My husband and I have been married for 5 years. We met, became friends, and a short month after we began dating, we eloped. It was a whirlwind military romance. The military separated us for 8 months within only 3 weeks of us being married. I was 18 at the time, and stupid, and I cheated, physically, 4 times, emotionally 1 time, during this 8 month separation. I never once lied to my husband about the cheating, and every time we talked on the phone I confessed all, and every time he would forgive me, ask me not to do it again, and try to move on. I was terrible, and selfish. I knew I could never forgive myself and that I needed to get away from this man that I kept on hurting, and couldn�t seem to stop hurting. So I asked him for a divorce, I was sick of hurting him, so sick of it. He wouldn�t give me a divorce, saying that I could hurt him until the day he died, but he would always want to be with me. After hearing that, and really believing him, I decided to change, and to never hurt him like that again.

I guess I never realized how much he truly loved me and how much I truly loved him. We went to counseling and he always said, I forgive you, I forgive you. It took me awhile to forgive myself, but I managed to after a few years. Within 2 months of us recommitting to each other (after that 8 month period), we became pregnant with our first child. It was a happy moment. We were blissfully happy, or so I thought. We had a wonderful 3 years, no betrayals or infidelity, and always complete honesty, always. We also attended annual marriage maintenance. We decided to try for another child and now have a 6 month old baby as well as our 3 year old, and I can�t forget my almost 12 year old stepdaughter as well (though she does not live with us).

When my stepdaughter was visiting us for Christmas week this past year, I was helping her with some math problems. I reached for my husband�s phone to use the calculator and saw messages between himself and a girl. I quietly tried to take the phone to a location away from our three children so I could see to what extent these message were bad� He chased me around the house, carrying our infant, and when I tried to lock myself in the bathroom he bodyslammed the door while holding our child, bodyslammed it so hard that my back (which was propped against the wall, my feet against the door) broke through the wall and created a deep crack there. He finally gave up when I began reading some of the love notes and cybersex chats aloud. He realized I had discovered all. So he gave up.

Right after that I managed to get him to give me passwords to email accounts and xbox accounts and found pictures and more communications between them. I slapped him once (which I know was wrong, I was so upset) and then he had to go take his daughter to the airport (she was flying back from Christmas break that day). He said, I may not come back or if you keep reading through those messages I may as well not come back. To which I got worried, told him I loved him, asked him if he was thinking of hurting himself, and vowed to stop looking through the messages.

Then he left, with his 12 year old, and I cried, while holding my infant and my 3 year old I cried.

We talked that evening. He explained how ever since I cheated on him and told him time after time after time (which he mentioned he wished I hadn�t told him and just had decided to change without him knowing), I created this scar, and he has tried to truly forgive me but every time I didn�t speak to him nicely or treated him with disrespect or looked at him like he was dumb, I caused that scar to hurt more and more and more. And I know, I speak very badly to him. I am nicer to strangers than to him, I have gotten way too comfortable with him. I demand instead of request. I interrupt instead of listen. I overreact instead of answer. I take things very hard, even little things like jokes and suggestions. All of these things made him not want to open up to me, made him realize he just couldn�t do this anymore. Realize that, I guess, our marriage was over.

I didn�t know. Two days before I found out about the infidelity we had taken family pictures and looked so happy, so whole, so full of love. The week before we had been talking about where we wanted to be buried together. The month before we had scheduled our dual wills appointment. 6 months before we had celebrated the birth of our second child. A year before we had purchased our first home together. And now this�

I went through a week of mixed emotions, dressing younger, sexier, getting drunk, crying, screaming, withdrawing. Then we started going to a Chaplain for counseling. In that second week, my husband told me that he loves her more than me. He cried more when he said that then he had cried at any other time since the discovery of this� He had convulsions and passed out on the floor. He hyperventilated.

Now, since then, he says he can�t sincerely say he wants to kiss me. He has been holding me less. I have to ask for hugs� And we don�t have sex.

Should I even want these things? I don�t know if I should, but I want to feel loved, and after reading some of the Love Languages book, I know my primary language is physical love. But he says he doesn�t know how he feels.

I asked him to tell me if he is still in contact with her, he said he would. But then I found out he was still in contact with her (I had emailed her and she sent me the messages they had exchanged). He swore on his children�s lives that he wasn�t in contact with her. And yet, he was. Later on he told me he was just testing me� to see how I would react I guess?

He asks why I am showing him how much I love him now, as opposed to showing him back before I knew. He sees it so much more now. I say because I never realized there was a possibility of me losing him. After I had hurt him so bad 4 years ago, and he stayed, I didn�t think anything could make him want to leave me, not after he stayed after going through that. But I was wrong and selfish to think that way, and I should have put more work in. I know that. And I admit my guilt. He says it seems as though I am loving him for me and not for him. Like a selfish love, I guess. I hadn�t ever thought of it that way, but I asked how I could show him I love him for him, selflessly. He said to give him what he needed. Time to figure this out on his own. No more checking his emails and xbox and accounts at all, no more questions about if he is committed or not, no more asking about her. Just give him time. I deleted all of his accounts from my access, I deleted my account that had her information in it. I deleted all correspondence that I had saved on my computers and all information in my phone. I have not looked on his accounts or checked up on him since the 12th. And I have sworn not to.

It has been almost 20 days since I found out about this relationship (entirely online, with some skype and pictures and xbox live chatting, messaging) and he has not once said he regrets it. He has not once said he thought it was wrong. He has not once said he is committed to me and to our family. He says he wants to say it, but he cannot, because he does not genuinely feel like he is committed to us. He could still be contacting her for all I know. He could be trying to find a way to leave us. But I have chosen to forgive, to trust and to love him. He did so for me, after what I had done to him, and I must do so for him, not just because it�s �fair� but because I just love him so much. I cannot forget, so that is why I am here, telling you all this, looking for advice on how to move forward.

I know there is nothing I can do to change him, but I can change myself. I study his love language every day, I wake up earlier and prepare his coffee and his lunch. I take over a bit more with the children, I bake him pie and make his favorite foods, I voice my appreciation every day. I allow him full privacy if he asks for it, and I grant him the time he requests with his friends, out bowling, or even on xbox live. I am changing everything I can, but still trying to stay me. I still have breaking points. I have crying fits� afterwards he says he is sorry for making me cry. But I recover, I clean up, I go to work, I am a good mother. I have even been working on not asking for physical affection as much (though I failed this morning, he didn�t want to really give me a kiss, only a peck, because I had lipstick on, though that never really stopped him before, so I kind of pushed for a bit more intimacy in the kiss). I am working on it though�

So here I am. The Chaplain wants us to read His Needs, Her Needs, when we are done with Love Languages. So I looked it up online and found this. And just need advice. What can I do? How can I change myself to make it easier for him to show me what he showed her, sexually and emotionally? How can I make amends, again, for how badly I hurt him in the past and continued to hurt him by not showing him respect? How can I show him that I am truly making a permanent change to always respect him and show him love the way I should? What can I do to enable him to say, �I am committed to you. I did so wrong by you. I love you more than anything else. I am yours and yours alone, for now and for always.�?

Welcome!

loveispatient, there are so many things that you and your husband are doing the wrong way that I can't even find a place to start. I would suggest that you read the links that are the first post of this forum Start Here and come back here. You need to understand the concepts of Policy of Radical Honesty as well as how to accomplish exposure.

I would also suggest that read "Surviving an Affair" rather than His Needs Her Needs at this time.

~RQ

Hi LIP, welcome to Marriage Builders. There are very specific steps that have to be taken in order to recover from an affair. And you and your husband are taking none of them, unfortunately. The book you need to be using is Surviving an Affair, not Love Languages and not His Needs, Her Needs.

The first step in saving your marriage is for your husband to end his affair with this OW and open his life up to you entirely. You should have access to all his phones, email accounts, etc. Everything. He should not have anything that is "private" from you. All of your leisure time should be spent together. He should be held accountable in every way if you want to save your marriage.

Forgiveness is very inappropriate when it comes to affairs. Forgiveness means to erase the debt as if it never happened, but that is harmful to your marriage. It is in his best interest to give you just compensation for his affair.

Please go read the links in the first thread in this forum and take a look at Dr Harley's concepts of forgiveness:

here

"I know there is nothing I can do to change him, but I can change myself. I study his love language every day, I wake up earlier and prepare his coffee and his lunch. I take over a bit more with the children, I bake him pie and make his favorite foods, I voice my appreciation every day. I allow him full privacy if he asks for it, and I grant him the time he requests with his friends, out bowling, or even on xbox live. I am changing everything I can, but still trying to stay me. I still have breaking points. I have crying fits� afterwards he says he is sorry for making me cry. But I recover, I clean up, I go to work, I am a good mother. I have even been working on not asking for physical affection as much (though I failed this morning, he didn�t want to really give me a kiss, only a peck, because I had lipstick on, though that never really stopped him before, so I kind of pushed for a bit more intimacy in the kiss). I am working on it though�"



This is a positive step.
I encourage you to continue doing this.
In the meantime I suggest you read Surviving an Affair By dr Willard Harley.
Your husband is having an active affair.
You should expose his affair immediately. Exposure kills affairs faster than any other action. You can expose his affair by first reporting it to the Inspector General.

You should also expose the affair to the tramps family and friends on Facebook, Try to find out who her parents are and call them and let them know she is having an affair with your husband.

Call his parents and ask for their help.
Call your parents and friends.

If he is unwilling to leave the affair in 2 weeks then you should plan to separate from him. So you will need to visit an attorney in the near future too

I have read the links, but I feel as though it is too late for exposure, and I also feel as though it is not smart... Adultery is still a punishable crime in the military.

I've looked into Plan A and Plan B, however, I just don't know how I feel about him being away from the children, until he is ready to recommit to me? Days, weeks, months? That seems like it would be more of a punishment to them.

loveispatient, it is not too late for exposure. Exposure is the first step to killing the affair. And there are many on here who were exposed to the IG's office AND are recovering their marriages. It is best your chance so how can you say it is not smart?

It is only smart if you want to save your marriage. Affairs thrive on secrecy, so keeping his affair a secret helps it thrive and grow. The longer you enable him and ignore the problem, the more entrenched his affair grows. Why would you do that?

As Dr Harley has stated, it is very hard to save a marriage when you are an enabler...


Women have nervous breakdowns and suffer years of post traumatic stress disorder from staying in such abusive situations. It is obvious that your husband is having an affair and it will destroy your mental health to compete for him. It also makes you look very unattractive to HIM to compete for him. Do you realize that?

So what? Adultery is taken very seriously because adultery/lies/cheating are so very dangerous.


Why are you on this forum? Are you here to use the MB methods, or not? We will not bother ourselves if you do not want to use Dr Harley's Plans.

How To Survive Infidelity

Thank you all for your advice. I am ready to purchase the book and continue to implement Plan A, while trying not to ignore my emotional needs.

I will need help, so please allow me to still come here for advice.

I have a question now.

Should I tell his office (coworkers, supervisor)? Should I tell his friends and mine (I've only told one friend, and not the whole story)? Should I tell his dad (a pastor) and mom? Brother and sister in law (they live close)? Should I tell my office (boss and supervisor)?

Or should I just tell the IG?

I would put a keylogger on his computer and spyware on his phone and find out who it is. When you get the details, come back here and we will help you with next steps.

Did you read my Exposure 101 thread?

And yes, the answer is you should tell all those people.

I know who it is, I have information. I have passwords, I have been choosing not to use them to check on him per his request since the 12th. I have some information printed, but most electronic information I have deleted.

If you tell the IG or anyone in his command, be prepared for his career to be over. As I don't recommend keeping the affair a secret, telling his command will not just impact him, it will adversely affect you and the children as well. It's a tough choice to make and I would give it some thought before proceeding. I do recommend that you tell his family, your family, and friends.

I read the exposure 101 thread. I do not know if I should email the message or tell these people in person or on the phone? Email would be quickest. Phone would be more personal, but difficult because I don't have all the numbers. In person would be most difficult... for me.

I worry that if I email it he will get into trouble through the military justice system. However, the military requires proof of sexual act... and this was all online.

Should I include my infidelity in the message as well, it is from 4-5 years ago... but i mean exposure is exposure. Most people who really know us, know about it...

Then you are prepared to expose. You should start snooping on him again so you can continue to collect evidence and hold him accountable. Don't tell him you are snooping or he will just go further underground.

And whatever you do, don't dispose of any more evidence. You need to keep that.

Who is the affair with? Is this a married woman?

I am pretty sure that he cannot face any real legal action as long as the fact that the entire affair was online is clear. Emotional Cheating or Emotional Adultery, I'm pretty sure, are not punishable...

The woman is not married, just someone he met, states away, through his video games he plays online.

Just use your judgement. Typically it is a good idea to call parents and the affair partners spouse and email others.


If he gets in trouble, it will be because of his affair so don't worry about that. He should get in trouble.


No, because it is irrelevant to the issue at hand. The purpose is to kill his affair. Your affairs are over.

Sure. Briefly.

"As many of you know, our marriage has already suffered one infidelity. Mine in (year). Now, another infidelity is threatening our marriage, WH's." <~~~~ Just an example of how to handle your previous infidelity.