Also, am I right in thinking that all of the "I want to WANT to fix our relationship, and and the moment, I don't want to" talk from last night, is all stemming from the fog that you guys have talked about before - because she feels she has another, better offer on the table that she's comparing with?

Not another offer. A fantasy.

She's comparing you with an idealized version of Tat-Rat that exists only in her head.

If you can't bring yourself to say "he put his x in her y" without proof, then just state the known facts. "She told me she was going to stay with a female friend and then spent the night with Tat-Rat." Your friends and family will get the picture since they aren't in your pain-fog. Just drop all of the "maybe she didn't" babble from your narrative.

Good to hear that the exposure has reached Tat-Rat's girlfriend.

Thanks.
Been talking with a friend who has been through a similar crisis, they separated, and then he missed the old relationship and stopped the affair himself.
Trying to explain this route to him is helping me understand, I think.
Separating and enabling the affair is, in the analogy of the alcoholic, going that they still have the presence of mind to WANT to be sober or at least realise that sobriety is desirable. But what we are battling here is past that point and there is little reasonable hope that sobriety will ever even have the chance to look appealing if the status quo is maintained. The only way back is to hit rock bottom, and so what we're doing is DRIVING FOR that rock bottom because that means true recovery can come.

To further clarify it seems that separating/enabling is simply hoping that the desire to be sober occurs to them, while all circumstance and situation in their life can and will be stacked against sobriety to their tiniest whim because that life wants to support that life -and not have to work for the other (better, saner but initially much harder) life.

Venturi:

Affairs follow an amazing standard pattern. That is way Dr. Harley says we are wired for it. It is about as close to a complex instinctive behavior as humans ever exhibit. Your denial as a BS fits right into that pattern. Please do not follow your instincts. Don't believe stuff just because you want to believe. The only thing that is different about this affair compared to others is that this affair involves *you*. You are blinded by your own BS fog. That is why you need to follow a recovery plan and not keep doubting it every time the slightest bit of variation comes along. We are into helping you through the long haul. Are you with us?

I am with you and I want to keep checking in with my thoughts and feelings to get validation from you guys - who have made the profound changes and succeeded - that I am on the right path. Indulge me in the below because I'm a natural philosopher and the below has helped me suddenly work out what I'm doing.

I had a moment of incredible clarity and profound realisation just now. And suddenly a lot of what you guys or the Doc has said make total sense bd sues I wasn't looking at them deeply enough before:

All of this is superficial. There are layers and degrees here but the core problem is to do with happiness - an understanding that "an element of my happiness is outside my control" which means you will never be truly happy. It has to be, from both parties, "my happiness is entirely controlled by me".
This manifests out into needing support structures to feel happy. When one falls apart you must look for another. But this is why my wife must hit rock bottom, where a core change can take place, or any reconciliation is superficial. If we separated then she will look for fulfilment elsewhere. Perhaps she finds it immediately and it lasts a decade, or perhaps not at all. Eventually a bump will occur, due to her inner need for external happiness, and she will be unfulfilled by that support structure and need to find another with better prospects. If its soon enough, that could be me once again.

But she would be coming back for the same reason that she left! Dissatisfaction with the status quo and resorting to something that looks more promising (because we have the children together and we have been together before and I gave clear instruction what she could do to get back together, which may be easier than what her alternative support structures require).

I feel I am hovering around being able to be self sufficiently happy although bit fully there yet. If she can't get there herself then any relationship we had would be ultimately shallow and loveless at some depth.

I spent 35 years as a research engineer. I am well versed on building and applying predictive models to describe the physical world. Don't try to reinvent the wheel; you can't afford to do that right now. The model we use around here is built on Dr. Harley's Basic Concepts. Your WW is having her affair because she permitted somebody else of the opposite sex to make enough love bank deposits that she fell in love with that person. The way to end the affair is to cut off the OM's ability to make love bank deposits, and then for you to make enough love bank deposits for her to fall back into love with you. Do you understand that?

The anger is because you caught a WW having an affair.

The anger is because OM who can't support himself does not/can not/wants not to support your WW throws her under the 18 wheel truck because all he wanted was some easy sex and your exposure now has made banging your WW not worth it to him.

Your WW is acting like a crack addict that can not get her OM fix any more.

The entire principle revolves around it being one specific person, though. If its just the overall concept of "I want to be with somebody, anybody else, because it might be better" then that's not quite the same as "I love this particular other man in spite of my marriage which I don't want to lose".

The overwhelming message I get from her is that she doesn't know if she wants the marriage. This is a common symptom of having needs fulfilled elsewhere, but if true, without the WANT for the current relationship then breaking up another that she is forming just hits the symptom, doesn't it? If not with this guy then she would cast around and find another because its not HIM, but ANYONE.

She said she came home last night because someone tried to kiss her and asked her to come home with him and she didn't want to wholly give up on our relationship like that so it drove her home to give things a chance. I take that with a grain of salt of course, but I expect there is some truth in it too.

If she is having a mental affair with an imagined other person, and every positive effort I make makes her feel resentful, which she has said; how can I ever start to build the love bank if positive things drive it down? Or are you saying there's a deeper level to her where she may accept a small amount of the positivity even if on the surface it makes her feel worse?

I know you will all say ITS AN AFFAIR, KILL THE AFFAIR FIRST , but if it's neglect that is the problem and the affair the symptom, and she feels so neglected she must push me away for her own well being, how can I make positive love bank donations that don't make her feel I am pathetic?

Look, you are wrong. If you had cancer, would you have an argument with the specialist or would you defer to his expertise and accept treatment? Dr. Harley has saved thousands of marriages, mine numbered amongst the rest. How many have you saved? At the moment, you are putting yourself on track for zero. The advice you are getting here is proven. Stop looking at your navel and put your efforts where it will count.

Venturi,

Positive things do not create resentment and positive things aren�t pathetic. She feels guilty when you do something positive.

Being wishy-washy and a pushover will make you look pathetic.

According to your account there is no neglect. That you have been a stellar H and that she just has poor boundaries and started letting another guy fill her needs. She feel victim (if you will) to the fantasy of another guy. Has she been able to define this neglect?

Seems she's unhappy and doesn't know why and is blaming you for all the problems.

She sounds lost and has no idea what she wants or what she�s missing in this life. This program will help provide both of you a path. It provides actions that will help each of you determine what your needs are and what things create negative LB deposits ... if you've no idea what they are.

First and foremost any affair needs to be busted up and then there needs to be EPs put in place to give the M its best chance to recover.

Reading through the literature for the thousandth time, we more closely resemble simply Conflict and Withdrawal than Wayward Wife and Blighted Husband.
If my wife has been in withdrawal for a long time, and I living in (peaceful) conflict handing out many olive branches but the constant denial sometimes dipping me into withdrawal myself. She is way way down in the well of withdrawal it seems to my eye.

Doc Harley has saved marriages and written much that I believe in but you guys, with the deepest of respect meant, you guys are not him - and all have your own biases based on your experiences.

MrAlias, your above post sounds the most realistic so far. If my wife is down in a pit of withdrawal and has entertained the fantasy of someone else, and I have tried introducing her to the program and talking about Emotional Needs but she is unable to talk about it realistically right now because she feels so negative about everything to do with us, how do I build us up and out? She wants time apart to try and figure out what she wants.

It is disrespectful to say that she would only come back to her family as a last resort because she couldn't find happiness somewhere else. You have completely disregarded your WW's own moral compass and that she may come back because it is the right and respectable thing.

The fact that she is mad over exposure tells us that WW does have a good moral compass. It is textbook waywardness to try to shift the blame to others to try to justify it in their own mind. Your WW is in the fog.




Have you read the basic concepts? That is how you rebuild the respect and love. It will only be shallow and loveless if you allow it.

Your WW needs to see that there is hope to turn this around. Plan A. It is all in your actions...

Marriages with children and a history along with strong support from family and friends have the best chances of recovery. You have all of these.

That is why I invite people in your situation to talk to Dr. Harley directly. It's free on his radio show. Write to mbradio@marriagebuilders.com and Dr. Harley and his wife Joyce will be happy to talk to you.

What you will find is that, while we are not Dr. Harley, we on this forum strive to do the best job possible of giving exactly the advice he would give for each situation, and as many of us have studied and listened to Dr. Harley for hundreds or thousands of hours, we usually are telling you pretty much exactly what he would advise. (When someone posts something contrary, we usually make some noise and/or the moderators remove it, in fact. We strive for consistency.)

That is an excellent idea! Be sure to include your phone number. That way, Joyce can call you and talk to you about being a caller on the program. Include you mailing address, and they will send you a free book that addresses your situation.

You might also want to consider enrolling in the online program. That gives you direct access to Dr. Harley's advice for your situation, as well.

Man, Dr. Harley completely disagrees with that kind of thinking.

That is exactly how the marriage described in Surviving an Affair (the book) was saved. It works great!

Do you own the book Surviving an Affair?

Somehow I doubt that. Do you even own the book?

No I don't own the book, I only became aware of this site about 24hrs before I posted this thread. But in that time I have read almost every article and Q&A available on the site, including ones that didn't seem relevant in the hope that a spark of something useful might be there as a side-note.