Stan -
1. Where can I get a hold of your email?
I think the one J posted is not working. This is where she can reach me help@saveyourmarriagecentral.com I would also strongly suggest she register at the SYMC board and then email me for access to the Reclamation Board which is a private board for people who are ending or would like to end an affair. There's a lot of discussion about how to handle w/d and the subsequent rebuilding of the marriage. I post there as well so she could find me there too.


2. Is there hope? My feeling is that we are going to make it, but who knows, at this point I trust no one.

Oh yes! Of course there is hope.

3. Should I keep saying that I love her? At this point I am overflowing with love for her and cannot keep my hands of her------- it is hard! However, I manage to keep a distance so I don’t annoy her with excessive attention.

If she likes it, yes. If it annoys her, no. Ask her how she feels about it.


C

Barbie -

Cerri, Ifeel funny calling you that..

LOL - I still have clients who mix up my names once in a while. And in fact, last week I posted something on my board and signed with a C - - J and a few others had fun with that.

in your opinion, Is it possible to have a good marriage with OC involved...And possible OW involved as well! How can we work this out to where OC can be involved in H life without OW involved.

Yes of course. But you, as a couple, need to set and maintain what the boundaries will be. First, you set up child support through the county, you don't pay her directly. You set up a visitation schedule through the county as well, and you or a neutral third party do the exchange. Yes, she will yell and scream and raise a huge fuss - get a lawyer if you have to - YOU are the ones who need to maintain the boundaries - she will not respect them on her own.

This OW is very visious..She is determined to destroy our marriage and she will go to any lengths to do it...She refuses to go thru a third party or even a lawyer! She says if she needs something she will call the H and no-one else!

She can call all she wants, the only one who makes the decision of whether or not to talk to her is your husband himself. This is what I mean about maintaining your own boundaries. You decide what is acceptable and you don't allow anything other than that.

My H is still comitted to working on our M, but this is all a agame to her! Any insight you can give will be greatly apreciated! thanks

She'll go as far as you let her. That's been the case all along. Boundaries are a relationship with yourself, what you are willing to accept or do. If you expect them to be maintained by the benevolent respect of others you will fail. The only way your boundaries remain intact is when YOU enforce them.

C

Stan -
What do you all think about the James Bond act?
Snooping is great if you're trying to find out about an affair. It's also fine if you agree to keep those precautions in place during the early days of recovery. The operative word there is agree. Accountability comes in all kinds of forms - but once the affair ends and you are working on healing the marriage you need to work on living by the POJA.

About trust. She's proven to be untrustworthy and will need to re earn your trust. But at the same time it doesn't help if you are doing things behind her back. Why not have a grown up conversation about your fears and ask what her thoughts are on how you could feel more at ease?

C

SS -
What I want to know, is:

Why didn't I hear about a bonfire this summer, and what effect do bonfires have on marriages?


Can you believe that even with it being one of the chilliest summers on record we did very little bonfiring? How sad! Some of that was being gone 3x. Twice with hubby when he travelled and then again for the Smart Marriages Conference in July. I'm hoping to do something fun this fall- bonfire and hayride maybe. Coming this time?

Effect of bonfires on marriage huh? Depends on whether one has tied one's spouse to a stake in the middle of the bonfire pit or is instead sharing a wine cooler and a s'more. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="images/icons/wink.gif" /> Outside the pit, of course. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Razz]" src="images/icons/tongue.gif" />

Hope you and yours are well.

Hubby and I are doing very well. We're in the process of trying to sell our house so we can move to the other side of the city - so if I haven't been buried with Marriage Fidelity Day or site remodel stuff I've had my head in a paint can! But we are really good - someplace I never imagined being. Have to say I like it a lot better than the other!

Kids are back in school - two of them in football this year. And of course there is always the never ending parade of trips to the orthodontist. Sheesh - who knew those long awaited teeth would be so troublesome! We're down to "only" three at home. My 19yo graduated last year and is living and working with his dad. I get a real warm fuzzy out of thinking of them together ....... they deserve to enjoy the annoying habits of the other. lol

Hope all is well with you - life has been busy in your corner of the world as well. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

Hugs -
C

Cerri,

Thank you for posting that link. I read the entire thing and I think I understand.
I know W is not in a happy place. That I know for sure. Even in plan B, wife has called me 3 times and left messages since it started at the end of July. What I personally gathered from reading that interview, is I need to do something to show W how important this is to me, not talk, but show.
Strangly enough, while reading, I was brought back to thinking about something W said when we were in our first false recovery. When I found out about the affair, I hired a P.I. to find out everything I could about him and possible family he had, etc. W found out about it before the false recovery. At that time, she wasn't upset about it, and I thought she would be.
Later she told me that when she found out, she felt that it was the single most important act of love she had ever seen from me. She saw it as me still caring enough about her that I would check into this guy. I would have to say that hearing her say this was surreal. It just doesn't seem to fit into a sane conversation. Of course I didn't say anything like that to her though. I just took what she had to say about it and left it at that.

My latest struggle has been about writing OMs parents/family a letter detailing the facts of what has really been going on. including sources to verify the truth with evidence. I know W and OM have not told them the real story. It was a screwup in exposure that I didn't do. Everyone else knows the truth, except them. Well, OM probably doesn't know the truth either. But it would definitely "trickle down" to him if I did this. The only problem being, doing it would be BIG bomb. Nuclear sized. Either it will drive her home, or drive her to stay where she is at.
This is a tough thing to do. I'm not even sure it is the right thing for me to do, but I'm running out of options quickly.

Once again, thanks for listening. Your advice here is absolutely fantastic. I am learning quite a bit that I hadn't previously thought about, even from advice you are giving others.

<small>[ September 10, 2004, 08:42 PM: Message edited by: TTSi ]</small>

TTSi - as in TryingToSaveit? Sorry - I have a thing for word games and am always intrigued by acronyms....

Yeah, exposure will be a big bomb. I think that would be a GOOD thing. When you do something that rocks the affair boat and you get a reaction that looks like a mushroom cloud then you know you've done something that seriously threatens the affair/addiction. I tell clients all the time - make a list of the top 5 people your spouse would be the most furious if you told - and then tell them. These are the ones that matter to him/her and who will put the most pressure on the lifeblood of the affair.

Sure - it might be the final nail in the coffin. I doubt it. The way I see it the final nail is really a series of little staples that get added one at a time through choosing the familiar comfortable "be nice" path over the rock the boat and take a stand for your marriage path.

OTOH - at this point, what have you got to lose?

I'd write the letter or even call them. A letter is better though - they have it in front of them to refer to later - can't mis-remember exactly what was said about the details. I'd also tend to reccomend having absolutely no contact with her whatsoever - after making sure she knows that you would welcome her back with open arms once the affair ends - but without knowing all the ins and outs that's not a definative statement. I'd want to chat about all the angles first.But exposure? Oh yeah - definitely need to do that.

I'm so sorry - for some reason your story touches my heart - maybe she reminds me of myself - I dunno. But I wish you all the best.

C

I bow down to your superior intellect! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />
To decipher that Acronym without any real clues is impressive <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

I wish my story didn't have to touch you. Because I wish it wasn't my story.
But then again, I have to play the hand that has been dealt me. Believe it or not, because of all this I have had to re-evaluate myself all over. The positives (if you can really say there are any) for me have been to be able to connect with my in-laws (can you imagine) and my own family in ways that I could not before. I'm glad I have them behind me and have their support. I don't think I would have made it this far without it.
So far, regardless of her calls, I have not had any contact with her since she recieved my Plan B letter.
I did send her a birthday card, as it is the middle of this month. SH and I talked about it and we both agreed ignoring her birthday would do more harm than good at this point.
I have to initiate contact with her soon though. In my mind, she had to come home before the baby is born I think. If not, I don't know if I could go forward with any type of reconciliation. The problem is, she doesn't know that. So I have to let her know my feelings on it. It's not an ultimatum, (those don't work on her, she gets very stubborn) but it is unfair I believe for her not to know. SH suggested that I break the plan in this instance to get it out.

I'm curious, what is it about her or our story that you've read that reminds you of things?
Oh, and if you'd like to read the whole ordeal, my threads linked in my sig. It would catch you up to everything that has happened.

TTSi - it's my one talent - word games. My family won't play things like boggle or tribond with me any more. For years, first with my mom and then with my kids, we played a couple of license plate games - making stuff out of the letters. Hubby thinks I'm insane so I don't do it any more.

When I left my xh life was not all that great. I told everyone it was, and that I was happy and doing what I wanted to do. In reality it was horror upon horror. A couple of times I called my not yet xh to come home but I was too caught up in my pride and my addiction to follow through. It feels very much as if your wife might be doing the same.

How about asking her out to coffee one morning and directly posing those sorts of questions? Don't wait for her to bring it up - ask.

C

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by cerri:
<strong> How about asking her out to coffee one morning and directly posing those sorts of questions? Don't wait for her to bring it up - ask.
</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Unfortunately, I am currently living in another state (TX). We had plans to move here together. But she backed out at the last minute. So I had to come here, considering I had my new job waiting here for me, and none back where we were. My family all lives here. This was all during one of our false recoveries.... She still says she's coming, but will have to wait until after the baby is born. (I don't know if I'll be able to do that)
Once OMs parents get the letter I'm going to write, I don't think she'll be able to stay there whether she wants to or not. The letter is really going to blow the lid off of everything they believe to be the truth... Maybe I can convince you to review the letter for me after I am finished with it. (should be either tonight or tommorow.)

Oh, one other thing. I do think your advice about asking her to coffee to meet would have normally been excellent advice.
It is exactly what I did when she was screaming for divorce. I spilled my guts to her during that meeting. Not begging or pleading by any means, but just a "I know what has gone on and I would still like you to come home." Type of conversations.
We met the next day for lunch and ended up tearing up the divorce papers. We then started our first false recovery. Looking back, I should have made it a condition for her to leave the affair before I went any further with her, but I screwed up and instead allowed my excitement over the turnaround blind me.

Send me your letter (penny.tupy@symcinc.com) or post it at the SYMC board to my attention and I'll be happy to look at it.

So she lives in what state? (uhmmmm.... that would be geographically and not, say, the state of confusion....)

Before you send the letter to his parents let's talk about an overall strategy. The exposure is essential but I think there are complementary steps you could be taking. I also think there's some Village support that we might be able to put to work.

Just to let you know what my schedule looks like the rest of the week - I am in and out of my office all day today. Tomorrow is Marriage Fidelity Day, I have a couple of interviews scheduled and then I'm out for the afternoon. Thursday and in and out and will be checking email and Friday I'm out most of the day.


C

<small>[ September 14, 2004, 07:59 AM: Message edited by: cerri ]</small>

<img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />
Thank you.
She is still in NV.
I will email you the letter when it's finished.
It going to detail everything, so you'll also get a good understanding of where things have been, and where they are.
I'm not going to send it right away. I'm going to try to get as much feedback as I can before doing it. I'm also going to try to arange for someone to personally deliver the letter to them. Just to make sure they get it.