My wife and I have been together since high school. Nov 20th will be 9 years for us...we just got married May 24th 2002, after a long period of both of us putting it off <mainly due to financial situations>

It hasn't been the smoothest ride, but I never expected it to be. 3 times during our engagement she took time to think things through... each time there was someone else involved. It had been almost 4 years since the last such incident. Just before we got married, she started a new job. She became friends with one of the guys there... I really didn't think anything of it at first. Gradually she started getting more defensive when I asked how her day was, more secretive about what she was going to be doing, and spending an extraordinary amount of time with this guy.

I started to worry. I had been running an application of my PC for a couple years that tracked keystrokes, disk changes, and logged IM chats <had NEVER even considered reading any of hers until i saw this change in her> The application was used to monitor disk changes and registry changes made by any program that was installed so that I could make sure if it was uninstalled, it would be completely gone.

It got to a point and it felt she had drawn so very far away from me, that I did something I never thought i would do. I opened the most recent chat between herself and this guy.

Praying for innocence, and anticipating the worst.. I read it. They were flirting like mad, and she was making fun of me to him. From that point on it became a daily exercise to see if they would slip and say something that would provide me with proof of more then flirting...

In hindsight i probably should have spoken with her at this point... maybe the majority of my pain could have been avoided... Hindsight is 20/20 right?

One morning she confessed to her cousin in a chat that she had slept with this guy... I was obviously devastated.

I tried to hold it in&#8230; to move on and let her keep it to herself as she obviously wanted to do&#8230; but I couldn&#8217;t&#8230; I don&#8217;t hide emotional problems well and she could see right through me&#8230;

<Insert confrontation scene here>

The bigger problem now lies in this&#8230; she refuses to stop seeing him &#8220;As a friend&#8221;&#8230; now, I must admit, initially I made some pretty big mistakes in trying to talk to her about this&#8230; I demanded that she stop seeing him, and never talk to him again and I did become very angry&#8230;<somehow refrained from knocking this guy into next week though>

Every time we try and talk about this&#8230; it keeps coming back to him&#8230;she will not stop being friends with him because &#8220;he makes her happy&#8221; though she will not go into any other detail as to what he does to make her happy.

Since our initial conversation about it, I disabled the logging application <obviously she was a little unhappy about the invasion of privacy and such> Last night while I was at work she had this guy over to our house&#8230; and had him &#8220;look&#8221; for the application to see if it was running. From the length of time that the application was running for, it appears that he ran the application THEN showed her the task manager to prove it was still running. She immediately got angry and confronted me when I got home from work. I tried to point out that the application had been started a short period of time earlier <conveniently when he had been on the computer> but this prompted yet another argument between us&#8230; she will not hear an ill word against him, and seems to believe he is made of gold and would never do something like that.

The worst part was that we had just experienced 3 &#8220;good&#8221; days prior to this incident. She has barely spoken to me since it.

I apologize for the length post, but I guess I just needed to get this off my chest.

Please respond with comments, criticisms and the like&#8230; I need all the help I can get.

Thanks
Tim

Tim, it sounds like your wife is trying to make YOU feel guilty for "catching" her out. She also strikes me as a "cake-eater."

Your wife has betrayed you in the worst way possible. She slept with this man and it sounds as though she sees nothing wrong with it. She is in denial.

I am in a similar situation, and i don't have all the answers, but i know your marriage won't heal until OM is out of picture. And that isn't going to happen unless she makes him go.

You need to take care yourself, get your self respect back and step back and look at this situation. In my case, H always got rid of OW, but only when I confronted him with evidence. I have to give him credit for that, but in my present situation, even tho things are over between them, he still works with her, and that can't work, IMO.

For your marriage to heal, OM must go. You have every right to be angry about what she is doing and OM being at your home. While you can't resort to violence, you have every right to refuse OM in your home.

I feel your pain. YOu have done nothing wrong. She must see she has and is doing wrong and be willing to see counseling to get to what is missing in your marriage. She is not having a need met by you (not your fault) that she is seeking from these OM. See if she is willing to go and talk to somebody with you.

Good Luck, Tim.

Thank you very much for your reply, it is greatly appreciated....

I just got home from work... for the 30 mins or so I got to see her it seemed good... close to old times...she came out of no where and hugged me...it was really nice.

then she left to have breakfast at his place.

Now I am once again left to go to bed alone...

On a side note... she comes from a very stubborn lineage.. both parents <though great> are VERY stubborn, and they passed it on to her... unfortunatly something she prides herself on at times. Getting her to step back and think about what is going on has proven to be extremely difficult so far. I am afraid that telling her that he is not welcome in our house may push her even farther away.

Our relationship had always been solid... we hardly ever fought <mostly because i absolutly detest arguments and could never stand denying her>...I guess that was my Giver in full force.
In the last month <wow... an entire month has passed already D-Day was Oct 15 <img border="0" alt="[Teary]" title="" src="graemlins/teary.gif" /> > we have fought more then in our entire relationship, and i fear that suggesting counselling may just spark another fight.

I guess it is time for me to stand back up... but she means everything to me I asked her to marry me 3 months after we started dating, I was 100% sure even then.

God my head hurts! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Confused]" src="images/icons/confused.gif" />

Time for sleep...

G'night
Tim

My friend this is ridiculous. She is mad at you because you caught her having sex with her lover and she tells you she will not give him up? She brings him to your home while you are working to check out the computer and leaves you in the morning to be with him for breakfast?
She is what they call a cakewoman who is humiliating and disrespecting you. She has the best of both worlds. A lover who pleases her and a husband who is willing to accept everything she does. My advise would to inform her she needs to leave if she continues to engage in this relationship. Seek professional counseling but if she refuses then seek out an attorney.
My guess it that she thinks you will accept everything. If she realizes that you will not tolerate a marriage where she has sex with another man and puts your health at risk; then maybe she will come to her senses. The bottom line is that she no longer respects you or your marriage. There is an old saying which states:
"No consequences to her behavior = equals no motivation to change". It sounds like you are enabling her to lead a single life while being married to her. There no reason for you to allow her to emotionally abuse you this way and to treat you like a doormat. You need to open your eyes.

Hi there,
So sorry to hear of your situation <img border="0" title="" alt="[Frown]" src="images/icons/frown.gif" /> , but glad you found this site <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" /> .

You and your wife are still living in the same house...and she is more-or-less "dating" and leading a single life...that is very disrespectful on her part.

I am a firm believer in "no contact." Sometimes easier said than done!!! But continued contact with the cause of the problem, is only asking for more trouble. She needs to show the willingness to work on the problem, just as you are willing to...one person alone cannot fix it.

From your history with your wife it appears that she was unfaithful a number of times during her engagement to you. Yet you went ahead and married her. It should come as no surprise to you that she continues this pattern of deceit. The problem, as you already found out, is that she does not see anything wrong with her cheating on you. In fact I believe that your wife would cheat regardless of who she was married to. Unless you want to accept your wife's lifestyle in which she has a lover there is nothing you will be able to do to make her change. She has made that clear to you. If your intention is to stay married to this woman you should accept the strong possibility that you will be continually on an emotional rollercoaster which will affect your mental and physical health. Personally, my advice is to get away from this woman and move on.

Update:

Thought i would stop by with an update....today is our 9 year anniversary, and she called me at 3am from work to wish me a happy anniversary! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" /> <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" /> <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" /> <img border="0" title="" alt="[Big Grin]" src="images/icons/grin.gif" />

Am still working on plan A, have had one or two LB slips... but am trying my hardest.

Cheers and God Bless
Tim