Sugar and Melody,
I respect you both and your opinions on this, I wrote my clarification as I felt it was the right thing to do, as I did not intend to insult anyone. I was upset when I posted about the yazu thread and that is clear.
My opinion is what it is, I think you can show a little of your heart to newcomers and get them to stick it out and get through the hard time, so you can advise them after they see you do care about THEM and not just the principals of MB.

Standing at the door of the church beating the bible does not bring in lost soles, it drives them away. Doesn't mean you have to give them bad advise. You can see who they are and where they are, then preach to them when they know you have their best interest at heart. That is my point. I will likely not change you minds on this, don't need to, just hope you can think about that and respect my opinion on it.

I will/ do not want to debate it, it is just my opinion. I know you will continue giving people good advice and doing what you do best. You hold a lot of my respect for that. As I said, you do good work here, and I am not trying to be a critic here, just giving you my opinion for what that is worth. Probably nothing

I have said it before and I will say it again. I believe I even posted Dr Harley's radio clip about serial cheaters. The key to success is changing your wife's lifestyle in a way that would make it almost impossible for her to cheat. Working opposite shifts would be the FIRST PLACE to start. It is good that she is transparent, but most of her trolling for men took place while you are at work and she is home. At the very LEAST, you should be working the SAME SHIFT so you have the same hours OFF and can run errands together.

One of the first steps is changing the environment that allowed her to chase men. What is being done about that?

I see you going off on the path of Plan SEM again instead of PLAN MARRIAGE BUILDERS and you know how that ends up!

Co dependency is a DESIRED state in a healthy marriage. It is only bad in a marriage that has addictions.


This is a distraction from implementing extraordinary precautions. Your wife should not get ANY say in those as EPs are NOT negotiable. Again, you are doing Plan SEM instead of Plan MB.

My opinion is that you have a very warped view of "compassion." My idea of compassion is helping people use these principles to save their marriages [which I have done for the past 10 years without any help from you I might add] and yours is to say some empty nice words to someone.

When I am in crisis, I want someone to give me direction, not babble some empty "nice" words at me.

Please don't lecture those who have been in the trenches for years helping others about "compassion."

This is why the poly is needed and why you should let the questioning rest until then.


Also working on questions is to be done with the expert not the person to be tested. Unless you want that person to beat the test.

Melody,
She isn't getting any wiggle room on the EP's. I wholeheartedly agree with all of them, we have gone over them several times. She has asked what they mean to me and I will explain what they mean. Never doing anything that would hurt my spouse and honesty are the ones open for the most interpretation and has been the forefront of conversation in respect to the EPs. Some items conflict, like total honesty sometimes trumps hurting your spouse. I have moved honesty to #1 as that is my #1 EP and EN. AS for the others they are easy to understand, but she needs to show me that she is following them, and that will take time.

As far as plan SEM, I don't believe that. I am following your advice, and reading a book about boundaries to better understand them and what they mean in my/our life. I think that is working toward the MB road.

Codependency is described in the book as a person who enables another to do the wrong things by eliminating the consequence of their actions (that's ME), at least as I understood it. Your referring to the positive codependency which is what I believe is relying on our spouse for the things we cannot provide for yourself, which keeps you together and is good.

But it doesn't take time to develop a PLAN. Talking about principles is NOT a plan. MAking an action plan and following those actions is what is required. I get the sense that you all think that you can TALK your way to marital recovery. That is not how this works. This is an ACTION PLAN, not a talking plan.

Putting together a plan is the first step and could be completed in one hour. There is no plan here, SEM. Not having a plan is a plan to fail. The key step is changing her lifestyle so she can't cheat.

What is the plan for that? Where is the PLAN?

Once you have settled on your EPs, that is when I would start on your plan to restore the romantic love in your marriage. I would focus on the top 4 INTIMATE EN's because they will give you the biggest bang for your buck. In order to create romantic love, you need to schedule 20+ hours per week of UA time meeting the top 4 intimate ENs of affection, conversation, rec companionship and sexual fulfillment.

Check this out: http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3350_attn.html

Total honesty is not an EP if she doesn't follow it though. Her committment to honesty will not protect your marriage. It hasn't in the past and won't in the future. What will protect your marriage is her changing her lifestyle in a way that it would be impossible for her to carry on the secret second life necessary for an affair.

That means you change your lives so you are spending all of your time off work TOGETHER. If you are together, she can't chase men and have affairs.

Senn, I show "a little of my heart" to newcomers by being here almost every day, welcoming them to the forum and posting any MB advice that I can give, quickly and clearly. I give them advice to get them out of what might well be the worst situation that they have faced - I know that my H's adultery was that for me. I show "a little of my heart" by caring enough to come here and help others who are going through the horror that I did. I wouldn't want to see anyone go through another second of lies, false hope or false recovery, the way I did. I told yazu to polygraph her H and get an STD test because I wanted to help her avoid what I suffered. Why isn't that good enough action for you? Why do you feel you have the right to demand that I post the way you say I should?

"Standing at the door of the church beating the bible" might not "bring in lost souls", but when those lost souls go, of their own free will, INSIDE a building where the sign on the door says "Christian Church" and ask for help with using the teachings in the Bible, I would forgive the priest for thinking that taking them through the teachings in the Bible was the right thing to do.

yazu came, of her own free will, here, where the sign on the door says "Marriage Builders", and asked for advice on whether to leave her H. We gave that advice, based on what Dr Harley has said about situations like hers. I still don't understand why you are criticising posters who gave their own free time to "care about" her by giving her that advice, just because she did not like that advice and ran away.

Total honesty, if she puts it in place and actually practices it is an EP as that will help in preventing an affair as she would know she has to tell me. I have in my heart held true to the total honesty from 10 years ago to this day, I tell her everything up to and including any contact or conversations I have with the opposite sex. I know she can do that herself if she puts her mind to it.. Not hurting me is also something she has to instill in herself.

You may not believe it, but the EP aren't a far cry from where we are today. The OM and his W were our best friends and I/we spent way to much time with him/them doing what W and I should have been doing. Which distracted US from our marriage. That part of our life is gone now leaving us with just US and our children. Not a lot of extended family left in this part of the country. We do have other friends (couples) who we don't do nearly as much with, and won't for a while as this is our time right now.

We agreed 10 years ago, and have maintained to this day:

No parties without both of us attending

No going to the bar or club without both of us present, (don't do that anyway- just a meat market for young singles)

As for now, she has agreed to the rest of the EPs and is practicing them. As for a plan, I don't understand what you mean. You are correct in it only takes an hour or so for us to work up a plan. That is done, how do you want me to describe the plan?

She will not go anywhere without first informing me. If she cannot she will inform me directly after, either by text or phone.

She will inform me of any delay returning home from work.

She will not talk to other men about anything unless it is on a professional level at work.

She will not talk to any men on the telephone with exception to the DR, Dentist or family, and the occasional none English speaking guy who finally answers after 2 hours of talking to a computer only to pay a bill- and even then will inform of such.

She has stopped teasing or joking with men at work as she does understand that that can be interpreted as flirting, and knows that flirting is unacceptable.

She will not make or receive phone calls from unrecognized phone #s without documenting it and informing me of who it was and what it was about.

She will not delete any incoming or outgoing phone calls or texts without me first seeing them.

She will not allow the children to use her cell phone, unless she advises me first or directly after, This is to prevent questions or doubts, as they always call #s that aren't in her contacts.

I'm sure I have forgotten something, I need to write the list out, but these have all been discussed and are based on the EP list.

Sugar, Melody,
I gave you my opinion in the most respectful way that I could. You all are good at doing what you do, every day you come here. You give your opinions/beliefs and expect everyone to take it or leave it. You to can see my opinion and take it or leave it. You are leaving it. I did not try to take anything from you. You do give your time to help others, that is noble and honorable, I recognize that. I gave you my opinion and that is how I feel. Melody you did not show that same respect in your response, I ignored that and will get over it.
Sugar, My opinion isn't to hurt your feelings or take away anything you do here, it is just that, MY opinion. Does not mean I am right.
I do not want to debate it, I gave you mine, you gave me yours, I can only hope we can move on from here.

Telling people they are not "compassionate" who devote hours of their time helping others, when you do nothing, is not only disrespectful, it is profoundly arrogant and insulting. Saying nice words is not my idea of "compassion", it is yours. My idea of compassion is helping someone save their marriage in a time a crisis. Nice words are no substitute for that. As we say in Texas: talk is cheap.

Well Senn,

It's clear that I have (in particular) offended you by sharing my thoughts on Yazu's situation. I'll take this as my cue to back off and leave your thread to others with more heart and understanding.

Don't drag out this conversation any longer. It's a waste of energy.

I wish you the best!

Zibbles,

You did not! I have referenced you several times, as I cherished and took to heart your advise and am trying hard to work on exactly what you said. I want to stop wasting my time arguing and work on my marriage. That did mean a lot to me and again I thank you.

Melody,
Compassion is a term with many meanings, I did not say you weren't compassionate(I'm not rereading back on my post here). I SAID put the kid gloves on for the newcomers, that is all.

I haven't been here for ten years, but to hit me with that, as to degrade me to no opinion is disrespectful. You can take where I stand on this forum, and determine what validity my opinion has, but to tell me I should have none is demeaning. I am done debating this, If I have pissed everyone off and get no help after this, the I apologize, and probably deserve it.

P.S. As for not doing anything; I do not post on others threads as I do not even remotely believe I am in a position to give a shred of good advice. I can't do for me yet let alone others. I hope you can respect that. Or do you disagree?

You are trying to defend some very unkind comments you made about the people that tried to help yazu when you say "You can see my opinion and take it or leave it". Some of those same people have tried to help you, and when you say that they are "disrespectful' to defend themselves against your attack, you disrespecting their advice to you. They are doing for what what they did for yazu - giving their time to help you.

Telling people - who are trying to help you - to be "more compassionate" is about as arrogant and offensive as it gets. It is not disrespectful to point out that your arrogance allows you to question the "compassion" of those who are not only helping you, but have been here doing the heavy lifting for 10 years. I see no validity in that stance.

And yes, it does piss off. And yes, I do accept your apology.

Yet you make it a point to point out to others who are here day in and day out actually HELPING people how they are lacking in compassion. This makes no sense at all.

And as far as the Co-Dependency issue? Here's what Dr. Harley has to say about it.
How the Co-dependency Movement is Ruining Marriages

You are also not in a position to question the compassion of those who ARE helping others, but it hasn't stopped you from doing so.

Why disrespect those who are helping?

All of this isn't going to protect your M if you two are working opposite shifts. Expressing a willingness to not flirt/talk with men will not stop a serial cheater from having affairs. She is addicted to getting needs met outside of M and has an uncontrollable compulsion to go after men ~ you have to eliminate the conditions that allowed her to have all of these affairs.

The fact that she learned all about MB and how devastating affairs are and how to prevent them but still continued doing this should tell you that...

You can write off my advice all you want by telling me that I am not being compassionate enough or that I am argumentative or picking your posts apart. That is fine with me.

But my response to that would be to write into the radio show about your WW's history of serial cheating even after having found MB and learning how affairs start...and see what Dr Harley tells you.