So here I go.. I don't know where to start. I screwed, majorly bad. I did so well, then it all went to pot. I can only blame myself which is hard for me to do since I hate to screw up ANYTHING!!
When I try to rationalize what I did I can come up so many things that I was feeling. Before we bought the house I was feeling a distance between senninpa before. I would see something in his behavior that made me think "well that is a unlike him" I would disregard it then something else would come up. Repeatedly, so then I thought he is having a relations with someone else. (still have that thought). No this is no excuse for my actions just mentioning what I felt.

Yeah I had four affairs ten years ago. They were more like a one might stand. I was young, dumb, stressed. there were no excuses for my actions. I have told my husband all about them answered all of his questions.

The the stress of buying a house, and having nothing mundane, with chaos, I think I wanted something familiar and I leaned on the wrong friend. Instead of a close female friend I ended up going for my husband's friend as if he was a life preserver in the midst of it all.

His wife was suppose to be my best friend, but her and I were already growing apart for some time. Our families had been friends for something like eight years. I have never had feelings for the OM in those years, since they were like family. So I guess in the midst of my stress I clung to the wrong familiarity that I was use to. I got to close then it was to late.

Senninpa deserves much better, he is a great guy and I know he is hurting something fierce right now. It hurts me to see him hurt. I told him that I would do a lie detector test( I would be lying to say that it scares to death)Not because I am with holding more lies but the unknown. I truly feel that I have told him everything. Yes I used what you call the "trickle effect" but not for the reasons you think. I have to be ready(not to make more lies) but ready to confront myself , my wrong doings, my shame, my guilt!

Hi .... Welcome to Marriage Builders
We're glad you could make it.


I'll match your stress and double it.
These past 2 years have been unbelievably stressful for me.
Yet, somehow, I managed to maintain my boundaries with men who are not my husband.

Question:
I maintained my marriage boundaries under stressful times, and you (more than once) failed to. What might be the difference between you and I? What might be the difference between our coping skills?

Really reflect on this question before you compose your response.


I am 100% certain that you will experience more stress in your life.
What happens then?
How will you cope?
What are your resources?
Are you safe for your husband only when life is not too difficult?

This caught my eye.
This was important enough for you to write.
I see what you have written as a !!!
You probably wrote the above not realizing that it was not something complimentary about yourself.

It's always interesting to me when the word "blame" is used.
Why use that word?
It's a child's vocabulary.

Take responsibility for your screw ups. When you take responsibility, you are far more likely to learn the lesson than when you "take blame".

Taking blame is a person looking for punishment, or retribution.
Taking responsibility is a person looking for solutions and lessons.

Everyone screws up sometime.
The fact that you screwed up the exact same way more than once means you never learned the lesson. Instead, you took the blame.

Funny, whenever I have bought a new house and moved, I didn't have time to have an affair. I was too busy with stress and the problems of moving to even think of it. How did you find the time and energy to have an affair with your husbands best friend in your husbands own home?

You do realize that this time you got a buy one, get three free for your efforts, right? That is some major talent. You destroyed your marriage, your husband's career and his best friendship.

What will your husband and children lose the next time you feel stress?

Oh wait! There is nothing left to lose...

Stop being coy.
It is unbecoming of an adult woman who is (supposedly) ready/willing/able to take responsibility for her actions and learn the lessons.

Just an aside: It's trickle truth, not trickle effect.

1. What do you assume are the reasons 'we' think you gave your BH 'trickle truth'?
2. What do you claim are your legitimate reasons for 'trickle truth'?

What questions do you fear being asked?

A person who has had FIVE affairs and been through Marriage Builders is not ignorant of the effect on her husband. She doesn't have affairs accidentally or becuase of "stress" but because she doesn't care.

She doesn't care.

You don't care what it does to your husband and your children. Lets just get honest about that.

And now, this.

You are correct. Senninpa has always deserved a faithful wife. Not a serial adulteress.
Your husband has the right to divorce you.
But, should he?
In fact, if I were advising Senninpa, I would tell him that he is not safe if he remains married to you.

You are a woman who lacks boundaries.
You cannot cope with average life stress.
You look to blame, rather than to learn.

Prove me wrong!
Surviving an Affair <~~~ buy this book. Your own copy.
Buy the SAA book and read it with a highlighter.
Post to the forum (on THIS thread) as you are reading SAA, and tell us what you are learning.
That would be your best hope at saving your marriage.

If you fail to buy SAA, and fail to read it and post about your reading .... You will be a future adulteress when life throws you a curve ball.

Keep to THIS thread.

OK?
Best wishes to you.

I am grateful you do not call me 'friend'.

NG analogy time:

SPW, you and your BH have just been brought to an ER after an MVA in which you were the driver; BH is severely, critically, injured. As the folks here are starting lines, taking vitals and providing life-support, you're distracting everyone with your opinions that the tires were bald, the road was poorly graded, and someone should have swept the wet leaves off the surface. NONE OF THAT MATTERS! YOU WERE THE DRIVER!

Nothing will interfere with the experts here getting to the root of your BH's emotional injuries more surely than being cadged into dealing with your excuses, justifications, and fantasies. (And for the love of God, could you have picked on a factor more rational than "stress"? How does leading a double life, and lying to two families, REDUCE stress anywhere?)

Here is what you should be doing, right now. ASK what you can do to to comfort SP, then SHUT UP and LISTEN, only writing to get clarification or expansion on something you're not immediately clear on. BTW: ML and PB are two of the more...balanced...posters here. Keeping up your ineffective "Yeah, but...." strategy will shake some of the really severe BSs out of their slumber! Even I have been known to become "peckish"!

Stay OFF your husband's thread.

Senninpa's wife ... You should listen to the vet posters here. Some of what they say may sound like attacks but they are not. They are 2x4s to wake you up. Stick with it ... read and post. This message board will guide you to recovery IF and i say IF you follow the narrow path they will lay out for you.

YOU CAN DO THIS. But its going to be a tough go for a while.

MNG

I say you put him out of his misery. You're so broken that it's going to take more than MB to fix you.

If you have no kids together, then go your separate ways and get a good IC to help you stop having such poor boundaries with men.

This is horrible abuse.

Lets make this simple.

You were willing to hurt your husband and your children to get what you wanted.

Also, you were willing to compromise your virtue to get what your wanted.

Additionally, you were willing to hurt your friends (OM & OMW) and their children .... to get what you wanted.

How did you justify hurting these children?
Yours and theirs?

You put empathy away where you could not see/feel it. You had to.
You had to remove consideration of other people's feelings, and their feelings became nothing more than obstacles in your way.


Yes. Your feelings were of paramount importance. Far above the feelings of others.

You are not unique.
You are wayward.
That's what waywards do.

What's the big deal? It's not like I meant my marriage vows. So I banged a couple dudes... Well four... No make that five. To be honest, in all this stress, I may have forgotten a few. Gosh, it's just SO HARD!

Senninpa's wife,

I know you, I mean I was a serial, too. I know your "language".

It didn't go itself, you ruined it. You DECIDED it was OKAY to do it. And then YOU DID it.

... which is followed mostly by "other people's faults". There is no point in making up those excuses, they won't make you look less WW as you already are. You have to accept the fact that you have NO boundaries around the opposite sex, plus you have no idea of what Extraordinary Precautions are. You may have been here 10 yrs ago but I do not see this has been very helpful nor have you implemented Dr Harley's Programme.

You don't understand (yet, I hope). Making your affairs look "more like a one night stand" is your attempt to minimize the gravity of the pain you have caused to your H and family. And there is nothing "more moral" in oral sex or "more oral" sex as you have been confessing to your H. I know the situation, but more important: you know it, too. I tried to play this game with my H, too, but I failed miserably and caused the the false recovery which is the guaranteed next phase you are heading when you do not tell him the truth. But the truth must come out with all the ugliness, only then you can FEEL the necessary pain to start the work on your non-adulterous life, I see no other way.

What does this have to do with anything?

Now, what are you going to do about all this? How you are going to help your H to overcome this pain, how you will help your kids? What is your PLAN?

It would be nice to see you continue posting and FACE the situation. Start reading MB materials like crazy, making notes and planning the next steps.

well written

Well thanks everyone for your input. I see that you all feel that we shouldn't work on Marriage cause apparently I am a hopeless case who cares about nothing. So I guess I should start packing since he would be better off. This what I am getting from your advice.
So I guess a person who has no boundaries is a monster. So should I pack now or after Christmas???
I really wanted to work on our marriage and be a good parent but apparently I am not capable of ever being a decent person.

Who is this?