As stated above, Plan A is your only hope

Well, she can't really be having an affair because she's not married.

The steps of plan A are part of the negotiation to end the affair. Meeting EN's and eliminating LB's are demonstrations by the betrayed spouse that you are willing to address the WS's complaints.

If, after a time, she still does not end the affair, or I suspect in your case, entertain a romantic relationship with you, then plan B is in order, no contact with her.

Not because you are trying to hurt her, but rather you are trying to protect yourself from additional hurt.

She can deposit child support in your bank account. You can have someone be there when she picks up your child.

I rarely, if ever see my unfaithful ex-wife, and 10 years after her affair, this is a blessing to me. I really have no desire to see someone who not only was willing to have an affair, but to this day by all outward appearances, feels justified in having and affair and choosing divorce.

People change, and the woman you fell in love with may no longer be there, she may never have really been there, or she may return.

None of us can tell you what will happen.

But the plan is spelled out, and if you want to go through with it, there are plenty here who have successfully worked the plan to save their marriage, or use the MB program in their marriages today.

That's a good question since it may appear as if you are stalking her now that you are not married.

Maybe others have some thoughts on this...

As to the she never loved you... More wayward talk. But arguing against it is pointless, because that's what she believes now.

Water off a ducks back. If she fell in love with you before, you have an advantage. You know what you did and may be able to recreate the love that you believe was once there.

The point isn't to argue with her and prove that you are right, that she was in love with you at one time. What good does that do since she's not in love with you now?

Just understand that it is her current perception. Maybe even agree, by suggesting that, "yeah, I was pretty unloveable."

Then be lovable.

Actually, it would be if she was doing it with her (now former) boss, because he's married. It would still be 100% wrong, and she would know it.

Also, if anyone has advice on how to meet emotional needs of an ex-wife, I'd be all ears. That's the kind of advice I'm really after.

If that's the case, then you have just presented the means that you can find out if she is still having an affair with him.

Gather the information you have on the EA, including any proof it was with this guy and present it to his wife.

She needs to know the facts about her marriage and is in a position to find out if he's still involved with her.

You know her better than we do, so what are her emotional needs and what sort of things did you do in the past that hit the mark in meeting her needs?

That seems like a real Pandora's box/can of worms to me. What if her boss is 100% innocent? What if the EA was truly one-way? Dragging him and his family into it could make matters far worse. Don't you think?

Look at it this way. Even one-way, unrequited love by your ex-wife toward her boss is a threat to her marriage.

She would be well served to know about potential threats to her marriage.

So again, if you have proof that she had a crush on her husband, wouldn't it be in her best interest to know about a potential threat?

You can make it clear that you don't know if he responded or not. But you can provide any concrete evidence you have that she had a crush on him.

This is why it's important to use facts, not speculation. If the only facts you have are with respect to her actions, then make it clear that you don't know if he responded, or if she was just crushing on him.

Metro,

You wrote This was exacerbated by the fact that sex was off-limits for the last 1.5 years of our marriage and had been rare ever since our son was born

I could be wrong, but I suspect the affair blossomed 1.5 years before your divorced.

Did your WW ever say "I love you but I'm not in love with you"?

One particularly strong piece of evidence is that WW abandoned her own child, most persons in their right mind will not do this, and even less likely a woman. But a person in an affair is not in their right mind and behaves more like a drug addict.

If your WW is in an affair their is ZERO change of reconciliation.

Besides doing what is right by the OMW, ending her affair will help your cause or at the least return your Sons Mother to some sanity. Some men are sadistic and keep their affair partners in limbo for years, you don't want that to happen to your exW.

God Bless
Gamma

You don't understand.

It will be next to impossible to get her to fall back in love with you while she is in an affair. And, yes, she is in an affair with her boss. If she admitted an EA to you, then most likely it was already a PA at that point. Most waywards will not even admit to ANYTHING.

Do you have phone records from when you were still married? If not, can you get access to them?

Even if you can't get them, the fact that she admitted to an EA with the boss is enough to expose to his W.

No. She never said that. She mostly just clammed up and would not talk about our relationship problems unless in a counseling setting.


I'm not quite sure she's really in her right mind. I believe she's depressed and has deep emotional issues she's not dealing with.

That's Plan A, though. Right? Meeting her emotional needs? I don't know how feasible that is at this point though.


I'm not sure how I would access that. I know she talked to him on the phone occasionally anyway. I know they ate lunch together occasionally, and he worked on her car a couple of times. One time I even helped. They were and are friends. They no longer work for the same company, but she's trying to get a job with the company he's at now. (And yes, I know that's just more evidence she's having an affair with him.)

metro, this is a common statement made by women who are having an affair; they now have a 'point of comparison' and you, the husband, fail in the comparison.

Your test to confirm this will be if she has told you over the years that she never loved you. If that is the case, then you may have a wife who married you for something other than love.

If her claim of not ever loving you is recent: SHE IS HAVING AN AFFAIR. That's pretty much how it is. I'm sorry. But you've come to the right place. Read, ask questions and learn.

No, she's not in her right mind if she is having an affair. Affairs are addictions - they will take a totally normal person and make them crazy.

No, she doesn't have 'deep emotional issues'. She's having an affair. That's what you've got, here.

THIS. Pay attention, metro.

Who is this boss of hers? Is he married?

It is possible she has deep emotional issues and was/is having an affair. I haven't told you everything there is to know about her. You know nothing about her family of origin or traumatic life events she's experienced.

Just about everyone who knows her well believes she has some kind of emotional problem. She herself was quite convinced 2-3 years ago that she was depressed and went on several anti-depressants but all of them made her sick or worse, so she gave up on that. She also had her thyroid removed due to health problems associated with it and hoped it would solve her depression. It didn't. Soon after that, she seemed to turn on me permanently. I absolutely do think that fact coincides very nicely with an emotional affair she had with her boss. There's no question that comparisons happened, and I came up the loser in her mind.

So here is some evidence of the kind of personality my ex has. She is big into self preservation. She is hyper vigilant about safety, both physical and emotional. Her father was a career corrections officer, and he pretty much brainwashed both my ex and her sister that every other person you meet on the street is a murderer or a rapist. She once told me she believed that something like 25% of the population was either a murder or a rapist (I can't remember the exact figure she stated, but it revealed to me what a warped perspective she has when it comes to this kind of thing, and it explained just how fearful of a person she really us.) Some of her favorite reading material is "true crime" and she has read lots of stuff about criminal psychology and such.

She also has a long history of writing people off: pushing them out of her life permanently. When someone offends her one too many times, they are blacklisted forever. She has done this to several of her friends and even her grandparents. For several years she kept her own father at arm's length because of an overzealous corporal punishment he gave her when she was 12. She did not discuss that with him till she was close to 30. Since then they have been on pretty good terms.

This is just an example of some of the baggage she has. She has had this stuff going on since before meeting me or her boss. So not every behavior she exhibits can be so neatly attributed to an affair. I'm not saying it's impossible that she's had a physical affair, I'm just saying that there's a lot more to her than you guys realize based on what I've said so far. (And isn't that true about anyone, really?)

Her CHOICE to have an affair is a CHOICE. It's not the result of a bad childhood, or any other 'emotional' thing. We ALL have baggage from childhood that we bring into our adulthood. What we do with that baggage is a CHOICE.

metro, so you know: I was very abused as a child. I grew up in poverty. I wore MY BROTHERS' CLOTHES to school. I could tell you stories about my abuse that would make you cry. I promise you this.

And you know what? My Husband, who grew up in the lap of wealth and luxury, was the one who committed adultery.

So I just want you to know that you're going to have to work pretty darned hard to convince me that your WW is some hothouse flower who was dragged into infidelity against her will. I will probably be one of the hardest posters you'll come up against here, when it comes to blaming infidelity on some vague issue from childhood or from some other lack of...whatever. That's not going to fly with me, and I promise you that the other posters here aren't going to be amenable to it, either. Because hiding behind a smokescreen of emotional issues is hiding from responsibilty. Don't give your WW that pass.

Conversely, I'm going to be YOUR champion to recovering your marriage and not allowing your WW to dodge her responsibility for her terrible decision to betray you.
Just so you know.

metro, I'm going to strike out all the stuff that is immaterial to her affair. Ready?



This has NOTHING TO DO WITH HER AFFAIR.