Hi all,<P>I’ve been married for 6 months and been here for (more or less) 5 months so I’d like to write the chronology of my young marriage and how did I get here.<P>H & I married on Feb 99. Before married, H has been in touch with an internet friend, which was a girl. After married, I found that H been very secretive about this girl. It did not take too long for me to discover that they were more than just a friend and that H had been seeing her behind my back.<P>I put a stop to it. I made him write her a good bye e-mail otherwise I’ll be seriously thinking of separation. We’ve been married only for a month after 9 years dating by then, therefore his capability of doing things like that was really freaking me out<P>The road of discovery was very hard for me. We should be in our honeymoon period still when the most difficult problem should be was tv channel or dirty laundry but yet I was haunted by H infidelity in a very early weeks of marriage in every single possible way. There were many times I thought about divorce seriously. This was not because he couldn’t get him self out of the affair but because I felt that I was unable to move on. The pain and the curiosity kept on lingering in me. I have always felt that there were some unfinished business left. Our sex life went bad as well. He seemed to lose interest in me.<P>We had terrible fight as well roughly a month a go when he threatened to hit me. I think that was really the turn around point of our marriage because his capability of wanting to hurt me physically was also surprising to him. He had never lay his hand on me or anybody, NEVER EVER, during our 9 years dating period. Hence, he realized that he really needs to do something before he ruin our marriage. I was really loosing my hope at that time.<P>Anyhow, things are better now. He learned to be more affectionate to me. And I learned how to convey what I want in a positive manner. And I gladly see that we reciprocate positively towards each other lately. Our sex life is doing so much better now. And so does our communication skill. But we still have a lot to learn. I just wish that there are many post in the ‘pre-marriage and early years’ section so that I could also learn from other newly weds. Or maybe any newly wed couple shouldn’t be in this mess as early as us?<P>Anybody think that this is normal for a newly wed couple?<BR><p>[This message has been edited by Saskia (edited August 30, 1999).]

Hi Saskia<P>I'm so glad you and your H are doing better. Something you said about the pain and curiosity of his internet relationship made me want to ask you to read my post, the one called "going insane" -- I would like to know how you dealt with this, if you can take time to read it I would really appreciate it.<P>Thanks,<P>Cristalle

Saskia...so happy to hear from you! Glad you are doing better.<P>It is hard to be a newly wed. Personally I wouldn't be under 30 or married less than about 7 years. Hopefully I will get my wishes. There are so many issues, large and small that you need to iron out, although with your long history, one would think many may have been dealt with.<P>So how has your H recently learned all the new skills he has? He just woke up? Or has he been to counseling, reading or just listening to you? <P>Although I could never bring myself to say that I am happy the affair happened, I do feel my H and I made the most of the recovery by learning new skills and truly recommiting to a relationship that would be better than ever...and so far it is. But I also know that the affair has left a few scars. Don't know if it is easier to accept them with 17 years of marriage or if it is easier in your case with little married history.<P>I've been wondering how you are, thank you for updating.<P>------------------<BR>Faith, Hope, Love Remain,<BR>but the greatest of these is Love.<BR>1 Corinthians 13:13

Hi Cristalle,<P>I will look to your thread soon. Hope I could give you some insight on that. I sometimes feel discourage in giving people advise because of my lack of experience of marriage. I am afraid that I will give them wbad advises, so I'd rather share my experience and the way I see things in life.<P>FHL,<P>Thanks for thinking about me. H is better now. Last accident (when he threatened to hit me) most probably was the wake up call for him of hiw own capability. He said that he did not know what gets him into that. He realised that he really mean to hit me and that scared him too.<P>From my side, I developed my own self protection. I showed him that his thread wouldn't intimidate me and he should learned to control his temper and to have a pleasant discussion.<P>We have another session of discussion last night about family. SIL asked him to go with her for a pilgrim trip and said that she would pay all his expenses. SIL did not ask me, which was fine. I felt uneasy because I don't want us owing her too much. She is known for trying to control her sibling's life and I don't want her to control us. So I told him since this would be a pilgrim journey and he wanted to go, it is fine by me. But I told him that I hope he wouldn't be that easy in accepting any expensive give from his sister next time.<P>We had a heated discussion afterwards but I tried to do my best to keep my self pleasant. I kept on telling him not to make any disrespectful judgement (he called me paranoid and negative thinker) and to keep the discussion on the line. He told me that he accepted it because it was a pilgrim journey and not a vacation. But if she offered him a vacation with her and did not offer me, he sure will object it. He critized the way I build walls around me from those who wants to be kind to us and he told me that I shouldn't feel that I should owe anybody that give us something out of kindness and sincerity (this is where the paranoid judgement came from). So I told him that I am not building walls around me, I just want to make sure that things that we received wouldn't be over expensive.<P>Anyway, I feel contented with my self that I was able to do my part of discussion pleasant and did not let my self making disrespectful judgement towards him. I corrected him here and there of the way he chosed words that things could have been said nicer and I think he got what I mean. So we are still learning in this part...<P>Sorry for being long winded and thanks for listening...

Saskia,<P>I haven't been lurking around this site for awhile, (I've been doing other things and my W & I are doing better these days) but I did want to tell you that you're not alone in your situation.<P>My W & I just got married in Jan of this year (in fact it'll be our 8th month anniversary day after tomorrow) and she had an affair on me from mid March to mid April with a co-worker of hers. We also had dated/known each other for many years before we got married (known each other 10 years, dated 8 years, lived together 2+ years).<P>Yes you're right that newlyweds SHOULDN'T be having to deal with "affairs", but unfortunately it DOES happen. It just seems like you've been cheated out of having at least the first YEAR or so with like you mentioned "only minor problems". I know right at discovery I was like "How the hell could you do this just 7 weeks after saying I DO?!?!? Hell, we don't even have our wedding pictures back yet!!!"<P>But since then I've come to see that it can really happen to anybody at anytime if the conditions are right.<P>I hope you & your H can work through it all and weather the storm. In time, with hard work and perserverance we all can have the relationships we want. It just doesn't come easy or free.<P>Later,<P>Knifed<P><BR>

Knifed,<P>Thank you very much, your letter means so much to me. For the last 5 months I've been struggling with the thought whether I had married the right man. I guess the issue now is that we have to make it right, right?<P>Things were never make any sense to me. He was the one who proposed me, I was the one who hesitated and think that we were too young (we both are 25) and yet he still wanted to have sort of internet flings. That was really one big question for me. From their chat-save, I could see that he used this OW as a dumping place, for him to let out his stress while I was busy dealing with mine. Y'know, going to the altar could be very stressful and trying to meet everybody's expectation was even more. Nevertheless, we had so much problem with his family in the beginning so at the end of the rope, upon discovery, I kept on thinking on how could he do that to me. How could he used time he suppose to use for us with her instead of me. How dare he do that after all we've been through just to get married. You are so right about the picture things, in my case, we have not even have times to wear clothes we bought in our honeymoon trips. <P><BR>Anyhow, I am 'glad' that I am not alone. And you are right that now it is up to us on how we want to re-build our marriage.<P>Good luck to you too...

Saskia,<P>You are not alone. It happened to me too, no honeymoon phase of marriage here. You know, when I tell people what happened it's amazing how many stories you hear of people they know that went through the same thing. It's more common then people realize. You take care.