Empathy is acquired during the program, though. Feelings follow actions.

The question is: should we advise people the way Dr. Harley advises them, in an attempt to save their marriage? Or should we tell people to do whatever we feel?

No BS is under obligation to recover their marriage. But if they want to recover their marriage, there are certain things they are going to have to do that may not seem fair, that they may not want to do. A classic example, which hits both genders, is the rule of not continuing to bring up the affair. That doesn't seem fair to anybody! But it's something that's got to be agreed to if recovery is going to happen. And the need for a husband to win over his withdrawn wife, even if she was wayward, definitely does not seem fair. And it isn't, and nobody has to recover under that circumstance if that's how they feel about it. But if they want to recover, we should give them Dr. Harley's advice, because that's what we are here for.

Folks, I am very gratified that calm discussion is following the stimuli I provided in my last note. All I am trying to do is assemble data to support/refute some of the truisms that are often recited.

XXYH: Does the "usurping" of your thread bother you? If you want, I will open this can o' considerations in another thread, most likely on this Board. Your preference, sir?

"Interesting data to me would be the percentage of recovered BH/WW marriages vs. recovered BW/WH marriages"

I would be interested in this data as well. Even though a remorseful WW isn't mandatory to recover a marriage it seems to me that it helps immensely...NG, Mirrormirror and 20yearhistory.

Personally I believe there are variables like WPG alluded to such as trickle truth and I would think a LTA would play an even greater role in recovery.

I also realize that it's typical for a WW to not be remorseful but I also wonder how typical is it for a BH to give it up after 6 months vs the 2 year time frame so often assigned to the BH...I think John in SAA and Marcos (kudos sir) are extreme cases...

One of the biggest problems we see is when betrayed husbands simply don't follow the advice given to them.

Nah. I'm good with it.

Proceed!

"One of the biggest problems we see is when betrayed husbands simply don't follow the advice given to them."

Thanks for the salt. Again congrats on your fortitude...

LB balances can rarely survive long-term, sustained lying and deceit. In my case, my FWW having remorse has impact on how loving she is to me. Sure, a WS could be loving to the BS without remorse but true remorse can really have a big impact on how the BS �views� their WS.

In Markos and Prica�s situation, it does not appear that remorse is a factor that has held them back.

Each BS has to determine on their own what they can and can�t live with. To me, Clearmind�s attitude toward R and her remorse can be seen in her eyes.

It is a big factor on my motivation to keep working on R. It makes huge LB deposits.

In practically any dataset, you're going to encounter datapoints called outliers - something that is numerically distant from the other data.

I'd hazard a guess that Dr. H's dataset, made up of the couples he has counseled over the years, is much, much larger than the immediate population on the message board. The MB program is based on the bulk of what he observed over his years in practice - not on the outliers. There are some cases where MB does not seem to work. One spouse may be doing the right things, but the other - for whatever reason - doesn't "buy-in."

Example - the second time I was on the radio with Dr. H, it was after broken had moved out the first time, after his father died. Dr. H advised me to continue Plan A and predicted that if I called him back same time the next year, broken would be back home. Technically, he was, but only because he'd been laid off and the stepmother he was living with was losing her house - he was not back for me or the M, and in fact had no intention of recovering the M regardless of any of my Plan A efforts. Dr. H made a prediction based on all the other available data he'd assembled over the years of a "typical" BH.

It doesn't negate the program but perhaps makes us outliers of a sort. There are so, so many things that make affairs similar that we see the same scenario played out time and again on the boards. The plan was developed to work for couples Dr. H felt were the majority of typical cases.

On outliers, it just may or may not work. Gladwell points out that with an outlier you're looking at a "really tall tree," but in fact we should not just be looking at the tree, but at the forest - the community, the family that surrounds it. Their generation, their value and belief system. A lot of things go into making a "really tall tree."

Of course Gladwell is referring to successful people, and I'm using the imagery to refer to people - cases - that don't seem to lump in with general MB experience...but I think it works. Something about the forest that surrounds a person may make them either a) unreceptive to a spouse's Plan A or b) unwilling to recover a marriage destroyed by adultery.

Or maybe not...I dunno...I've long viewed the board as heavily weighted with success stories - typically, those couples who have been successful have remained around to guide others. Those that aren't successful tend to disappear. But not every marriage crippled by infidelity uses MB - only those who are find it or are somehow guided to it - and yet other statistics I've read seem to indicate that a majority of couples stay together after infidelity - but they don't necessarily recover from it.

Well, as Disraeli said, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

I'm happy for you 20year and I'm pulling for you.

This data gathering is very interesting...thanks

I think it is only fair to let people know, while you are commenting on the problems that wayward wives cause for recovery, that you refused to follow Dr. Harley's advice.

I think it is only fair to let people know, while you are commenting on the problems that wayward wives cause for recovery, that you refused to follow Dr. Harley's advice.

Yep, it was all me....

I really was interested in the data, I didn't think I was casting aspersions...

BTW, great post WPG...

I am extremely concerned that some betrayed husbands might be encouraged to give up on recovery because of statements made on this forum. If a betrayed husband is encouraged to feel a sense of entitlement because of his wife's affair and that sense of entitlement causes him to act demanding, disrespectful, or angry towards his wife, he will destroy his own marriage. If he then turns around and blames his wife for this, what we'll build is a support club for men to sit around and blame their wives when they could have recovered had they eliminated love busters.

I am seriously concerned about this kind of thing, because I participate here to try to help recover marriages with Dr. Harley's advice, which works when followed.

I see situation after situation where betrayed husbands who went to Dr. Harley would hear "Keep at it, you are going to recover," whereas on the forum they would hear "It's up to your wife to help you heal. She's not doing what she needs to do. You are not going to make it." Are we trying to increase the failure rate by making things more fair?

Salt? I cried when we couldn't convince you to take Dr. Harley's advice. Having wrecked my own marriage with the same kind of anger that you displayed toward your wife and even to Dr. Harley himself, I'd give anything to help other men prevent it.

What I don't want to do is give them the hook to justify their anger and entitlement. Because it doesn't work.

Sorry for the thread jack 20....

One of the biggest problems we see is when betrayed husbands simply don't follow the advice given to them.

LFTH, I was waiting XXYH's okay to respond.

Markos, I'm going to admit something that may/not be comforting to you.

You had persistence and forbearance while Prisca fiddled and danced that many men (including this writer) would not possess.

One of the biggest problems we see is when betrayed husbands simply can't follow the advice given to them.

Had Bride subjected me to the treatment that Prisca (by her own words) did to you....well, the only corresponding I'd be doing today would be on Match.com ("60y/o divorced w/m, looking for a woman with some minimal integrity....")

But there would be huge numbers of variables to consider....

Reading Prisca's account, it seems she had gotten to a point in which she was less "in love with POSOM", than "out of love with Markos". Would that be fair? If you detected that, then, it might go a ways to explain the extent of your willingness to endure the long ride to full reconciliation.

Additionally, her account alludes to an extended period of YOUR behavioral changes, the extent of which most BHs are not forced to undergo. You can tell us how that realization might have fortified your own endurance.

We can pick individual histories and dissect them to a fare-thee-well. What I'm wrestling with is the following:

On a "macro" basis, would any evidence suggest that a more explicit statement of higher expectations by the BS, (Note 1) most feasibly included in the "Just Compensation", yield measurably better (Note 2) results?

Note 1: This will inevitably have to be analyzed for each gender, but it's not a given that "women won't do that" as WPG, XVY, DM, and BV have demonstrated.

Note 2: "Better" may well include an earlier flushing out of the WSs that are truly here for mere window-dressing, not planning any behavioral modifications at all.

Yes, I did have a number of changes to make. And when I was rational, I saw that making them was a prerequisite to recovering my marriage. There were many times when I was NOT rational, and during those times I focused on what my wife owed me and how she had caused the problems that led to her own withdrawal and how by all rights she ought to be the one to extend the olive branch and fix the situation, and all sorts of other "entitlement" thoughts. The very things I see posted frequently here, but which I don't actually hear Dr. Harley say to betrayed husbands in most situations.

And I can point to any number of situations here where I have seen husbands do the same thing. They are waiting for their wives to heal the marriage, when, if they were sufficiently motivated, they could heal it themselves.

NeverGuessed, have you listened to the radio show that I linked? Dr. Harley lays it out very clearly. If anyone wants a divorce, it's easy to obtain, but if they want to stay married, then there are certain things they are going to have to do. Or else their wife will be just as justified in dumping them as any other neglected or abused wife.

As you know, I don't ask a lot of rhetorical questions. I'm hoping to find out if you've actually listened to the scenario of "Steve" from October 25, 2011.


Just Compensation is a situation where husband and wife give each other the marriage they always should have had. Dr. Harley is pretty clear about this.

The husband should indeed be radically honest about his emotional needs, and he needs to be respectful and non-demanding in doing so. Non-demanding means he may discover that there has to be some negotiation in order to find a way in which his wife will be enthusiastic about meeting his needs.

The real realization to come to about Prisca is this:

She wasn't "on board" with Marriage Builders - but Dr. Harley does not advise women to keep meeting the emotional needs of a love busting man. Her Love Bank would not let her feel enthusiastic about meeting my needs, because I needed to change a lot of things (stop love busting and start meeting her needs better) in order for her to feel that way. There was no way to motivate her to work on our marriage by reasoning with her logically, pointing out how much of the damage was her fault, debating, demanding, referencing her past failures. Even Dr. Harley, and Steve Harley, and the coach from Dr. Harley's online program didn't really succeed at motivating Prisca to meet my emotional needs. There was no way to do that short of me finally topping off the my balance in her love bank.

Dr. Harley says that if a man makes a determined effort and eliminates love busters and meets his wife's emotional needs, she will pretty much fall in love with him. This is the way to address a reluctant wife if you want to keep your marriage. Many times I have heard him tell men to patiently keep on, even in the face of love busting wives, and assure them that they will succeed if they keep doing it. I believe he's right, and it worked in my case.

Bingo.