During the last couple of years, even before the affair, I was becoming increasingly concerned about my H's apparent memory loss. He has forgotten so many events and things that people have said to him - and often these are things that it would be to his advantage to remember. He has been known to watch a tv show that he taped, and then watch it again a few weeks later, adamantly insisting that he had never seen it. Tonight he sent me an email, saying that he had paid half of each college tuition bill - last week we agreed that I would pay one, and he the other. It is a good thing I haven't paid yet. It looks like he forgot that our daughter was going to pay some, and he actually paid too much, unless he had a sudden burst of generosity. Last week he asked when one daughter was coming home - and it appeared from something he said in the email that he may have forgotten when that was. I know that depression can cause memory loss, as can stress, but his seems excessive. Sometimes I wonder if he could have early Alzheimers - but he seems to be fully functional at work.<P>Our daughter's computer broke, while she is in the middle of writing several long papers. I emailed him about it, and mentioned that I would have to bring her out one of mine - he emailed back that she should go to the computer lab and type them there - not only is that very difficult at the end of the semester, but the old H would have been driving the computer out to her himself. He was always so willing to go out of his way to help out his kids - and this is not the daughter who isn't speaking to him.

It's perfectly possible that your H has early Alzheimer's. It's not too common, but it happens. Also, it could just be (much more likely IMHO) that he's in emotional/mental "shutdown" where his family is concerned, that he's putting his family out of mind as much as possible in order to minimize any negative feelings he may have (guilt, anger, fear, etc.)...<P>Betrayers often escape into a fantasy world to help escape/ignore what really troubles them in reality. Sometimes they become so secure in this fantasy world they start "forgetting" reality... Sad, but true...<P>------------------<BR>~~ Elixir ~~<P>

Elixir,<BR>He has certainly shut out the family. He was severely depressed even before the affair - it is obvious in retrospect. For a couple of years I was bothered by how much everything seemed to be divided into "him" and "the rest of the family". The older children complained that he had no clue what was going on in their lives. He came home and watched tv or spent hours upon hours playing computer stategy games.<P>I worry about the Alzheimer's because his grandmother wasn't all that old when she started suffering symptoms, though she was a whole lot older than he is.