IF she tries to reconcile with me, I will stipulate that I know who he is so that I can verify there is no contact. IF we get a divorce, why should I even care what she does then?

Oh, and IF she tries to reconcile, right now I don't think I would want to, anyway. Which puts me in the post-M standpoint of "none of my business". I can only be the best dad I can be. It is sick that you think I should try to control her any further

You clearly don't listen to Dr Harley's radio show or read his material if you believe that. These are just a few that I found very quickly. He talks about it all the time on the radio show and proudly refers people to his snooping forum, Operation Investigate.

here

Snooping: Is it wrong? Or, is it the right thing to do in marriage?

here

I'm done with this place. I love Dr. Harley, his books and his radio program. This message board has done nothing but cause me further pain. There's a reason I stopped posting here months ago. I thought I'd come here and tell people they were right, and you drove me to the worst interaction I've ever had with WW. You also insult me as a man, husband and father. Great work!

This OM has wrecked your marriage and your child's family and you say it's "none of my business?? That is NUTS. It is nuts that you stick your head in the sand when it comes to pertinent facts about your own life. This is vital information about your own life that has been wrongly withheld from you. Isn't your marriage and your child's life "your business?"

I guess you missed the critical bit of info: Post-M. a.k.a. divorced. When we're divorced, as much as I hate it, WW has 100% control of who D2's stepdad is.

But you are not divorced.

Hence the word "IF"

Listen, right now we are in limbo, waiting to see what each of us wants to do. One of two things will happen:

- Attempt at reconciliation. I will demand his name and everything else before I do that. I will not agree to reconcile if she does not agree to provide that.

- Divorce. After that, she can do whatever she wants.

Neither scenario requires me to do more snooping NOW.

You don't have to do anything. You have free will and are completely free to continue to stick your head in the sand. It is your life after all and is no sweat to me.

I'll go enjoy my sand, I guess. You win, Melody. 81,800 posts later, you sure know how to win an argument.

Best of luck!

Lou,

Sorry to hear about your week. I know you must be very devastated.

You deserved/deserve better.

You will make it.

In a few weeks or a full month your wife will complete withdrawal and MAY be open to considering reconciliation. I know you must be in shock right now getting your suspicions confirmed so it's a bit of an emotional time to decide one way or another. You have every right to quit on your marriage. You've got your get out of your marriage free card but, unfortunately, when you/we have children it's just not that easy.

Reconciling MAY be the best for your child. If you can do it right.

Please stick around as you process these decisions.

Godspeed,

Mr. W

Oh,

I see some discussion of some porn problems on your thread among the idiots.

You know wonka is a man-hating lesbian who has no idea how to save a biblical marriage, right? Lesbians hate exposure and partake in a culture of secrets and man-hating so don't let anything she says bother you. She's not an expert at anything but witchcraft.

I haven't read everything but I am aware that DB pushes a betrayed husband to own and own and own WAY more than they should. Your wife's complaints about pornography were likely just rationalization and justifications for her now revealed affair. They weren't legitimate complaints to that extreme. She merely used it as subterfuge to keep you feeling bad and her covering up her shame and guilt as she lied her butt of to you and cheated with OM.

It makes sense OM is married with kids. The affair was likely kept very secretive and harder to catch as he was extra careful not to get busted. You really needed to put a VAR in her car to catch her talking on the cell phone.

I'm not minimizing porn problems but it doesn't excuse your wife's adultery nor the fact you have a right to divorce her if you choose.

Will you PLEASE quit DB. It truly sucks and they destroy marriages. Their advice to men, in particular, really sucks.

Mr. W

I'm good, actually, MrW. I am perfectly comfortable with what I've owned in our M, including porn. I never once hinted that she was justified in walking away from our M. And I don't care what the sexual orientation of someone is. I have the ability to judge thoughts and advice on the merits of the thoughts and advice, so I stick with that.

I thank God every day for DB. It allowed me to gain perspective, to reclaim my life. Also, there is not a single word in any DB book that is specific to men, and doesn't apply to women. The women on those forums get the same advice as the men: Focus on yourself while your spouse has abandoned the M.

And I have no interest in snooping any further. Thanks for the (same old) advice. My marriage is dead, completely. If we're going to reconcile, it's going to be a brand new M, and it will have to start with both of us wanting it. I'm not going to snoop my way back into her heart. The A is over. Like I said, if we both agree to reconcile, it will be with the stipulation that she opens up everything to me, including the identity of OM. Until then, what is the point of snooping?

I can see that snooping is the only advice I'm getting here, so I'm done here. I love Dr. Harley and all of his work. I will read SAA, I will re-read HNHN, HWSW, LB. My next M (with WW or a new woman) will be using MB principles.

I didn't say anything about snooping (other than I wish it was successful months ago and maybe that you'd have tried other methods months ago)

I was just being supportive, I thought.

I assure you. God isn't there.


Sometimes it's nice to have people patting you on the back while you take a softer less direct more enabling path towards addressing the most significant UNKNOWN problem of adultery in your marriage. However, those soothsayers didn't do you any favors advising and encouraging you to fix and work on yourself while ignoring your wife and not snooping on her.

Your wife was having a secret affair with a married man with children who had absolutely no desire to leave his wife. He drew out the affair with your wife as long as he possibly could. Exposure to his wife would have IMMEDIATELY ended the affair last summer. If only DB encouraged you to snoop harder as we did, perhaps you would have found a more successful method at that time. IF your PI had busted her that would have been timely; but, then what....MB would have told you to expose to OM's wife immediately and DB would have told you not to expose at all. In fact, exposure advice is forbidden on that forum completely. Wonka and all those marriage destroyers would have strongly and, in concert, tried to talk you into NOT exposing anything to anyone. If not for MB, even if you or your PI had discovered the affair your opportunity to bust up the affair would have gone by the wayside due to poor internet advice.

So as you leave here discouraged, please be careful and exercise discernment. The title of this thread says it all....we WERE right and we remain right. We help save more marriages per week then DB "saves" all year. "Standing" is nothing but waiting around hoping your wife strolls back into your life. Women don't respect that. They want a man that cherishes them and is willing to fight for them not one sitting around navel gazing and falling for their lies indefinitely. Deep down at some level your wife's takes home message regarding the fact you failed to catch her cheating is that you apparently didn't care enough to catch her. It sucks. I know. I've been there and I've been here AND saved my marriage to boot.

Come back. We are a forgiving bunch. If you are truly done. We/I respect that. It's your choice. But we remain willing to help, either way, nonetheless.

I agree for the most part. But either way, nothing has to be done today or this week.

I do think it would be nice if you confirmed (without involving your wife) that the OM's wife actually knows about the affair. He may have just lied to your wife when things got a bit too hot (her actually pushing him to file a divorce and get on with being with her 100% of the time including the holiday). He told her it was over, his wife knows and he's gonna work on his marriage when, in fact, his wife doesn't know anything and he was hoping that by telling her that your wife wouldn't be vindictive (like many dumped WW's) and expose him herself. Insuring his wife knows would be a kind gesture, protect her emotional and physical health and, perhaps, guarantee once and for all that the guy never comes sniffing around your wife for some action whether you reconcile or not.

Anyway, you don't sound receptive today to any of this so sorry if I'm just reiterating things.

You mentioned that she got dumped about 3 weeks ago. She might actually be coming out of withdrawal about now and open to discussion soon. Lots of roller coaster days. She's likely to be all over the place emotionally.

Godspeed,
Mr. W

Exactly and this is one of the biggest reasons DB fails to help men save their marriages. It's a female crafted plan based upon Dr. Harley's work, that sort of works for women. The plan is like a soft MB plan for women. Recall that MB only encourages women to Plan A for 3 or 4 weeks (get the exposure done with ), send a Plan B letter offering a route back to the marriage and then go VERY dark and focus on yourself. Conversely and VERY much unlike DB, men are encouraged to Plan A for months. Pretty much for as long as they are able. Plan A included snooping, strategizing and aggressively opposing and trying to bust up the affair while also minimizing/eliminating (other) love busters, confronting the OM and the wayward spouse while also meeting as many needs as the wayward will allow to be met. It's different because men and women are different. Our brains our different. We function differently.

Anyway. I just read through your other thread and it sounds incredibly surreal. Your thoughts, feelings and reactions to getting some of the worst news of your life are normal. I would like to mention your indications of relief at getting the news you've suspected for so long is one of the greatest benefits of successful snooping. Hardly anyone regrets it after they've do it and I see no logical reason whatsoever for such a blanket opposition to any snooping whatsoever. Now that you actually know you are finally free to make honest decisions and choices about your life with all the facts and evidence before you. Prior to that, you were living your wife's lie. Not a fun or healthy place to be, right? You seem like a fairly nice guy and I'm willing to bet you give your marriage another shot.

Last thing...I hope....

Your wife is a admiration junkie. She likely missed some important childhood development most likely during the period when her dad cheated on her mom, left the family and married his mistress. Her betrayed mom probably parentified her while looking to your wife for emotional support. Maybe there are other issues. Regardless, she needs to grow up, set aside childish notions and you would smart to send her to MB versus anywhere else. My wife posted here for years and it's made all the difference. Like you, I didn't think she'd do the work. She was immature (as was I) and not really up for owning her behavior (neither was I). You could read her stuff if you want. Her original posting name was something like WWWondering, I think. Instead of making demands and trying to get her on board yourself (and having a text fight with her) just tell her you'd like to see her post 100 posts on MB and then you'll talk. You are just as confused as her so maybe others who have gone before you can help. You could even start posting together under a new name if you want. Just ask the mods for permission so you don't violate some dual identity rules or anything.

Wait a minute: you do know who he is. You've even spoken to him.

It's this same man, and she is lying when she says it isn't.

It's up to you whether you follow our advice, but if you do you can rebuild this marriage.

The title of this thread is "you were right", and that is correct. You resisted our advice when we were right before, and you failed to bust up this affair when you could have done so and stopped your wife from moving out and making you sell the house. You could have fended off the situation you're now in, where you only see your daughter for less than half the time. We were right then and we are still right; you need to expose this affair to his wife and run off this dirtbag.

To be clear, NOBODY HERE told you to text your wife and have you insist on getting the OM's name and information such that you could disclose and expose to his wife. You reacted and overreacted all on your own without thinking clearly or rationally about how to go about things.

I also never challenged or disrespected your manhood in any way when I posted how unfortunate it was that you didn't plant a VAR in your wife's care last June. I was merely pointing out that if you had, you likely would have broken up the affair quickly last summer, had a better chance to save your marriage while you still fully cared about your wife. You also would not have had to endure the last 7-9 months of lies. You'd have been much better off emotionally and physically today had you discovered the truth about your life.

Not coming back here is fine. DB can help guide you through the divorce process. It's what they are exceptionally experienced at.

We all do the best we can. No better, no worse. But one can strive to do better next time especially when using hindsight as a tool. Hindsight should tell you that MB knows what they are doing and saying and you made a mistake not listening to us the last 9 months or so. If and when you want real productive successful marriage saving advice in the coming weeks, months, years....I'll leave the light on for you.

Mr. Wondering