Not mentioning the affair comes across as complacence. Complacence reflects a lack of caring.

Have you confronted this dirtbag?

Things will not be headed in the right direction until you successfully run off the OM. You need to understand that recovery is IMPOSSIBLE until that happens. You are NOT in recovery.

Her affair is just like an alcohol addiction. She gets drunk on every contact. Every little phone call, PM or text, puts her back to day 1 of withdrawal. And the longer this goes on the harder it will be to bust up. So your main focus has to be running off the OM. Exposure to his family and Facebook contacts will be very impactful. OM are cowards who don't want trouble.

Her hostility comes from her affair. All of her feelings are being driven by her affair. So everything she says is about as meaningful as the words of a falling down drunk. Kill the affair, kill the affair, kill the affair.

Do your children know all about her affair?

Plan a *is* setting boundaries. I don't think you understand what Plan A means. OF COURSE, the addict is "nicer" if you ignore his drunken state, is that any surprise? Really? Our goal is to save your marriage, your goal seems to be to placate her destructive behavior with complacency and a** kissing. THAT IS NOT PLAN A. Complacency reflects a lack of caring that she won't soon forget if the affair ends.

You need to understand that you are facing divorce if you don't move. The affair will NEVER end as long as her feelings are perpetually triggered by the close proximity. What will happen to your finances if you are divorced? That is the true reality of what you face.

"us to fight more. It looks like as long as I completely stick to plan A, she starts making the correct decisions herself. "

She is still in touch so this is not true. Even so, what you have been doing is not really plan a. You have to focus on killing the affair; that is a huge part of plan a.

Ok, I may be confused about plan A.
I looked at the exposure checklist. When I notified OM's wife a couple weeks ago, me and her together notified their workplace, their friends and OM's parents. It started a huge fight and she said we were done and went to meet up with OM. For a week after that we barely spoke except about lawyer and kids. It pushed WW and OM closer together. I made the mistake of leaving the house though since my lawyer said to let her have it so i could get my other demands.

So after a week I talked her unto holding off on divorce while I stayed home to get my affairs in order. I followed the advice in one of the articles on this site about competing with the OM. After 4 days she cut off contact with him without me asking her too. She was angry for 2 days and fighting with me and ended up contacting him again. Then she cut off contact a day later and apologized to me. Now it has been a few more days and the latest she told me was she cut off all possible contact with him except for Facebook messenger. They aren't friends on Facebook anymore, but she said she needs him to have a way to contact her to warn her if OM's wife is planning something crazy to hurt her. I know this is bullshite, but I don't know how to get her to cut off that last bit of contact.

I did try confronting OM, but he said he is just going to call the cops. So I figured it woukd make me look like an idiot if I got arrested.

You keep bringing it up, on a regular basis. You don't argue or fight, but you do let her know you need it done.
"Your continued contact with OM hurts me horribly."
"You keeping your Facebook account hurts me terribly."

No, it did not "push them together," that is an irrational statement. She got angry because you were interfering her affair. Her anger effectively put you back in your place and now the affair is back on. You are not being strategis, you are being reactive.

And sure, enabling her affair by keeping quiet and pretending the affair is not happening will not piss her off, if that is your goal. Just like pretending a heroin addict is not shooting up will keep him quiet, but neither of those strategies are effective in saving your marriage.

See, we have different goals. Yours is to avoid angering your wife. Ours is to save your marriage. And you won't ever save your marriage by being complacent and enabling. That is NOT plan a and is NOT the approach of Marriage Builders.

You should be contacting the OMs family and friends and doing your best to run this man off.


You are cherry picking the advice and don't understand what you are doing. She contacts the OM because she is ADDICTED. Not because you made her mad on Tuesday. Your focus has to be on killing the affair - not only avoiding her anger. Otherwise she will continue to contact him for years. The way you kill the affair is to keep he pressure up.

Believe it or not, I have read one or two articles here and have listened to thousands of hours of the radio show. You need to apply more pressure to the affair and keep it up until you have run him off. Pretending like the affair is not active when it is is not Plan A.


And you are delusional if you imagine that the affair will end on its own just by being complacent on occasion. If that is the case, then she will be running back and forth on a regular basis whenever you upset her. That is not recovery.

I just want to remind you that her affair is STILL ACTIVE so your methods are not working. You will have to apply more pressure and change your goals. Our goal is to save your marriage - your Goal is to avoid her anger at all costs. That will not work.

Have you exposed to the OMs Facebook contacts? Have you personally spoken to his parents and asked to intervene?

What about your children? Her father? Did you expose to her mother?

" I made the mistake of leaving the house though since my lawyer said to let her have it so i could get my other demands."

When your lawyer gives you marriage wrecking advice like this, keep in mind that his goal is to facilitate an easy, amicable divorce. It is not to save your marriage.

You have moved back, right?

Yes. I am back in the house.
I wasn't sure how to tell the children or if I should, they are 2 and 5 years old.

Oh good! I am glad you are back. The 2 yr old wouldn't understand, but most 5 yr olds do understand the situation when it is explained to them.

Here;
"I encourage BHs to confront OM" Dr. Harley

Also:
"Don't put up with OM" per Dr. Harley

Last night I told her it is hurting me badly for her to keep communication open with OM. She tried all the usual excuses. I didn't argue. She ended up storming out at midnight to go stay at her mom's and said she was getting divorce today. She came back home 2 hours later and went to bed. This morning i noticed she had called OM last night after getting to her mom's house.
I asked her this morning what did she do at her mom's. She said she called him and told him not to speak to her anymore. I left for work and she went back to sleep.

This is about the 5th time we've been in this exact situation. Except this time I was more firm and didnt try to argue or convince her not to leave. She also calmed down a lot quicker than the times before. But I did tell her we are never going to have a chance to fix this as long as they are in contact. Before she went to her mom's she said she doesn't want to fix it and she doesn't really want to be with OM or me. This was also the first time she was mad enough to say she doesn't care if I ever get to see the kids or not. Up until last night she has maintained that she wanted me to share 50% custody.

I guess I will see what will happen today. Any advice on what else I should do? I'm going to expose to the rest of the people I didn't expose to yet.

She called me at work this morning and was very angry again. She said she blocked OM on all possible communications and told him not to speak to her again. But she was still fighting with me and saying she doesn't want me to ever mention him.

Look at the Document thread

Expose the affair and KILL IT. If you don't, this will be your future! Every time you look at her sideways,, she will threaten divorce and run to the OM. Do you want to live that way for the next 20 years?


Stop sitting around letting life happen to you and take your life back. Go after the OM with a vengeance and run him off. Stop making yourself at the mercy of the affairees!!

Move forward and do everything in your power to run this rat off. The affair is still active until you do.

And you will have to move if you want to have a marriage. I would start thinking about how you can do this.

This is NORMAL wayward behavior! TOTALLY out of the script that they all seem to play off of. She's mad you've interfered in the affair. Period. She's angry partially at herself because she knows what she did was immoral. Don't give up hope, but don't sit by and do nothing, either.