I had suspected it for a while, but when confronted, my husband made me feel so guilty for the accusations. I felt paranoid. I found out in July 2002, on my birthday no less, it's been just over 7 months now and the pain is still so new. He can't understand why I'm not "over" this yet. I've explained to him many times what it going to take for me to heal from this...I need, no let me rephrase that...I REQUIRE unconditional affection and attention from him. He says that the things I'm asking from him make him uncomfortable because it's so "out of character" for him. However, in the first few days following "the News" of his affair, he was exactly the man that I need him to be. It was those actions that made me think that I could actually make it through all of this. But, now there is no sign of that man anywhere. How can I get him to see that he IS capable of what I need, and that it wasn't out of character for him in the beginning, when I needed it. I've even written him letters telling him In detail what I need from him. Holding me, intimate conversation, touching my face, rubbing my hair, etc.. We even took the ENQ and I was very candid about what I wanted. Yet when I asked him what he thinks it will take to help me, he doesn't have a clue...HELP ME....What should I do?...Any advice or comments will be SO greatly appreciated.

Lori, have you and your H been to IC and MC? Had the A stopped before you found out? How did you find out? Are you sure it's stopped? Has he told you why he had the A? It's really important to understand the A and learn the messages of the A, without doing that, it's impossible to fully recover. You also need to get empathy from him for what he's done and put you through. Is he remorseful, feel guilty, show empathy for you and what he's put you through?

Have you read Surving An Affair, Infidelity or Torn Asunder, has you H? They are all very good books. Good for both BS and WS.

My FWH and I have been in a very good recovery for almost 4 months now, so if you have any specific questions, ask away.

Hang in there!

Hi,

I am him, in that I felt the same way. Actaully it is a skill he will have to learn. He like me probably grew up in a household that did not have touch and such. So he will have to learn those skills and after awhile he will actually enjoy it. When i started it felt fake but after a few weeks it become easier and i enjoy doing it. Sorry to sa my wife on the otherhand wants no part of me but that is beside the point. I quess after 6 years of no emotional giving on my part she still feels that i am acting and not sincere. Hopefully she wll come around if not then at least i have learned some good skills and are a better person for it.

Good Luck

tell him from me that if he does not learn good marriage skills he will be doomed to being alone. Wake up and smell th coffee

Lori&Ron,

Forevertogether askss some important questions and gave you good advice. Try reading those books, they helped me to at least understand things better.

I am sort of in your husband's shoes, except that my H was not and is not nearly as forgiving as you. I've been willing to do almost anything to make this up to my H, but he'll have none of it. He still seems hell-bent on punishing me.

This is a bit of a thread-jack, but I have a question for you: Have you cut off any and all female friendships since your female best friend betrayed you? (My H refuses to be friends with any men ever again, and now has 2 females for best friends, grrr...)

Jen

The reality is, it frequently takes two years or longer to get over an affair. He can complain about that all he wants, but it will not change reality. I am really concerned that he doesn't seem to understand your needs even after you have told him and written it down. It sounds like either his attention is elsewhere (Work? Another (or the same) affair?) or he feels like he is incapable of giving you what you need. Men are really emotionally more fragile than we would like you to believe, so encouragement from you is likely to be MUCH more effective than demands "I REQUIRE..." or criticism. Do everything you can to combat his feelings of hopelessness.

I really also liked working through Torn Asunder together as an aid to recovery.

Since this is your first post, even though you found out months ago, I think my standard reply to new people on this forum might be helpful, if you haven't already seen it:

-------------------

You can recover. Many people have. It isn't easy, and not everyone succeeds, but as long as you are both working on it, your chances are close to 100%, providing you do three things:

1.) Learn. Read everything in the Basic Concepts section of this site. Next, read all the Q&A's on infidelity on this site. They are found at How to Survive Infidelity Then buy and read “Surviving an Affair”, by Willard Harley, (hereinafter referred to as “SAA”) available at the Bookstore. SAA is THE best book on the market for helping one get to the root of “the message of the affair” (BUT YOU HAVE TO DO THE QUESTIONAIRES!). It (along with the Basic Concepts section of this site) is also helpful for giving you a vision of what a great marriage should look like. The approach of SAA to this problem is that the best defense against affairs is to have a great marriage. My wife said we had a good marriage, but she still had an affair. She was kidding herself, but it was not until we read SAA and saw what a great marriage should look like that we could clearly identify the problem areas and had the tools necessary to fix them.

The phrase “the message of the affair” is from the book “Torn Asunder”, by Carder (hereinafter referred to as “TA”). I personally think this is the best book on affair recovery we have read. In particular it deals with the two different paths the recovery of the betrayed spouse (BS) and the wayward spouse (WS) need to take, and deals w/ remorse in a way that I prefer to SAA. Read it together, if your spouse is willing. If not, go through it yourself. If you or your spouse has issues with control, you might also want to read “The State of Affairs”, (SOA) by Todd Mulliken, which also treats the remorse issue similarly to TA. SOA also deals with "the vision thing" for marriage, which is neglected in SAA.

2.) See a marriage counselor. This is hard. You need help. These boards are populated by amateurs. MC’s are professionals. There is a difference. They can help deal with issues the books don’t cover, and customize things to your individual situation. That said, there are lots of bad MC’s in the world. Read, and take to heart, How To Find A Good Marriage Counselor. You do not want an MC that is going to teach you how to live with an awful spouse, or how to adjust to divorce. Too many of them do, as is documented here: Hazardous Counseling. Reading that link may scare you off counseling, but it should give you some good ideas to ask a potential MC before you start w/ them, so you can avoid those that give you the wrong answers. You need one that is committed to helping couples have great marriages, and knows how to do that.

You are on an emotional rollercoaster right now, and there will be times that you will think it would be best to just divorce your spouse and go on with your life. Though there are no guarantees, recovery IS possible, but it takes time and effort. You will hate yourself if you don't do everything you can to make that happen. Give yourself the time you need.

3.) I understand that you may not be a person of faith, but for me, getting my spiritual life in order was crucial. As I said, this is hard. I knew I would need all the help I could get. Repenting of the habitual sins in my life let me stop pushing God away so I could hold on for dear life. I had to humble myself and ask Him what I had done wrong, and what I could do to be the husband He wanted me to be for his child, my wife. This was not about blaming myself. It was about doing what I could to do my part in having a great marriage. My wife could participate or not, but I had to know I had done everything I could do. It also helped me to let go of thinking about what SHE needed to do, since I couldn't control her, anyway.

You might also want to read through: WAT's Quick Start Guidelines for Betrayed Spouses, but keep in mind that these are the writings of amateurs. Get the books, read the articles, and see a GOOD counselor - you need the best help you can get.

My sincerest thanks to those who've answered my post. You raised some very good points and interesting questions. To answer some of them, I think I need to be a bit more specific about the details of my husband's A. First, let me begin by saying that not only do I KNOW his A is over, but I also believe he knows that ANY suspicious behavior on his part would certainly lead to divorce. Once I found out about it, ANY & ALL communication with my former friend was INSTANTLY broken off, both by my H and by myself. The hardest part of it all is that not only did this crush me, but it did our daughters as well. Our girls and my former friends' daughters were best friends. It was hard for mine to understand why they couldn't ever see or speak to them again. Because they had no idea about the A. And I've kept it that way, I don't see any reason for them to loose total respect for thier father, and also I'm afraid that them knowing might in some way plant some some sort of idea in them sub-conciously that when it comes time for them to marry, that they need the same kind of man as their father. I want soo much more for them. I NEVER want my children to experience this kind of pain.
Thirdly, we haven't seen a MC yet, though plans are underway to be seen asap. We've read much of the books and columns that all of you suggested. (Not all, but, many)
I just am still having the hardest of times dealing and coping, especially when I see my H go on about his daily routine appearing to be unaffected by any of this. He says, that he thinks about what he's done to me all the time. I told him 2 days ago, that to look at him, one would never know that anything at all had happened between us. He seems completely "Over" this. Sometimes I think that's what I find to be the most frustrating, the fact that he never mentions what he's done, and when I do, it upsets him, to the point that he almost gets mad at me for bringing it up again. His attitude becomes one of "Not Again!!"...That isn't to say that he is smug about everything, because he isn't at all. He's just emotionally barren unless I force him to communicate on an emotional level.
I'm hopful though, that things will begin to change for us. I pray everyday that his eyes will be opened and he will somehow see what it is that I so desperately need from him to be able to cope with recovery. I do know this much, if things continue on their current course, I'm not sure how much more I can take.
Any suggestions?

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial"> if things continue on their current course, I'm not sure how much more I can take </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">What things in particular? If it is the "seemingly unaffected by what he has done" thing - How can you tell? And, how do you expect him to act? Remorseful and repentant all the time? Look, if he is doing stuff to "make it up to you", does he just go back to the way things were once the debt has been paid? I think you need to be working on "having a good marriage" more than you need to be working on "affair recovery". For one thing, the first will help the second. Our MC suggested we limit talk about the affair to 1 or 1-1/2 hours per week. That was really hard for me at first. Now we talk about it much less than that.

The other question I have is: "Do you both know why he had an affair?" (Note I am not suggesting the reason is an excuse. There is no excuse.) If you don't know why, it is hard to deal with the fallout in a way that will restore trust (though using the POJA all the time will go a long way in that direction, no matter the reason, or whether or not it is known). To prevent a recurrance, it really helps to know the causes.