Several months ago I posted a message detailing my A W/OC. To those who responded, thank you.<p>I'm back for more advise. I need to know how to handle my wife's questions, mood swings and her short fuse. Normally she is a nice person, but since D-day she been in a funk.<p>My W questions are deep, she has plenty of time on her hands to think about every little detail and she wants to know every little detail about the A. Most of her questions I can awnser. But the ones that I don't anwser brings out the angry streak in my W, and it usally occurs without warning. How do I handle her response to the questions I can't anwser and her mood swings? And what about the short fuse? What do I do?<p>I Love my W, and our daughter very, very much. I can't breathe without them.<p>I want my marriage back. It wasn't perfect, but now it's worse because of the A. We have very few good days and a bunch of bad days. How can I reach her? What can I say that I haven't said already?<p>BTW, we're on our second counselor, and we're continueing our search for a place of worship.

It sounds like your doing what you should be doing to me. I have those irrational mood swings myself. We'll have two good days then something will trigger a bad spell. Doc has asked me what can I do to help you...truth be told, there isnt anything outside of what he's already doing that he can do. What we've started doing, because I to have questions... is I write them down...give them to him and he answers me back in writing. I have found I am way less hostile and he is way less defensive. Then if there's a need we discuss it...in a calm rational matter. Sometimes I'll just write down my bad feelings for him to read...
Keep the faith and the bad days should over time lessen , at least thats my hope and what keeps me going
Peace

Hi there Mr. Smith,
Reading your post makes me think of my husband. He had an affair over the last 9 months. I found out Dec. 21. I'm not sure of all your details but I can say this from my experience, talking, talking and talking help me the most. My husb. and I go through the same thing. He can't answer my questions and I flip out and get angry. I'm still in the rebuilding process here but I can say that when he is open to talk about it with me, for some reason it makes me feel better. The problem is that we don't always know the truth. What, when where??? and that not knowing festers all kinds of ideas in our heads. My husb. has closed the door on the subject so many times. It makes it worse. I think answering the questions over and over the best you can will eventually cool things off. We need to keep being reminded that we are the soul mate and we need more than anything now to be loved and cherished. I know it must be hard when emotions are high. That's the hard part of it all though, it will be a struggle for some time to come. I think we just keep searching for the answer to why it happened. It sounds like you really want to make things work, so good luck and maybe give her more time.

Dear Mr. Smith,<p>What type of questions can't you answer? The Harleys say that the WS must answer every one of the BS's questions.<p>How fast did you think this anger would resolve? Are your expectations realistic? W/o an OC being thrown into the mix most infidelity experts say that it takes a marriage a couple of years to recover from this betrayl.<p>That said, I don't think that all questions are good questions (even speaking as the exBS). Mr. J answered my questions to the best of his ability (eventually and in his own time. It took him awhile to get really honest.) I refrained from asking certain questions. I didn't want pictures stuck in my head of sexual positions and exactly what every lie had been over their 7 year affair.<p>The things I did need to know were:

• to the best of his ability could he explain why this had happened?
  What were his methods of deceit that had fooled me?
  What did he feel about her?
  What were his thoughts, feelings and plans for the child born of this affair?
  What did he intend to tell other people about his affair?
  Was he truly repentent for his affair?
  Was he willing to promise me that this would never happen again?
  What was he willing to give up in the way of privacy to allow me to assure myself that the affair was over? We have no more private phone bills and email accounts.
  Was he chosing to stay with me out of a sense of obligation or because he truly chose me?

<p>If your wife asks you a question and you think the answer might impede rather than encourage recovery, you might ask her to think about her question for 24 or 48 hours and then reask it if she still felt the need. For example if she wants to know if you did XY or Z with exOW, you might ask her how she thinks that will help recovery. If she goes away, thinks about it, and still wants that answer, in my opinion, you owe her that answer.<p>I don't know how long past D-day you are, but for most of us the rage seems to quiet down after 6 to 12 months and then a shakey recovery begins. Are you doing all you can and all you promised to contribute to the recovery of your marriage? Are you meeting her ENs? Are you sure? Have you done the Love Busters questionnaire? Are you giving her plenty of your free time, discussing the important issues with her, protecting her from your own angry outbusts? If not, these are all ways you can improve your chances of recovery and display to her that you are serious about being that better husband you promised to be on D-day. If you didn't promise it, you need to and then you need to put a plan in place to achieve that goal. [img]images/icons/smile.gif" border="0[/img] <p>Best of luck,
MJ<p>[ February 27, 2002: Message edited by: MaryJanes ]</p>

DocsGirl,<p>Thank you for your comments and advise. God be with you and your family.<p>
HurtandLost,<p>I appreciate you for your advise. Sounds like you and your H are expriencing the same pain as my W and I. God bless you and your family.<p>
MaryJanes,<p>Thank you too for responding to my cry for help. To answer your questions, D-day for my W and I was Nov 2001. You mentioned talking to my W about important issues, the only issues we disscuss are the aspects of the A. Finally, what is the Love Busters questionnaire? I send my prayers to you and your family.

Mr. Smith,<p>I looked at my reply to you written at about 4:00 am this morning and I cringed. I didn't mean to be as crabby as I was.<p>Right now on this board is a topic called, I think Harley Basics (http://www.marriagebuilders.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=35&t=002488). It points to a post that points to a post that lists the Harley's plans on rebuilding marriages, especially those touched by indfidelity.<p>Have you considered telling your wife about this site? We often encourage the betrayed partner in a marriage to do their venting here to us instead of dumping it into their marriage. For you to stick this out you need to have hope that someday this will no longer be the dominant issue in your marriage. <p>We also helped betrayed spouses look to what they might want or need to improve in themselves to make them better marriage partners. Not that we bear the blame for our spouse's affair but that we do (all) have some issues in our own behavior that need to be looked at. Mine is weight and not being my husband's recreational companion because of my weight. I have lost almost 40 pounds and am on my way to a healthier life and he is quite happy to "see less of me." [img]images/icons/wink.gif" border="0[/img] <p>After a couple of months after D-day we all begin to think that there needs to be some structure placed around discussions of the affair. The former WS shouldn't have to walk around constantly waiting for the next berating. Couples have devised different methods that still allow the BS to get their questions answered and still give some level of control to the BS about when and how they are going to have to talk about the affair. Some people also set aside date times during which no discussion of the affair or marriage difficulties will take place. Gotta make some time for enjoying each other again or the anger will kill any good feelings left between the two of you.<p>No matter how angry your wife is at you for your affair and child, she needs to begin to gain some control of her anger and speak to you in respectful ways.<p>Many of us exBSs on this site have talked about the changes this has made to our personalities. As much as I hate to admit it, even after 18 months of recovery, I doubt that I will ever be the joyful person I once was. I am no longer angry and vengeful (abherrent behavior for me), but I don't know if I will ever recapture the joy for living I once had. It is an unfortunate consequence of the greatest betrayal in life. I don't punish him for what he did, but an unavoidable consequence of his sinful behavior is that this has knocked some of the stuffing out of me and truthfully, out of our marriage. I still have hope for recovering that joy. Also, I will never afford him the level of trust that he once enjoyed. He has proven that he is willing to betray that trust for whatever his motives were for his affair. I require that he is more open with me about his time, his money and his private leisure activities than he once was. By the same token, I make my life more open to him. The Harleys say that complete and total trust in a marriage is a mistake given that anyone, under the right circumstances, is vunerable to an affair.<p>Shalom,
MJ<p>I really advise that you order the Harley's book Surviving an Affair. You can order the books off of this web site. I know as an exBS, I would have loved to have seen my H doing some of the active work required to repair our marriage. Instead, as usually happens, most of the work fell on me, the BS--not fair, not fair, not fair at all.