Hi all,<P>We have had major changes regarding OW and OC and I want/need to post but I am afraid of starting another flame war. If I get attacked please just ignore the attacks.<P>Most of you probably already know that I have been pretty open about contact with OC even though that means contact with OW. well, we finally called it quits with visitation. Every month I would check my husband's cell phone bill and every month there were many many calls to the OW. That was distinctly against the agreement we made in marriage counseling of no private conversations between the two of them. All calls were to be three-way calls including me. Every time we get a phone bill with 20 or 30 calls to the OW I would obviously be very very upset-- To the point of considering divorce.<P>Every month the OW would become more and more hysterical as we got closer and closer to visitation. She would call my husband with hysterical, unreasonable and threats such as "leave your wife at the hotel when you pick up the baby." She was also verbally abusive toward him and very, very manipulative. My husband knew that there was no way that I was going to consent to him seeing the OW without my being there--not even for five minutes.<P>You know what? I don't feel guilty about this decision and neither does my husband. We did not choose to discontinue seeing the OC; her mother forced that decision upon us by her unreasonable behavior. It became clear that her intent was to destroy our marriage and it became clear that it was visitation or our marriage.<P>My H finally seems to be out of his fog and sees the OW as she really is -- -- dysfunctional, codependent, manipulative, and in need of help. He was carrying around a massive load of guilt over "ruining her life." I told him over and over again that it took two of them to destroy their lives. She is completely responsible for the mess her life, and he is completely responsible for the mess he has made up our lives. The first thing you need to do in recovery is figure out what you are and aren't responsible for. She entered into and stayed in a seven-year affair of her own free will. Granted, it shattered her life, but it was still her choice. He did not "get" her pregnant; they did that together. Now he feels free of guilt towards her.<P>I hope that in a couple of years she will have pulled her life together and we can resume visitation.<P>Mrs. Job<p>[This message has been edited by Mrs. Job (edited May 07, 2001).]

Mrs J,<BR>I hope you don't get crashers too. You don't need to be attacked for this. <P>You are doing the right thing by protecting your marriage. Thank goodness your H has come out of his fog! I hope as you do (since you are POJAing it as a couple), that if your H's OC has no father figure, that your H will someday be able to be so without the irrational destructive hysterics from the XOW.<P>Best wishes and keep posting <BR>J

Mrs. Job-<P>I am not a crasher, so please don't take this post in any other way than in the helpful way it is intended.<P>If you are really serious about having contact with the OC without having to deal with the OW you can try mediation(some states have cort ordered mediation). It is a process where you get together with OW and neurtral mediator to try to work out a mutually acceptable agreement. It might be the right forum for you and H to get the OW to understand that the realtionship is over and that your only concern is for OC. You might also want to consider joint legal and/or joint physical custody. The OW in our life is also very unreasonable about visitation and wants to be present, but we made it clear to her that it was not acceptable and that we would and were capable of going to great lengths in order to make sure that we would be a part of OC life(I am an attorney so that makes it a little easier to do)<P>I know it sounds like alot but if you want to be a part of OC life than those are some avenues you might want to consider. <P>Please try to remeber the person that really suffers is OC.

Mrs Job...how did you handle the calls? Not in anger? Did H tell you she was calling?<P>I heard message from ow on H's business phone a week and a half ago. At first I spazzed. Then H lied first saying he hadn't talked to her when he's had communication w/her all along!(even if it was angry communication! he shouldn't have talked!)<P>Just curious. It was the beginning of the end for me.<P>Debi<P>------------------<BR>Imagine....

Mrs. JOb, good for you and H. I think it is not easy dealing with all this, and Marriage needs to come first. I am glad your marriage is coming first for you and H.

Gem,<P>You wrote:<BR>> Mrs Job...how did you handle the calls? Not in anger? Did <BR>> H tell you she was calling?<P>I did not do the best job of it. I was angry, but moderately angry. No screeching (I think). No, my husband did not tell me that the phone calls were going on. In fact, he lied about them. He felt that his only solution was to keep her calm. Each time I read a phone bill, I made a list of all phone calls, date and time and we took the list to the marriage counselor. I told my husband that the phone calls were destroying the any remaining trust and love that I had for him and they could become grounds for my leaving this marriage.<P>Hurt Mom,<P>I am not offended by your comments and do not think you a crasher. I thought you offered good advice, but something that is not right for us just now.<P>I am one of the few on this board who might agree with you that the OC is hurt by no contact. I have a niece who is 12 years old. Her father divorced my sister when my niece was 6 months old. Although he has lived only 10 miles away, he has never once seen his daughter (although he pays his child support. When my sister tells you she will put your a** in jail, you believe her. . My niece truly does believe that it must be something she did and her self-esteem has suffered. She feels guilty and ashamed that he doesn't want to see her. From the time she was 3-years-old she knew that other kids had fathers and that she didn't. I had her in a restaurant when she was 3 and she pointed to a little girl having dinner with a man and she told me "She has a Daddy. She lives with both her mommy and her daddy. I don't have a daddy." She was very sad about this. I told her that I knew how much that must hurt but that there were lots of men in her life who loved her, including my H and my father. She called my H UncleJimDaddy and my father GrandpaDaddy. No one told her to, she just made up the names. (Don't worry, I didn't just give away my husband's real name.) She used to beg my H to be her father. When she was very little she thought that if they got married when she was older that would make my H her father. One time when she was 9-years-old she told my sister that what she wanted for a Father's Day present (!) would be to call her father. It was enough to break your heart and enough for me to decide that visitation was beneficial to the OC.<P>However, I am beginning to agree with others on this board, that I am not responsible for the happiness of the OC. That is her mother's responsibility. She chose to be a single mom; she had other alternatives. My H offered for us to raise this child (without having even told me of the affair yet), and asked about making an adoption plan for this child (please don't say "giving up." Being on two points of the adoption triangle [adopted and trying to adopt], I am a bit sensitive to painful adoption language.)<P>I think that in the future we may go through some type of arbitration, but for right now, my H needs, I need, and our marriage needs, a break from the constant controversy.<P>Mrs. Job

My H usually averages about 4 calls per month on his cell phone to ow. N ow ,that doesn't take into account how many times she calls him.The incoming calls are shown as incoming to his number. She also calls our business compulsively. We were having a party on Saturday night at our store ,after hours, she must have called 6 times in a row. My h just ignored it.His cell phone rang inbetwee. When we got in the truck to come home, the cell phone rang again. It was her,caller id. He rolled his eyes and ignored it. I bet she was seething. But, there is always e-mail.I am sure she e-mails him quit frequently, but we have separate computers so ,I can't check.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Mrs. Job:<BR><B>Hi all,<P>We have had major changes regarding OW and OC and I want/need to post but I am afraid of starting another flame war. If I get attacked please just ignore the attacks.<P>Most of you probably already know that I have been pretty open about contact with OC even though that means contact with OW. well, we finally called it quits with visitation. Every month I would check my husband's cell phone bill and every month there were many many calls to the OW. That was distinctly against the agreement we made in marriage counseling of no private conversations between the two of them. All calls were to be three-way calls including me. Every time we get a phone bill with 20 or 30 calls to the OW I would obviously be very very upset-- To the point of considering divorce.<P>Every month the OW would become more and more hysterical as we got closer and closer to visitation. She would call my husband with hysterical, unreasonable and threats such as "leave your wife at the hotel when you pick up the baby." She was also verbally abusive toward him and very, very manipulative. My husband knew that there was no way that I was going to consent to him seeing the OW without my being there--not even for five minutes.<P>You know what? I don't feel guilty about this decision and neither does my husband. We did not choose to discontinue seeing the OC; her mother forced that decision upon us by her unreasonable behavior. It became clear that her intent was to destroy our marriage and it became clear that it was visitation or our marriage.<P>My H finally seems to be out of his fog and sees the OW as she really is -- -- dysfunctional, codependent, manipulative, and in need of help. He was carrying around a massive load of guilt over "ruining her life." I told him over and over again that it took two of them to destroy their lives. She is completely responsible for the mess her life, and he is completely responsible for the mess he has made up our lives. The first thing you need to do in recovery is figure out what you are and aren't responsible for. She entered into and stayed in a seven-year affair of her own free will. Granted, it shattered her life, but it was still her choice. He did not "get" her pregnant; they did that together. Now he feels free of guilt towards her.<P>I hope that in a couple of years she will have pulled her life together and we can resume visitation.<P>Mrs. Job<P>[This message has been edited by Mrs. Job (edited May 07, 2001).]</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>It sounds to me like the Ow is a bad mother. If she really wanted what was best for her child she would have made visioatation easy so her child could grow up knowing and loving her father.<P>