Looking at OM photos and videos,
listening to OM on answering machine,
looking at OM FB,
re reading old emails and texts to and from OM,
are all examples of breaking NC.

Every time NC is broken WW gets a fix of her drug/OM. Affairs create the same chemical reactions in the brain as any other addictive substance.

Your WW will not detox from OM as long as she keeps breaking NC and gets her fixes.

Put that key logger on the PC and don't tell WW.

You don't TELL HER you have a keylogger on her computer. It is completely invisible. And no, your marriage would not end over it. It might end if you don't though. Your wife does not have the right to the privacy to destroy you behind your back. You have a right to know everything she does.


And your experience in saving marriages after an affair is..........? If you have experience that works, then you don't need us, do you? See, we have saved our marriages using these tactics. If you know a better way, you should use it. So far, your best thinking has led you to this terrible place.

Unfortunately, we have entirely different goals. Yours is to avoid her anger at all costs; ours is to save your marriage.

Your marriage can survive her temporary anger; it CAN'T survive an ongoing affair. Until you start working to kill this affair, this is hopeless. Your complacence reflects a lack of concern.


As you can see, you are not making progress and won't make progress doing what you are doing. Let us know when you get serious and we can help you. But there is absolutely nothing we can do to help you if you won't take the advice here.

here

You are wasting very valuable time that could be used working on saving your marriage. You have no idea what you are dealing with and are making strategic mistakes that will hamper your ability to save this if you ever do wake up. Like Dr Harley says, it is very hard to save a marriage when you are an enabler.

If she used heroin as an "outlet" would you be agreeable to that because she needs an "outlet?" Well, facebook is just as destructive to your marriage. I don't know what it means to "need an outlet" but I do know that facebook is keeping her addiction alive and needs to go. You should DEMAND that she delete it. And yes she can start up a new account. Which you would quickly discover with a keylogger.

How about helping her eliminate these destructive "outlets" so she can seek her "outlet" in your marriage?

Arthur, if you are serious about saving your marriage, your next steps should be a strategy to kill the affair and then lead your marriage out of the ditch. Your strategy of hope and enabling will get you nowhere except an entrenched affair. I assure you that your wife is thinking of ways to resume the affair and that will eventually happen if you don't kill it.

The first step is exposure. Since this is not a workplace affair, you wouldn't expose to the workplace, but you should expose it to her mother, dad, your family and other close friends and family. Give them all the facts and ask them for their support. Read the exposure templates in my exposure thread for talking points. Exposure is the single most important step towards recovery and you can't afford to skip this step because you are afraid she will be "humiliated." Of course she will be humiliated. As she should. There is nothing wrong with that.

After you expose, she will be furious. Don't let that bother you one bit. Just be calm and offer her a potato chip or a cup of coffee. After a couple of days of her ranting and raving, show her a plan to lead your marriage out of a ditch.

Ask him/her to send a no contact letter to the OP that is written together, approved by you and mailed together. [template below from SAA]

Set her down and explain to her that you want to have a romantic, loving, SAFE marriage and that you won�t stay in a loveless marriage. Tell her you are willing to give her an opportunity to give you just compensation. In order for the marriage to recover, certain things have to happen. This is what it will take to keep you interested:

1. end all contact with the OM for life - that means sending a no contact letter that is approved by you and NEVER attending any conference where he is present

2. no more nights apart or going out without each other - create a healthy, integrated lifestyle

3. complete transparency - cell phone passwords, etc

4. no more opposite sex friendships

5. complete honesty about her affair<s> � passing a polygraph

6. commit to the Marriage Builders program for recovery as outlined in the book Surviving an Affair.

Tell her "this is what it will take to keep me in this marriage." Whether your marriage ends up with success or failure will depend almost entirely on her willingness and ability to make radical changes. Her lifestyle must become absolutely transparent, holding nothing back. She is in no position to negotiate when it comes to extraordinary precautions, because those precautions are designed to prevent another affair and help you feel safe. She must also meet your emotional needs in a way that until now she has failed. Unless she makes a 180 degree turn in her approach to what it means to be a wife, your marriage won't recover, it will be a crippled version of your pre-affair marriage.

You have nothing to lose and everything to gain by taking this approach, because if she won't do these things, you will have lost nothing except a loveless, abusive marriage.

Unless you use this program to create a much better marriage than the one you had before the affair, you are likely looking at repeat affairs. So don't even think you can get away with sweeping the affair under the rug and going back to what you had before. What you had before led to the affair!

It IS scary to snoop on a spouse.
They might find out and have a huge tantrum
but
they are the one who broke the bond of trust.

Not the betrayed spouse.

Any anger about snooping, well, is a tantrum and misplaced entitlement and abuse to the betrayed.

It just is.

If you are too scared of making her angry and her leaving, you will not be able to do what must be done to possibly save the marriage. It is the path to getting to where the wife might someday be willing to do the v e r y hard work to rebuild from her affair.

I would DEMAND that she completely delete facebook and that she end her "friendship" with this toxic "male friend." Did this "friend" tell you about the affair? She should not have opposite sex friendships and she most certainly should not have a friendship with a creep who enabled this attack on your marriage.


You should tell her TODAY she can't go to this. Additionally, the OM's wife should be informed of this conference and informed of the facebook stalkings and these other "friends" who knew about the affair. These "friends" [enemies] might be facilitating the affair.

Welcome to MB. Sorry your marriage is in this sad condition. You have been receiving great advice. I just wanted to add my support and offer you the following ....


Eyes wide open. Nothing will sink your recovery chances faster than trusting your wife at this point. WW will tell you the opposite. WW will say that mistrust from you will be the ruin of the marriage. Do not believe her. Do not argue the point. Simply nod and say "I understand. You are wanting secrecy." when she claims her entitlement to her "privacy".

Privacy = shutting the bathroom door when nature calls.
Secrecy = taking her cell into the bathroom and locking the door so she can communicate with OM, or friends/agents of OM.

Please, these actions are a show of your commitment for your marriage.
Put a GPS on her vehicle. Even if you think it is unnecessary.
Put electronic checks on her equipment.
Contact OM's betrayed wife and invite her to inform you right away if she suspects anything.

Do not tell your WW about this MB forum, not for awhile.

Plan A.
Click/read the "carrot/stick" link in my sig line. Use it as a guideline until you've gotten a chance to read and digest Dr. Harley's book Surviving An Affair. (SAA)

Do not trust your wife. It is dangerous right now. You want to trust her because you fear, deep down, that your distrust may drive her towards OM. In fact, trusting WW (at this juncture) leaves the door OPEN for OM to walk into your marriage and take what he wants ~~~> your wife!

In February, there is an industry wide 2 day conference which I know they will both be attending.

News flash. If WW goes to this, she goes glued to your hip.

AW, what you have not yet absorbed is that until WW commits to rejoining your marriage, you and she are not allies, but opponents. As your alias would suggest you are a student of military history, you would be expected to know that successful campaigns require the selection of the correct strategy and its effective application.

Here is the program you should be following:

NEVERGUESSED'S BETRAYED HUSBAND SURVIVAL KIT

1- KEEP ALL THESE ARRANGEMENTS SECRET FROM YOUR WAYWARD WIFE!
2 � Put a keylogger on any computer you can access that she might use.
3 � Put a spy program on any cell that she might use. ("Eblaster" can cover #4 as well.)
4 � Put a GPS on her car, reporting to your computer.
5 � Put a VAR in her car, and in any room she might use to take "personal" calls
6 � Get a mini-audio-recorder, and have it in your possession and "on" whenever in her presence.
7 � Put together an e-address list of anyone who might have influence on her � parents, siblings (sisters, especially), coworkers, college friends, clergy, hairdresser, anyone.
8 � Put together a similar list for the POSOM.
WHEN YOU HAVE SUFFICIENT EVIDENCE,
9 � Put together the electronic evidence for each AP.
10 - Write a cover note for your wife's contacts, to the tune of: "I must unhappily inform you that my wife, XXXXXX, is carrying on an illicit affair with YYYYYY. I am hoping to recover our marriage, and ask if you have any influence over her, to urge her to abandon her cheating lifestyle and return to me and our family. Her cell number is 111-222-3333"
11 � Write a similar note to POSOM's contacts.
12 � Send out both packages, to all contacts at one time.
13 � Brace yourself.

AW's program of "loving" and "trusting" her back to the marriage has not proved effective. How about trying our suggestions?

You need to expose this and go with your WW to that conference. If you allow her to go by herself you will keep her attached to her OM.

Read these.
Exposure 101
Carrot an Stick of Plan A

Going to the conference would be OUT if the OM is there because seeing him would be a breech of no contact. Seeing the OM is the equivalence of an alcoholic taking a drink.

Arthur, Melodylane is absolutely correct.
In order for your marriage to survive this adultery, you wife will need to ELIMINATE the conditions that made her adultery possible. (see above list/examples)

And, by the way, whenever you discuss OM with your wife, NEVER refer to him by his name. Instead, refer to OM as "Betty's husband" (use his wife's first name). Do this each and every time, and repeat it often. OM's wife should be referenced whenever WW speaks of OM.

Example:

WW says: "Clyde said he wanted to marry me."
You reply: "Betty's husband wanted to marry you?"
WW says: "Why do you insist on repeating that?"
You (calmly) respond: "I have committed myself to face the fact that he is in fact Betty's husband."

Pep is great at dealing with fog, pay attention!

Last but not least, take care of YOU. No one else will do it. And you need to be on form.

It is massively difficult, but be sure to sleep and eat. Or at least snack and nap.

See your GP if the depression becomes overwhelming for help in functioning day to day. Many BSs need ADs

Thanks for the tough love.

Ok, so I think you're right. Something is probably still going on, but she's being more careful now.

I guess I just need to get more information.

How are things with you two today?

Thanks for asking.

Not good. Quite troubled actually.

Yesterday, I thought we made some progress. I was very nice and got her flowers. She seemed responsive and it was nice. Today I found that she had wiped the history on her computer.

I told her that it really seemed that she was hiding something from me. She told me not to be so paranoid and gave me her new passwords for facebook and gmail (but I don't have her work email details). I just can't shake the feeling that there's something else going on.

Do you have a key logger on there yet? You need to up your snooping, pronto!

AW, I know how you feel right now...miserable, like someone else is driving your happiness off a cliff and you can't stop it. You feel like you're losing everything. But the thing you don't realize, is now that you know the plague on your marriage, you can fight it! And you will come through a survivor whether your WW ever gets her head out of her rear or not. THAT is the greatest strength...you will survive this. Will your WW? That's entirely up to her. She could chose to lose everything (many addicts do). She could chose to follow you to recovery. But YOU will need to recover from this regardless of what she does. And all the awesome advice you've gotten so far...to snoop then expose...is HER best chance of making the right choice. So if you want to help your wife, and it really seems you love her and want the best for her, snoop and expose, and plan A like a rockstar. Let her join you in a healthy life and awesome marriage. If she doesn't l, you really can have a beautiful life regardless.

Today I found that she had wiped the history on her computer.


That is a bad.


I told her that it really seemed that she was hiding something from me. She told me not to be so paranoid ..................(but I don't have her work email details).


That is bad.

Tell WW you want those as well. You are not a security risk.

You are wasting valuable time get the key logger now. If WW logs on to work email from home you will have the pass word.

Dollars to doughnuts WW gave you her email password because she has a secret email account to use for her affair. Get that key logger.

Wellington, of course there's something going on. (As we've been telling you based upon our experience with how wayward spouses behave.) People who don't have things to hide don't wipe their computer histories. People with nothing to hide don't waste their time trying to hide things.

So now, you need to stop talking with your wife about what you think she's hiding from you. That discussion is not useful for you right now, because she is not yet your ally (and she won't be until you bust up the affair that's still addling her mind). All that's accomplished by your discussing your suspicions with her is that you might tip her off to what you now & don't know, and thereby help steer her in her efforts as she tries to keep the affair going "underground." James Bond wouldn't tip his cards that way. You must be James Bond. So keep quiet about what you suspect. Be pleasant with her and keep a self-assured half-smile on your face. Let her think that she's thrown you off the trail.

It may be that you've tipped her off just enough so that she'll be extra careful for a while. You might wish to consider hiring a professional private investigator. If not, then really, please do get a keylogger onto her computer and cellphone(s) surreptitiously (i.e., to be very clear: Don't tell her you're doing this). Look at the "Operation Investigate" forum if you need advice. Again: Allow her to think that she's thrown you off the trail. That's when affairees will get sloppy and slip up. Then, when you've garnered solid evidence of the ongoing contact with the other man, you'll be set & well-armed to unleash a massive exposure.

Hang in there, man. We're pulling for you. You can do this.

If/when you get the keylogger

do

not

tell her!

You will need to withhold that info for it to help you see the truth

to save your marriage.

No to telling her. No.

Also, stop telling her you know she is hiding things from you.

Plan A her (study up on this) and snoop but be cool while doing so.