And it really doesn't matter when or why your AOs started. What matters is that they are abusive and destructive, and will kill any chance you have at recovery.

The anger of a Betrayed Husband is perhaps even worse than that of an angry man who has never been betrayed. He feels justified in his anger, and a lot of times a WW will take the abuse under the idea that she deserves it. Your anger is more dangerous because it started after her affair, not somehow better than if you'd been an angry man all these years.

And you will not get the JC you need if the AOs continue.

I appreciate all the supportive responses. I think this is one of those things where the newbies are able to help more than the vets. I like to hear about people near the same place as me, coming to grips with a 2+ year recovery is extrememly daunting. No offense to the vets, you're advice is valuable, but I KNOW all that stuff, the trouble I'm having is LIVING it, KWIM. I am truly working on it. I understand that every AO or mentioning of the affair is a huge LB and my W has every right to put up a wall to protect herself.

Not to get ahead of myself, but it's been three days since I've been angry (I know, big deal). I know I've been asking alot of my W, but near CONSTANT contact with her has kept me grounded. After a half dozen AO, I can now sense when it's starting to build and immediately stop what I'm doing and switch gears. I'm so thankful that she hasn't yet started working. We love having this kind of access to eachother.

Did you write Dr Harley?

Yes, I just did. I'll post if it gets read on the air.

Proof that everyone wins with RH: After 15 years of M, my W admitted she was never SF "completely" (if you catch my drift). Not once. After she told me 10 days ago, I made it my personal mission to fix that. I read books and practiced...put her first. She took MelodyLanes advice and quit "taking care of her own SF needs". Well last night was a BREAKTHROUGH...she was still glowing when I left this morning.

Still no more AO. No LB at all on either side, actaully. I'm feeling great.

Fantastic news, MMM!
You are on the recovery road.
Gentle reminder that you are still on the roller coaster, though. Hang on and watch for dips...

This is fantastic. Stay with it and good job for listening to her being RH.

Keep at it. Let us know when your question gets read.

Glad to hear that, MMM!

Remember, recovery is a marathon, not a sprint. Keep moving forward

My question was read at the end of yesterday's broadcast. Dr. Harley pretty much confirmed what we already knew.

1. Second affairs (after first recovery) are exponentially more difficult.
2. Recovery is measured in years, not weeks.
3. She cannot slack off on EPs, even a TINY bit. As a serial cheater, there are no excuses for any infraction.
4. My real problem isn't depression, it's anger. I should consider professional help.

He also said the latest revision of SAA covers resentment a little more in depth than the previous version so I need to make sure I have the most recent. I should also check in on the thread that's reading through that book.

The past week has been "mostly good". I did get a bit depressed/withdrawn and had a AO that upset her. Not at bad as the first one. I threw a plastic cup when I was in a different room. I didn't even see it coming. I just snapped. I'm not trying to excuse my behavior, but I can feel some improvement in the way I keep the anger at bay, or at least find other outlets besides verbally abusing my W.

I�m sort of in a bind now. I knew this day would come but now it's here. My wife is going to be starting back to work. The past 3 months she has not, which has really helped with our UA time. It's also made it very easy for me to keep track of her and her activities.

I still don't trust her around other men, particularly in the workplace. As soon as someone gives her a compliment, I'm sure she'll just smile and accept that $LB deposit. If it's out-of-line, she'll say something, of course. But it's those small deposits which she doesn't seem to even recognize until the balance is high. Like in Office Space, "It's not really stealing, they're only fractions of a penny". Anyway, they build up pretty quick. I imagine her high need for admiration makes the interest rate in her $LB pretty insane.

I asked her the other day what she would do if a doctor innocently put his hand on her arm when he spoke to her? She didn't have an answer. Kinda scary to me.

What's the best way for her to handle those tiny $LB deposits? I told her that in the beginning I want to know if any men talk to her PERIOD, if they are attractive, what their expressions indicate. I don't ever see that easing up either, not with two workplace As in her history.

I foresee this causing some arguments in the future if I don't like the way she handles a particular situation. I won't apologize to her for protecting our M but since I don't trust her judgment on OS relationships, I'm afraid I'm going to look like a big green monster.

Newbie Alert here <--- Me, I'm the newbie

MMM, How do YOU feel about your wife starting back to work? Is this something that was POJA'd and you both have enthusiastic agreement?

As for brainstorming solutions, I can think of "practicing" ahead of time so as to reassure you that she understands what you need.

For instance, when she is out running errands or at the grocery store, whatever, during the day. Perhaps you two can "practice" PORH by spending time at night reiterating about people of the opposite sex that you both interacted with in any way?

Yes, POJA'd.

Part of the negotiation included a clause to back out at any time. Two biggest concerns are loss of UA time and flirty male co-workers (my call). She can find something else, we don't need the money that bad.

Have you been RH and told her this?

What did she say?

If you're no longer enthusiastic then nothing should happen.

How's it going, MMM?

That depends on the day. It�s been about ten days since my last AO. I really feel I have them under control. DJs are still there (I think), but they are not generally intentional. I know they were a HUGE part of her dissatisfaction pre-A and they have to go completely. It�s a nasty habit I have, but I think I�ve gotten better. She is not very good at calling me out though which I need her to do because I honestly don�t see them sometimes.

We share a lot of the same EN which is convenient. SF, A, and IC are on both our top 5s. She also has RC which I don�t have. I�d stay home all day and talk, hug, and SF her if I could. We have had a few dates and planned on a concert this weekend in DC but it got cancelled. We are still well above 15 hours a week.

We�ve had a few �flops� on SF recently. Like I said in a previous post, for the first time in 15 years she actually felt �complete� SF. This has really inspired us (at least me) to catch up on so much lost time for her. So we ended up going overboard. We tried to introduce some toys. Didn�t go so well. Kind of a bad idea when we are still relearning each other in our new M. Definitely going to go back to the basics for now. Go with what works, ya know.

The depression still persists which puts me in a withdrawn state (she follows right after me) but those instances are fewer between. I did get put on a temporary AD which should help. I�m on day five and starting to feel a little better.

I need to stop trolling the internet for things that put me in a bad mood. I�ve been desperate to find success stories about people overcoming resentment, but I haven�t really found any that feel like my type of resentment. Lots of failure stories (Krazy71 comes to mind). I did run across mywifeilove�s sitch today and it was a much needed pick-me-up. His story isn�t like mine but he had every reason to be resentful, but wasn�t. Or, at least the resentment wasn�t consuming him.

I�m trying to never talk about the affair, but I think about it all the time. Bottling up those emotions has lead me to some pretty messed up dreams. Last night I dreamt that my W went back to the OM and brought DD14 and DS9 with her. OS13 was bullying my DS and molesting my DD (along with OM). Oddly enough, I truly beleive this situation WOULD happen if she would have left me for him. OS13 is damaged due to having a crappy role model, I can totally see him beating up DS and having his friends at least sexually harass DD. That's just a sick thought to me that she even considered that as a possible outcome. That dream put me in a terrible mood but I managed to get out of the house for work without any AO or DJs. I call that a victory.

Oh, and we are going back to the POJA drawing board on her new job. I don�t think either of us enthusiastically agree.

That was longer than I intended.

I'll also say that I'm pretty close to granting my WW her F. She's doing great. I don't feel she has any real empathy, but she's trying. And, what WS can truly empathise with a BS?

I wish she wouldn't give up so easily though. As soon as she sees me take a turn for the worst, she kinda "checks out" and watches for signs that I'm fine. At first she used to email and text me if I appeared to be down in the dumps, but now she mostly goes silent and waits for me to make the first move. I feel like she's plan B'ing me at times if that makes any sense. Not all the time...just sometimes.

MMM:

Your past AO's may have taught your W not to tell you upsetting news (like when you DJ.) It might help if she can document them (write them down) and then you can review the form. This can take some of the heat off, and you still get the coaching you need.

What do you think?

DJ's are on the "anger continuum" that Dr. H talks about. In our case, it was obvious that my regular habit of DJ'ing lead to my (very occasional) AO's. Pre-MB, I truly believed that an AO every couple of years was par for the course in marriage. That it "cleared the air"... "brought us closer as a couple"... That there was something WRONG with couples who never argued. (Maybe they just didn't care?)

So your commitment to managing your DJ's is a great step forward. And, I have found, by eliminating my DJ's, my frustration level is way down. And, the strategy to eliminate DJ's requires conflict resolution, which decreases frustration, and really helps to eliminate AO's. Because I never get that far down the anger continuum.

Again, it could be that you have taught her to "check out"...

And thanks for the update. Seems you and your (soon to be F)WW are doing great.

Impressive!

YAY! You are figuring it out! I bet that the DJs and SDs will go away soon also. H and I re-read the 1st and 2nd chapter in LB last week, and I am finally thinking that I can even stop the SDs as long as I am careful to always ask for what I need (I used to always keep my mouth shut until the Taker took over).

You're still early in this process, as am I. I think that as long as we are working it, we just have to trust MB to work.

My dreams also got lots worse once I stopped talking about the A. It makes sense that we still will process things even when we've stopped verbalizing them to our spouse. I'm almost 5 months in at this point, and the dreams are MUCH better.

Thought a bit of an update would be good.

Still doing very well on AO. Have not had a single one in about a month. I�ve talked to FWW about DJ and she doesn�t have any complaints in the past month either. I don�t really have any other LBs that she identifies.

I finished HNHN, and can say it was very helpful, but very difficult to read as a BS. I don�t know if it was just me but there seemed to be a lot of triggers and �justification� of affairs. I frequently had to put it down for a few days at a time. Overall though, It has a lot of good stuff.

Through our discussions, I�m becoming more aware how difficult (not impossible) it will be for me to prevent affair #3. She admits that she had developed an infatuation for POSOM#2 well before they even started communicating. Serious infatuation that I would qualify as a one-sided EA since it totally interfered with our M. This happened with POSOM#1 as well. There was also a 2 other one sided EAs that interfered with my M. Right now she agrees to the EPs and tells me she will be O&H if she ever �crushes� on someone in the future, but I�m having trouble believing it. After a few years I think I�ll start to feel like a warden keeping her from enjoying her natural tendency to play the field.

I still go into a depressive state from time to time, but it�s shorter lived and it doesn�t result in any LB. It does put me into a withdrawn state so no ENs met on either side during that time. Last weekend, I was pretty down but we still had a pretty good date night that met all four of the intimate needs. She was crying the other day, probably after seeing me depressed for a while and said she �just wants us to be happy�. I think the work of recovery is hard for her to, particularly when I withdraw. I can�t help but to think if she had just worked on our M instead of going to bed with POSOM, we could have had a GREAT M. Now, I think it�s still possible, but with a heck of a lot more work. She made this so freaking difficult.

And it really kills me that POSOM (both) walked away scot-free. They took a steaming [censored] in my life and walked away with smiles on their faces. I really hope there�s some credence to karma. These guys deserve to pay up. Good thing they live thousands of miles away or I would help out this karma lady.

I don�t want to leave any impression that it�s all bad. Actually it�s mostly good and at times I get a glimpse of the great it can be. I think my W�s effort is remarkable and wish I was better at getting over things. But, I think she definitely earned her F so I updated my signature. I�ve encouraged her to post but she doesn�t really think she has anything to offer.