Questioning my decision to reconcile
� on: October 10, 2011, 02:44:23 PM �
Sorry for the long post, but there is a lot I have to say.
I have been married to the same woman for 18 years. We have 4 children. The oldest is 12 and the youngest is 6 months.
About 3 years into our marriage and before we had kids, I discovered that my wife had been having an affair for about a year. It was so devastating. We went to christian counselling and even though I always new she still had feelings for the other man, I stayed and worked hard to be a good husband. On the day we brought our first child home from the hospital, I discovered that she had called the other man. She later admitted that she had not ended that affair until she discovered she was pregnant. He is supposedly sterile, so she said she never questioned whether or not the child was biologically mine. Again, I was crushed and all trust that I had learned to give her was gone again. Four years later, I woke up in the middle of the night and found her on the phone with another man. Over the next few days, we talked about it and she decided that she didn't want to be with me anymore, so she left to live with him. Before leaving, she told me that she had been unfaithful with a total of 6 different men throughout our marriage. We had 2 boys at the time ages 4 and 2. The man she left me for lived a few hours away and she would come back into town once a week and spend no more than an hour with her kids. During that time I depended completely on God to give me strength. I became so close to Him during that time. I also became so much closer to my kids as we would sing to God and pray for mommy and talk about how much we loved her. After 3 months, my wife decided that she wanted to try and work on our marriage at least for the sake of the kids. I was so thankful that she came home and welcomed her and did anything I could think of to please her. She told me she was pregnant with his baby. She had a miscarriage at 11 weeks which made me so sad because I was really looking forward to raising the child as my own. About 3 months after she had come home I discovered that the other man had given her a cell phone and that they had continued their affair. Again all trust was gone and I remember wishing she had just stayed gone for another 3 months instead of going behind my back again. She said she would stop seeing him and never talk to him again. As far as I know, they have not had contact since then. About 3 years later, I found her talking on the phone and she abruptly ended the call when I approached. She said she was talking to a mutual female friend of ours. I knew she was being dishonest, so after my wife left, I called the friend and she said that she hadn't spoken to my wife. I confronted her later that day about it and she became irate yelling and accusing me of not trusting her. When I told her that I talked with our friend and knew she was lying, she admitted that it was one of the men she had cheated on me with earlier in our marriage, but that nothing was going on between them now. She never admitted otherwise, but again my trust was gone.
I continued to try to get her to love me and be faithful. It has always been so frustrating because she is a very loving person, but it seems that she is only that way to others and she acts bitter toward me. From the beginning of our marriage, our sex life has been almost nonexistent. When we would have sex, it almost always came with a list of rules that she would lay down beforehand or she would just say, "you have to hurry though". It has made me not even want to try to initiate sex with her because I almost always get rejected or there are so many rules that the desire is gone.
About 2 years ago, I woke up in the middle of the night and found her chatting with another man. I asked to read the conversation and she said I could. She had been talking to an old friend of hers who had left his family because he was having an affair with another married woman. He was trying to get the woman to leave her family to be with him but she wouldn't. My wife was telling him how sorry she was for him and that she didn't love me and never had, but that she was only staying for the sake of the kids. That was so hard to hear, even though that is exactly what she showed me through her actions. I asked her not to talk to him anymore and she defended their relationship, but said to keep the peace that she wouldn't talk to him anymore. Well she continued to text and talk with him on the phone behind my back, and when I discovered this, I told her that I couldn't do this anymore and that I was considering divorce unless things changed dramatically. She sobbed and begged for my forgiveness. Over the next couple of weeks, sex was great. I realize now that it was a mistake to let the emotion of makeup sex get in the way of addressing the real problem. We got pregnant with our 4th child and about a month or so later, I discovered that she had started talking to him again. I was so angry and again questioned whether or not the baby was mine. If she hadn't been pregnant, I am almost certain I would have divorced her. But I didn't want to be that guy that divorces his pregnant wife. After a few months, we had our 4th child, a beautiful baby girl that I love very much. However, my wife still treats me poorly. I know she doesn't really love me like a husband. I dread calling her on the phone because she is often so hateful to me. I have to answer questions from my oldest boys when they say "Why do you let mommy treat you like that". When I hear those things it breaks my heart. I tell them that they must respect their mother and that we are not going to talk about her that way.
A few nights ago, I went to bed before her and since our baby was asleep in the center of our bed, I didn't turn the lights on and just quietly slipped into bed. A couple of hours later, I heard her come into the room and she whispered to herself "he's so stupid. he's such an idiot". Apparently I had layed next to a small stack of folded laundry and she got upset that I didn't put it away. Hearing those words from her in an honest moment reaffirmed her lack of love and respect for me.
So, that's a long story, but I really need advice. I cannot live in a loveless marriage for the rest of my life. I hate not being able to trust her. I worry about what we are teaching our kids by not having a healthy loving relationship. I feel like I have tried everything. I want more than anything to please God with my life, but for the last 18 years, I feel like all my energy goes to keeping the family together and keeping the peace. Please pray for me. I really need some good advice.

foj, I am so sorry for your circumstances. Welcome to Marriage Builders.

This is quite a lengthy post, but I think I can sum it up fairly quickly: your wayward wife (WW) is a serial cheater who does not love or respect you or your family.

It sounds like nothing has been done to eliminate the conditions that laid the groundwork for these affairs. Why in the world would you continue to trust someone who betrays your trust over and over?

I suspect you are better off ending this marriage. This woman is very dangerous to your and your children's emotional health.

Have you had DNA testing done to make sure these kids are all yours?

You must be exhausted with all this peace-keeping. But keeping the peace is not going to save your marriage. Your WW has built a life based on lies, deceit and selfishness. She's got a lot of work to do if you're going to turn this around, as do you.

A loving God would not require you to remain in a loveless marriage. That would not be pleasing to Him.

What would you like to do, foj?

How many of the children are yours?

I want to do the will of God. I do love my wife and I know that she also wants to do God's will. She is a very caring person in most settings. She is very outgoing and is great at reaching out to people to make them feel loved especially in our church. I know she prays a lot and is involved in a couple of bible studies each week with other women. But she is not the same person with me. I feel like she resents being with me and so it is easier for her to be bitter toward me than loving. There are times when there is harmony, but our relationship always feels strained.
I want to look back 5 years from now and know that I did the right thing. I want to be in a Christ-centered marriage that brings glory to God. I want to be loved. I want to be happy. I want to be respected. I want to be a servant of God.
RMX, all of the children are mine. I am not certain if they are all biologically mine, but they are mine.

Your WW is a hypocrite.

What do you think God's will for you is?

You can be Christ centered and do God's will without putting up with disrespect and betrayel.

If you are taking divorce off the table and willing to continue in the nightmare, you are only enabling your wife to continue on her path of evil.

Sometimes you have to do things you don't want to to be a strong Christian man.

foj, am I correct that you are looking for help to decide whether or not you should reconcile?

If so, I would say you need to look carefully at what conditions will allow a marriage to recover. After an affair, the betrayed spouse of course is justified in choosing not to recover (Jesus said this, you know), but recovery is possible under certain conditions, and many people have done it. But it is a narrow path. A lot of situations will prevent recovery. If you live in those situations and try to recover anyway, you will just be hurting yourself and your kids.

A good example is contact with the affair partner. Recover is simply not possible if the spouse continues to have any contact at all with the affair partner (going to the same church, working for the same company, etc.) A lot of people try to recover anyway like this, because they believe they "can't" do otherwise (it's strange how a lot of people think they can't change jobs or churches, or move, when millions of people do it every day). What those people find is that recovery just never seems to work. They wind up with post traumatic stress disorder or other issues. We see those people come here all the time wondering why they can't make it work.

There are other conditions, too. All of the conditions have to be just right. If your wife will not agree to meet all those conditions with you, you guys can't recover. And of course you can't make her do that.

The best thing we can do for you on this site is get you reading and understanding Dr. Harley's material. He is the expert.

Have you read Dr. Harley's material on recovering from infidelity?

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi5525_qa.html

Have you seen Dr. Harley's video on infidelity?

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi1000_video.html

I would have to agree. It would seem she does want to give the impression of being something or someone she's not. If she truly wanted to express the love of Christ, shouldn't that start in her home with her husband?

I'm dealing with a similar.situation, so I know where you are. What I've learned is this, even though I still love my wife unconditionally, I STILL have to accept what God allows. God wants us to desire more of him and trust that he knows what's best.

I would love to be able to say or do something that would turn my wife's heart back to God and hopefully back to our family. BUT I can't change or control her. Only God can do that.

I won't tell you to stop loving your wife. I will tell you to concentrate on you and your relationship with God and everything will work according to his plan.

God bless.

I'm not sure what God's will is for me. I am trying to discover that. I have recently started spending more time reading the bible and praying and talking to christian mentors in my life to get some clarity. When I think about the life I want to live, it is a life where I am living boldly for God in everything I do. I think about how I want to let God use me to change people's lives. When I think about these things, I almost never think about the role my wife plays because it's so difficult for me to even envision such a life with her. I have wonderful, spiritual conversations with my oldest boys and I love that. I don't have that connection with my wife because of the walls that have been built up over our marriage that makes it so hard to communicate with her about really important things.

God's will is for you to glorify Him and enjoy Him forever. I think of the passage in Ephesians 2, that Christ, the chief cornerstone has torn down the wall of separation between man and man and man and God. Now the context is written to the church, that means that Paul is assuming there is true faith between man and man for this to work. True faith is evidenced by fruit. Adultery is a breaking of the covenant of marriage. You are free biblically to stay and reconcile or to go.

Time to play hard ball with her. Real love says *No* there are things others may do, but you cannot. Are you ready to say that to her?

CV

So life has been busy these last few months, but I am still trying to evaluate my life and change things that I can to be a better man. My wife and I have had some pretty intense conversations about my displeasure with the way she treats me. It usually ends with her cussing at me and storming off. I can't explain why she is so bitter toward me sometimes. She knows that I have contemplated divorce and it makes her so mad at me. I know that she doesn't want a divorce, but it seems that she is content to live her life married to me, but very distant. Sometimes I feel like it is just convenient for her because she is a stay at home mother and the alternative would require her to find other means to support herself. I have been to counselling by myself to try to cope with things and hopefully get some advice that will help our marriage, but she is not interested in seeking any sort of outside help. I am afraid that our relationship is so fragile now that if the opportunity presented itself to her, she would not be strong enough to remain faithful to me. The last time I know of that she slept with someone else was in 2003. I need things to be better between us for my own sake. I don't really know how to fix this and I'm not convinced that I still have biblical grounds for divorce since her verifiable infidelity was almost 9 years ago and we have had some form of reconciliation. Any insight would we appreciated.

Well, let me ask this... Does scripture anywhere say that there are Biblical grounds for divorce unless *X* amount of time has passed?

I would argue that you are not in any form of reconciliation if she is still acting this way to you. Reconciliation means joining back together both parties. Reconciliation means bringing the hostile party to a point where they lay down their arms and are no longer at war with you. It means both parties are brought into harmony with each other.

Does that sound like your marriage?

CV

No it does not. Some days I wish I would discover that she is still cheating on me. It would at least explain her behavior and make my decisions easier. Right now I feel like I am in "no man's land".

I can appreciate that feeling FOJ, I really can. Can you try a plan a for about a month and see what happens?

CV

What components of Plan A?

Start here:

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi8113_ab.html