There will be serious consequences to you if you don't expose, too.

Exposure gives your marriage the best chance for recovery. That is a simple fact.

How about a voice activated recorder in places where he can be by himself? His car, a bathroom, a garage?

dapoc, a 29 year affair is firmly entrenched. I hope that your H has truly gone NC, but I must share my experience that it may not just "end" because the wayward spouse wants to save his M and promises to have no more contact. My H had a 13 year affair, not even half of the time as your H, and I believe that my H truly meant it when he promised no contact after D-Day #1�.his resolve lasted exactly seven days and then he continued contact WHILE spending 3-1/2 hours per day working on marriage builders with me.

Good to demanding absolute transparency and honesty. Once we started true recovery (after the false recovery), I finally started noticing the layers and LAYERS of dishonesty that had prevailed in our M. It took us a while and a ton of work together to recognize what being truly transparent feels like. Because my H's secret second life was so entrenched, we had made "couple" decisions for YEARS based on his lies of gaslighting me so as to arrange to keep his SSL secret. The layers are still coming off daily and we are having to learn to live together again. Recovery is not for the weak, that is for sure.

I am going to be quite blunt here because I wish that someone had hit me on the head over and over when I was in your position. I "exposed" lightly before I found MB. I thought that it had done the trick. I was wrong.

It may be too soon to see that your life has ALREADY been detonated more than you see at the moment. You may discover that the decisions that you've made together for the last 29 years have all been a lie. After I went through six months of heck on earth, and then found out that he had still been in contact, I realized that any consequences that I would "suffer" from exposing were nothing compared to facing certain divorce.

You can read one after the other story here from people who did not expose a SHORT term affair correctly and then lost their marriage. Your situation and mine are certainly ENTRENCHED and must be killed with every weapon known to man. When I finally did expose, I went nuclear, including mailing a one paragraph exposure letter with our family photo at the top to the OW's neighbors. I included my phone number so that her nosy neighbors could call me if they ever saw my H on their street again.

It seems to have killed it dead on the spot. But we are only into true ?? recovery for three months now, and so I still verify every single thing that comes out of my H's mouth, and I probably will for years.

After TRUE no contact, my H went through HORRIBLE withdrawal. Just the ugliest thing that I have ever witnessed. Once THAT slowed down and he started coming out of the fog, he was a totally different person than I've ever seen him. Totally humble. No more talk. All actions (finally!!!). Unless you have seen that dapoc, please take this seriously and don't rest in your verification of his actions.

If you are a follower of Christ you have an obligation to report the affair to the Church Pastor and Elders/ Bishop.

It would be a sin to knowingly allow him to continue to have any leadership role in the Church

And I will be blunt.

Your WH, has in essence, two wives. Two marriages.

Yours is the legal one but he has created a separate history,etc with OW.

You must expose to have more people know the truth.

Whether your marriage survives or goes kaput you are in charge now.

What are you afraid of with exposure? Embarrassment? Loss of financial security? What ARE you willing to sell your soul for here?

Not exposing is, in essence selling it.

(stepping off my soap box for now)

What kind of repercussions?

Anyone who doesn't support you, supports sin, so you need to know who those people are. If they respond unfavourably, you need to cut them out so their poor influence cannot hurt your family.

Please don't tell us it is HIS reaction. Please don't tell us you are so afraid of your husband you are willing to keep up the secrecy for his next affair, or continuance of this one.

Since everybody already knows courtesy of his mistress' big mouth, what's the problem in your taking charge of a proper exposure?

Your husband thinks it is perfectly fine and rather efficient to get his 20 pc somewhere else. Only the shock and awe of exposure will convince him it is disgusting.

How do you think his mindset will change through blank forgiveness and your helping keep it secret?

We understand the consequences very well. They are quite grave if you choose to enable this affair by keeping their secret. No one benefits from that, no one. Other than the affair. Affairs thrive on secrecy, so keeping it a secret serves to enable the fantasy and helps them hook up again. Exposure is your most powerful weapon and the critical first step in recovery.

You have no legitimate reason to NOT expose the affair and thousands of good reasons TO EXPOSE it.

I agree. What better way to waste time and avoid taking the right steps? Since we already know that Dr Harley will tell you to expose, wasting time in asking him what we already know will help you avoid taking a crucial step a little longer!

Thanks Justthe3ofus!

Now what does Dr Harley say about exposure? I do not know!! I did a google search just to find out!




Dr Harley telling a caller he is an "enabler" for not exposing an affair: http://www.marriagebuilders.com/radio_program/play_segment.cfm?sid=2815

And I believe there might be about 1000 such radio clips in the archives since Dr Harley gives this advice several times a week.

In other words, there is no need to write Dr Harley for advice about exposure, since we already know. Why waste his time and that of this poster? It is to only prolong the inevitable.

Just to be clear here: The first time I discovered the affair, I exposed loud and clear. My family, his family, her husband, our friends. (And I happen to know at the time she had told her friends because I was getting calls from them. My in-laws even got a call from her!!!) So I did not fail to expose the first time. My reticence at this time for exposing has nothing whatsoever to do with protecting HIM. I have no problem with that. The real victims in an exposure in this case are innocents - including my children. And frankly wide exposure last time didn't change a thing.

I'm still thinking. And I've written to the show; got an email back and am going to call. I am taking my time because right now I am in control - I feel completely in control.

Thanks for your continued support.

I am utterly confused. You refused to expse when it was suggested above:

"Believe me there is a big part of me that wants to expose him; but there are consequences that I will suffer if I do and I don't know that I'm ready for that right now. I very much appreciate the support and understanding from this forum."

So now you are saying you did? When did you expose the affair? I am confused about why you said you didn't want to expose and then you say you did?

What did you write Dr Harley about?

Correction: they are not victims of exposure, they are victims of the affair.

The only victim of exposure is the affair and that is a good thing. No one benefits from keeping an affair secret; no one.

ML,
The affair is 29 years old. Dapoc learned of it 29 years ago or so and exposed it. Then the affair went underground and she only recently discovered it.

I recommended she call the show because she is dealing with a 29 year old lie, which I think makes recovery very difficult.


Dapoc,
Exposure is not a guarantee that the affair will be killed, but Dr. Harley is very clear that exposure offers the best chance at killing the affair. That is why exposure is always pushed hard on this forum.

Also, what good is there in hiding the truth. Keeping it secret enables it, and doesn't hold the wayward spouse accountable. The truth must be exposed.

Yes, recovery is difficult. In all marriages. But she does not need to write Dr Harley since we already know the solution here. It is great to write Dr Harley when there are complicated issues, but when the remedy is clear cut, that only serves as a distraction and a way to avoid taking necessary steps. So instead of exposing the affair, a necessary step, she is wasting time writing dr h.

Dr Harley provides the forum for free and recommends that people ome here for help. There is no reason to believe she can't get the necessary help here. When we can't help someone we send them to dr h.

Hi dapoc, the problem with your previous exposure and it not changing a thing is that there is a very narrow path to true recovery.

After exposure, EPs (extraordinary precautions) must be put into place. I am guessing here that you did the very best that you could at the time, and maybe your H even tried with all his might to stick to his promise, but many if not most affairs are addictions, and this addiction is bigger than him.

You will need to re-expose, and if you decide that you want to save your marriage, you will need to put extreme EPs into place. Because of his entrenched affair, H and I have some extreme EPs, but we both agreed to them, and they were the only way that I would risk staying in the M.

I literally had to follow my H to the bathroom for the first couple of months (thanks to Melody who took the time to point out the obvious to me).

We were never apart except for when he was at work�and the only reason that I agreed to him continuing employment was that my brother was the boss and he hired an extra person to babysit my H all day long, including to the bathroom. Even with THAT and his agreement to the EPs being necessary, my H did admit to me that for the first two weeks of withdrawal, he sometimes still felt like cutting and running (now he is disgusted when he thinks about that). We are still always together, but now he leaves the bathroom door open and I don't go in with him. I know that this all sounds surreal, but it really IS what it took to cut off that addiction and allow enough safety for me to start healing because I KNEW that he truly had NC.

The only way to stop an addiction is to take it away. If your H really wants to stop, and you two decide to work together and design EPs to take it away, there is hope. But you HAVE to re-expose first (and then once he calms down you can talk about a NC letter and designing EPs, etc).

dapoc,

Is your reluctance to expose your H's 29 year affair because your children idolize their lying, cheating father and you don't want you burst their fantasy bubble? Same with your church? Protecting HIM from his behavior enables him to continue.

Since your husband is self-employed, can you move? This OW is/has been way too close and way to accessible.

AM

Does his other child know about your children and they are siblings?

Another reason to expose.

If you do not follow everyone's advice here you will one day regret it, trust me I didn't!

How I look back and wish I had heeded the advise of experts! I wasted 4 years and I would think you would not want to waste even 1 more after a 29 year affair.

Dr. Harley addressed your email on the Radio Show today.

He encouraged you to speak with family, friends and church and tell them the truth and ask for their support.