Dude, between the pair of you, you'll drive me (us?) crazy! I read her self-abasing account and decide, "That Markos must be a Prince!" Then I read you figuratively flagellate yourself, and decide, "That Prisca must be a SAINT!"

Your case, on balance, must stand as a d-i-s-t-a-n-t outlier to the normal distribution of W/B pairs here. Most BSs have not committed (and continued committing) LBs at the rate you claim to have done...and STILL the too many WSs never get motivated to fight ALONGSIDE their BS as opposed to AGAINST their BS.

There is a tide in the affairs of men.
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures. - Willy S.

You snooze, you lose. - NeverGuessed

The question would come down to the balance-sheet between WSs who get "miffed" enough at the addition of Plan commitment to blow up any chance at recovery, versus those who, possibly doubtfully, do sign up with enough verve to see the benefits of the Plan, and give heart to their BSs.

I accept Prisca's avowal that she would have blown up; I ask you to accept mine that without Bride's immediate enlistment....well, you get the idea!

And lastly, at least for tonight - I listen to a LOT of MB recordings, virtually every one posted (like all those from the MB DJ). I'm sure I listened to your recommendation, but can't find the note in which it was referenced, so I can review it again. Do you have it handy?

Well, he is.
He saved our marriage.

On the contrary, most BHs who show up here are very well entrenched in lovebusters (especially AOs and DJs). Our situation was pretty typical.

Any BH has the right to divorce his wife if he doesn't want to put forth the effort of winning back an unrepentant, unremorseful adulterer. I am grateful that markos did not. I admire him for everything he went through by grabbing onto the reigns and pulling us through hell. It was not fair. It was not easy. He struggled with the heavy load more often than not. He did it anyway.

You are blessed that your wife immediately enlisted. Most BHs are not going to be so blessed and will have to do as markos did -- a relentless Plan A. Any BH can do it, if he so desires.

He has also stated that - especially with young children are involved - the cost of divorce is very high for men; both financially, and in terms of child custody. This is one of the key reasons men are usually advised to expend every effort to recover the marriage if they can endure it.

And, to add to that, Dr. Harley believes that most men can endure it, with help.

Here it is:
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/radio_program/play_segment.cfm?sid=03324
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/radio_program/play_segment.cfm?sid=03325
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/radio_program/play_segment.cfm?sid=03326
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/radio_program/play_segment.cfm?sid=03327

I fairly assiduously attempted to remain gender-neutral (ie WS, BS) in my prior notes, but I'll swing over the the specific case (WW/BH) that would seem to be all others' preference. My first two points are not hugely specific to the debate, but they do affect the "orientation" of what is to be discussed.

On the contrary, most BHs who show up here are very well entrenched in lovebusters (especially AOs and DJs)

Sorry, I do not accept this premise. The words "most...very well entrenched" alone, would render this statement indefensible. If we would aver the "absolute absence" of lovebusters, by either gender, on either side of the infidelity divide, the position would be equally flawed.

Any BH can do it, if he so desires.

This is patently untrue. I stand here in "not-so-mute" refutation that "any" BH could do it. (See below.)

...assure them that they will succeed if they keep doing it.

Here's the rub, friends. The "will succeed" is not at all supported by the majority of the BH's experiences here.

Shall we start counting the BHs that have arrived here in the last few (two?) years, and decide if their efforts, funneled through Markos-like devotion, worked?

There ain't a lot. I THINK the recovered BHs who took alternative paths - NG, mm, MSS, jah, xxyh - would out number the Death-Grip-Plan-A recoverees.

You may very well state that the failures WOULD have succeeded had they:

- eliminated the cyclical resentment engendered by dumping ENs into a bottomless sinkhole;
- quashed any DJs and AOs based on the above;
- stuck it out longer;

but THEY COULD NOT, even with all the encouragement found here! A universal plan predicated on the abilities of "Prince Markos the Beneficent" (recognition, NOT sarcasm) who could plug along with his FWW seemingly disengaged, if not in actual opposition, does not seem to be the best approach for the "great unwashed" of more typical BHs.

Getting the WW necessarily engaged seems to me to be the key, otherwise-untapped, variable. Would such a mandate by the BH be somewhat of an LB of "Educating"? One might make that case. But in the turmoil of the timeframe I would target (post exposure, post NC) it would seem necessary, and justified, that the more rationally able of the spouses (the BS), make decisions for the future benefit of the marriage that the WS (still smarting from the two actions above) is prevented from considering ("The drunk doesn't drive....").

Net/net: In supplement to NC and adequate EPs, I feel that MB Plan Enlistment (MBPE?) should be a part of the JC.

PS: Prisca, I am fully aware that you made a very similar point to RQ on her thread. If this does become a plan modification, I would be happy to yield "naming rights" to you!

But the thing is, NeverGuessed, that I have heard Dr. Harley tell men essentially this. He tells "Steve" he can do it on that call I linked yesterday. I've heard him tell other men that it is "inevitable" that if they keep doing what they are doing, their wives will fall in love with them.

I am not going to argue that any man can Plan A an active affair forever, and I don't think Dr. Harley does, either. But he does seem to believe that, assuming there is not an affair or addiction going on somewhere, that enough love bank deposits will eventually turn a wife around. She will move from hate to dislike to neutral to like to head over heels. In fact, Dr. Harley even told "Steve" that he was confident in his case that even if his wife WAS still in contact with her affair partner, Steve could still turn it around simply by continuing to patiently make love bank deposits.

As for our data points on the forum - well, if we start with me, we find that when the plan was failing, the problem was I was still love busting, and thus not really following the plan. And in the failures I have seen, that is usually apparent. Disrespectful judgments and demands are subtle and hard to root out, and they are usually evident in the posts of the husband but not apparent to him. When I used to email and phone HerPapaBear frequently, he would point them out to me. I particularly remember a delightful 2x4 when I was explaining Prisca wouldn't talk to me and everything had gone downhill since a certain incident a couple weeks prior: "For a man who says you don't dwell on the past, markos, you sure do talk about the past a lot."

If you read Dr. Harley's "when to call it quits for men" article (part 3 of the whole "when to call it quits" series) you find that he says, in bold "before any separation, I make sure that they [husbands] have been doing a good job meeting their wife's emotional needs and avoiding Love Busters." There's his position right there. When a husband is finding that it doesn't seem to be working in his marriage, the first thing for us to look at, if we want to be using Dr. Harley's tested and true approach, is to look at the husband and find out if he's being demanding, disrespectful, or angry towards his wife, and find out if he's meeting her emotional needs. I know for a fact that Dr. Harley does not advocate threatening, issuing ultimatums, or doing or saying ANYTHING that a wife would find demanding, because that is what he told me! On the private forum and in my radio call in 2011 he did NOT side with me and tell my wife she ought to start meeting my emotional needs. He over and over again coached me to learn to be respectful and non-demanding toward my wife and to patiently meet her emotional needs.

I have seen it come up on the forum, and in my own sitch, that a lovebusting husband can delay a reluctant wife from falling back in love with him.

Just an observation.

Dr. Harley also says that if the BH (Steve in this case) wakes up one morning and finds that he no longer wants to continue the pursuing of the WW that it is perfectly within his rights to call it quits and divorce her.

I actually participated in the home study course prior to having my situation available for critique on the private forum...my ex and I had never (her words as well) had a fight prior to our ill fated recovery. By the time we had gotten to the Dr. Harley consulting stage I was about burned out. I will go to my grave believing that I had given it my best shot in the first 6 months...the time I spent on the private forum was a waste. No fault of Dr Harley, I was simply running on empty...

Where I failed miserably was not recognizing my own personal limits and I indeed did have AO's and probably was mentally/verbally abusive to my ex wife. I'll never forget the morning I actually broke down and was a completely broken and probably certifiably insane person...I should have called it quits prior to that awful episode or at least once it happened.

I stayed too long and not only was it punishment for my ex wife but it was extraordinarily painful and self inflicted punishment to myself as well...

We talk of fairness and all that, I would just hope that every betrayed husband would understand how extremely difficult recovery can be. If there are any BH's out there that have reached the point that you can't control your emotions; please consider that it may be more loving to just let it go...

.You all say that if the program is followed that success is guaranteed...Steve told us at the very beginning that even if both spouses do everything perfectly that it doesn't always guarantee success; he called it tier 2 or something, I may have the wrong digit but y'all get the point I hope...

I'm hoping this is my closure...

Well, yes, of course! Any betrayed spouse has the right to pull the plug. That's fine.

Dr. Harley said it very well to Steve: "My thought is, if you want a divorce, it's easy to go see a lawyer this afternoon and get one. But if you want to stay married, you gotta follow my advice."

And that's what we do here on this board: for people who WANT to stay married, despite the trauma of an affair, we help them do that. When they say "I've done everything and it's not working," we help them see what they have failed to do. When they say "I can't," like Steve did, we come back like Dr. Harley and say "Yes, you can."

And when we say that to somebody who wants to save their marriage, and we are communicating Dr. Harley's advice to them, the last thing we need is people coming through saying "Hold on, that's not fair, he really can't, she really should," etc.

What kind of a wimpy coach would let his team get by with doing less than their best and call it "everything"?


And if I remember right, Dr. Harley disagreed with that and coached you to do more.

When I got to that point, I took antidepressants. I discovered that I could, in fact, do more.

I could've called it quits. I was certainly entitled to do that. But I wanted to recover my marriage. So do most people who come here. That is their decision to make. They have the right to receive Marriage Building advice, not marriage wrecking advice.

This is why I tell men who are love busting their wives in recovery that they absolutely need to stop it, or else quit trying to recover.

Like Dr. Harley said to Steve: "Do you want your marriage, or not? If not, a divorce is easy to get. If you want to keep it, there are certain rules you have to follow."

We are not here to put our arms around guys and say "It's okay; you did all that you could do." We are here to let them know what else they can do. Usually that is quit love busting and start meeting emotional needs.

You are not me and as smart as Dr Harley is; he is not all knowing...

It is quite presumptive of you to tell me how much I can endure. This was my third marriage and both of my first two wives left me for other men and after 6 months of this "recovery" I was depleted; as one of our prestigious vets has in her byline I was wasting my time hoping for a better yesterday...

Now Marcos, I congratulate you again on your recovery and you don't even have to have the courtesy to say "thanks" but I ask you to consider that Dr Harley himself is the one that said a BH could last SIX MONTHS to two years ...I made it six months and that was it! Everything after that was pure torture for my ex wife AND for me....

Marcos, I fully expect you to use the divulged fact that I had two previous failed marriages to put me in a bad light...lol, go for it dude! I haven't expected empathy for quite some time now...

"This is why I tell men who are love busting their wives in recovery that they absolutely need to stop it, or else quit trying to recover."

^ This! That's really all I'm saying...if a BH has reached the end of his rope and can't control his emotions; do the loving thing and pull the plug.

I could've called it quits. I was certainly entitled to do that. But I wanted to recover my marriage. So do most people who come here. That is their decision to make. They have the right to receive Marriage Building advice, not marriage wrecking advice."

I don't think you realize how "non typical" you are. Or at least I think thats the case. I admire your fortitude...

The only reason I joined this thread that XXYH has graciously extended to us was because I was very interested in maybe discovering data that would shed light on recoveries of BW and WH versus BH versus WW...

The main point of the forum is to help marriages recover. Not to help you feel better about your choice! You were perfectly entitled to divorce at any time. But it's not for you to come in here to Dr. Harley's forum and contradict Dr. Harley - when he tells men they can do this, we who want to help others are here to agree with him and be backup coaches.

I don't think you have enough data to know what "typical" is.
Dr. Harley does. And the typical BH, which markos was, can recover his marriage by following Dr. Harley's plan if he wants to. Even if he thinks he's drained and cannot go any further. Nobody says he has to.

I've listened to The radio show quite a bit myself and one thing I've noticed is Dr Harley invites debate...a moderator can tell me what to do, you sir cannot!

Personally I believe strongly in the basic concepts, I really don't see where I'm even arguing against MB concepts...Dr Harley says a BH can last 6 months to 2 years trying to recover; I concur...if the BH is lovebusting and can't control himself he should divorce; again I concur...

**********edit**************

I don't think you realize how many hundreds of hours I've listened to Dr. Harley do this stuff.


What could I do? I could not possibly abandon my six kids to the horrors of divorce. I could not possibly go through the financial devastation of divorce. I could not possibly think of finding happiness through divorce.

I took the pills. I did what I had to do. No fortitude that I can see.


Why does everyone say this WHILE they completely dismiss what Dr. Harley has to say, who has actually studied thousands of couples?

Because I've seen men flush their marriages down the toilet who didn't have to and who wished they hadn't.

This is not a game.

I said "I think" Ms Prisca... I'll reiterate; I would be very interested in any data on WW and BH VS BW and WH and their recoveries. Why the war path?