(I found out about this site from my sister, who was in a terribly abusive marriage for years. Thanks to all of you who helped her out....)

Just how much truth should the WS tell the BS? I have known about a business associate's affair for a few years, but thought that he had moved back in with his W for reconciliation. He told me today that he has been seeing the OW for the entire period, including the time he has moved back.

He confessed to his W, bc the fact he moved back was discovered by his OW. He was afraid that the OW was going to tell his W what had been happening.

He told me today that he has mixed feelings about continuing the marriage. His W was very hurt and confused, but he has not told her the truth about how he feels about his OW. His W is older and has a lot of concerns that she is too old to attract another man, and feels that the world is more "couple-friendly".

His W told him this morning that they needed to talk about their marriage this weekend. He can't decide if he should tell the entire truth about his feelings for the OW, or if that would be too painful for his W to hear. He still has a lot of mixed feelings about staying in his marriage, too. I told him that he could not expect her to make decisions based on incomplete knowledge, and that if he were never going to be able to be happy with just his W in his life, then he should not subject her to a marriage where he does not love her passionately.

Dunno....never been a BS myself, so I can't say. Any more advice from people who have been there?

She deserves to know the entire truth about her own life. To withhold it is nothing more than cruel and manipulative. She can't possibly make informed, rational decisions about her OWN life if her H withholds facts from her about his feelings.

She has every right to know all this, more so than ANYONE. I am horrified that you, a friend of her H, knows more about her life than she does. Perhaps she wouldn't want to be married to someone who was not in love with her. Shouldn't that be HER RIGHT? He has no right to withhold this information from her.

Please urge him to show her some compassion, for once, and tell her the truth. To let her live a lie is to compound the betrayal and cruelty of the affair.

Thanks for the answer. I will see him at the office tomorrow morning early for a staff meeting, and may even print it off and give it to him. Hope that is ok.

He says he loves her in a caring way, but that he loves this OW in a passionate, all-consuming way. He just has a hard time with the guilt and the fact he hurt his W.

I think he is a bit afraid that the OW will tell his W everything if he doesn't. I can only imagine that she would rather hear it from him.

You are a good person and a good friend. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

Here is something else you can show him. This was written by Dr Willard Harley, the founder of Marriage Builders:

“From my perspective, honesty is part of the solution to infidelity, and so I'll take honesty for whatever reason, even if it's to relieve a feeling of guilt and depression. The revelation of an affair is very hard on an unsuspecting spouse, of course, but at the same time, it's the first step toward marital reconciliation.

Most unfaithful spouses know that their affair is one of the most heartless acts they could ever inflict on their spouse. So one of their reasons to be dishonest is to protect their spouse from emotional pain. "Why add insult to injury," they reason. "What I did was wrong, but why put my spouse through needless pain by revealing this thoughtless act?" As is the case with bank robbers and murderers, unfaithful spouses don't think they will ever be discovered, and so they don't expect their unfaithfulness to hurt their spouse.

But I am one of the very few that advocate the revelation of affairs at all costs, even when the wayward spouse has no feelings of guilt or depression to overcome. I believe that honesty is so essential to the success of marriage, that hiding past infidelity makes a marriage dishonest, preventing emotional closeness and intimacy.

It isn't honesty that causes the pain, it's the affair. Honesty is simply revealing truth to the victim. Those who advocate dishonesty regarding infidelity assume that the truth will cause such irreparable harm, that it's in the best interest of a victimized spouse to go through life with the illusion of fidelity.

It's patronizing to think that a spouse cannot bear to hear the truth. Anyone who assumes that their spouse cannot handle truth is being incredibly disrespectful, manipulative and in the final analysis, dangerous. How little you must think of your spouse when you try to protect him or her from the truth.

It's not only patronizing, but it's also false to assume that your spouse cannot bear to hear the truth. Illusions do not make us happy, they cause us to wander through life, bumping into barriers that are invisible to us because of the illusion that is created. Truth, on the other hand, reveals those barriers, and sheds light on them so that we can see well enough to overcome them. The unsuspecting spouse of an unfaithful husband or wife wonders why their marriage is not more fulfilling and more intimate. Knowledge of an affair would make it clear why all efforts have failed.

After revealing an affair, your spouse will no longer trust you. But lack of trust does not ruin a marriage, it's the lack of care and protection that ruins marriages. Your spouse should not trust you, and the sooner your spouse realizes it, the better.

The Policy of Radical Honesty is one of two rules you must follow to protect your spouse from your self-centered behavior, which includes affairs. The other rule is the Policy of Joint Agreement (never do anything without an enthusiastic agreement between you and your spouse). If you were to be completely honest with you spouse, and you were to follow the Policy of Joint Agreement, an affair would be impossible, unless for some reason your spouse wanted you to have one.

If you knew that your affair would be discovered -- that right after having sex with your co-worker, your spouse were to find out about it -- you would probably not go through with it. And if you were honest enough with your spouse so that YOU would be the one to tell him or her what you did, your honesty would be a huge reason to avoid any affair.

How the victimized spouse should respond to the revelation of an affair is a subject of a later column. I do not have the space to treat it here. But a spouse is twice victimized when he or she is lied to about an affair. Truth is far easier to handle than lies.”

Thanks Melody.

You were a big help.

Melody - I just noticed that you have been in recovery since 2000.

How long does it take to get over something like this??? Aren't you exhausted?? Do you think a strong faith in God helps recovery; i.e. do more marriages fail that don't have that faith?

You're welcome, confused! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

Exhausted? I never even think about the affair anymore. We have a wonderful marriage now. For me, it took about 12 months to get over the affair. Others might be shorter, others longer.

I think my faith in God helped tremendously. It helped him even more.