I am new to MB and this is my first post. I wished I knew about MB long time ago. I enjoy this forum very much and It is wonderful to see how many people are willing to help others in need of help. I too could use your help.

I am separated nine months and divorcing. Second marriage for both of us. Both of us have two children from previous marriage. My kids are in college and her kids are younger. We had what everyone said a great blended family and rather good marriage. Everyone says that we a a great match and a great couple. However, last year was tough and we had all kinds of problems that put a lot of pressure on all of us. I did not quite notice how many AOs I had and how many LBs I committed. I struggled with anger all my life. My DW is a non confrontational type. I was not aware how empty her love bank was. I was making big withdrawals and I deposited very little.

In August last year I returned home from a trip to find the house empty. It is then when I was served divorce papers. She left me with her kids and my kids were in college. It was surreal and extremely painful. She left a note with the divorce papers listing all my transgressions and the reasons why she decided to file for divorce. On her insistence we met for dinner on the same day and she told me in person the same day. I was crushed. Our children were crushed too. As a step father I had no visitation right for my step children. I was their second father. I did so much for them and we love each other very much. How sad is to be divorcing step-parent.

A month before filing for divorce she told me that we had a "perfect" marriage. It is also then when her ex-fianc� contacted her after 20 years. She showed me the email right away. He was in a miserable marriage. I felt so secure in our marriage that I did not object to her talking to him. That was a major mistake of my life! A couple of weeks after that she told me that she had feelings for him! I started panicking and we had a huge fight before my trip. After the trip she moved out, filed for divorce and was planning her life with out me in it. Call me stupid but I did not think at that time that the reason for her getting out was her ex-fianc�. I saw myself as a main reason for her wanting to divorce me and all the things about me she mentioned in her list. I started going to therapy and I am still doing it every week. My goal was to get her back.

Seven years ago while we were dating she abruptly left me. Prior to that I was her prince. I could not do wrong. In one day that changed and she left me. I implemented NC and after one month she was back. She then admitted that the reason for her leaving me was an EA that she had with a guy she met at the conference. I was very hurt but decided to get back with her anyway. Eventually we got married and had 4.5 years of good marriage before she filed for divorce.

After filing for divorce she was often brutal in conversations with me. What a change from a sweet wife that she was before. All that bottled up anger kept coming out. I was blamed for everything wrong in her life. She was very unreasonable in her requests but divorce did not progress except for initial filing. Then she invited me and my children to the Thanksgiving dinner. Prior to that she told me that she was in love with me! I asked about her ex-fianc� and she said that they were just friends. I chose to believe her.

We started spending more time together and even started MC. We were even looking to buy a house together. Everything was looking great. I was living in her house. Then after an argument we had at the ski trip I noticed that things started going south. She started withdrawing. Looking back I think we're we're getting back too fast and without any plan. I wish I knew about MB few months ago. We even went to a spring break vacation as a family but prior to that she told me she wanted to proceed with our divorce. Double death for me!

After the spring break she kept pushing relentlessly and unreasonably for the divorce to be completed in a very short time. I refused to do that. She was mad.

Ten days ago I found out everything. You all guessed it right: She had a PA with her ex-fianc�. Later he separated from his wife too. She even told our friend that she loved him with all her heart. Even before I learned about her PA and OM I asked her to stop any contact with him. She did it mostly because (as I learned later) the high from that PA wore off.

I also learned that after our ski trip there was OM #2 that she also had a PA with. I knew this guy as long as I knew my wife. They are colleagues. I thought that he was a friend and a friend of our marriage. He was not. He too separated from his wife after tenaffair with ,y wife started. He lives in another state. I learned that they were visiting each other every weekend.

I learned about "affair exposure" on MB on May 3rd ( Thursday). I liked the idea very much. The next day (Friday early morning) I emailed a very short email to my wife telling her that I knew about her affair #2 with POSOM #2 (notice how quickly I learned this acronym :))

Later that morning I called POSOM2's wife and expose the affair to her. She got with her lawyer right away. We kept talking and texting to each other all weekend. On Saturday morning I exposed my wife's affairs to our social group. O. Sunday night I exposed it to her colleague and his wife. On Monday and Tuesday I exposed it to her family and to guys in her department. On Monday I exposed it to my daughter. Yes and I exposed it to POSOM2's boss! The boss is a very nice guys and wanted to hear what I had to say.

On Monday I heard from a mutual friend who is a friend of our marriage that my wife is "deeply hurt" by whatever I was doing! POSOM2's wife stopped communicating with me. She exposed her husband's affair to his family. They were mad at him and sided with BW. On Tuesday her attorney sent a letter to my attorney to tell me to stop sending emails about my wife's affair. I did because I was done anyway.

Because of the conflict of interest I had to find I new lawyer. The new lawyer is good. The new court appearance was reset for November! That is six months from now. My wife is mad now. She wanted a quick divorce and she did not get it.

I want to save my marriage although most people including my lawyer ask why. My answer is: If I did everything right in our marriage I would have divorced her right away but I did not do things right especially last year. I want to see what would our "conscious" marriage look like. I do believe that some of the strongest marriages are created after the major crisis. However, few go beyond the crisis. One has to have faith that it can be done. My wife does not have that faith. At this point, she obviously thinks that jumping from one man to another and "falling in love" over and over again is much more fun than working on our marriage.

My wife says that there is a zero chance of us reconciling. Two weeks ago she told our friend that she loved me and that she wad attracted to me but that she could not be vulnerable with me. She also told me that even if both of us fixed all our issues she could not stay married to me.

I fixed many of my issues. My anger is virtually gone with a combination of therapy and antidepressants. Everyone noticed that I have changed a lot for better. My wife did not. She still sees me as an angry man. She tries to provoke my anger but i am aware of that and i do not let her do that. Also, I do not see her all talk to her especially after affairs discovery and exposure. I exercise and I look great. My ex-wife tells me jokingly that I can have a new date every night. I am not interested at all. I want my wife back.

Our children want us to stay married. Is there any chance that she can change her mind in the next six months? The only way to keep divorce alive for next six months is to make divorce more complicated. I do not think that my wife will like that and I do not see that she will love me more for that. What do you suggest?

Good for you for exposing her affairs! I would wager that your wife is a serial cheater who is addicted to having affairs. She gets a real charge out of that and it seems to have been her pattern for some time. Can your marriage be saved? Yes, but only if your wife makes a serious committment to a radical change in her behavior. For example, she would have to agree to complete transparency and an end to ALL opposite sex friendships. Marriage Builders could save your marriage if she was willing. This program would achieve 2 key things: a) affair proof your marriage and b) restore the romantic love in your marriage.

But of course, that can only happen if she commits to a plan. Otherwise, you are better off without her because cheating will be in your future. If I were in your shoes, I would give it a few more months while you drag out the divorce. If she doesn't make a serious committment to change in that time, you will be divorced.

Also, it is not against the law in the US to tell the truth, so her attorney had no legal grounds to demand you stop telling truth.

Do you travel for a living?

ML thanks for your input. I read many posts and your replies and I appreciate your wisdom. I see this crisis as an opportunity. My WW does not and it breaks my heart. I expose it to my sone today and he said: She will be back. My children love her. She was a great mom, step mom and wife but it changed with her afair with her ex fianc�. I realized that many things she said were lies.

I do not travell for living. She does travell a lot for conferences. POSOM #2 is in the same profession as her and they see each other often. Next conference is in June 1-5 and they will see each other. I do not know if that affair is busted. He is a real POS who would not return my calls. I have no contact with WW from the time of exposure 10 days ago. At least she is not rushing me with the divorce. I have the upper hand now.

Thanks Almostdivorced. I also see opportunity here. There are no guarantees, but there is still a chance.

Have you exposed the affair at her workplace? And are you still in touch with the OM's wife?

ML

I did expose the affair to the three top people in her department. She really did not like that since I said that these affairs are damaging to her children as well which I do know for a fact. Her kids love me and want me to be there not some POSOMs.

I am not in touch with POSOMS #2 BW. She did not reply toa couple of my texts. I did not want to push. She is really nice and a great mother. Her husband is an immature and lazy SOB and really bad father. Do you think I should ask once more if that affair is busted and where she is with her husband. She was not sure if she wanted to reconcille with him.

Poor POSOMS #2. He is scared, lost and most likely ridiculed by the friends and colleagues. My WW too. There is so much truth in the "affair down" concept. The cruelest joke would be to let them marry each other. However, if this affair is still alive my WW will dispose of POSOMS # 2 soon. The high will wear off. He will not know what happened and the market is slim out there except for the low lives like him.

Your WW needs to quit her job.


Yes contact the BW of OM2.

She could be a great ally.

BH

I was not clear in my last reply. I did expose the affair to the OM2 wife as soon as I learned about it. We talked and texted each other a lot for a three days and then she stopped communicated. I wonder why? I told her about MB and "affair exposure". She was not quite sold on it especially exposing it to her kids (11 and15) also she did not want to cal my WW who she knows well. She wanted to talk to her lawyer first. Smart! She did expose her WH to WH's family. They did not even know that he moved out. They were furious. His mom especially.

I do not want to push his wife. She may not appreciate it. Also, She may take a view that i may have caused a lot of problem for him and her too if they want to reconcile. I do not share that concern in regard to my WW. She should be ashamed.

AD, I would text her and let her know the affairees will be together at the same conference next month. Ask her what the situation is on her end. Maybe it would be better to call her on the phone?


What about Human Resources? If the affair is exposed - officially - to Human Resources, they are much more likely to take action. On the other hand, it is not uncommon for bosses to sweep an affair under the rug. There is a post about best practices for workplace exposure in the thread in my link.

ML I will call or text OM2 BW tomorrow and tell her about upcoming conference and ask what is going on the other side. As I said I talked to The OM2's boss. I do not know what the impact of that was. All I know is that my WW is "deeply hurt" and was MAD in the court yesterday. I was not there. I had an important meeting to attained. I guess it is good that she is "hurt deeply" and MAD. What do you think?

I was threatened by her lawyer (letter to my lawyer) and by the police about additional exposures. The policemen called me and told me that my WW filed some kind of complaint. She complained that I was calling her all the time!!! I was not. I sent her a very short email 10 days ago that was it. She would like me to call her but I have no intention of doing it. I want her to hit the bottom and call me instead.

The policemen had all exposure emails that I sent. He read them. That explais why he was very nice to me while conveying these "threats" to me about any future exposures.

I am going to ask my lawyer tomorrow to check with the police department what is that complaint the my WW filed against me. Does it carry any weight or it is just an empty threat.

I think that an official exposure to the HR of her big institution is a good idea. I will reread your Exposure 101. Thank you very much!

Sounds like you already are but read this anyway.
DOCUMENT DOCUMENT DOCUMENT!!!!

I would like to explain something. As I said people are asking me why are you staying in this marriiage where your WW is a serial cheater. Well 15 years ago I was a WH and I cheated twice on my wife. I understand the brain of WS. It is indeed as an addiction. I used these two women to get high. They used me too. They were very short affairs but I felt "in love" as if I was a teenager! That feeling was so powerful. I felt alive and I wanted more of it. When they ended I felt so empty. The second one led to my divorce. My fog lifted but it was to late to save my marriage. I never got over my divorce and I always wanted to create a stable home for them. I thought that I had that with my WW. Now we are divorcing and our children are beteryed for the second time. God help them and us too.

I have never cheated on my WW. I avoided female friends. That is always a trouble. My WW did not avoid male friends. The OM #2 she knew for a long time. I did not like them talking about their respective marriages. She kept telling me there was nothing to worry about! Really?

Few days ago I told my children about me cheating on their mom. I wanted them to understand what is going on in the brain of a WS. I told them to treat their step mom as a drug addict. They love her but they are very angry and domnot want to communicate with her. She loves them too and it is really hurting her that they know what she did. She is in denial and is telling them not to believe me. My WW knew that I would expose her affairs to my son today since his last final was yesterday. I told him today. My son met the OM2 at the function that she took him to and my son saw that there was inappropriate "arm around my WW waist" kind of behaviour and he did not like it. Guess who is he going to believe. She is alone right now. I think that her recovery is possible but only after she hits the hard bottom. That is how it worked for me. It may take a very long time formherbto,hit the bottom. My goal is to speed up that process for her own good. Any ideas?

BH thanks for the documentation thread. I am sort of doing it but I will be more strict about it. I live in a no fault state but adultery is taken into account for the community property division which my WW was not aware of. From the legal point of view it is much worse for the OM #2. I do not know if the fool is aware of that but his wife is for sure.

This morning I sent an email to OM2's wife. It was a follow up on this side of the affair. I told her about affair exposure that I did. She was aware that I was doing it. I also told her little that I know about the effect of these exposures on my wife.

I asked her what was going on with her and her WH. I also told her to work on her marriage and to think of her husband as a drug addict and to treat him that way. I encouraged her not to make any quick decisions and to work on her marriage.

She did not reply yet and I do not think she will. She was very polite before and when I exposed the affair to her almost two weeks ago we communicated a lot. She is not communicating with me any more. I was very polite and respective of her choices regarding her marriage and affair exposure.

Why is she not replying to my email? What is your gess?

She may be in denial. This is why it is a good idea to keep her apprised of any new learnings about the affair. Doing so might help it sink in.

ML
That is an interesting observation that I did not think of! I presented some really good evidence. Her WH is the best fiend with a guy my wife works with. That guy told her to that he knew about the affar and did not like it. You would think that is enough. Who knows what kind of spin her WH put on the affair exposure.

Today I realized that my email was taken from the list of the social group that my WW and I are/were part of. I do not receive any emails from them. The woman who runs the group is a good friend of my wife. She sided with my wife to "protect" her from further embarrassment. I know that most of theele in the group believe me and will not buy my WW's BS any more.

So I faced two "rejections" today but I am ok. I am so convinced that the "affair exposure" is the right thing to do. My lawyer did not think so but with all respect I disagree with him. I do not believe that divorce lawyers will accept MB concepts in general especialy about affair exposure. My lawyer is a good family man doing his job protecting my interests. He said that being a divorce lawyer helped him keep his marriage strong.

I just learned from OM2's BW that the affair between our spouses is very much alive.They are possibly going on vacation this week, conference next week and another one after that one. I was hoping that my exposure did some damage but now I see that it did not. It has been two weeks since my exposure and atbthatntime I stopped all contacts with my WW. I do not think that OM's BW did much of exposing except to his family.

She told my son that I am telling lies. Wow! Is that the same woman I married. She has lost all decency, morality even humanity! We humans have empathy. We feel of other humans. WS are not humans. They are indeed aliens as it has been said over and overb on MB. I think that my WW even feels pleasure I inflicting pain on our family and OM's family too. She also thinks that everyone around her is stupid.

My WW's ex-husband divorced her after she had an affair. I ignored that fact. Big mistake on my part!

Wow! Is she planning on doing anything about it? What about exposing to the OM's facebook contacts?

And most lawyers advocate against exposure because their goal is to facilitate the easiest, softest divorce possible. They are divorce experts, not marriage experts. They don't care about saving your marriage and seek the path of least resistance.

ML

I am expecting a phone call from OM's wife. Her WH does not have a FB account. My WW deleted her FB. I just found out. My WW was most likely afraid of possible exposure using her FB account. Somebody must have warned her about that possibility.

I want to talk to OM's wife and see what her goal is: divorce or reconcilliation. If she wants to reconcile she must do full exposure. I could have exposed more as well. I did some more .

My daughter and I have no contact with my WW. My son is thinking if he should accept invitation to lunch from her. What do you think? Does plan B include my children ( her step children)? Is it more effective if my children and I go NC with her? Should I influence my children or let them do whatever they want. They are 19.

I feel sorry for my WW. After this high that she is feeling now she will crash. Her problems will not go away just because she is high right now. She will be worse off hen the affair is over. I for sure know that she will be sorry one day for all of this. I do not know whenthatnday will be.

It has been confirmed: My WW is on vacation with her lover for a whole week. I understand that people here say to think of your WW as if an alien occupies her body now but it is very hard for me to understand that her fog will ever lift. If it does I do not know if I would be able to take her back. It hurts so much.

What happens when the fog lifts? Do they realize how cruel they behavior is? My WW is a serial cheater. She seems not to learn from past mistakes. She was in deep love with her OM #1 last year from August till December and then she dropped him for me and then she dropped me for the POSOM #2. She is totally neglecting the needs of her children and step children, let alone BH. I think she could watch me die and not care. How domyounguys ever go back to a such woman. Are they ever capable of being hi,an and truly loving someone? Even if you take her back don't you wonder when is she going to do the same thing all over again? Do they change for good and what is needed for that to happen.
I do love my WW. I feel sorry for her. She is desperate to find happiness. She is looking for happiness in other men. She thinks that other men will make her whole and happy. They will not. Is is sad to watch her get high for the affair and close her eyes to many real life problems that she is facing. She and hern POSOM and the most selfish hedonistic idiots on the planet (together with other affaires). Deep inside they are very lost, sad, depressed and very weak souls. To truly love you have to have courage face not run from yourself and your daemons.
Please all of you vets and new members alike share your thoughts. This is all like a nightmare. I am waiting for it to be over. Sure I did LB and AO but I and kids did not deserved this brutality from WW. Two of our four children are a mess.