To all, a statement on another thread prompted this. My H was in the Army 19.9 years. His affair occured while he was traveling to another state weekly and met a young woman who made herself available to him when he stayed at the hotel where she worked. He had also just been passed over for a promotion, and was fast approaching 40. He told me she made him feel good, feel young, (she was 23, I was his age). <BR>Any way, I was curious who else had been in the military and whose spouses had affairs while on active duty. It seems such a sad state of affairs (no pun intended )<BR>for our service people to do this. I used to laugh and say we were on a constant honeymoon, he was never around for us to get tired of each other. But I believe what problems he had could have been dealt with if he had been honest rather than susceptiple to her asking him out, to her house, coming to his hotel room etc.<BR>So Please if you have been military, post, let's see who else is a member of the "club".<BR>Thanks, TG

Texasgirl,<P>My H is in the Navy, almost 13 yrs(this sept) and he plans on retiring from the military. My H has had A's, but, luckily, no OC for him. XOM was in the military as well. Now that I look back, I don't know WHAT I was thinking back then! I do know that my H's schedule is one of the culprits in this whole mess, as we had been "seperated" for about 15 of the year and a half that started everything. Before I came out here, H had been at school, then transfered here. I was going to stay in our house until the kids had finished school, but H wanted us to move out sooner, so, after being apart for 8 out of 9 months, we moved out here, only to have H leave 4 weeks later for 6 weeks. Then they were home for 2 months and then gone for what was supposed to be 6 full months. The life of a military spouse can be he!!, but we have, and are working on our marriage, and it is getting stronger by the day. In fact, he is gone right now, will be home in 2 weeks for 2 months and then gone for 6 months again! I can't wait to transfer from here, because it will mean that he will be home ever night! I truly believe that the Navy is the hardest on the spouse for all their deployments, but will follow where ever we end up!<P>Ok, I am getting back to what I used to do, rambling again!!! <P>Love,<P>Tigger

I've never posted on this site before,but have been lurking for sometime. My husband is in the Military (AF) and had an affair that produced a child. He was sent overseas one week after the death of his parents. He was setting us up a house so the kids and I could come over. He was invited to dinner at a neighbors house and when he got there he found out her husband was on Temporary duty assisnment. Against his better judgement he stayed and things "happened" that evening. Two weeks later she informed him she was pregnant. The affair continued for the two years we were stationed there. She threatened to have him put in jail and numerous other thing so the affair would continue. There's so much more to this story but I wanted to give a brief history. <BR>Now for my opinion on the military and affairs. I believe it is a shame that they hold military personel accountable for having affairs and not everyone involved. We were lucky that we had proof of harassment and stalking on the ex ow part or my husband would have been court martialed and dishonorably discharged from the military. They sent my husband to another country only one week after the death of both of his parents and seperate him from all of his support base. This kind of thing happens all the time. The base we were at had only 68 active duty men and women and 75% of them had affairs while they were their. I hold my husband accountable for his part, but I believe the military makes and sets people up for infidelties to happen.

Welcome to the board Dignity!! What an interesting story. I'm so sorry for your pain. <P>TGirl, you've heard my story before... I feel like I've been here forever. We're also a military family. <P>J, 3 years of recovery (I love saying that!).

Texasgirl,<BR>My W and I are both military. I am getting out soon and my W will be out a few months after me. We have been married about 3 yrs. Out of the 3 yrs, we have a total of about 20 months apart, 16 of those months were consecutive. After we ended the 16 months we were back together but things weren't the same. I did not realize how unhappy my W was and she/we are learning more everyday about how we screwed up, but more importantly how to improve and move on. A few months after we were back together, I had to leave for a month and my W had a one night stand and is now pregnant. I was starting to get sick of the military life before this happened but this A definitely influenced our decision to get out. So, unfortunately I am a member of this club. Do we get a cool little membership card??

Most of you know my story...<P>We were military. H just got out in Dec.: was in for 6 years. Ow was also military. Both army.<P>D&G,<P>totally agree with you about the military setting you up for it and why not? If your commander and cheif can flaunt it all over the tv and get away with it, why not the little peons who work for him?<P>Families First, my rear-end.

thanks all for response. Maybe club was not a good word. What should we say different group. I think all would agree that the military lifestyle is so different from the civilian. Yet there are civilian jobs that require a lot of travel and time away from home. My H is still gone m-f. The money is better, and he is not "punching a ticket" for promotion. I think also when the affairees are both military there is a different way in dealing with it rather than when one of them is civilian.<BR> My H was an officer, his exOW was civilian. When we addressed it to JAG, they said so long as it did not become an issue and was not brought to the CG's attention we did not have to worry about UCMJ and adultery prosecution.<BR> Remember "If the Military wanted you to have a spouse they would have issued you one"? I agree that commanders don't take the family into consideration when they continually keep military members away for a long time continuously.<BR> Hutch reading your post really prompted this. I hope you will find the support you are looking for here. I admire your desire to raise your wife's child yourself. Is there absolutely no way it could be yours? I was willing to adopt the OC in our lives, but her mother would not hear of it.<BR>D&G - It sounds like your H's exOW was a real witch.It sounds like he had some real messed people in his command. My H was a personnel ofc for 18 mos in Army in Ger. His command arranged for a man and his wife to return to the states after they had a stillborn child. Another was sent back because his father was dying of cancer. This man was sent to a post near his father. I must admit except for time we were separated by military assignments and the affair, our years with the Army were good. I guess too since my h has retired, '95, the military has gone done. We have had several friends tell us that it was not the same since '92.<BR> Just for laughs, my 24 yr old son is an enlisted man in Ger, he was complaing about getting an assignement as a driver for another unit on field maneuvers. He said he got this assignment because he was single. The command didn't want a wife complaining about her husband being in field on back to back assignements. He went back out with his unit 5 days after he got out of the field the first time.<P>BW you are staying strong. You're a survivor.<BR>Jenny you make me smile <P>Thanks all for responding. Sorry we are in this situation, but I have met some really nice people here.

BTW, my H found the UCMJ statute on adultery and there is a 5 year statute of limitations... if military didn't prosecute within that time, they can't.<P>Just thought I'd share!<BR>two years to go on that one,<BR>J

It has been 3yrs since D-day and my husband and I are well into recovery. We have a wonderful relationship with only minor setbacks once in awhile. I guess you could say that I'm still a little angry at the AF for this whole situation. He tried to get out of his assignment after the death of his parents and they just couldn't spare him. He's in a critical career field and peoples lives depend on him. The funny thing is I thought he was severely depressed over his parents and never even had a clue an A was going on. He never even had a chance to grieve over his parents, so now 3 yrs later we are dealing with that. <BR>I found out about the A because the ex-ow sent my H commander a letter stating he has a child that he isn't doing anything for. What makes me even angrier is her husbands command tried to have my husband procecuted over this. Luckily we had e-mails of her black mailing him and also trying to extort money. His commander was very lenient on him. Guess what I got from it? They sent my husband to a school 2000 miles away for 1 mo. only 2wks after I found out. They told him they would take it easy on him as long as his job was not affected by all of this. How about that for understanding?<BR>Texasgirl- tell your son to be careful, the ex-ow is in the same country as him and she has a thing for army men!LOL!!

Dear TG,<P>My husband was an Flight Officer in the Navy for 9.5 years. He left active duty and finished up in the Reserves. <P>His A took place two years after he left active duty. He went corporate and entered sales. Big, big salary, gorgeous suits, sports car. I think, it continued growing the ego that the Navy had begun laying down. He says that his affair was just a "big f***ing ego trip." She came on hard to him over a period of weeks and he got caught up. I am not excusing his behavior because after all he is the one who had the marriage vows.<P>MJ

My H has been in the Navy for 14 years and we have been married for 10 years next week. I too am shocked at the number of affairs that are "permitted" to occur. In my husbands office (which is small), I know of 3 divorces occuring because of A's. Nothing happens to these men, sometimes their commands even try to shield them from their spouses. We have been told that the military if moving to improve our quality of life and make more time for families. Has anyone seen that? I never thought in a million years that my H would have "a 2night stand", but all the men he was travelling with were off with their OW and I think he felt the pressure to do the same. Please do not think that I am giving him any excuse, I hold him totally responsible for what he did. The OW is now pregnant and says that it is his. We have no contact with her and she has none with us. My H still has to travel to that area, but he is trying to find a way to transfer to another area. After all of our years of sea duty with no A's (I believe him when he tells me there wasn't any), one happens right "under my nose" (meaning in the states). <P>We are currently working toward a "new and improved" version of our marriage and I hope that we can cope with the impending birth. Right now I try not to think about her and am focusing on finding myself again (not just mom or wife) and improving the state of our marriage.<P>Sorry this came out so long but when I saw the military thread I just had to respond.<P>Thanks for listening,<P>VS&H

TG, <BR>For a short time I thought the baby might be mine. We got an ultrasound done and it said the baby was 7 weeks old (+/-a week). We looked on a calendar and we knew that we were active right before I left for my month deployment and thought the baby could be mine. But my W and I were thinking the ultrasound reflected a 38 week pregnancy. If that was the case then the baby would probably be mine. But we learned from the Dr who gave the ultrasound that the 7 weeks of pregnancy means that actual conception occurred around 5 weeks. I was deployed at the 5 week mark. I always felt that the baby wasn't mine but I tried to hide that but that did not work. One day I just had to know and that was when we called the Dr. I feel better because I would've always wondered if the baby was mine or not. I just hope the baby is the spitting image of my W. But I am preparing for the exact opposite.

I also haven't written before but have been reading a lot of the posts. They've helped me enormously in the 2 months since I found out about my H's affair. My husband and I are both Navy officers. We've been married for 2 years, together for almost 8, separated 6 months (plus lots of underways) since being married, and a year during our engagement. H began an affair with another officer on the ship. Continued under my nose after he returned from deployment. I finally found out because she began to get possessive and started calling our house. He tried to break it off, she claimed she was pregnant, has been a royal b**** since. Said she'd get an abortion, then said she wasn't "raised that way" (but apparently she was raised to commit adultery?). I didn't believe she was really pregnant because her story was a little convenient -- my H thought she was but was too afraid to push the issue because he was afraid he'd get NJP'd. When she threatened to tell her command (he had transferred to a different job after the deployment) he beat her to the punch and told his boss (which she was furious about -- he'd "ruined her life, and now her career"). Their supervisors were trying to figure out what to do with both of them, knowing they'd have to give them equal punishment. She continued to call him at work but wouldn't give him "the satisfaction" of knowing if she was pregnant or not." The supervisors seemed content to kind of let it fade away, but I couldn't begin to save the marriage if she were pregnant and his thoughts were with her, and if she kept calling wanting to know how he was going to support her and her child. So I contacted her command (I complained about her harassing me by calling my cell phone trying to reach him after I told her not to) and found out she wasn't pregnant, never had been, and they had instructed her that if she contacted us again they'd send her to Admiral's Mast. Surprise, surprise -- haven't heard from her lately. Guess she doesn't have any more manipulative maneuvers up her sleeve.<P>I agree the military makes people vulnerable, but people, especially military officers, have to be held accountable for their actions. They supposedly are both going to be formally counseled and they've suffered a huge loss of face with their commands. I felt powerful knowing I had the UCMJ on my side. BUT, as others have written, it sure looks like we'll have short-lived careers because I've told him I never want him going back to sea. I know he's too weak to deal with long-term separation, so I won't be going back either.<P>I'd like to thank everyone on this board for sharing -- you help more people than you realize through your experience. If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have gotten through the two months of not knowing whether she was telling the truth about being pregnant or not, and I definitely would not have been able to understand how others could cope with such a situation.<P>Betsy

I haven't posted in a while, I usually lurk. My H was on orders at NTC, in California. I think the military personnel almost encourage each other. The out of site, out of mind is rampant. Everyone knew, and know one thought there was anything wrong. She was walking around pregnant with the whole office knowing that I too was pregnant. You would have thought there would have been one decent person who would have said something to me. I found out when papers were served, and the oc was already almost 2. When he had to go to Korea, everyone was out with the $2 hookers there, they all figured why not. My H didn't engage in that activity, he thought those women were gross. He too was a Army officer. He got out a year ago, and we live in the corporate world now. Which I think can be encouraging for affairs, but not as easily accessible. <P>babstr.

Military here also.. The OW was also military. They have been sending my H away with OW since April. Friendship turned sexual... History from there.<P>They are both married.<P>Too sad to talk about this..<P>Heather