weepy/weary....what to do, what to do?!?!?
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I have talked to both offenders and both said it was a huge mistake and are now just friends.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Gee...you really think it was a huge mistake? Maybe they do believe that, which is good as far as it goes. I'd tend to call it a conscious CHOICE that they both made, but not quite on the same level as eating ice cream while you are committed to a diet. But they still want to avoid the CONSEQUENCES of that mistake. More on that one a little later in this post.
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">This happened at work but H met OW's parents(who are his age, OW is 28)they are lovely people and unaware of A. My problem is he wants to remain her and her family's friend because he does go to that state occasionally for work.</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Uh huh. All one big happy secret, as long as YOU continue to enable their behavior. Once again, there are CONSEQUENCES to all actions and they want YOU to let them not have to face up to them.
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">All the books say NC, and our MC has also suggested the same advise, but H says he values the friendship. I have not made it an ultimatum.....should I?</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">If I may be allowed to be a bit sarcastic here....
NO Contact, not ever, for the rest of your life my HUSBAND!!!weepy/weary, you need to understand that I have been dealing with this very same attitude for the past 3 years. It may work for the WS but I'm going to tell you that
it DOES NOT work for the BS!!! More clarification a little later.
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">He would also like to see me forgive her as well as him and rekindle our friendship.(b
efore A I considered her like one of our daughters) I don't really think I can do that. What should I do???? </font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">IF she has come to you and confessed her sin, repented of her sin to God, and has sought your, and God's, forgiveness for her sin, then YES you should forgive her. This is a classic "if/then" scenario. HOWEVER, being forgiven does NOT mean that all is "forgotten." You DO NOT have to remain "friends" with her and SHOULD NOT, anymore than you should allow a drug carrying drug supplier to remain in contact with, and friends with, your formerly addicted self or spouse or child or ANYONE who is recovering.
weepy/weary - Here's the "Tough Love" part of this reconciliation. There can be NO relationship of any kind between your husband and this "sweet young thing." There is NO sharing of your husband with another woman, especially one that he had been having an adulterous affair with.
(before A I considered her like one of our daughters) You may well have and that part is sad. BUT what your husband is trying to get you to agree to is "incest is best" if he is trying to use YOUR former relationship with the vixen as a reason to stay in contact.
HOW you end affairs, or at least destablize them and begin to end them, is through EXPOSURE. If your husband can't agree to No Contact on his own and keeps trying to convince you that you should all "just be friends," then tell him in NO uncertain terms that if you find out about ANY contact with the OW by him from this day forward, then YOU will inform her parents about their affair and we'll see what THEY think about continuing a "friendship." Marriage is either "all in, or all out." The ONLY threesome allowed in a marriage is God, husband, wife.
weepy/weary - the part that so many FWS's, including my wife, don't get is that what they did was the equivalent of RAPING you against your will, in addition to several other things. Your husband's request to "forgive" and then maintain a friendship is ludicrous. Yes, given the proper remorse and repentence, you can and should forgive their sin, but you don't bring the rapist back into a "friendship mode."
Think of as if a friend of YOURS and your husband, WITH YOUR help, held your husband down, tied him to the bed against his will, then smashed both of his ankles(ala "Misery") and performed an "Elena Bobbitt" manuever on his "manhood." NOW you and the "friend" feel bad about what was done and want your husband to forgive the two of you and want him to remain friends. Emotionally, he MIGHT recover, but physically...some things have lasting consequences whether the perpetrator is forgiven or not. Would it be reasonable for your husband to reestablish a "friendship" with this person? A marriage to YOU, maybe, if he loves you enough to forgive the heinous crime AND learn to trust you again. BUT he's NOT married to the "friend." The friend goes to JAIL and is out of your lives FOREVER.
It's the PRICE that gets paid. It's the CONSEQUENCE of their action. Forgiven...yes. A "'get out jail free' card" for the consequences....about as "tasty" as the District Attorney who just let a mother off scott free who had killed one of her babies (she had 8 by at least 7 different men). NO jail time, just had to agree to a tubal ligation. After 8 pregnancies, most women might consider a tubal a "gift" not a "penalty."
Sorry if it seems a bit harsh. A lot of it is colored by my own experience over the past 3 years and some of it is just simple "non-fogbound" common sense.
In short (after an already long post, sheepish grin) .... NO Contact, not ever, for rest of his natural life.....is the minimum to be expected to "make up for" the devastation he has wrought upon you and your marriage. It's also the minimum that God expects....."forsaking ALL others," and "go, and LEAVE your life of sin."
God bless.
<small>[ February 16, 2005, 07:05 AM: Message edited by: ForeverHers ]</small>
