A month ago I found out my husband was having an affair. He was out of town on a project and I opened the cell phone bill and saw a number over 100 times in a month. Then, on a credit card bill was an airline ticket flying her up there for a week. I was and am completely devastated. We have been married only 3 years but together for 10. I will admit we were having major intimacy problems and not having sex very often at all and I knew this bothered him as it did me. Other than that things were wonderful so I guess this was just something I kept thinking we would eventually adress. I never dreamed in a million years he would do this. In the past month we have started counseling. He is still on that project and it is suppose to end this week. An 8 week project out of town! He is going to counseling as well. He tells me he wants our marriage to work but doesn't know if it can. He feels like he has ruined any change of recovering from this and damaged it beyond repair. He is also scared that if we do get through the affair that we will go back to the way things were and he says he can't live without the intimacy and felt like he was living with his best friend. I want the intimacy too and will do whatever I need to in order to address the problem. However, I am not getting the re-assurances from him. He just keeps saying that things seem beyond repair and seems to be wallowing in misery. I am going crazy with worry. As of two weeks ago he says he has called it off with this girl. How do I know? How do I trust him? PLEASE any advice you have would be helpful. I feel like I am going crazy and walking on eggshells because I want this to work.<P>

WOW! Same thing happened to me - an out-of-town project that lasted 5 months and an affair that lasted 3. I also found out by the cell phone bill. <P>Well - Discovery Day was just 3 weeks ago, and we've progressed soooooooooo far - Praise the Lord!!! But, my husband is home and we are in counseling together.<P>I am still hurting and have bouts of depression and anger - which I find is normal - but we are doing so very well, it is almost unbelievable! <P>The reason for this - I believe - is totally God. My husband rededicated his life to Jesus Christ - and has repented of his sin, committed to the marriage and to making a fresh beginning! He is also committed to praying with me and for me everyday. He prays for our home, our children, our finances, our marriage and many, many other things each night as he walks our property before bed, and we also pray together each morning before he leaves for work. He is working extra hard to help me feel his love, his compassion and his concern for me, and he is very sorry for the hurt and pain he has caused me. <P>I believe that the answer for you (and everyone for that matter) is God. I pray that when your husband does come home that you can both work on working things out. This web-site has much valuable information that should assist you, and it is vitally important to get involved in a good bible-teaching church. Also, make sure that the people you counsel with are also committed Christians, as this makes a tremendous difference! Prayer is a wonderful healing agent!<P>I will pray for you and your husband. Be blessed, and . . .<P>Be God's!!!<BR><P>------------------<BR>"For I know the plans I have for you - plans to prosper you - plans for good and not evil to give you a hope and a future" Jer. 29:11

Welcome <B>name</B>...<P>There is a post of general welcome I wish to share with you... <P>It has a lot of quick links to many of the <B>most</B> important MB sites...<BR>Click here ==> <A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/forum/Forum29/HTML/000553.html" TARGET=_blank>General Welcome for All New Builders(Newbies)</A><P><B>About your post</B>...<P>Do start on a <A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi8113_ab.html" TARGET=_blank>Plan A</A>...<BR>Check out my post <A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/forum/Forum30/HTML/000176.html" TARGET=_blank>Plan A - 101 (2nd ed.)</A>.<BR>Sticking with Plan A (both he and you)... will make recovering easier.<P>I hope the counseling is in lines with the MB concepts...<BR>...so often "feel-good" therapy is common <B>and</B>detrimental.<P>At some time it would be good for your H to sent a "no contact" letter (one you review) to the OW. Read about it in <A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi6070_sa.html" TARGET=_blank> "Surviving An Affair"(SAA)</A>.<P> <P><A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/forum/Forum29/HTML/000254.html" TARGET=_blank>Jim</A> / <A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/forum/Forum29/HTML/000037.html" TARGET=_blank>NSR</A>

{{{{adviceplease}}}}:<P>I am so sorry to hear your pain, but so glad you found us. There are a lot of good people here who will do their best to help you.<P>Please read more of the information on this site. Personally, I found the information about affairs, how they begin and end, to be most helpful. <P>For a slightly different perspective than the Harleys, I would recommend the book "After the Affair : Healing the Pain and Rebuilding Trust When a Partner Has Been Unfaithful," by Janis Abrahms, Phd. I think you might find the chapters describing what is going on inside the typical betrayed spouse's and wayward spouse's brain to be quite helpful. The first because it will help you know you are NOT crazy or alone....the second because it will help you understand the flurry of emotions in your husband's head.<P>I think your husband is afraid that you will never be able to forgive him and that he has ruined his marriage. <P>I also think that there were key emotional needs not being met in your marriage before the affair.<P>Believe it or not, your husband is probably really afraid right now, even though he is trying to cover it up.<P>My short term advice would be (after beginning your reading!) to try to do little things to show your husband that you care and that you are still the same fun person you were before you were married. Perhaps you used to send him funny cards or call him just to say hi, not just to tell him that the water heater doesn't work....<P>Start small. The more you post the more you will hear that it takes time to rebuild a marriage. You may get tired of hearing about the time....but it is true. You will also hear about and experience the "emotional rollercoaster". Some days will seem great and others bad. It's okay. Your body and mind are trying to deal with a lot. <P>Please come here and to "General Questions II" to post on those bad days to blow off steam and get support. It can be a real love buster to rag on your husband when you're feeling down--but it can be vital to your own mental health to do so. We are here if you do not have a trusted friend or relative that you can talk to.<P>Finally, although it has really helped some people on this board, know that it is not <I>necessary</I> to devote your life to any deity to be a member of this board. I do not wish to diminish the religious experience of anyone here (Be God's, please don't think that I am!), but I wanted to let you know that neither my husband nor myself are Christians, but we have both benefitted from the advice and ideas we got here. <P>I guess I am almost in the "success story" category. My H and I have been through a lot in the past year and a half (D-Day Number One was 9 January 2000--yes, we had multiple D-Days, but I digress), but it would seem that my H has not had even one EA since October 2000. I'm afraid to cheer for fear of finding myself wrong, but I think that I can honestly start looking in the "recovering" section for guidance.... I tell you this just so you know that it is possible for even a marriage as troubled as ours to drag itself up from the abyss. There is hope for you and your husband!<P>All the best to you as you get through this. And you will!<P>Please post back and let us know how things are going today.<P>Hang in there.<BR>--HBC<P>

HBC - your message really made me feel better - thank you! I am just so scared that he won't do his part to make this work. He says he wants it to but then I am not feeling like he is sincere. He really is a wonderful person and usually so caring. But I want him to beg my forgiveness and tell me he will do whatever it takes on his part to make this work. I am not hearing that from him and I need that right now. I give him re-assurances and am walking on eggshells not to make things worse. He cries when he is home on the weekend and says he is so sorry he has hurt me and he is unhappy with the person that he is. I know he is sad and sorry but right now it is all about him. I need some re-assurances and signs he will do whatever he needs to. The therapist said that I need to look at the fact that he is coming home every weekend and going to therapy on the weekends; however, I need some things from him personally. I told him this and he says he knows that and he is sorry. He is just so unhappy and wallowing in his misery. Another thing is that I do not KNOW that he has really broken it off with the girl. How do I know? He told me he has but when all this came out he said he did and then I got the cell phone bill again and he was still talking to her. His project ends this week or next and then he will be here and she is here. I will be more crazy then worrying that he is with her when he isn't with me. This is just miserable. He supposedly started this when I was out of town for training in January and I caught him on March 13th. We both just turned 30 and were going to start trying to have a baby in May. Now that won't happen (I know it isn't a good time!) but I feel like everything I had believed in and my future has just been thrown away. Thanks for listening....

adviceplease,<P>I only have a moment, but I wanted to let you know I read your post.<P>I know it's hard when you want so desperately to hear your H say some comforting words and he doesn't. Hang in there.<P>Know that whatever happens, you will survive and thrive. <P>When things were really bad for me I decided to "worst case" my situation. (It's something we do in work all the time; I had not applied it to "real life" until then. )<P>I asked myself what the worst possible outcome to my situation would be. For me, that was divorce while my son was small and H marrying his OW. I sat down and gave that a good, hard think. I thought about the emotions I might feel, and what concrete steps I would have to take to make a good life for myself and my son.<P>I did not like to think about it, but when I was done I saw that I would survive a break-up. <P>Knowing that I would survive made all the difference in the world to me. I could then work on the marriage as a choice.<P>Please know that you will be okay no matter what. Your marriage is going to take a lot of work to make it whole again, but it can be done.<P>Your counselor is right: it is a very good sign that your H is coming home to you on the weekends and going to counseling. Affairs produce a kind of fog in the mind of the WS...he can't see past it yet. He is lost in the middle of the feel-good things he is getting out of the affair and is afraid to think of the hard stuff he will have to go through to make life outside the fog work. He isn't yet realizing that life with OW would require hard work, too....<P>Hang in there, AP. You can do it. You are a good person. You are strong. You are a good wife.<P>All the best.<BR>--HBC

Dear adviceplease, Wow, when I read your two postings, I felt like I could have written them. My H said many of the same things during the first part of his turn-around from the A. We have gotten a little beyond that, but I am still feeling like I need to hear more concrete reassurances and, more importantly, concrete action on his part. Good news, if your pattern follows mine, H may reduce the "wallowing in misery" over time, and Plan A definitely helps that. Like the literature on this site (and "Surviving an Affair" and "After the Affair") say, the WS is often so confused he/she cannot think straight and doesn't know what he wants, only knows things are not right. When my H first started asking if I thought we could try again, he was mostly focusing on his own turmoil--kept saying how could he know trying with me was right when before he thought he had been sure our marriage was over (he pursued the A without telling me he had already unilaterally decided the marriage was over). All this time, I was thinking, hey, wait a minute, I'M the one who should be doubting whether our marriage can get over what HE did...but it's true, if the BS pursues that course, WS will just think, oh, I was right, the marriage was over anyway. So if your H is like mine (and apparently many others) the mere fact that you express to him that you want to stay married and think you can both move beyond the affair will mean a lot and start him thinking in a positive direction. My H really bottomed out...felt he was a horrible person, didn't understand how it all "happened", was sorry...and yet kept vacillating back and forth between the OW and me. Finding out this is normal definitely helps keep the BS from giving up. I'm not in a position to say how all this will end, but just wanted to share that I know exactly what you are going through. I'll be watching this topic for advice, too--I expressed related concerns under "How did you Stick with Plan A when the clock is ticking?" (under Plan A/Plan B) and am wondering like you how long to wait for believable reassurances that the WS is willing to do, as you said, whatever it takes on his part to make it work. Thanks and good luck, octavia99

Thank you octavia99!!!<P>Sounds like they are saying the exact same thing. Don't you get tired of the poor WS thing??? Any suggestions on how to believe him that the A is over? Also, this happened because of intimacy he said he was missing. How am I suppose to work on that and more intimacy and more sex when he has cheated on me! We are taking a planned vacation with another couple the week of April 28th. He thought we should cancel but we have decided to go. I hope it will be good for us and hopefully a new beginning. Thank you again.

Hope you don't mind if I stay tuned to this topic along with you, because I am having the same questions. The intimacy problem is something I'm wondering about too. Yes, my H was right, our level of intimacy was way down, but that had been affecting me horribly too, yet I didn't go elsewhere to find it. It has dealt me a horribly blow--whereas he had the OW to boost his ego and make up for the bad state of the sexual side of our marriage (which in our case was due to the bad state of the rest of our marriage), I was every bit as needy as he was but have suffered through it alone. We both want intimacy to come back to our marriage, and we are both having problems on how to get past the A.'s effect on it. One nice and unexpected thing is that, although we have not had full marital relations since I find out about the A., we have been much more physically affectionate with each other in other ways, more than we had been in a long time. I mean cuddling and hugging and non-sexual physical expressions of affection and love. I think this is a good thing and probably the healthiest foundation for resuming sexual relations. I think we are both really scared about what feelings will be brought up, but I still believe in my heart that if and when we do eventually overcome the psychological hurdles, things are going to be on a whole different plane and better for it. I would say going on the vacation with the other couple is a great idea; it is time for you and your H to try to enjoy being together again, but the presence of the other couple will take some of the stress out of it and give the two of you an outside focus during those times when dealing with the A. threatens to cloud things. I hope it turns out to be the first step of things getting back on track for you two. Yours, octavia99