3 months ago my husband admitted to having a one night stand.

He was away on a business trip for a few months renting a place, and a female coworker needed a place to stay. After discussing it with me, I agreed that as long as I could trust him and he would behave, that it would not be a problem. She was married as well.
One week after he being there, my husband decided to have a lot to drink and ended up in her bed. He claims that she woke him from the couch and pulled him into her room.
He lied to my face for an entire week before he came clean and begged my forgiveness.

After spending some time to myself, I told him that I would be willing to try to work on our marriage. But I can't get over the resentment and I don't feel the same way about him as I used to. I was very much in love with him until this happened.

I don't know what to do or how to move on. I asked him what it was that she gave him that I couldn't, and he said nothing. That he was drunk and self-sabotaging, and he never wanted it to happen again. He has since stopped drinking and has made sure that I am always aware of where he is and who he is with. He has technically done everything "right" according to the articles I've read both here and other sites. But my feelings towards him haven't grown into the love that we had before.

I have been trying very hard to actively move past this, but I tend to hold onto things, especially when people lie to me. It is one of the things I never forget. Any advice?

Polarizing,

Have you contacted the womans husband and told him what happened?
Have you exposed this affair to family and friends?

Welcome to MB. I am sorry to hear of these events.

My dear, what she gave him that you couldn't was simply that he allowed her to meet his EN for sex and companionship when you weren't there. There's nothing special about her.

However, he might well have been attracted to this colleague before that night. It sounds as if her "need for a place to stay" was a set-up from the start. They both knew what was going to happen, and, I'm sorry to say, it has probably happened before.

You shouldn't take from that that she has something that you don't have. All it shows is that we are all attracted to people other than our spouse. However, being faithful in marriage is a matter of keeping our boundaries up, so that we do not indulge in drinks, conversations and flirtations that inevitably develop into more, and we do not taking risks with our marriage, such as renting a place away from home. A HUGE amount of affairs take place with workplace colleagues - people with whom, that we spend a large part of the week, and with whom we talk and become friendly - and a huge amount of workplace affairs take place when a spouse is away from home. Jobs that require nights away from home - never mind MONTHS away - are just too risky for a marriage. Your husband will have to change his working pattern if your marriage is to stand a chance, and if the resentment you feel is ever to ease.

If your marriage is to recover, your husband will have to leave that job, also because he cannot see that woman ever again. There is no way he can carry on having even occasional contact (at meetings, for example) or indirect contact (in groups emails, for example). Each day that he goes to work will feel like a knife to your heart. How do you know what contact he has with her when he leaves home?

You need to get your H to agree to leave the job, and if he won't you need to expose to their employers and line management.

You need to expose the affair to this woman's husband.

You need to expose the affair to friends and your families (both his and yours) who will support you and put pressure on him to rebuild the marriage.

Do you have children? How old are they? Do they know anything about this? If they are aged 4 or over, you need to tell them about this. Does anyone else know about this?

How long have you been married, and how old are you both?

The woman he cheated with told her husband. I have not, nor need to, talk to the woman or her husband.

I also have not exposed the affair to either of our families because, frankly, it is not their concern. He does not need to have "pressure" put on him to rebuild the marriage because he is doing everything he can to achieve that, as I said before. He is doing everything right in terms of reconciliation and rebuilding. He does not need my or his mom riding his back.

I will never ask my husband to leave his job as it is an excellent one. He is in the military and you cannot simply ask them to not send him away. Exposing the affair to people outside of our marriage is not going to help me rebuild, so how is telling his boss relevant? However, his boss does know, on my husbands own accord, because my husband made sure to work different hours than the woman so that they will not run into each other. Asking him to quit when he provide the majority income for out family is not an option, and is unrealistic, to be frank.

And her staying with him was in no way a set up for it to happen. He had another guy staying with him who was leaving and needed someone to help with rent. She was the person coming to replace the guy he was with, so that is what happened there. Renting a place was not "taking a risk" in our marriage as it was either rent a place (for cheaper) or stay in a hotel the entire time.

Not trying to be rude, but leaving his job would cause more strain on the relationship, so how would that help? We are adults, we have to work to pay bills, and his job is very important. I don't appreciate assumptions that the whole thing was a set up from the beginning and that it has "probably happened before". I came here looking for advice on how and what I personally need to do to move past my resentment to feel the way I used to. I don't need people trying to put into my head that he has done it before. That is not helpful.

I know you do not know my husband, but I don't need information about his actions, and I don't need to tell our friends and family, that is absurd. I guess I just need to know that the love with come back. I need reinforcement that I'm not wasting my time. But no one can really tell me but myself. So thank you for your response.

There is a very specific set of steps to follow to recover from an affair. Deviating from them WILL prevent you from recovery. Sugarcane has counciled many many people on the MB recovery path and I would encourage you to come here with an open mind instead of a combatative attitude towards one of the best posters here.

As it stands now, your mind is closed off to recovery steps, and you are being very close minded to the advice given. You do not need to take the advice given, it is your life to live, but you WILL NOT recover if you sweep this under the rug. Sorry.

I could have written your exact same story, only my husband did not tell me about his colleague ONS until 9 yrs after the fact. I only wish I had the information from the MB program available 9 yrs before I did. We could have avoided a lot more marital turmoil. You have an opportunity here, to not only recover but have a GREAT marriage going forward. You will not get there with this 'can NOT do' attitude though.

The love will NOT come back, instead the resentment will linger, if he continues to work with his AP and you brush this under the rug and pretend to everyone around you that this very devastating thing did not happen.

You ARE wasting your time, if you brush this under the rug, because you will end up in a marriage that is resentment filled when you could be in a wonderful recovered marriage. I would say that is a waste.

Marriage Builders has a plan to help you overcome this and have a great marriage. It was devised by a clinical psychologist who has over 40 years experience helping couples who have suffered from infidelity. Or, you can continue to brush this under the rug and be resentful. Your choice.

Hi polarizing, welcome to marriage builders. Your posts are very alarming because you have imagined that you know how to save your marriage after an affair and you do not. The same piss poor judgement that led you to believe that you "could trust" your husband to share a space with a woman is still in full force. (The equivalent of "trusting" someone to go drunk driving - REAL BRIGHT!) Unless you can accept that you have no earthly idea what you are doing and will accept advice from people who have been through this and saved their marriages you are wasting our time.

Your best thinking got you in this mess and it won't get you out. So...are you here to listen or are you here to waste our valuable time? If you won't take the advice, there is nothing we can do for you.

I wrote my post with sympathy for someone going through what I went through; who has tried to "get over" the affair but who is still in pain every day, and is not making much progress recovering.

The recommendations that I gave come from Dr Harley, the founder of the Marriage Builders programme. He has dealt with thousands of couples in the aftermath of affairs, and he knows just how hard it is for a marriage to recover from one. He has seen how hard it is for affair partners to end the affair, and how impossible that is if they continue to work together. He has seen the inevitability of affairs when a spouse works away from home. He has seen the high failure rate of military marriages, for just that reason. He has seen the depression that resentment creates in the faithful spouse, and the marriages crippled by pain, many years after the affair has ended.

He devised his recovery programme to tackle every issue that leads to affairs, to ensure that the affair ends and another never starts, and to build a romantic, integrated marriage where the faithful spouse comes to know that she is secure, and her resentment fades. I'm sorry that you did not appreciate his recommendations.

However, I gave them with time and care, and I do not appreciate your tone towards me, so I'll leave you to your resentment.

One is reminded of the hurricane Katrina stragglers who, while begging for help, were shooting at the rescue helicopters.

Suggestion: don't ask people for help if you have no intention of taking it.

It never will given the path you have chosen. You are wasting your time.

It COULD come back, if you were to follow the advice you were given.