All,
Unfortunately I have had an affair with another women 8 months ago and have ended it 5 months after it started and have confessed the affair to my wife 1 month ago. I have even exposed myself to my family, good friends and my church family.
Although my confession took the weight of the world off my shoulders I am plagued with guilt and remorse for what I have done. I have also been consumed with thoughts of the other women who I had finally ceased all communication with last month (just before I told my wife about the affair), after reading articles and watching videos on the Marriage Builders website. Somehow I thought that the causal encounters at business and social events would not be an issue. Oh how I was mistaken, those meeting did not allow me to fully separate from her, even though she had already moved on and was in another adulterous relationship with a married man at her company, I was stuck wanting her back even though I knew it was wrong and sinful.
I have become so broken by the whole experience that I am now on antidepressants due the overwhelming feeling gloom and guilt surrounding all the hurt I caused and am now feeling.
My question is how long will this pain last and how do I stop the bad feeling that I keep on going over and over again in my head, about the affair, the OW and my wife that I hurt so terribly much.
The affair happened so quickly and fell apart just as fast, and here I am now trying to understand what I had done, why I did it and can I ever love my wife again and have a happy marriage without all the feelings of guilt and shame?
Thanks

You should move. Every time you see this woman, you go back to day one.

Have you established transparency with your wife? Started spending 20-30 hours per week on fun datone.How is your wife doing? Have you answered all her questions?

Hi PhotoMemo, welcome to Marriage Builders. Do you have any contact with your OW at all? Email, Facebook, text? Any mementoes? Does she live close by?

And how is your wife dealing with the trauma of the affair? It is as traumatic as physical assault or rape so she must be devastated. Her pain will last about 2 years if your marriage recovers.

The reason that you did it because you have poor boundaries around women. That is something that should be addressed immediately so you don't do this to your wife again. If you had not allowed another woman to meet your needs, the affair would have never happened.

Yes, you can love your wife again if you put the same effort into your marriage as you did your affair.

As far as the guilt and shame, I view that as the conscience's warning system. Yours is on high alert. My suggestion is to embrace it, because it is protective. That is a good thing, not a bad thing.

Do you have the book Surviving an Affair? I would get that book along with the work book, Five Steps to Romantic Love. The program really does work if you follow the steps. Here is the extraordinary precautions checklist:

From Surviving an Affair, pg 66-67

The extraordinary precautions do more than end marriage-threatening affairs; they help a couple form the kind of relationship they always wanted.

These recommendations may seem rigid, unnecessarily confining, and even paranoid to those who have not been the victim of infidelity. But people like Sue and Jon, who have suffered unimaginable pain as a result of an affair that spun out of control, can easily see their value. For the inconvenience of following my advice, Sue would have spared herself and Jon the very worst experience of their lives.


Checklist for How Affairs Should End

_____The unfaithful spouse should reveal information about the affair to the betrayed spouse.

_____The unfaithful spouse should make a commitment to the betrayed spouse to never see or talk to the lover OP again.

_____The unfaithful spouse should write a letter to the lover OP ending the relationship and send it with the approval of the betrayed spouse.

_____The unfaithful spouse should take extraordinary precautions to guarantee total separation from the lover OP:

_____Block potential communication with the lover OP (change e-mail address and home and cell phone numbers, and close all social networking accounts; have voice messages and mail monitored by the betrayed spouse).

_____Account for time (betrayed spouse and wayward spouse give each other a twenty-four-hour daily schedule with locations and telephone numbers).

_____Account for money (betrayed spouse and wayward spouse give each other a complete account of all money spent).

_____Spend leisure time together.

_____Change jobs and relocate if necessary.

_____Avoid overnight separation.

_____Allow technical accountability.

_____ Expose affair to family members, clergy, and/or friends.

I saw the women after the affair ended, but that was befor MB, I did not understand the principal of the triggers. Since then I have not gone to any events that she would be at, or have I made any sort of contact. I have deleted every e-mail, phone or IM contact.
I have started my 15 hr/wk with my wife. We have been going out for walks and romantic dinners.
We will also trying to find a marriage consoler.
I have established transparency.

No contact at all. I have thrown away all momentoes. Although I do not work with her directly, the company I work for does do buissness with them. Her new BF is my sales person and I told him not to invite me to any events. As a matter of fact I called him out on his affair with this women because he is also married and has two young kids. Now we avoid each other, only communicating by e-mail when needed.
My wife has not decided to leave me, but is willing to work on the marriage with consoling.

Thank you for your reply. You are correct I do have poor boundries around women. I am very easy to talk to and enjoy talking to women.
However I have been concious of my communicating with my female friends and trying to stop. I now realize I need to stop it 100%.
Thank you for pointing this out.

Thank you for the information. I have checked off almost all of the items. However I have not left my job, even though it is a big trigger for me.
My wife told me that she trusts me now. I told her not to trust me any more and that she needs to keep me accountable by checking up on me whenever she wants.
I am also planning my trips better to avoid overnight stays at conferences. This will help me avoid contact with women in general. This is how I meet the other women.

An alcoholic working in a bar... Sound like a good idea? Find another workplace or you will be triggered constantly and your marriage doesn't stand a chance.

Is your wife willing to post here? Invite her to start her own thread.

This is not affair proofing at all. The OW is free to contact you any time. You work in the same environment with the OW and in the same environment where your affair began.

As long as you are accessible then you will always be at risk. Can she call you? Can she IM you? Can she email you? Then you are at great risk.

I am concerned that your wife does not understand the risk she faces. [and you certainly don't] This will very likely happen again because the OW if free to contact you at any time. And you will come running.

Will your wife come here and post?

The only solution is to eliminate any opposite sex friendships and stop having personal conversations with female colleagues. That is how affairs start. If you want to see where opposite sex friendships lead, go read the thousands upon thousands of threads over on the Surviving an Affair forum.

So you're not just working in the same environment, which acts as a trigger; you have been running into OW at business and social events, which are part of your job.

This is a workplace affair, facilitated by travelling to conferences etc, and you are still at risk of contact with her, as part of your job.

You need to change jobs.

You need to make changes that will result in this or any future affair becoming essentially impossible. That means taking a hard look at what facilitated the affair, and then aggressively mitigating those things. It is not your force of will that will protect you. You shouldn't aim to fight temptation, but rather to avoid it entirely. Changing jobs is just a start. In my situation, we ended up moving over 500 miles away to another state.

Also, stop questioning why you did it. Concentrate on how you will make it impossible for such a thing to happen in the future. You will never be able to explain the why to any level of satisfaction, so it is a waste of effort when there are much better ways to move your recovery along.

Please send your wife here so we can help her.

I second all of what the other posters said and will add this:

Moving and changing jobs will be a huge relief to your wife in the long-run. She says she trusts you right now because she is still in shock and turmoil. But she will realize someday soon that she doesn't and your job is a major issue. It LED to the affair.

I moved myself with my daughter and offered my WH husband to come with us to save his marriage. He chose to stay at his job and, presumably, with the OW. Although his choice was to stay in his affair and addiction, I realized after I did it that it really was the only way to recover (either the marriage or personally). You mention that you are triggering, but she is too--probably much more severely than you. Every time you go to work, she is wondering what is going on.

Even if she says she trusts you (she doesn't by the way, it's impossible. She just is in turmoil), you need to make yourself totally above reproach. You need to go to great lengths--lengths that seem paranoid to those who have never been in this situation--to make things better for your wife and your marriage.

Also--this is slightly off topic, but this woman needs to be exposed terribly badly. TWO affairs with married men? And probably more. She is a vicious predator with no regard for anyone but herself (constantly remind yourself of that when you think of her).

Other posters: Would Dr. H recommend exposure of her by PhotoMemo's wife at this stage?

The answer is yes. This is an affair that will resume in an instant if the OW were ever to return and resume contact. That makes this a much more precarious situation than either PM or his wife seem to appreciate. Exposure of the OW drives another nail into the coffin of the affair, and everything that can be done to advance that cause is worth doing.

If this woman is having affairs at work, she must be exposed to her supervisor, HR director and other key company leaders.

Thank you all for your comments and recommendations
To summarize these are some of the steps I noted:

1. Have my wife join the discussion forum.
2. Quit my Job
3. Move to a new city
4. My wife should Expose the OW
5. No women friends
6. Make it impossible to have contact with the OW
7. Have my wife understand that she should not trust me for a long time because I am at risk of having another affair in my current situation.

Exactly. As far as trust goes, too much trust leads to affairs. It is not good for marriage!