So I guess im just looking for some support to keep going- I have been kinda down for the last few days and it seems to be getting harder for me to keep going, D keeps creeping into my thoughts- I have recently got on some anti-anxiety / depressants, which has really helped with the anxiety of the situation and is keeping me more stable so I am not constantly throwing LB's at WH.

But what i guess is really getting me down we are just not making as much progress as i would like. He still says he has no "love" feelings for me, though our communication has vastly improved and we are getting along well now. Its been over a month since WH NC- I have been doing my best to fill his EN's,and he "is trying" to fill mine the best he can without having those feelings for me. Maybe we are just not spending enough UA time together, but its getting harder for me because i crave him to have some sort of feelings for me and it still hurts so bad every time im rejected in that area. Like I will say- I will miss you today and he cant say it back- the only thing he can ever say to me is - "you look nice today"- well my grandma looks nice today - what about beautiful, hot, or sexy? -

Sorry for rant but need to vent somewhere today- any suggestions are welcome

How much UA time are you spending together?

sm, just a couple of questions:

Are you sure there has been complete NC?
How many UA hours are the two of you getting in each week?
How much time are you spending recreationally with him? What do the two of you do during your UA time?

You're still pretty early in recovery. He is probably still going through some withdrawal.

markos and mb,

As far as i can confirm NC is still in place I have all his passwords and a keylogger on the home computer and his phone- and i search regularly for a affair phone. The only thing i cannot confirm is when he goes to his office 2-3 times a week for a few hours-

We are avg about 15-20 of UA time- Right now about 2 days a week, we are going to dinner/lunch, mini golf, bowling, movies, sports events, shopping, museums- I have tried to vary it to keep it fun- ( so prob 6-10 hrs recreational). We also have been trying to do sleep overs for our S(3) so we can get more time in together in the morning. The rest of the time is at home prob 1-2 hrs a night and sometimes a little time together in the morning.

I realize that it is still early in recovery and he says he "is trying"- its just frustrating when that is always the answer

As a side note the EN that I could use some help meeting for him is admiration- that is the need his EA who lived in another state gave him that I didn't- I am not a person who needs a lot of admiration and praise but he does to feel good. I am having a hard time coming up with things, especially considering the situation--

Scoot over, sister - I'm in the same Admiration boat

Admiration isn't a high need of mine, but it is for my H. As Pepperband reminded me, when I was newly arrived here - it's a need that is very easy to fill, once you get rolling on it.

First: skip the whole business of "especially considering the situation-- ". The current situation is that you have a husband who has a need for admiration. That's all you need to think about.

Next, watch what he does. It doesn't have to be anything big. Watch how he dresses and admire his ability to throw together a great outfit. Watch how he talks to someone on the phone and admire how effortlessly he pulls together a great conversation, or fixes a problem for the caller. Watch how he drives and tell him you wish you could navigate rush hour traffic as easily as he does.

The keyword for you is to WATCH him. Pay attention and WATCH him. You will find a lot of opportunities to admire him. And it will become more natural to you as you practice your admiration skills.

You can expect your husband to go through a period of withdrawal and depression for 3 to 6 months following the end of the affair. Doesnt seem fair does it? Keep up with the UA time, control AO' s, DJ's and he will get there! This is a difficult time for many spouses, the WS doesnt seem "all in" but it is normal. My WH said he didnt go through this with drawal phase BUT in hindsight he was grouchy, mopey and a pain in the rear! hang in there, it gets better!

Scimom,

ALL avenues for his continuing the affair must be checked into...

The 2-3 times a week for a few hours MAY be when he has contact and must be explored.

WITHOUT TELLING HIM IN ADVANCE arrange to meet him at his office for coffee or bring him a special treat...

and watch CLOSELY for his reaction.

If he is GLAD to see you and does not appear nervous or makes a beeline for the bathroom or otherwise leave the room (to alert the OW on his cell) things are PROBABLY ok but you need to maintain your vigilance...

During her affair I sent Mrs.Flint flowers and went to see her at work...

and found them in the closet.

God bless.

Jim

Thanks to all for the advice-

MB you are right i need to be in the present and my husband has a EN that i need to meet- sometimes its hard not having a pity party for yourself

Texassun- he claims he is "over her"- so its hard to tell if he is out of withdrawal or not-the EA lasted only a short time and she lives a few states over so they only had phone/text/email contact- I keep thinking things are seeming to get better but unfortunately every time i ask its "no change in the feelings department"

Jim- I think that's a very good idea that i will have to follow up on- Thanks

There's a point where you have to stop bringing up the affair and the elephant. If you find yourself often asking him "So, are we better now, do you love me now, do you still think of OW" then try backing off from that a bit. Having a natural conversation is hard, but that's going to be key to your UA time.

For the admiration need, do you listen to what he talks about? There's listening while just waiting for a chance to speak yourself and then there's listening and hearing what he is talking about. Doing the latter and engaging by asking questions about what interests him will help. Try talking about just him for a bit and see how he responds.

As for the few hours going to the office, a voice recorder in his car may be advantageous if you suspect something. I, too, like the suggestion to do a few random drop-by's to get a feel for his reaction.

Thanks NW,

I rarely bring up the affair and am even learning to control my triggers around him but I am very guilty of the "Is it getting better for you now" or else i do "tell me something good" ( meaning about us/relationship) question. Conversation wise things are good now as long as i dont bring up the whole "feelings" or "Is it getting better for you/ tell me something good" thing- at this point he either gets frustrated or shuts down completely when i do. I know that i need to stop ( since it obviously a LB for him at this point) but its really hard cause i keep feeling like i need some positive movement/ reinforcement in the right direction to keep this going.

I am planning on stopping at his office this week-

Question for you all is it normal for me to keep thinking about divorce during the recovery phase(we are still very possibly in WH withdrawal phase )? I really want the marriage to work and am trying my hardest but I keep finding myself thinking about meeting with a lawyer, dividing up the assets, the letter that i will write to his family... I have gone as far to get some numbers for reputable lawyers but have not actually called them.

As I think about it I think it happens more on days that I feel WH isn't meeting my needs, trying enough, or feel we are not making enough progress.

Hello Scimom,

There are several reasons your WH may be less than enthusiastic in rebuilding.

Withdrawal from the OW COULD be part of it...

or he never stopped contact and having passwords and spyware mean very little if he knows you are using those methods to check on him.

What counts is what he is doing when he thinks you are not checking on him.

ANY CONTACT WITH THE OW will keep your WH from successful recovery with you REGARDLESS of how well you are doing the MB Plan...

Just checking did YOU actually mail a No Contact Letter written in the Dr.Harley format by your WH or just accept his versions of the emails he allegedly emailed to her without you being involved???

Who all did you expose your WH affair to???

Did it include HER family and all of her friends and parents???

Have you installed a VAR in his car so that you can catch him if he is talking to her on the way to work???

I would REALLY make plans to visit him SOON at work SEVERAL TIMES as you are starting to lose enthusiasm in rebuilding and that is not good.

You MUST be sure that this affair is dead...

and that he hasn't resumed contact...

or started another one.

Visit him...

OFTEN...

and VAR in the car on the way to work.

God bless.

Jim

or he never stopped contact and having passwords and spyware mean very little if he knows you are using those methods to check on him. He gave me passwords to all email accounts, he dosent know about the keylogger/spyware on the home computer or his phone so I can see if he sets up anymore secret accounts- he works a lot from home and those are his only two access when at home


Just checking did YOU actually mail a No Contact Letter written in the Dr.Harley format by your WH or just accept his versions of the emails he allegedly emailed to her without you being involved??? - after the last time i caught contact with the OW ( when he was supposedly sending her a goodbye email- and her response is what i caught) It didnt happen right away but yes I made a NC email that i oversaw and was there when it was sent as a requirement for him to stay-

Who all did you expose your WH affair to???- all of our friends and family have been exposed to

Did it include HER family and all of her friends and parents???- per melodys lane suggestion I exposed to her mother - who was the only one i was able to track down since she lives several states away

Have you installed a VAR in his car so that you can catch him if he is talking to her on the way to work??? - I have not purchased a VAR- I do regularly search for an affair phone, I also have online access to every phone number incoming/outgoing calls text and frankly check it at least 3 times daily ( though he knows i have access to that). Several times if i didn't recognize a number i called it to see who it was. Also I fully control all the money he gets a debit card "allowance" for lack of better terms ( he has no credit cards), for gas money for his car every week that I can verify, any and all his purchases, so if any $ was missing for a affair phone it would be noticed immediately - but if you really think he is showing signs of red flags i will do this

I would REALLY make plans to visit him SOON at work SEVERAL TIMES as you are starting to lose enthusiasm in rebuilding and that is not good.- Planning on stopping by today

The purists will say if the MB steps are done to the fullest extent and you have a receptive wayward, then D shouldnt be crossing your mind. A loving, wonderful formerly cheating spouse meeting and exceeding your needs and you doing the same will raise all boats and the A will be but a bitter (subsiding) memory.

Hogwash.

I have the greatest wife compensating me in ways I always wanted. I try my darndest to meet as many of the things she got elsewhere and being trying hard for 8 months to love her and respect her and have her for life.

I will say however when that 'heat rush' comes thru me when I imagine her laying next to him unclothed or other days perhaps suggesting lunch then a quickie, my thoughts will go thru many things and D is one of them. Cant deny it.

I use mental tricks to move on. I use some of the wisdom I got from here to understand the only real remedy to what we got is time. The fury stemming from her idiocy is definitely less than it was months ago. Her continued devotion to me and our family is a help. If I saw but an ounce of resistance in the from of independent actions or withdrawal and, God forbid, contact made Id be calling my lawyer immediately.

Life is short. Mistakes do happen. She has shown a desire to move on from her mistake and that is what any of us in our situation should hope for.

mss

MSS,

Im glad to hear im not the only one who contemplates D, its not what i want and i keep trying to tell myself its going to take time to repair this. That being said if i find any contact with the OW again it is over and I have made that absolutely clear to him- he is on his last chance with that- Unfortunately the independent actions and selfishness are something he has always done but he is working on it- I have seen improvement, its just not as much as i would like.

I am unfortunately not very patient ( anxiety of the situation is not helping that) and he can only give me so much to meet some of my ENs when he doesn't feel "love" for me- I want so badly for him to tell me that he misses me or will be thinking of me today, or kiss me passionately, but he cant tell me something he doesn't feel or do something that doesn't feel right. Some ENs he has really stepped up with and is doing a good job like conversation and helping with the house/family. But the one that matters to me most right now, affection, is really hard for him.

SciMom-

I believe firmly and after 8+ months of reading these horror stories i got it lucky in some respects. Yes, my wife spent an inordinate amount of time with a deviant who met her shallow EN of nice dinners, some clothing, and jewelry not mention mindless conversation that I wasnt giving her. On so many levels it make my wife looks bad. She knows it all too well.

She told me early on in their "relationship" there was a love of some nature. Then it moved on to this psuedo-prostitutional laziness situaion that appears to be the nature of the last number of years. She got to live a relative life of ease and he got his rocks off. Im coming to grips with all of the nuance from such a pathetic relationship. And you can read my story on the SAA thread somewhere a lot pages back.

Anyway, on dday I had woman completely devestated by what she had done. Shes an impressive liar, but not that good of an actress to put on the display she did. She contacted everyone around us told of the affair. Parents, (she didnt have to call my mother as dday was on Mothers and the call from OMW happened while my mother was at my house), and took care of my kids' anxiety, and most of all she took care of me.

Anything short of complete attention to NOT REBUILDING what we had but a brand new construction of a new marriage would have sent me to file for D.

I feel for those who are going thru this stuff and are struggling with recovery. It really sounds a lot like OMW and the problems she is facing based on our last converstaion a couple months ago.

Stay strong until all paths have been taken. A D is sometimes the natural course these things take.

Scimom,

Do not be hung up on the contact from home concept.

He KNOWS that you will be watching him at home.

That is why I am very suspicious of his work.

Is he in charge of his work schedule?

The no contact letter was to be HANDWRITTEN by your WH and sent certified mail return receipt. Not an email.

Also a no contact letter means very little if he then calls her from work and tells her to ignore the email...that you MADE him do it... and he didn't want to...

Which brings this up...

Ask yourself how did your exposure cause a huge disruption in the OW's life i.e. bringing hellfire down on her life and making her life a misery if she continued contact with your WH when all she had to do was tell ONE person i.e. her mother you're a crazy woman and that she and your WH are just friends???

What if SHE gives him money for an affair phone etc. to continue the affair?

What if sometimes he never even GOES to work but to her or someone else???

What if she no longer LIVES several states away...

Mrs.Flint would stash her car at her work in a hospital parking lot then get in his car to meet my brother...

All she had to do was say she was SOMEWHERE in the hospital...

Waywards can be VERY creative...

You've got to be too.

If you cannot absolutely rule out any contact you may want to consider scheduling a polygraph.

His reaction to that could be very telling.

I actually scheduled a polygraph because Mrs.Flint wasn't wanting to answer all of my questions in the beginning and she went ahead and fully confessed prior to the poly...

BECAUSE...

I told her that she would either do the poly and fully do MB or I was done.

Jim

That's quite a strawman. I probably was the textbook case for a successful recovery:

• Affair discovered before it had advanced beyond kissing/groping (but well into "maybe we should divorce our spouses and marry each other" territory),
• Betrayed husband still very much in love with his wife,
• Kept going on weekly three-hour dates through the whole ordeal,
• Never stopped having regular intercourse, showing affection, having intimate conversations (except the month after D-Day), and doing things together.

Despite all that, I still have occasional bad days where I wonder if I should divorce my wife. Those days, however, have subsided from every day for the first year, down to once or twice a week during the second year, down to perhaps one day every few weeks during the third year.

Marriage is still better than it's ever been -- and it's pretty darn good -- so I continue moving forward. There are so many LOGICAL reasons for us to be together, that when my emotions run awry I can often pinpoint something my wife has done that upset and triggered me. We can discuss the issue when I'm feeling less emotional and eliminate the behavior from our marriage.

I'm a purist, and I'm pretty sure I routinely state that most betrayed spouses won't trust your spouse again for about two years after beginning recovery. And that that is the litmus test: if your marriage is better than it ever was (not just better than before the affair; better than it has EVER BEEN) after two years from beginning the program, you should keep going as there's hope for your marriage. If, on the other hand, your marriage isn't better than it's ever been two years later, it's probably as good as it's going to get and you should plan for a divorce.

If you're less than two years out from the start of recovery, this typically isn't a resentment problem. It's a "time in recovery" problem. It needs more time. This statement is telling:


Yep.

Dr. Harley is pretty explicit that any spouse wishing to divorce their wayward spouse due to infidelity has his blessing. It's what he would do if Joyce cheated on him. It's the quickest, easiest course to personal recovery. However, if you make the choice to recover with your spouse, it's a very difficult, narrow road filled with emotional landmines, motivational swamps, and a creative wilderness. Any of those can cause you to get "stuck", and triggers may occur even years later.

Your comment is hogwash because people here DON'T SAY THAT.

You have completely distorted what is said on these boards and what is said by Dr Harley. Harley says that if you are still having trouble years after the affair, then the cause is that you and your WS have not done enough to recover the marriage. However, he doesn't say that if you early into recovery and the affair has just ended.

It takes upwards of TWO YEARS to heal the wound and transform the marriage.