I'm so glad I found this forum. My marriage is going through a rough patch, and we both agree that we want to stay married and improve our relationship, but we are facing a disagreement about how to do so.

For some background: We have been together for 13 yrs, married for 11. He is 34, I am 32, and we have a 6 yo DD. We are both working professionals with advanced degrees.

We moved to our current city 2 yrs ago, after my husband received a new job offer. Prior to this, we were both working very stressful jobs, often on opposing schedules, and barely saw each other. I admit that I did not make meeting my H's EN a priority during this time. I thought that our marriage was strong enough that we didn't need to make those investments with each other at that time, but I was wrong. The result is that my husband built up an emotional wall around himself to protect his feelings. Meanwhile, I thought everything was okay (albeit not great) because he wasn't bringing his ENs to my attention. (He did mention them a few times, but stopped doing so, which I wrongly interpreted as meaning that they were no longer important to him.)

When we moved, I changed positions with my company so that I could work PT rather than FT. I also have another PT job with a non-profit organization. With more time available to devote to my family, I started to realize what was missing. We were never affectionate, and had sex very infrequently. We barely talked to each other, and we had lost our friendship, which used to be strong. I reached out to my H and said that I wanted to strengthen our relationship. Initially, he agreed, but he didn't seem motivated or interested in meeting any of my (newly discovered) ENs. When we talked, he would tell me that everything is okay, but his actions didn't match his words.

Finally, about a month ago, he told me that he was really unhappy and that he wasn't sure if he wanted to be married to me anymore. We agreed to go to MC. The first MC was a joke -- we had to quit after 2 sessions. The second MC has been better, but it's slow-going. We've had one couples session, then individual sessions of our own. We were supposed to go back this week as a couple, but the MC changed her mind and wants to see us each individually one more time individually. (I have to admit I find this REALLY frustrating, since my H refuses to have any conversations about our marriage outside of counseling until we have a roadmap from the MC and the MC is aware of this.)

H has agreed that he wants our marriage to work. He says that to do this he needs alone time and doesn't want to feel smothered--which I can understand, but at the moment, we only spend about 5 hrs per week together (and very little of that is UA). Meanwhile, I'm feeling starved from a lack of physical touch (sexual and non-sexual) and friendship. He thinks that I am asking too much of him because I am asking him to DO something (be affectionate, spend time with me, etc), whereas he isn't asking anything of me because he is asking me to NOT do something (not schedule his time, not engage him in conversations about the marriage, etc). I don't mind giving him what he's asking for if he is willing to do the same, but I feel like my H is focused on his individual needs and I am focused on the marriage. Am I way off base? How are we supposed to rebuild the R if we never spend time together working on our friendship and romance?

There is no possibility of an affair -- his time is all accounted for, I manage all of our finances and there are no suspicious transactions, there are no mysterious numbers on the phone bill, and because of his field, an affair would jeopardize his career. However, in some ways I feel like he has found independence through his career the way some men find independence through an affair. His career has really taken off since we moved. He makes 2x as much money as he did before, and he could support himself quite nicely on his currently salary. Before we moved, we were financially dependent on each other. I wonder now if divorce seems more palatable to him because he knows that he can be self-supporting.

I would first rule out an affair. I know that you think it is impossible but I have been on this forum longer than you have been married and have seen everything. Unless you are with him 24/7, you can't possibly know what he is doing when you are not there. You can't imagine how easy it is to carry on an affair at work and leave no trace. The reasons you gave for not believing it is an affair are not in the least bit convincing to me.

Start there because if we are dealing with a hidden affair, then nothing we tell you will be of any effect. It will be like treating a patient for the wrong disease. The patient just dies.

So my suggestion would be to hire a PI to follow him for a couple of days. A good PI can usually unearth an affair [if there is one] in a couple of days.

I am sorry to read you are going to counseling because that is a distraction from solving the problems in your marriage. Individual counselors help clients achieve personal desires that are often in direct conflict with the marriage.

Please go read through the "Start here first" thread at the beginning of this forum. It will help you understand the advice we are giving.

I read the "Start Here" thread and all of the articles. I don't see anything in them that would suggest that I need to hire a PI to rule out an affair when there is NO evidence that one is occurring. For reasons that I don't want to get into on a public forum, there is nothing that a PI would be able to uncover about anything going on in his workplace anyway. (You're just going to have to trust me on that.)

Maybe I was wrong that this would be a helpful forum . . .

Actually, there is evidence. There are numerous red flags, namely your husband's desire to be alone and his unwillingness to work on the marriage. When a spouse says he wants to resolve the problems in his marriage but his actions are the exact opposite, there is usually a hidden reason. And that hidden reason is almost always an affair. It may not be an affair, but it has to be ruled out FIRST or anything we tell you to do will be of no use.

The reason you saw nothing about hiring a PI in those threads is because you are not on the Surviving an Affair forum. It is very common place for a spouse like you to show up on this forum, however, completely unaware that the underlying problem is an affair. It is our duty to tell them this.

I am sorry you don't find that helpful. But that is my best advice.

How have you come to that conclusion after one reply?

You might be correct in your strong assumption that your husband is indeed NOT having an affair; however, the most expedient thing to do is to first rule it out completely as a cause for his withdrawal from and disinterest in you.

None of the MB advice will help your marriage if an affair is taking place. After an affair is ruled out, then you would work on the next step.

An affair can be easily conducted at the workplace, and many many people have jeopardized, even ruined, their careers by having an affair.

The point is to rule it out first, not based on your strong assumption, but based on fact, then move to the next step.

Well, again, there are things that I can't really get into on a public forum but that make the chances of an affair (especially a workplace affair) vanishingly small. Again, a PI isn't going to be able to do anything that I can't or haven't done. I don't know what good it does to speculate about a possible affair at this point because if there is one, it doesn't look like it's going to be uncovered.

Two to three years ago, I probably exhibited all sorts of behavior that you would consider warning signs of an affair. I wasn't having one, nor was I even considering it. I was simply happy to be focused on my own career and individual needs. I suspect that's where my husband is now, with the added layer of resentment from having had his ENs ignored in the past.

Did you even read my post, except for the last paragraph? He does want to work on our marriage. He wants to stay married to me. We just disagree about how to make that happen. I'm looking for advice on (1) whether I'm way off base or misunderstanding something about how MB works (i.e., is it too much to expect for him to be affectionate, etc while he is working on breaking down his emotional wall?) and (2) if I'm not way off base, how I do help him "buy-in" to the idea of turning toward me as part of rebuilding our marriage?

ETA: I am basing my rejection of an affair based on fact, not assumptions. I can't prove that it's not happening, because it is impossible to prove a negative. But none of the facts that I have uncovered point to an affair (and I have been very thorough), and there is an alternative explanation that explains his behavior without relying on factual circumstances that do not appear to exist.

It wasn't a conclusion, just open speculation. But now that I see other people also have a one track mind about the issue, perhaps it will become a conclusion.

Oops, meant to quote SugarCane.

It does a lot of good to try and uncover the facts behind the mystery of your husband's actions. If not a PI, I would find another way to rule this out. You can't just say it can't be uncovered. I don't accept that.


Yes, we read your post. We need for you to rule out an affair.

Again, I can't do anything else that I haven't already done. You can either accept that and help me or not. That's your choice.


Just curious -- what WOULD satisfy you that either an affair is not occurring or, if it were, it could not be uncovered? Because it sounds to me like you are the one making an assumption without factual support, and an unfalsifiable one at that.

That's fine with me. I have offered my help and you can take it or leave it. That is your choice.

This is a public forum but nobody has the slightest idea who you are or where you live.

You cannot expect to give veiled details, or no details at all, about a major aspect of your sitaution (your H's work) and get specific advice that is bang on target. What job can your H possibly do that rules out contact with women? Is he on an oil rig in the middle east? If so, why didn't you mention that you spend nights apart while he is working? If not, what can he possibly do locally that rules out women? American and British employers are not allowed to discriminate again women (with very few exceptions), so we are left thinking that your H must come into contact with women in his job - or at the very least he gets a lunch break! Hence the suggestion to hire a PI.

It's hard to give advice with obscure information, and unfair of you to label the forum "not helpful" when you don't get what you want. I know if I were as desperate for help as you sound, I wouldn't be rude to the first poster who spent minutes composing a post to me. I would consider every suggestion.

It is odd that you choose to so vehemently reject the idea of an affair when the simple fact is that you first brought it up on this thread.

Your husband's behavior strongly suggests an affair. That is a simple observation. I don't understand why you react so strongly to this possibility. He is checked out of your marriage. Something must be up. People don't work on their marriages by choosing to be alone. Rather, they work on developing alternative ways to meet their emotional needs.

I'm not trying to be intentionally vague, just careful about what I reveal. I don't know why you would need more specific information about his workplace in order to offer advice. I'm not asking you to help me rule out an affair. I have done that and feel comfortable with that conclusion. I don't know why I can't be trusted to have evaluated the facts of my own situation, but so be it.

I admit that I was suspicious of an affair and that is why I looked for evidence of one. I found none. It is unhelpful to insist that I need to look harder rather than address the alternative explanation that I raised in my post.

I don't get your alternative explanation, at least I don't see one that makes any sense. If your husband were "married" to his work, then he would have no problem just leaving you sitting there on the side to meet whatever occasional EN he has. Wanting to separate from you means he wants to ultimately replace you. I doubt he wants to replace you with work. There are ENs that work can not provide. He is in withdrawal. That is why he has turned away from you. You are still in the state of conflict. That is why you think he is focused just on himself whereas you are focused on the marriage. You are going to have to work a lot harder if you want to draw him back into the state of conflict. This will be impossible if he has found a better way to meet his ENs. That is why you have to snoop out what is going on. Otherwise, you are just letting any recovery opportunity that may exist pass you by.

Clara, I could never have believed that my XH could have an affair and yet I discovered he had been a serial adulterer for (at least) 16 years. He would meet the women on planes and see them infrequently using only his work landline for contact I discovered the slag because of a single phone call made on one of our lines. There are plenty of ugly, fat, desperate women out there looking for a meal ticket.

Of course looking back, there were red flags that I should have seen. There always are. For one thing, his father openly cheated not just on his wife but on his long term girlfriend too.

Thank you for taking the time to address my questions, mrEureka. Perhaps I have not explained our situation well, but I think the first sentence I quoted here is an accurate description of our relationship. He is not asking to separate, but for time to work through his feelings of anger and rejection from the past before I can expect him to try to meet my EN. He thinks that this is the best way to fix our marriage, but he is open to professional advice that goes against his intuition.

My real question was and is -- am I misunderstanding something about how MB works? If my husband and I were to go to see Dr. Harley and we both said, "We want this marriage to work and we will do what it takes," would Dr. Harley tell me to be more patient or tell my husband to be more giving? Or both?

Clara, believe me I am not trying to make you feel piled on here. I came in 2005, and within the first month it was suggested that my now-ex had a drinking problem that would prevent my marriage from being restored. Well it sure felt like all my eggs were in this one basket, so I fought for 5 years to try to restore my marriage anyway, with my ex staying checked out for the most part, to the point that he was telling the kids we are splitting up and still me fighting year after year to try to salvage this. Meanwhile my one of my kids tried to kill herself repeatedly at 11 and even with all the FC (family commitment) time together she didn't tell me about her struggle at the time because I was so distressed so long about my failing M. It wasn't until the divorce was well underway that finally she was able to open up and get the help she needed.

I hope you do find that your DH is a workaholic instead of in an affair. Either way a short term discovery focus will be the Plan A Reality Bringer you need to make some plans for next steps so your family doesn't flail without you for years like mine did.

If both spouses are fully committed to rebuilding a marriage, then all Dr. Harley would have you do is read his books, principally those that apply to your situation from among these: "His Need, Her Needs", "Love Busters", "Surviving an Affair", " He Wins, She Wins", and the workbook "Five Steps to Romantic Love". Apply what you read there to your marriage, and your problems will be solved. Sounds simple? Well, when neither spouse is reluctant and both are committed to recovery, it is simple. Simple to outline, that is, but very hard work to do.

The situation you are in doesn't sound like two committed spouses. I don't think you need to be more patient or him more giving. He needs to come out of withdrawal. You need to understand why he is in withdrawal. If there is no affair, then he must have ENs that are unmet. Work on identifying and meeting those needs. That will eventually bring him out of withdrawal. Do not let him retreat to himself. That will not work.

But, I have to say again, an affair is the most probable cause for all of this.