My wife and I have been together for 12 years and married for 5.5. She is now totally infatuated with another male she works with, of course she thinks it's love. They can't stay away from each other and she openly admits that. E mails, phone calls etc. I feel she's honest when she say's they have not had sex yet. But it is definitely imminent. I lost my wife by not meeting her needs, hard though when she was out of town 4-5 days a week. She has read a lot of stuff from the site. She knows what she is doing is wrong but because of the addiction she can't stop. The OM's wife is now aware of what is going on but she freaked and went away to think. Wrong response. The OM confessed and told his wife about the affair hoping his wife would throw him out. Oddly enough my wife thought by telling me I would throw her out. Wrong again. I'm not mad over what has happened but totally confused. I'm spending this weekend trying to do nothing but score love points but somehow I always sem to withdraw a few. This has been going on since mid August with me knowing about 2 weeks. How do I make up for lost time? She asked me to go to NJ this week with the kids and i said yes. Well earlier tonight after another long emotional talk i'm not sure what to do. She won't not contact other male, admits openly she feels she can't. I told her i was willing to close my business and relocate but that with other male in picture I feel I am wasting my time. She told me she wants to introduce the kids to the OM. This hurts me deeply. I have seen an e mail where he indicates he hopes my girls call him daddy. I now wonder whether or not to go. My heart tells me to keep trying and I should go. But my heart also knows that when she's at work or not with em she will be talking with OM. So now here I am 7.5 hours from home with my daughters taking a holiday to be near my wife because she asked me too. I tried to explain that if she got rid of him cold turkey that we could make things work but she says she won't stop contacting him and he is also pretty persistant. Do you experienced others feel I should go to NJ? I'n not sure how i will be able to deal with this away from home. I feel hopeless and just wasting my time. Yet if I don't go then I can't even deposit any love points and I will make another major withdrawl by hurting her. I love her and want to fix things and have been doing my best to get my point across but every time I make a small deposit by sending roses or a fruit basket he deposits truckloads of units by meeting her emotional needs of communication. As you can see my user name states how I feel. Am I on the right track? Should I go to NJ? Am I wasting my time? Is there a way I can get her to see what is going on? I not sure how much longer I can deal with this. Is this going to take months or should I push her to decide. I know the only thing holding her around right now is the kids. I have made it clear that I want the kids 50% of the time and that I will never let the girls go live 100% with them in NJ. By the way I'm from Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Please provide me some helpful insight as to where I am. Thanks.

RC,<P>I don't think you should go to NJ. I think she wants you to go so she can see om. I think if you go, you will be opening the door for her to see him and, prehaps, allow her to take the affair to the next step (if it isn't there already). By not going I don't think you are LB. Let her go if she wants (and she might, to see om), but don't go yourself. To me, your not going is staying around to protect what is yours. That hurtful crap about the om and daddy makes me question whether she has gone further than she wants you to believe (sounds like she is trying to protect her image).<P>The fact that you are willing to give up bussiness and relocate says a lot about your love for her. She probably can't see this right now, but in the future, she might. LB does not mean not giving them their way. LB is venting your anger and resentment on her. Don't let her play you like that.<P>I'm a little confused because you say you are 7.5 miles from home with your daughter to be near your wife. Does that mean you are not living together? You also mention you have not thrown her out- so I don't know if you are living together or not. I do know, however, her wanting you to go away with you children makes me beleive she wants to carry out her plans with om. You will not be hurting her by not going-not in the way you think you will. It'll probably make her angry, but it will not be hurting her. You will be showing her you love her and want the relationship. If she wants to go away, that's her decision. I think if you go your going to be playing right into her hand. I wish I could offer you more advice. <P>If you only found out two weeks ago, you have a long road ahead of you. I suggest counseling and lots of prayer. Its a long, long road, especially if she is still in the affair-which your wife clearly is. Good luck.

Thanks for responding. My wife has wanted to take the kids to NJ for a while, she says to spend more time with them. I think otherwise like to get OM approval. She is still living with me but works 5 days a week in NJ. That's why it was so easy to fall into the trap. It's like we are already separated and have been for a year or more. If I only knew then what I know now. How can a marriage survive on a part time relationship. Up until weeks ago she would have done anything for me, now? I guess I typed 7.5 miles but I meant hours. We are still together but I am not sure how much I can put up with her contacting him all the time. She say's she knows it is wrong to have an affair but doesn't seem to want to stop. It's really hard when you work together and neither really wants to stop. I am not sure how I will deal with this if I can't see an improvement. She say's she wants to think of me but the OM just keeps encroaching in. I can only see things escalating. I have been replaced emotionally by OM. She say's that she wants us to do things this weekend so that she can concentrate on me. But she has also said she will call him. She say's that if I am there in NJ with her that she will have to spend more time with me and the kids and that hopefully it will influence her in the correct direction. She say's she's undecided in what direction she should follow. She really does love the kids. She has also said if the kids weren't here she would be gone. She knows that we had good times and bad together but right now things look better with OM. i.e. soulmates, made for each other. I am happy to be still talking but I feel hopeless that it's only a matter of time. I want to tell her to get lost but I love her too much. And I really don't want my daughters to get hurt and eventually this will hurt them. With this futher information do you still think if I go NJ it will be bad idea?

RC,<P>I misunderstood your first post. If it means being near your wife (especially in the light that she has invited you), then go. I thought she wanted you to leave town so she and om could be alone in one town with you and kids in another. Frankly, I have a hard time believing she and om have not been intimate.<P>I can only offer my experince to you. Presently, I am the betrayed spouse. But fourteen years ago, I was the betrayer (we have been married 21 years). I'm not going to make any excuses for what i did-it was the worst mistake of my life and if I could take it back, I would gladly give up my life. I love my h. with all my heart and know I had to be out of my mind to do what i did. In my case, I did not love om. I did it more as a way to hurt myself-it was like I was tyring to destroy myself. So my experience may not be helpful. But, after the betrayal and confession to my h., I was in a state of limbo seeing both of them on a friendship basis (no sex-this was easy for me because I was not in love with om even thought om tried to convince me I was). My h. accepted this and I stayed living in our house. It was very hurtful to him (0f course, I was blinded by my own pain and guilt-so it was hard to see his). Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that my h. hung in there showing me that I was more important to him than anything in his life. Part of the betrayal had to do with his neclect of me. Within a month, I started to hate om and wanted nothing to do with him. I blamed him for brainwashing me against my h. and for destroying my life. I just wanted him out of my life (and to this day, he is the only person in the world that I think I could actually take a gun to and shoot). All I wanted was to spend the rest of my life making up to my h. what I had done. What made me fall back so deeply in love with my h. is the fact that he still loved me in spite of what I had done. I couldn't believe it. It was like the love of God shining through him. It was like the forgiveness for sins and all I wanted to do was spend eternity kissing the feet of my h. and giving him the love he so rightly deserved and to make up for the horrible pain that he never deserved-no matter what the state of our marriage had been-no one should have to experience that pain.<P>If you love your wife and want the marriage to work, do everything you can to show her she is the most important thing in your life. Tell her you need her. My h. told me that all he wanted was to die in my arms. That crushed me-he wrote me love letters telling me how much I meant to him, how nothing could heal his broken heart but me. I began to see what i was doing to him, to me, to us. And I wanted to stop. I don't know if any of this helps you. I would suggest you hang in there and do everything you can to let your wife know you love and want her more than anything in the world-but do not be her doormate-by this I mean don't let her play you. You have to have some rules and this is only another way of showing her you love her. FOr example, I would not allow her to introduce your kids to om. Put your foot down there. That is dishonoring and disrespectfulto you. You have to show her that you love and want her more than anything in the world but in a way that shows her you are honorable and still repect yourself. I hope this helps some.