First of all, yes, I'm a diehard Red Sox fan. But I'm also sitting here writing with a broken heart.

My wife wants a divorce. She just saw her counselor tonight and says I should leave the house. She is "checked out" of our relationship. I still love her. I am a good family man and I love my kids and my wife. I'm heartbroken.

I've been married for almost 17 years and now it appears its over. She says she hasn't been in love with me for who knows how long. Especially in the last six months we have both been emotionally withdrawn. She's working long hours and I'm doing the best I can to keep my company running.

We had dinner a few weeks ago and we took the emotional needs survey. At this time I told her something (policy of radical honesty) that I had intended to keep a secret. I now wish that I had not told her.

She approached me six months ago saying we needed counseling. I never payed much attention to it and this was a huge mistake. A month ago she told me she was 'almost checked out'. I made an effort to find marraige counselors but I think I still downplayed how she was feeling. She is not very good at telling me her true feelings all the time so I didn't pick up on her cues.

She's been seeing a counselor of her own off and on for the last 20 years to deal with her own issues. Obviously, her counselor has helped her reach this conclusion. I haven't been to therapy but now feel that I need it. I will seek it.

I did some bad things in the last few years. I cheated on her by going to strip bars but I never had intercourse. I've had about 20 or so lapdances and one time I exposed myself to get touched. I contracted herpes somewhere along the way and I gave it to her. I told her the truth about this because I wanted to rebuild our marraige and am generally a person who cannot hold lies back. I read the policy of radical honesty and I felt it would help us start to heal. But now I realize she was already withdrawn and this only cemented it for her. Now I think I pushed her over the edge and surely headed for divorce.

Now we've gone to see a counselor (once) and we're going tomorrow. I know I have to work on my issues (sexual infidelity) and I know I can follow the ideas on this site and do my part to deposit love units. However, is the bank closed?

I think I am going to move out and it is really going to hurt our family. I want to reconcile but I don't know if we can ever get the sexuality part back.

I am really sad and I feel like my life is over. Can someone out there give me some advice?

i know this may be totally not what u r looking 4, but how did you contract herpes? I did not thinkit was contracted through touch..

Also, if I am not mistaken, your wife asked you to go to marriage counceling, AND THEN you went to these strip clubs (20+ times). --in which despite when it happened,many factors are involved, including the cheating part but also the spending money on whores that could be used for the family.

If you want your marriage to last, and if your wife is still there, I highly reccomend that you:
1. allow a complete open policy with your wife:
give her all of your passwords-- and do not
change them; give her keys to anything she
doesn't have keys to, access to anything
hidden you own in general. Key point:
anything hidden you have MUST be revealed
2. call her when you will be even 10min late and
tell her where you are and the number you can
be reached at and who you are with (esp the
females) and INVITE HER if it is possible
3. do not go to strip bars or any other
establishment of the sort, including Hooters
and massage parlors.
4. Do favors for your wife--anything she needs
done, be it shopping, bill-paying,
housework..etc. Do it without asking and
without showing off (because that may annoy
her and make her angrier)
5. Bring her gifts (I place little emphasis on
this one, but no matter how much she does not
seem to appriciate it, she probably does) and
constantly affirm your love, regret and
apologies.
6. In all things, constantly reaffirm that you
are sorry (which is what all the actions I
reccomend show), that you love her, and that
you want to be with her

These are a few things I can think of that would make me (my mom, and my friends) less angry. Hopefully, they may be of some help to you. Good luck.

Red Sox Fan,
Why did you ignore what your wife was telling you about her feelings? You say because she doesn't show her true feelings. Usually, with women, this means she puts on a happy face and makes it seem BETTER than it is.
Do you think your wife exaggerates her emotions and makes things seem worse than they are? If so, I'd suggest your assumption was wrong given the current situation.

It may be taht your wife has expressed her feelings very well, but because they didn't match up with your feelings or what you wanted to hear, you dismissed them.

When I was working with Steve Harley, he told me something fascinating: People judge the health of their marriage on their own feelings about it. They judge how their spouses feel about the marraige based on how they feel.

That is one reason why a spouse is shocked when they find out their mate is filing for divorce or cheating on them. "Everything was great. We had the perfect marriage!" No, You singular had the perfect marriage. You plural had some problems to address.

Soooo. The first thing you need to do is listen to your wife. If you find yourself thinking defensively, disable those throughts. For example, change "Oh, that's just not true," to "How fascinating she sees it that way. It's so different from the way I see it." In the first thought you are moving into a competitve stance where you two could fight about who's right. The second way you've positiioned yourself for cooperation. Neither of you is wrong, so how can we turn the different views to our advantage?

EpiphOny - I hear what you're saying. I went to the clubs before she confronted me. About once a month for the last 2 1/2 years. I've answered her questions and she even wanted to go see the place. I took her there and let her go inside by herself. She is a brave and wonderful person. I feel that I want to put her on a pedastal and make her feel loved. I'm going to send her a yellow rose to her work every day as a token of my sorrow, remorse and affection. I cannot stop crying about it because aside from this dysfunction (yes, I call it a dysfunction and maybe I need help sorting all that out) I think we a wonderful team.

Maybe thinking about it more, parenting has taken all of our attention and we simply had not made the time for each other. I realize that now and I want to make it up to her.

Currently, I do most of the cooking, share in household chores, take my youngest to school everyday and pick the kids half of the time. I do it without showing off (most of the time) and I know that being around the house just to help out may be reason enough to stay separated at home.

I don't want to leave the house because I don't want to disrupt the kids routine but I know that she does not want to touch me. I understand why.

I know I won't go back to those damn clubs, I hated going anyway because of all the weird and dirty feelings it gave me. If I ever had any feelings for any of those girls, it was that of sorrow for them. I was just letting my you know what take over for the brief pleasure and thrill of it and that is just plain weak.

Greengables,

My wife was molested as a child and went through 20 years of therapy. In the last 2 years or so (conciding with my affairs) she started losing touch with me and me with her. 6 months ago, she yelled at me about it and I listened but I reassured her there was nothing wrong. There was.

I am so full of regret for what I have done. I was the one who needed the therapy as much as her. My mother is a therapist and I feel that for a man, I am fairly in touch with my feelings. I thought I could do it on my own. I failed. I need to confront the devil inside and kick him out for good.

My question at this point is whether I should leave the house or try to resolve matters under the same roof. Her therapist suggested to her that I should leave. We're discussing this with our MT tomorrow night.

I don't want to hurt the kids and I don't want my family to know. But most of all, I want to make amends with my wife.