First may I apologise for lurking here for a while without posting. I guess I have been too scared to plunge in. Well I am in a 23 year relationship with my hisband, married 19 years. We have a 17 yr son, 16 yr D and 12 Yr son.
My husband is in royal Australian Navy and is a commander. Becaouse of this we have moved a lot and he has spent a lot of time away from me. For most of my life I coped well with this but for the last six years I felt him distancing himself from me. I began to become very resentful of his being away and our marriage deteriorated to the point where I would describe it as an emotional divorce. Twice due to terrible fighting I tried to leave him but the first he begged me to do marriage couselling where he declared love for me and insisted that my concerns that something was wrong and that he was pulling away were in my head. The second he left but came back two hours later crying begging me to reconsider upon which I felt such a huge wave of love for him that I set out to improve my marriage. For three years he lived away from me for work and came home on weekends when he was not at sea. He returned home (Canberra) in April 2000. He was between Newcastle and Sydney. My oldest two were in High school and I thought I was doing the right thing not moving them around However I was talked into staying here, I never felt right about it.
Anyway prior to this in 1996 we were in Cairns which is where I started to fall apart. I was having all sorts of problems and he would berate me if I needed support.After we moved here he basically ignored me when he would come home for the weekend. He didn't seem to want to do anything with me and if I tried to talk to him about it he would withdraw, return early to Ssssssydney or it would end in a terrible arguement. I blamed myself fo the state of the marriage because I was becoming resentful of working, running the kids around and runing home feeling I was getting nothing from him. I got into a real depressive rut and considered suicide at times.
Anyway for the last couple of years I had been trying to repair things. I got Dr Phil's relationship rescue and worked on improving self and marriage. I went back to university and did a postgraduate diploma. Changed jobs and I must say feel better about myself for that. After husband finally came homefor work I felt that we were growing together again and that while things weren't as they had once been I just put that down to having grown apart while he was away. and also to all the bitter thing we had said to each other. Now I think that I had basically given up on recapturing the real intimacy and settled for a distant aloof relationship.
Anyway in October my husband left his wallet home. The first thing I saw was that he had an account which I did not know he had. Then I noticed he no longer had a picture of me in his wallet. Then I saw something under his licence and ther were two pictures of my best friend. One was taken in his apartment in Sydney, The other was of her in lovely french style lingerie done professionally. I rang him at work where he had a go at me for going through his wallet and then denied that anything had gone on. After telling him even I was not that naive he eventually said that he had seen her once or twice and then that yes they had had sex.
That night I was a mess. I jumped to the conclusion that it had occurred when I had asked him to see her as I was worried about her because I knew she was in financial difficulty and was having a rough trot. This had been three years ago. He went along with that and basically blamed me saying that I had been treating him bad and that I had accused him of OW prior to this and that he thought he might as well. The affair was ongoing, he had been up to see her twice the week before while I was in USA for work. SO I thought it was for three years. That night he said he thought he loved her and that he did not know about me. By next day he did a complete turn around and wanted me to forgive him. By the next night he rang her to break off the relationship. I basically blamed myself, felt intense love for him, but was shocked and utterly destroyed thinking that my life was a big lie.
The next day the OW (my best friend who I had known since primay school) called me saying that she was having revenge on H and wanted to tell me full story. Told me to stop blaming myself that the affair started 6 years ago, that he flew her up there after I had moved down here, that they had basically been living together in Newcastle and Sydney that my name had been ***** or it if I came up in conversation Of money in his other account of another phone that he had just to call her. I couldn't believe how deceitful H was I had always thought of him as a loyal and trustiong man. Although he had treated me terribly during that time (my counseller says I was emotionally controlled and abused). 13 years ago (around the time my 12 year old was conceived they had abrief affair which she described as nothing!) Then nothing again until six years ago.
Anyway that night I kicked H out. It was horrific having to tell the kids. However he came crying to me at 7.30 next day to save marriage saying he couldn't bear losing me and that he loved me and couldn't care about her. To cut along story short we are together again and he rang her again told her he loves me and he will work it out or die a lonely old man. She owes him a sum of money and he has rung her once with me beside him to ask for it back. We are in counselling and seem to be doing well. He is a changed man and is acting like the man i fell in love with.
My problem though is me. I doubt his love. I can't fathom him doing all this to me if he loved me. He even wanted to leave me at times. I am terrified that he is settling for me and somehow denying himself to do the right thing I don't want him to be in a marriage with someone he doesn't love. I also get so jealous of her and he is sick of me asking about their relationship and of me comparing myself to her. I also am terrified of being deceived again as it took me so long to find out and that their affair was really like the primary relationship for a few years. I got very depressed despite my H's best behaviour over Xmas anddddd did some major love busting until I read a wonderful post here from someone who had been to AA and that woke me up to myself since then I am trying to focus on the positive and things are going better but its just that I feel so destroyed and unsure of myself. I also feel like I've been in fantasy land and lived a lie. I feel exploited and used. But I still feel immense love for my H. and grateful that he seems to have chosen to stay with me. I am also saddened by my ex friend's behaviour as I trully loved her too. I also feel like I am compromising my principals by staying with H even my mother thinks I should leave him saying he has been putting me down and mistreating me for years. Anyway our times are different so hope someone gets this. I tried to post last night and it did not work. Thanks you guys. this site has helped me enormously just by reading posts and that AA gem was great. You are probably helping others like me too timid to post but able to get help from your discussion.

G'day C&S - (I'm an American with an Aussie au pair from Canberra).<p>First, I recommend you post your story on the In Recovery forum because that may be where you'll get the most experienced help.<p>Second, if your H is sincere, he'll agree to send OW a no contact letter severing ALL contact for ever. Your former friend is no longer a friend to either of you and you both need to exorcise her from you lives.<p>Forget about the money she owes him - write it off a part of the expense of an affair. Attempts to get it back only prolong contact and hinder your recovery.<p>Continue posting and leearning. You can recover. Your H may have lapses that scare you, but if you practice patience and consistency and provide a safe harbor, you can definitely be successful in restoring your family.<p>Good luck.<p>[ January 02, 2002: Message edited by: worthatry ]</p>

Thanks Worthatry. I have tried to tell H to forget about money but he has a thing about it. Says he wants to prove to me that it was just a loan. This is probably because of the other account where he had more money than in our account. I had been working double shifts and extra shifts to help with things only to find he had all this money hidden away to use for her. I'm so sorry for your loss. How are you?