ok to make a long story as short as i can my h and i have been married 9 years and we were overseas, i was feeling alone and unhappy and i tried everything i could and finally i left him and moved into the barraks with some friends. i really thought he would come after me but he did not and due to my stubborness i did not go back either. 7 months went by and i assumed it was over. up until then i had been good and just hung out with people and then i had 1 night, the night it all happened and i became pregnant by the om. instead of lying i felt i owed my h at least the truth and as much as it hurt him i did that and then went back to the states thinking we could not repair things. fast forward to three months later when my h calls and asks to come visit and when he did he said he wanted to make it work and he said that the baby was the only innocent one in all of this and he would raise the baby as his own. he went back overseas to wrap up work, put in a transfer and by the time he got back, our son was about a month old, things seemed ok but my h seemed unhappy. our son is now 10 months old and i feel just as lonely as i did when i was overseas and left. i have brought it up to him and he says that there is just no bond between him and our son and he doesn't even feel love for him. of course that kills me and makes me not sleep at night but i love my h and want to work it out. if he can't ever get passed things than i know i owe it to my son to whats best i just don't know whwt that is. the om did know about the pregnancy and called me until i was 3 months pregnant and i told him i did not expect anything from him and that i love my husband and i have not heard from him since. my h is really good with our son and interacts with him and feeds him and even changes diapers but he doesn't love him. i was prepared to raise him on my own and when my h came back wanting to work it out i was extremely happy but maybe he didn't know what he was getting into. i have talked to him about it and even asked him if he wants us to leave and he never gives me an answer. does that mean he doesn't care if we leave? i think that since we married young that my h is keeping us around only because its comfortable in a way. i want to make it work but i don't know what to do. i have my h and my son and our little apartment but i am still alone. how long do i have to pay for my mistakes? he is the one that asked me back and now it seems like i am making all the effort. i know i betrayed him but i am truly sorry and he wanted me back!!! help!!! give me answers please!!!

I'm so sorry for the ordeal you are going thru.
It may not be the case that your H does not love the baby since,by your own admission, he is very good with him. Your H may be going thru some type of post affair depression, and if that's the case, he would be wise to seek out professional help to get medication, in order for him to be able to resolve this situation in a positive and constructive fashion. If you find yourself extremely depressed, it may also be wise for you to go see a doctor to get anti-depressant medication to help you cope with your emotional rollercoaster. This will help you in controlling your emotions and prevent them from dictating your course of action.

While you may wonder how long do you pay for your mistakes? your H is probably wondering how long will his pain last? It will serve you well to remember that these kinds of situations take quite some time to recover from (some say up to two years). But take comfort in the fact that your heart is in the right place and you are to be commended for doing the right thing in fighting for your M and for the wellbeing of your son.

Stick around and much more wiser folks will give you their valuable input to help you cope with your situation.

Good luck and God bless.

thankyou coffeeman for your input it really does help just talking with people. i am having a hard time because we live away from family and friends and i don't want to burden my family with this. my family knows that the child is from the om and i fear that if i talk to them to get things off my chest that they might insist on my calling it quits for my sons sake but i know that they would also have the motive to say that because they miss the grandbaby. i am not ready to call it quits. my h was going to a therapist for a while but he changed jobs and we are waiting for insurance to kick back in. he seemed to be happier but still wasn't talking to me about things. he never exploded about the situation. i waited around for the explosion everyday and it never happened. does that mean anything? he did ask why and tell me that i hurt him but that was it. is that healthy for him? i know you said the healing process takes some people years but how do i do that and keep my son feeling loved by both of us when my h keeps saying he does not love him?

I'm a firm beleiver in the old saying 'actions speak louder than words' and I'd like to suggest that you observe his actions to see if they match his words with regards to his assertion of not loving your baby. Sometimes people are surprised when they see that the actions of a loved one, do not match his/her words.

Have you read the Harley books 'Surviving An Affair' and 'His Needs Her Needs'? I'd recommend that you, and your H, read them because they are full of valuable knowledge and insight that can help heal your M.

As simplistic as it may sound, do not let your emotions get the best of you and dictate your actions. Doing so almost always brings pain and regret (the ONS with OM that resulted in your pregnancy is proof of this). Try to learn as much as you can from the Harley books, professional counseling, and this forum.

Stillalone,

Well, I too am raising the xOM's child w/my H, so I can understand some of your situation. The biggest differences, and what I feel may be causing your H's feelings at this time, are that my H was with me the whole pregnancy, and xOM never even knew about the P. The reason I feel that it may be what's causing your H's feelings is that you were seperated almost the whole pregnancy, and your S was a month old when your H was able to be with you again! Now, 9 months later, he is still dealing with things that in most cases like this were dealt with, or were beginning to be dealt with 9 months earlier! Do you understand what I'm trying to get at here? Most cases of recovery take around 2 yrs, and in essence, you guys are just at the 9 month point!

Give it a little more time. Encourage him to seek counseling again, once your insurance is straightened up, and join him in that counseling! And read anything and everything you can on this site! To save a M it takes 2, and you may want to ask him again, does he want to save this M? I know, it's scary when you don't know the answer for sure, but the question needs to be asked!

I hope that I helped, at least a little!

Tigger

stillalone,

I am moving back in with W after 1.5 years. The OC is 4 weeks old. The baby did melt my heart the other night when I was holding her. I cannot admit that to W yet. But my actions reflect it.

I do not think your H would be as good as you write if there was no love. I cannot speak for him, but I know I could not do those things if love truely was not there.

Scott

stillalone,,,,,, one thing i don't understand is that since you and h were separated for so long why he would feel betrayed. (please everyone don't take this the wrong way) if i were separated from my wife for 7 months especially if she moved out i think i would assume my marriage was over and that paper work was just a formality. so i would start to move on with my life including another relationship. and i would assume my wife would have done the same. considering that there was what sounds like very little contact during the separation. if things were to come full circle and we were to reconcile then her child would be viewed as if she had him/her prior to our relationship.

now for the feelings your h has towards your child. as has been said actions speak louder then words. from my own experience i love grace (my wifes oc) with all my heart yet still there is a difference with how i love my own kids. it's not a stronger or weaker or more or less thing. i don't know exactly how to say it. it's sort of like a pride thing i quess. not that i am not proud of her when people make a fuss over her in the supermarket or when i take her to our other kids activities alone when fh is working. i think it's just the knowledge that she has no part of me in her. i will never hurt her and i will do all the things for her the same as with my natural kids. i share my food and drink with her, play with her, tend to all her hurts and scrapes, hold her in the night when she has bad dreams, kiss her good night evry night, coach her in her sports, support her in her activities, be proud of her for her school work, even walk her down the isle when the time comes (if she so desires) and do everything in my power to keep her from harm and heartache. i will never say anything negative to her or about her bio dad. maybe it's just a man thing on how we express ourselves or view life. like i said i don't exactly understand it but it's there none the less. maybe as time goes by and the memory of the hurt disapates into the gray matter my views will cbange.

point being i would venture to bet that your h does in fact love your little one it is just going to take time for him ti figure out how to express it. and it will only happen on his time schedule.

your patience and understanding is the nest thing you can give your h right now to help him figure things out.

pops

one more thing i would like to add.

if your h loves you and wishes for your marriage to blossom then i would think he loves all of you and that includes your little one. after all he is part of who you are.

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">your patience and understanding is the nest thing you can give your h right now to help him figure things out.

pops</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">I couldn't agree more.

thankyou to everyone who is giving me support. i feel that i am making it better through the days with this support. POPS it really almost made me cry when you said that you kiss Grace goodnight because my H has never kissed our son up to this point but i do look forward to the day he does. we just went back home for the weekend because i was in my sisters wedding and surprisingly enough i was able to be happy for her. i could just see the love she felt for her h all night and it hurt a bit to feel think back to my big day and remember that feeling and wonder if my h could ever make me feel like that again. we are trying to work things out but the hardest part for me is knowing that we cannot go back to the way things were because that brought us to the way things are so where does that leave us? i hope that makes sense. another thing that is weird and i don't know if anyone has encountered this but when we were apart i had been severely depressed and had ended up at the hospital to have my gallbladder removed and i ended up losing a great deal of weight, now i had always been a little chubby but i got thin and up until i was 7 months p i stayed thin and today i have gained most of it back but am tired of the extra weight, now here comes the crazy part, i am worried if i lose the weight that my h will think that i am going to betray him because i have never complained or cared about the weight before but now that i know how thin i can be, i want to look good for myself first but also my h. is this crazy???

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">i am worried if i lose the weight that my h will think that i am going to betray him because i have never complained or cared about the weight before but now that i know how thin i can be, i want to look good for myself first but also my h. is this crazy???</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">No it's not crazy and in a nation of overweight people racing towards an early grave, it makes a lot of sense for ALL of us to shed a few pounds. Remember that your son is still a baby and that means that you have to take care of your health so that you can be around to help him develop into a healthy and independent adult. And there is no greater way to combat depression than with regular exercise and a proper diet. Your H should be reminded of this.

stillalone,,,, i know exactly what you mean when you say you feel a difference in the way your h is with you. fh says the same thing. she now wishes i would do all the little things that she overlooked before.

as for your weight thing i understand that also. fh started going to the gym with her om from work. she had always carried a few extra pounds but lost them and and was looking better then she had in 15 - 20 years. since she had grace she has gained her weight back. i want her to lose her weight again but fear that if she does she will fall victim to another affair. sort of a catch 22. but here is another corker. when fh was involved in her a a started to go to the gym also to get rid of alot of anxiety. i lost 25 pounds and was also in the best shape i have been in in 15 years. now i have gained my weight back also. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Mad]" src="images/icons/mad.gif" />

Hey everyone i just felt like writing because tomorrow is our anniversary and i am feeling kind of nervous because we were apart on our last Anniversary so things are a bit strange. i am feeling like i don't know how to act because i have no idea if we will see another anniversary so i am a bit sad. i wish he would just open up and tell me how he is feeling. about 4 days ago i tried talking to him about things and i asked him if he wanted me and our son to leave and he didn't answer me. do i take that as a yes? i am so confused. i really am trying hard to make things work but i don't know if he is seeing that. a friend of mine who knows both of us and is very honest with me told me that what i did was wrong but the second that he decided that he wanted to make things work out that he should be working with me to resolve everything and now she told me that maybe since we have been together so long that he may just be comfortable and scared of what else is out there!!! what do you think? i just am tired of seeing him unhappy. if he would be happier without me than i want that for him. it would be hard because i do love him but this is no way to live. well those are my feelings today, i will let you know how the Anniversary goes!!!!

ok well its been a while since i last wrote but a lot has happened. Anniversary didn't go to well but i will fast forward so you can hear the important stuff. i had decided to get a job so i could get out of the house and when i was looking into childcare and realized it was 900.00 per month i knew i had to either find a great job or forget it because financially we are ok without me working. i also thought it would be good for my child to interact with oc. i did not want to work just to pay for childcare!!! anyways, a company called me for an interview and my h and i were very excited, we went shopping for clothing for the interview and i went to visit several childcare centers to find one that i could trust to care for my child. i made it to the second interview and they discussed salary which was more than i had imagined that i could make and it was all a matter of waiting for my background check to come back so i could accept the position. the weekend went by and they were suppose to call me this week sometime to make it official. well my h seemed more upset and distant than usual so i decided to try a different approach since he has a hard time communicating and i wrote him a letter and let him know that i love him and i have been trying but i am not sure whats going on with him and that i sometimes feel that he doesn't want me here with him and that he doesn't love me and that i can't take it anymore and that we really needed to talk about things so we could move forward and i thought that by reading this he would realize how distant he has been and he would let me know he would try harder but i was wrong because he started out by saying that he thinks he wants a divorce and then said that maybe we should just separate and i should go back home to my parents and he said that he does not want to throw me out into the cold so he would pay for food for my son until i get on my feet and that i don't have to leave that day or anything. that was the jist of it and at that point i simply asked him to excuse me so i could call my family and find a place to live. i was hysterical and of course my family was worried about us and said they would drive the 17 hours over the weekend so i could follow them back home. the weekend was 5 days away, so i had five days to pack everything and i was an emotional wreck and i was taking care of my son. well i started thinking and wondered why my h let me go through the interview process and buying the clothes and checking out childcare centers and even putting a non refundable deposit down for childcare if he was planning to send me packing and he told me that his therapist told him to fake it until you make it. in other words, lie to me until he knows what he is going to do!!! he realized that i was about to accept a position so he knew he had to do it before they called me with the offer and that my letter had nothing to do with it because he was going to tell me that day. well i decided to call and let the job know that i appreciate their consideration but unfortunately i was unaware of marital problems i was having and i had to decline the offer and they said they would try to get in touch with the florida branch and see if they needed people but they didn't, so they wished me the best of luck and that was it. i talked to my mom and she explained to me that even though i would never try to get child support from my h because that would be wrong that i still needed to get alimony because i followed my h for 9 years overseas and didn't work because i was completely there to support everything my h was doing and we didn't have a lot of money in the beginning so instead of us each taking one course each a semester for school my h would say that he was closer to his degree so he wanted to take two so i said ok and now i have nothing except my wonderful son and i don't know how to support him. i have no education and just had to give up a great job offer because i couldn't afford a place to live,childcare,and food for my c in this area. well two hours after i turned down the job i called my h and told him that he owed me more than just food for my son and that i don't expect money forever from him but we needed to sit down and discuss what he could afford to give me and put it in writing and he said that he was actually on his way home early to discuss it and when he got home i let him know that i called and turned down the position and he told me that he was really overwhelmed the other day and that he wants me to stay so we could work it out!!!!!! yes, i was as confused as you probably are and of course i asked him a million questions. i told him that you don't ask someone for a divorce because you are overwhelmed and make them give up a great job opp. and make tham miserable for days and he asked me to call my family and cancel the move and to call the job and ask them to reconsider after an explanation and i did do all of that but i told him before that this was an eyeopener for me that now i realize that in one second he can take everything away from me and i need to prepare for that now, not just in fear of him leaving but in case anything were to happen to either of us!! i told him that if i could convince them to give me the job, that after childcare and taxes were taken out of my pay that i was going to put 50% of the remainder into an account for me and my son in the event anything happens and he said that was fine. i also made him promise to start going to therapy again but obviously not the quack he was seeing before and he agreed. well i am almost done. this was yesterday and we stayed up until 4 am communicating which we havn't done in a long time and he wanted to get romantic after that but i told him that i didn't feel like it was the right time for either of us yet and he was ok with that. he took the following day off work and let me sleep in. the company called and gave me the position, still good pay but because i am risky they offered me 10,000 less than the original salary with the understanding that once i prove myself they will renegotiate salary and i accepted the position. so, what does everyone think about this. some people have told me that i need to watch my back, others say that they think that he was worried i was going to take everything he has so he is keeping me around until he can figure things out better and then he will boot me. i think that as long as we communicate that we will work it out!!!! i do love him and i am in love with him and even though we have made mistakes i think we owe it to ourselves to try harder!!! what do you think????????????????????????????????

stillalone,,,,, i think that you should hope for the best but plan for the worst. i agree with those that said he was in fear of losing everything.

i was confused at the fact you had to give up a terrific job opportunity and move home. i would suggest that you plan on a successful new carrier and if d comes into your future that your h move out and you stay in the house, continue working and raise your son. pops

Hmmm... It sounds like you guys are on the rollercoaster of recovery! You both should read Surviving An Affair like coffeeman suggested. If buying the book is not an option right now, please read the Concepts on this Website. Understanding these concepts would really help you in your recovery.

It sounds also like you both would benefit from the Emotional Needs Questionnaire--please take this survey so you can begin to work on meeting each other's top ENs.

At least you could be working on meeting his needs and by doing so, you will find that he will want to meet your needs. It totally works. The more you complain about your husband's inadequacies, the more it discourages your H and convinces him that he can never make you happy so why even try. After all, you left him once, what will stop you from leaving again, right? He might not feel like he's good enough for you...

He wants you home and you're home. I'm not sure if it is a good idea to plan your recovery with the back door open. You both are going to have to make a commitment that says there IS NO BACK DOOR. In other words, don't work and set aside money for your moving day. That is sabotaging your recovery efforts, don't you think??? As well as setting yourselves up for failure? You're not going to fail. You can recover from this! You have to want to make it and decide to make it regardless, at least I think.

I could be wrong, you know what you are dealing with but perhaps if you start with the Questionnaires, at least you will have a roadmap so you can chart your course.

It sounds like you have a big need for conversation and he has a need for sexual fulfillment. Try the questionnaires and see if they help!?

thankyou everyone who has responded. i took your advice "binthere" and looked at the concepts and actually printed out two copies of the en questionaire and its sounds like a great start. i hope that you are not getting the wrong message from me. it helps to write and get advice and my h knows that i write here and as far as the way we are at home, there is no yelling or fighting and sometimes i wish there was because he never blew up over everything and i guess i have been kind of waiting for that and i guess that was his way of doing it. i am sure that we will make it and i just want to thankyou all for your support because it does help a lot. i will keep you all posted and look forward to your comments and advice in the future!!!

<img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />

You can read some of the recovery stories over on the IN Recovery board and see for yourself that there is nothing really magical about the 2-year mark either. Some have just as much difficulty with triggers after years as they did in the beginning, just not daily.

But notice... Those are also primarily marriages without Other Children (OC's)! You will be paying consequences for your mistake as long as you are mothering your OC because the child will be a constant reminder of the OM's existence to both of you, even without contact. So it's not going to be an easy road regardless... Some moments will be easier than others. Just remember your husband is dealing with a rollercoaster of emotions right now and an OC is not something any of us can just get over. OC's complicate recovering from the affair a gazillion times over!

Hang in there. You'll make it. Right now is the time to secure your marriage tho, while your baby is still a baby. By the time the baby is old enough to realize anything, all he'll know is that he has two terrific, loving parents and that's the best gift to give any child!

<small>[ March 20, 2003, 02:34 PM: Message edited by: BINthereDUNthat ]</small>

Both of you need the services of an MB oriented marriage counselor to map out a plan of marital recovery. It takes work, and you (and especially) your H have to be seriously committed with following thru with the work it will take to rebuild your M.

I'm glad that you stood your ground with your H because you were in the right to not only look after yourself but your little one as well. Passive/aggresive abuse should not be tolerated in a committed relationship, it must be dealt with a soon as it occurs otherwise a pattern of repeated abuse gets set into motion.