3 and a half months ago my husband came home in a strange mood. After a lot of staring into space and looking pained, he told me he was in love with somebody else and wanted to end our 12 year relationship. This came as a complete shock as we always have had a very strong, loving relationship.

He had been working abroad for a number of months, and at the beginning of this year I moved over to join him. Only weeks before his revelation we had booked a trip to the US for my birthday later this year, and had been trying to get tickets to next year�s Olympics. In other words, we were making plans for the future.

The person he claims to be in love with is a co-worker, from an office in a neighbouring country. She is a 40 year old (he's 33) who has never had a long-term relationship, and is under pressure from her father to get married and have kids like her siblings.
I knew about her in so far that he had mentioned her a fair few times over the previous months, and 2 months previous to that fateful evening I had found some email correspondence between them that I was not happy with. It was very gushy, and going beyond the friendship my husband claimed he had with her. She called him �her special friend� and signed off with �all my love�.
After confronting him about the mails he was in tears, on his knees telling me that I was the one he wanted to be with, and that he understood that he overstepped the mark in this friendship. He promised to back off from her.

I had no reason to doubt him, he had never done anything to betray my trust and we both put it down to an error of judgement. I asked him periodically about it, and he told me that he was no longer communicating with her other than on work related issues.

But less than 2 months later, he claimed that he no longer loved me, and wanted to be with her. I tried to persuade him to take some time away from it all, and he booked a week's holiday by himself to think things through. We also decided that, in order to give him the space he said he needed, I would move back to our house in our home country.
I had to give up my job, and leave our 2 cats behind but I thought it would provide him with the time and space needed to sort this out.

We agreed that we would give it until the end of the year to see how he felt and what he wanted, and for him to go and see a counsellor to help him understand his feelings. He agreed to, and told his co-worker he wanted to return to a purely professional relationship with her, with no outside phone or email contact.

One week after I returned to our home country he had to go to the office where she worked for a couple of days. He had told me he would do the work via video conferencing, but instead he flew out there, and stayed on to spend the weekend with her.
I was unaware of this (he told me he was going to spend the weekend on the town with his mate) and found out the following week because the airline he flew with lost his bag, and they rang our house to follow up on the complaint.

I was shocked and dumbfounded. I could not believe the level of duplicity, deceit and betrayal he was inflicting, he is normally such a straight-up, honest guy.
He had told me throughout that he had no dealings with her outside of their working relationship, but it was clear he had been pulling the wool over my eyes. He never intended to stay away from her.

I rang him and told him I knew, and how hurt I felt. He said he wasn't thinking, and he had only had dinner with her and hadn't slept with her. As if that justified anything. He said he would be happy to go back and stick to the agreement we had, and back off.

A couple of weeks or so later he flew over for our annual family get-together and told me that he did not want to continue with the trial separation, he wanted to finish with me for good. We spent a long time talking, and time and time again he said he did not do it because of his feelings for her, he was doing it for himself. He said he was not going to start a (physical) relationship with her, promised me had no intention of doing so but I did not believe him.

And sure enough, a week later he flew over again to spend the weekend with her. It seems like he�s trying to justify to himself that by 'ending' things with me, it�s now okay to get involved with her but as far as I�m concerned it is still cheating as we are married.
After finding out that he, yet again, had lied to me and got involved with her straight away, I subsequently found out through our joint frequent flyer account he spent what should have been our wedding anniversary with her. He saw nothing wrong with this, as we are no longer together.

It seems as though he�s living in some sort of fantasy, where his actions and consequences mean little or nothing to him. He appears to be completely void of any loyalty and empathy for me and what we built and shared over the past 12 years. And there is a startling lack of guilt over his actions and behaviour.
I find what I see hard to reconcile with the person I have known and loved for so long. It is so unlike him to behave in such a reckless and callous way.

After not having spoken to him for almost 2 months I spoke to him a few days ago. He told me how he cares for me, but only as a good friend. And he had felt like this for years now.
I was startled to hear how he seems to have rewritten our history to suit him and seems to put a lot of responsibility at my door, i.e. I was depending on him financially to much, I was too messy, I did not have enough of a social life. And so on and so forth.
Most of these things he now says caused him to leave me were never really raised before, at least not to the extend that I was to realise they were a threat to my marriage.

He still insists that his leaving has nothing to do with the OW, she was just the 'catalyst'.
I'm seeing a counselor and this helps a great deal. I've also taken up a couple of old and new hobbies to help me recover from all this. Some days are good, some not so.
I just wonder if, and when he will come out of this ridiculous state and see what he is doing to me, and to himself.

Am I best to take the high road and wait for this affair to burn itself out, and hope maybe then he is willing to work on our relationship? Or am I a complete fool for even entertaining this thought?

Me, 35
WS, 33
Married 2 years
Together 12 years
No kids, just cats

Welcome to marriage builders, sorry you are here and going through this but its the best place to be to create your best chance for recovery by following the plan here at marriage builders.

Before we dive into your situation .. could you please break that up into better paragraphs so it is easier to read?

THanks

MNG

edit spelling.

I am sorry you are here.
Because you are already living apart and have no kids, I think that you should:

1. Make sure the adultery is exposed all over creation. Let everyone know.
2. Seek legal counsel. Find out what your legal rights are. Try to get spousal support.
3. Plan B his sorryass.

You have to go to Plan B and hire a lawyer, he is going to have his relationship with his OW and everything he says is probably a lie, you need to look after yourself, file for alimony, let him feel the brunt of his choices.........

I agree expose to everyone he knows who the OW knows and let them feel what it feels like to be looked at like cheaters.........

I am so sorry that he is such a jerk, you deserve better go out and get that for yourself......don't let him off scott free......

I 'exposed' the whole sordid tale to his family, he tells me his parents support him as 'he is sure of what he's doing'. The rest of the family either keep quiet or refuse to take sides (and this I do understand)
I am not sure about the exposure to his boss/colleagues. I think that this may backfire on me. He seems to not like me much as it is, and I do not want to alienate him any further.

Hi Maryse, where are you from?

Read up on plan B, that is not necessarily to get your husband back, but much more about healing yourself.

Oh he will be hopping mad. But he wil also feel shamed and embarassed at what he has done. He will see it as the ugly thing it is in the light. But he wont want to admit that.

Here is what he thinks right now:

Everything I am doing is right and reasonable.

Anyone would agree with that. (Though I hope they dont find out)

I must be ok in my actions because me and Maryse are still good buddies!

I dont even think shes upset.

Shes a good pal

She doenst even miss me much I bet. Shell find someone else.

I hope she carries on being nice to me so I can have my fantsy divorce where maryse meets some needs and OW meets the rest, I still love her but not in love with BLAH BLAH BLAH

Tell him you are fighting for your marriage (dont warn him you are about to expose) but afterwards tell him it was so other people could help him see the mess he is in.

Tell him it is for your marriage you exposed.

Tell him you will be his best friend - but only within a safe, loving marriage. Otherwise he can expect a swift divorce where you will get whatever you can and you will never talk to him again..

Btw, isnt it funny mr 'so sure' hasnt filed.

He is dipping in to you when he wants your love and support and then going back all giddy to OW for some more from her.

You must stop this cycle and get his addiction dealt with in the light of exposure.

I anticipate Plan B will be a big help. But try the stick of Plan A first letting him know that he can have a great thing with you but tell him what you expect and that you will not settle for less.

I'm from the UK. Not born here, moved here in my twenties to be with WS.

Affair fog, fantasyland, rewriting history. All attempts to apease his ego, and justify his actions. He is looking for a comfortable and exciting life, and you are giving it to him. He finds the fantasy and the excitment with the OW, and the comfort with you, and justifies the affair, and is trying to make that his comfortable place now. Of course he is a sucker, and this OW will use him.

Oh don't misunderstand, you thought that was what he wanted, an understanding and supportive wife, and that is what you are, in spades. The problem is that it has been to easy for him, and his life hasn't included you, for too long.

Two things will have to happen for you to save this marriage.

You will have to bust up the affair.

You will have to create romantic love with him again.

Both are important, or it will happen again, because we all need romance.

The best way to bust up the affair, is stop being his friend. Yes stop being so understanding, and demand that you have the things you need, loyalty and devotion, or you will take him to the cleaners. This can seem so,"trite and controlling", but that is where the passion is. He is your husband, not your friend, and he hasn't probably acted like a husband, for a long time.

I am sure you being an intellegent woman, have read the concepts on this site, and probably agree with them. I also believe like many of us, you wish you had found this site a long time ago, and thought,"But my marriage is different from everybody elses, we won't have those problems, our plan is to..". But not including the UA time to a marriage, and not excercising the nessesary boundaries and extrodinadry protection of emotional needs being filled by the marriage partners only, allways ends up the same, they look outside the marriage.

You are NOT a stop he has made to his ultimate fantasyland, you are his wife, that he took vows to a greater power of love than he has within himself.

Maybe its time he grew up and recognized that.

Protect your assets
Read here and become pro-active
Don't let him off the hook for anything.

"Two things will have to happen for you to save this marriage.

You will have to bust up the affair.

You will have to create romantic love with him again."


Easier said then done; we are separated, don't even live in the same country. So how on earth I'm going to 'create romantic love' with somebody who is convinced he does not love me seems like a rather impossible thing to do.

As to busting up his affair, I don't really see that happening either. Yes, they are co-workers, but they don't work in the same office, or again, in the same country. She is 'no strings attached sex & fun' for him, something for the weekend.
They work at a large international organisation, where I don't think anybody much cares about who is sleeping with whom or why.
Some of his co-workers might smirk a bit as she's quite a bit older than him, but that will be about the extend of it. The ripple will soon die down.

There are so many obstacles here I wouldn't even know how to turn this around. First off, just the fact that you live apart is an invitation to an affair. You can't sustain a marriage if you don't live together. And now that you live apart he has even less of a motive to live together. Basically, he is gone in almost every respect.

And you are right, you can't recover the marriage if you don't live together. I don't see any way this can be fixed if you don't live together.

Why do you not live together?

I would still expose at work, expose to his boss, and HR. They may have a policy, regardless if they work in the same office. I am sure personal e-mails and phone call are going on during work hours. Also, he may have plannned unintended trips to that office. Why not tell the boss they are using company funds to promote their affair. I am sure they expense dinners when he is visting the neighboring office. They will have to investigate their expenses. Do not underestimate this step. This is what happened in my case.

EVERYONE should know!!!

We did live together when he first told me he had fallen in love and wanted to terminate our marriage.
After a lot of talking we compromised; he wanted some time and space to himself to get his head together, to see what life would be like on his own.
There wasn't really any way for us to continue to live together, we lived in a very small rented place and tensions would build up to unbearable levels. So I returned to our marital home in his native country, whilst he remained in the flat.

Unfortunately, that was a major strategic mistake. He wanted you to move out so he could carry on his affair. Unless you move back in with him, I don't see how this can be saved. Can you move back in with him?

I would pack my things up and head back home if I were you. It's hard to fight an affair if you move out so he can conduct it at his leisure.

I don't think I could have stopped him seeing her whether we lived together or not. He seems to be so infatuated with this OW that he would do practically anything to satisfy this 'need' to be with her. He'd only start to resent me being there and being a constant reminder of what he's doing is wrong when he feels (and thinks) it's oh so right.
Besides, I respect myself enough to not put myself in a position where I am open to more hurt and more lies on a daily basis. On top of him resenting me.
I owed it to myself, my sanity and my well-being to not have my nose rubbed in it everyday.

And no, I cannot move back in with him. He is now in a full blown relationship with her (which means he flies out to see her every third weekend or so) and I have landed a very good new job that will help see me through financially as well as careerwise if I end up on my own.

I fail to see how not living together now is the wrong approach, isn't that what this much lauded Plan B is all about?

Well, what you did by moving out was facilitate the affair and greatly minimized your chances of killing the affair. You had about a 50/50 chance of stopping him, now you have about a 1% chance.


We already knew this. This describes 99.99999% of affairs. But your moving out made it worse.


His resentment is not relevant if you are divorced, though. His affair is the threat to your marriage, not his temporary resentment.


That makes sense.


Not really. The best chance for your marriage was to do a solid Plan A before Plan B. You didn't do that. So now it is much harder to save.


I am sorry to be so negative but I don't know of any way to save this and would suggest just moving on.

Tried Plan A for 6 weeks. Rather a futile exercise when only one person is committed to it...

You do not understand Plan A.

"Plan A is for the betrayed spouse to negotiate with the wayward spouse to totally separate from the lover without angry outbursts, disrespectful judgments, and selfish demands."

"In these negotiations for total separation, the causes of the affair should be addressed. Since one of these causes is usually unfulfilled emotional needs, the betrayed spouse should express a willingness to meet those needs after the affair has ended."

"Another common cause is a wayward spouse's failure to take the betrayed spouse's feelings into account. The betrayed spouse's inconsiderate behavior sometimes leads the wayward spouse to believe that he or she has the right to return thoughtlessness with thoughtlessness by having an affair. Willingness of the betrayed spouse to follow the Policy of Joint Agreement (Never do anything without an enthusiastic agreement between you and your spouse) helps identify and prevent instances of thoughtlessness."

"In general, a betrayed spouse's effort to encourage the wayward spouse to end the affair should address all the root causes of the affair, and offer a solid plan for marital recovery. It should not be one-sided, however. The plan should make the wayward spouse and the betrayed spouse equally responsible for following the overall plan."

As I said, rather futile if only one person is interested in giving plan A a shot.....