What I am having a hard time with is she is just so upset over what I would have done. She feels I'm not being honest with my intentions. That I haven't admitted I would have slept with them given the opportunity. My actions were clear that I would have eventually. The facts are I didn't and there was just kissing. ( I'm not trying to minimize ) She feels like she would be the fool staying with me. I am trying my best to fix this. I have been in therapy every week for the past 4 months, I offered to go bi weekly in order for us to afford to go together every other week. She would just say we would talk about it. She found MB, we have read the website aggressively, we talked about doing the home program. I was at the point of ordering it, asked her if it was ok and she said we would talk about it. We looked into going to a weekend workshop. I called to make arrangements and then discussed with her the details and asked if she wanted to, we didn't go. We have talked many times everyday about the affair and have been intimate many times. I feel we talk more about what I didn't do than what I did. She asks where was she when I kissed the OW, that I didn't think of her. Of course I didn't, I didn't think of anyone but my self. It was so important for her to move forward yet she now says she doesn't want to be with me bc I chose to leave her 3 years ago. That I did this.

It still doesn't add up. How can she be mad at something that happened 3 years ago?

Why do you refer to it as an affair?

You can't control what she does, you can only control what you do. Be honest with her, show remorse for your past behavior, behave in a trusting way now and avoid disrespectful judgments. If she still wants to leave you, let her.

Establish boundaries and enforce them. It seems she enjoys seeing you do the "pick me" dance. Tell her how you feel, what you want, but that ultimately she has a free will to chose what she wants in her life. If that means not being with you, so be it (you can live without her). Give her what she thinks she wants. Either way, you will be better off.

Thank you so much for your comments Loyal2afault. I look forward to new comments. It has felt like a push and pull situation. The first kiss with the first OW was 9 years ago and the second was 3 years ago. I call it an affair as well as my partner bc we were committed to each other, 12 years together. I have told her I want her happy no matter what she chooses. I have been extremely remorseful and apologize everyday. I have always been the person she could depend on. I try my best to take care of everything I can so she doesn't have to worry about it. I also opened my own business 1 1/2 years ago with her support. I don't know what more to do. She has always had a gut feeling but it's just been in the past 4 months that she found the truth, I didn't have the b*##s to do it myself. She says she would have never known if it wasn't for her. True! It's so much easier said than done to walk away, I feel so much guilt for the pain I have caused and just want to make it right by her. She asks why is she so important now?

Why was my post moved to this location vs surviving affairs?

Because it is not viewed as an affair because you are not married. As far as Harley is concerned, unmarried people are free agents. It is certainly viewed as cheating and is very hurtful, but it is not the same thing as a marriage.

**EDIT**

Please familiarize yourself with MB concepts before posting to others. A reminder that this poster is here to inquire about Marriage Builders, not to learn personal philosophies about the program.

I have to say I agree with her: you aren't married and am I right in thinking you don't have kids? She'd be an idiot to volunteer to clean this up.

I'm not unsympathetic to your plight and I know you couldn't marry. That still means it is an uncommitted relationship, even if you would have if you could have.

When I discovered my H's affair my instinctive reaction was that he could never have loved me. Yet, there was irrefutable evidence that he did. He had stood up one day and told the world, endowing me with legal rights.

Your partner doesn't have that proof. You're asking her to go on faith. A faith you destroyed. It's hard enough when the safety net of commitment is there.

You really did do this and you should probably face it.

Like I said, I'm not unsympathetic. Having affairs is a very common human failing, it affects 60pc of marriages. It's even more tempting when there is no taboo of marriage to break or shock everyone with. There was a very vague boundary of being able to be with whoever you loved.

Commitment really is that important. Sorry.

But lots of people who claim to be committed, aren't. How does your partner know you were?

We see women who were not married because their loving partner planned on exchanging them for a younger model. At a certain age they are replaced without the guy losing a penny or needing a lawyer.

Why should your partner believe you were really committed to her while cheating on her? The fact is you were not. Maybe you would have been if the law was different. It's not possible to know.

I don't believe that. There was once upon a time a thing called uncommon law marriage. Does that mean they were not committed to thier partner?

I should have been committed bc I love her....period. I made her a promise that I broke.

What can I say when nothing happened but thier was always the posoblity that something could? When I left her the night I went to check on the OW, who knows what could have happened. I know I was beginning to wake up but I don't see where I was strong enough to have stopped at that point. After I kissed the OW the last time, I explained how I felt when she chuckled. I wanted to ignore what had happened, yet I still chose to go check on her. So I do feel I still had intentions and was open for another opportunity. I was trying to figure out what the heck I was doing. When I got to the OW she seemed fine with her friends. That was the moment I realized the game I had played and at my partners expense. This is when I went back to my partner and secretly tried to make it right. ( making it right would have been telling my partner). I saw what the OW was doing and what I had foolishly done. This is a big issue with my partner and I. Any advice on this would be great

Some people believe this really common myth that living together would have once meant you were common law married. It's ridiculous and is more a social term than a legal one. Otherwise roommates and housekeepers would have found themselves married. What is far more likely is that people were prosecuted for fornication or ignored. There were some common law marriages were people observed strict rules to make their marriage legal, such as making out joint paperwork and pronouncing themselves to witnesses.

But they didn't just say I love you, move in and hope for the best. That would be crazy. It's also totally irrelevant to your situation.





Really do wake up. You are quite right that the 'spirit' of the promise is more meaningful than the legality. I do agree with you - it is.

The problem is you had neither. You weren't able to do the legals which placed all responsibility on you to prove your word was your bond.

You didn't and nobody forced you. Your partner would be a complete fool to take you on faith because you arrogantly seem to think you should be believed no matter what the facts imply.

Even married people are completely free to walk away from a cheater. Stop acting like she owes you something.

You ruined it. Deal with it.

One of the ways Dr Harley explains the difference between marriage and non marriage is the example of buying a house and renting a house.

Essentially, your living situation means squat when it comes down to legal responsibilities and risks. You can live in a house and not own it, just as you can live with someone and not be committed to them.

Take your example. You had an agreement with a landlord (your girlfriend) to care for the house (the relationship) just as well as if you were married. You would both talk about how unfair it was that the law wouldn't allow you to buy (marry). You say that you would snap up the house in an instant if allowed to buy.

'Not to worry', the landlord says. 'Care for the house as carefully as a buyer and it will always be your home'. You say OK and give every appearance of doing so, creating a feeling of trust with the landlord.

This feeling of trust is vital in such a shaky set up because both of you know you have no legal rights. The landlord knows you could leave for a different house in an instant leaving her with nothing for the investment of the past x years and no tenant. Ditto, you could be evicted with very little legal recourse, all that would be required is notice.

One day the landlord discovers you have been cheating her for a long period of the time. The rent money you gave her was counterfeit and you haven't been caring for the home as you pretended to. It looked OK but now she sees negligence has actually been rotting the very foundations. You've been freely letting vandals come in and piss over her life.

Most renters would be sheepish and expect eviction, but not you. You're awfully sorry, but this is your home you tell her and you aren't going anywhere. She looks most unimpressed, naturally.

The trust-only system has been revealed to be a con. It isn't possible to go back in time and make the relationship real.

This isn't a question of morality but physics. Unless you have a time machine you can't turn your non-committed cheating relationship into a committed and trustworthy relationship. I know you really want to, but you can't.

She has every right to walk away. Stop being selfish and let her.

I don't feel she is suppose to believe me, how could she? I can't go back and change the past, I just want to make the future right. Selfish? I respect the fact that I can't make her be with me but I have hurt her and I'm responsible.

OK, I respect that. The way for the unfaithful person to help recovery is to put themself entirely in the betrayed person's shoes. You consider them your victim and you give them any treatment they need; up to and including buggering off and leaving them alone if that is what they want.

Whether it is a personal recovery where you leave them alone or a recovery where you make radical changes to remain, is entirely up to them.

If she has agreed to give you a shot I would consider her a trifle foolish. It takes 2-5 years to recover and since she doesn't have to deal with divorce lawyers or do child visitation it makes more sense for her to build something up with a new person who has never betrayed her. Everything you have built in the past has been wiped out and she has to re-start, so why restart with a risky person? This is why Dr Harley tells people in young marriages, with no children, to simply not bother.

So if she does give you another shot simply consider yourself a very, very lucky person and do anything she needs to feel safer. Loyal2AFault's post covered that really well. It will also be pretty rotten and rocky for a number of years as she has no way to trust you and you have no way to prove yourself except with time. Add in the complication that there is no possibility of putting in place the committed framework of marriage and it isn't going to be easy for you both.

I honestly don't know what to advise on that front. I'd be interested to hear what Dr Harley tells gay couples who cannot marry to do. I know he encourages people to examine their sexuality because the odds are so much better in the straight world (where they can usually get married too) but I know he does help people in gay relationships. It might be worth asking the man who wrote the program you want to follow directly.

That's IF she decides to give you a shot.

Dr. Harley is very clear on this matter.
You can watch a video of his statements on homosexual relationships and his extensive work with them here, as an expert witness before the Minnesota State Legislature:

indiegirl, his position is in Defending Traditional Marriage in chapter 13. [that can be downloaded on kindle, I believe.]

The way he helps people in homosexual relationships is to encourage them to end the relationship and pursue heterosexual relationships instead. I think there might be certain elements of MB that are appropriate for ending homosexual relationships, ie: Plan B, but I don't see how the other concepts would apply. It would be like telling a kleptomaniac to go to alcoholics anonymous. Sure, some of the steps would apply, but since kleptomania is a different issue altogether, it would do no good. Perhaps that is a poor analogy, but my point is to say that Marriage Builders cannot be all things to all people.

I haven't read that book, so thanks for the clarification. I know that MB is based mainly on the differences between men and women in marriage not to mention the emphasis on a legal marriage so felt this poster needed some clarification instead of blindly following articles not intended for her. If MB is not suitable for this poster she should know and not waste time on it.

I have read other posts on MB, in fact their is one up there now where a lesbian couple are having infidelity problems and they are married. I have read many positive responses to her situation. I am happy they are married in their state but I am being pushed to the side bc I'm can't marry in mine. I'm not here for a lecture on my sexual orientation, I am here asking for genuine help from knowledgable people like yourselves. I have read and understand and am trying to follow the rules on this website. Regardless of being gay, I want to improve the person I am and I can only do this with help.

Let me explain who I am.....I am 36, have been in a no traditional relationship with who I believe is my soulmate for 12 years. Within 12 years I tried my best to stand by my partners side thru 11 major surgeries. I have helped raise her two kids as my own. I lived a traumatizing childhood with my parents physically fighting as far back as I can remember. My parents separated after 33 years of marriage. When my father realized my mother was not coming back after 6 months, he brought me his suit with his shoes requesting this is what he wanted to wear when he died. After that he proceeded to drink himself to death....I did my best to save him. By the end he was up to a half a gallon of captain Morgan a day. The summer I cheated I was dealing with the worst times of him, he died the following May 2012 and we were not speaking. It took me along time to realize he made his choices. For 3 years I lived in this, for 3 years I took care of him and my mother. After my father died I opened my own business and have been success now for almost 2 years. The home I inherited from my dad I let my mother move into with the understanding she would take care of it and make the payments, it was hers as long as she lived. I was trying to make sure she had a secure roof over her head, only to find out for the past 2 years no payments have been made and I have lost my house. My mom has never been big on drinking up until the past few years and mostly social, now she has liver damage and will die the slow death my father did. And all that truly matters to me is my partner and my kids. It has taken me years to realize my happiness is important and I deserved to be happy all those years. My happiness is making my partner happy. I am a very straight and narrow person, a seat belt ticket is my only crime. I have always tried to take care of everyone else. I am a committed person although I have failed the one I love. I want to be the person she believed in, she trusted in, I want to be a better person! With or without her.

I have no credibility, all this does not make up for my choices, nor are they excuses or reasons. I'm just asking for help.

One more thing, we do have two beautifully smart children who are in a early college program at our local community college. They will spend 5 years there vs 4 in high school and graduate with high school diploma and two years college. Our kids have been first and foremost and they still are even thru this heartache I have caused.