw it. Not now. Intermitent contact only. Her work sched is such where she gets done when she has no more patients to see. She works on a traveling truck (medical) so it is extremely difficult for me to track her whereabouts.

I have not exposed her. I have had differing opinions on this. The OM is divorced (wife later died of cancer). Nothing to expose there. Only on our side.

You are rite - I have no plan at this point and am very very confused.

OM knows where that truck is parked at all times.
Wanna bet?

**edit**

moderator's note: please familiarize yourself with MB concepts before you post.

Oooh! Oooh! I do!


( Not really. I was thinking the same thing. LOL)

A reminder to posters to stick to Marriage Builders concepts if you are going to post to newcomers. If you can help with Marriage Builders concepts, please feel free to post. If not, we ask that you refrain from posting. The purpose of this forum is to help posters learn Marriage Builders principles, not to promote personal philosophies.

Any questions, shoot me an email. Thank you for your cooperation. Fireproof

There should be no locked doors in a marriage. Unless you are bluebeard

In a perfect marriage there are no doors at all. Everyone is free to see everything. Nothing is hidden. Phones are free to be used by anyone. Bank accounts can be checked by either partner. The two people live as one, with no walls at all. There is no need to snoop. But when things are being kept hidden - that is a lie. That is unethical and wrong. There is nothing wrong in the deceived person taking a look at the lie. They need to know.

Yes, snooping can uncover some very unpleasant things, as bluebeards wife discovered! But it is better to know who you are married to. Because when those locked rooms get stuffed with lies, they tend to spill out the door on their own anyway.

The person who married you vowed to become one with your life. Their life is your life, their money is yours and vice versa, their body is yours and vice versa, their fidelity is yours.

How is it wrong to look at something which is yours?

Is it wrong to check up on a stranger and invade their privacy? Yes.

Is it wrong to look around the walls of privacy within a mariage? No, because the walls should not be there to begin with.

However some married couples do treat each other like strangers and entirely separate entities and so they complain about it as much as if it was a criminal taking an interest in their personal information rather than their spouse!

Think about it. You get to see her naked, but not her phone? Does this make sense?



You can't meet the needs of an active wayward no matter what you do as they wont let you. They believe themselves to be in love with someone else and cast you as a pest. You have as much chance of meeting her needs as a guy who has just met a woman in a bar who is in love with a new boyfriend. She will brush you off.

This is very typical behaviour and it is not because you arent meeting her needs well, it is because she is an addict to the high of the affair.

To get her on board you must first kill the affair. She is definitely still involved.

The only ways to kill affairs are with snooping and exposure.

Get used to this word here ---- ADDICT

If your wife were an alcoholic and kept driving drunk, youd be snooping then wouldnt you?

You would also ask everyone who loves her to help her see sense and go into rehab.

You can whistle in the wind and 'let her go to god' but I rather think god would prefer you get up off your jacksie and save your own marriage. God helps those who help themselves after all.

And letting her go to her own destruction through adiction is not the action of a loving husband.

I'm going to bump the Never take the word of a wayward for you as I think you are being fed quite a lot of fairytales

She is gaslighting you.

I see. I have to agree with your concepts in order to post. Interesting.

This is an MB site, you have to agree with MB priciples. This is all spelled out in the forum rules when you sign up.

The original poster is looking into Dr Harleys methods and people who have used those methods properly are telling him their experiences of that.

So lets get back to that.

From the Administrator welcome message

And this:

Did you read these when you signed up?

That reaction is because of guilt, MrAmazed.

You're not playing her game right. You're supposed to be doing all sorts of bad things to justify her actions in her mind. Because if you really are a good guy and she sees that her actions were not justified, then what does that make her? So, it's best for her to lash out at you, then, to make you back off and be unattentive again.

Try not to spend too much time analyzing what she says. You'll go nuts trying to find reason where none exists.

So that we keep the story line straight, it's easier if posters stick to one thread. Just a thought

T/J -

Marbles, these are your only posts on MB?

Why dont you tell us what brings you here on your own thread?

-If of course you still want to hear MB advice after you have reviewed the articles.

Up to you. Just wanted to say welcome.

T/J over.

MrAmazed,

My thoughts regarding the most recent affair of my husband was that I didn't want to "spy" on him.

I had accidentally discovered his affair while using his office computer. I had absolutely no idea he was cheating on me - AGAIN. No clue whatsoever.

I found MarriageBuilders. The idea of spying and checking his computer was here on the threads. I have to say I was tempted to, but I felt guilty about it.

I didn't want to be his keeper. I didn't want to be a spy. I didn't want to snoop in his "private" life.


Then I read the idea regarding openness and honesty.

I was living a life of openness and honesty with my husband.

He, on the other hand, was not living this life in return with me. He was living a life of secrecy and deception. He lived a life of closed doors, lies, and dishonesty. He refused to tell me the truth of my own life, my own marriage, and my relationship with him.

How was I to find out the truth? How could I know what was happening in my own home? I could not trust him to tell me. The other woman certainly was not going to let me in on the scoop.

Would my husband point to the computer, to his cell phone, and say, "Here is all of my information, please go through my records and find out everything you need to know about my cheating ways"????? NO WAY!!!

He lied to me when I asked him directly to his face. So, I began searching his computer for information. If he asked me about it, I told him I was working on the computer. I actually WAS working on the computer. That work was for ME.

That work was to save our marriage.

In the end, it helped save our marriage. I was able to create a timeline of the affair, using some of the information I found. I also found more photos of the OW that she had sent him. I found some photos he had sent her. He had lied about that, too. This information, held in my hand, helped him "remember" the extent of the affair. It helped him "remember" his lies, or rather, the TRUTH.

It helped me when I confronted the other woman, too. It helped me when I told her that if she EVER came near me or my friends ever again, I would be sure this information was more widely "appreciated".

The timeline helps in recovery. The checking back on the computer gave me peace of mind, knowing that the two had never had email contact or phone contact ever again.

Your wayward wife does not have to "like" feeling spied on. That is okay. You didn't "like" being cheated on either. We all live with stuff, don't we?


Going forward, there may come a time when you don't feel a need to check all the time. Maybe you will want to check on occasion. The point is that you need to understand that there is a huge difference between

SECRECY in a marriage

which is what an affair uses to hide bad stuff....


and PRIVACY in a marriage

which is what you want when you close the bathroom door to pee.


Schoolbus