I wrote a long version of my story on the reconciliation board and was told there was more acitvity here. Can you go over and read my story and help me. I am in big trouble and don't know what to do. <P>Please help me.

Weekend are slow around here.... So keep up the faith.<P>Z

Hi A Husband:<P>To make it easier I copied your original post:<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>This is going to be long, so bear with me, please.<BR>I married my dream woman in the mid 80's We had a beatutiful daughter, nice home, good jobs. Our sex life was and always has been great.<P>In 1988, a friend of hers (not a good friend) really let me know she would like to have sex with me. I did it, we then went on to a 5 month affair until my wife found out. I thought I would die. Throughout the affair I felt like ****. The woman was not worth throwing away my wife for. She meant nothing to me. At the time I thought it was fun. Was I wrong. The sex was ok, but it never felt as good as it did with my wife.<P>We got through it somehow. I never told her all the details cause I knew if my wife new it all, she would be gone and I just couldn't ever lose her. We had another child and recently built our dream house in the country. We were doing great. The affair came up on occaision, but for the most part we were past it, until February of this year.<P>My wifes best friend caught her husband in an affair. They separated and we watched as "Bob" fought to get "Linda" back. They went to counseling and have recently reconciled. Throughout all of this, Linda confided in my wife. I could hear them in the great room many times. Both crying as Linda told and retold the questions and the answers. I felt a deep dread coming over me, I knew this was triggering my wife. Suddenly she started asking me the same questions, I kept lying. After all this time I was hoping that would stay dead. It didn't. She kept pressing, suddenly we were in huge fights. She accused me of lying and, she was right. It ate at me day and night. Do I tell her the truth now? One night, after she accused me of lying again, I blurted out the truth to her question. <BR>It killed my wife. Today, she still is angry and is telling me she is considering a divorce. She can't belive that I would lie to her for all these years. She calls our marriage a huge mistake and she wishes she never stayed with me after she found out. I am desperate. I have never ever cheated on her again, but now she is sure I have. I don't know what to do. The woman I love more then my own life itself is thinking of leaving me. We went to counseling. The counselor told her she had to let it go, I was hoping she would too. She isn't. She has seen an attorney, she has thrown my clothes out. But I am still here. I refuse to leave.<P>What can I do now? She will ask a question "did you love her" I say no (I didn't), and she tells me I am lying. We are in big trouble here. Back then, she never asked these questions. But Linda has told her how vital it is to have every detail so, now my wife wants details. I can't remember. That woman is a bad memory for me. I know I was wrong, but I hate that woman. I was a fool for falling for her come-on, and it is my fault what this is doing to my wife, but my wife just laughs in my face when I tell her that. She is scaring me and I don't want to lose my wife or my family. <P>What can I do at this point? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Now, I agree with Lotsva...this is just an emotional reaction to the dregging up of the old issues...perhaps it would have been better to have deal with this then...but it might have been even more painful then. Being a BS myself I have never thought the details were that important...although WH seem to feel I needed to know in great detail (perhaps he thought I could understand better if I knew more).<P>I question why you seem like this was such a casual thing at the time...OW said she wanted to have sex with you so you did???? Nothing was wrong with the marriage...it was just sex? I'm sorry but this is harder for me to believe then if you had been in love with OW...and I'm sure the same is true of your wife. Maybe at the time she couldn't bear to hear the details so she made peace with it and moved on. I will bet however that it has never really gone away for her...and this latest thing has just laid open a big scar. <P>I don't thing there is anything you can do now but continue to reaffirm how much you love your wife, what an A** you were for having done this at all, tell her you are prepared to tell her anything that she wants to know (and tell her), tell her how sorry you are and how much you want to stay together and work this out. This may be a bad scene for a while as she works through it, but it is necessary for her to come to terms with it and in a way it is good for her to finally be dealing with it. If there is still love for you in her heart then she will get through it and you can begin to heal the damage you've done. Good Luck.<P>Faye <P>

Each truth revealed is a stepping stone in the painful path of rebuilding trust.

No, I can't help you - but you can help yourself: You gotta come clean - completely. What other demons are you hiding from? The truth will set you free.<P>Consider pointing your wife to this site.<P>WAT<p>[This message has been edited by worthatry (edited June 03, 2001).]

Good Morning AH,<BR>You are in a very good place to find help for your marriage. I would recommend counseling with the Harleys. I had some pretty terrible counseling experiences and wish I had just gone with them from the start! DO it-make the call.<P>Now read all the info on this site and get some good books for both of you. SAA and Torn Asunder are both great for early recovery. And there is one by Peggy Vaughann, but I cannot remember the name. They have a website on infidelity. (its been awhile since i was at the stage your wife is and read these books).<P>Will your wife come here? If she will not....then will she make some e-mail friends that will support her through this? Her friend that is experiencing the infidelity now may not be the best support system, though she may feel it is all she has. Somewhere on here is an e-mail addy list! <BR>cheryl_fnp@hotmail.com<P>Talk, be honest. Use the tools. Plan AAAAAAAAAAAAAA++++++<BR>(((((hugs))))) cl<BR>

I am going through my H 2nd affair. We are seperated. I needed to know the whole truth both times. I feel you cant go forward if there is anything that has been left unsaid. Your W can never heal if the wound was left opened, which it sounds like it was. I feel on the truth can help you, and sometimes you just got to take the chance that things will work out. It was unfair not to be honest with her from the beginning, but you can be honest now...good luck

A spouse's unfaithfulness is one of the most painful experiences anyone can have in life. So almost everyone feels betrayed, used, abandoned, and very angry when they discover that their spouse has had an affair. After all, an affair is hatched with full knowledge of how much pain it will inflict on an unsuspecting spouse after it's discovered. It reflects a wanton disregard for the feelings of someone that was supposed to have been cherished and protected for life. <P>Resentment is an understatement of what is actually felt whenever those memories come to mind. <P>Sounds like your wife's memories come back to haunt her. Maybe she and you suppressed the issues of the affair and therefore they have been bottled up inside her. If this wasn't dealt with she could have built up ressentment. Sometimes are imaginations surmise circumstances worse than they actually were. Therefore it's better to just tell the truth. Although it may be painful that's usually easier to deal with than NOT knowing. Statics actually show that the more that is revealed to the spouse after the affair, the more honestly the better chances of the marriage surviving. It varies with each individual BS as to the magnitude of knowledge they feel they need revealed, only she will know that. <P>Your lying was a BIG "Love Buster". Think about how you would feel if she lied to you? To lie in order to avoid trouble only creates more problems. It's a real issue of TRUST, and it's very hurtful to believe you can't trust someone. Don't you think? I think too many people think it's just a lie. It's actually breaching a TRUST and without trust what do you have? Honesty is something we all want from others. We all hate to be lied to -- that's why dishonesty is a Love Buster. I think it's easier to deal with the truth than it is the unknown. <P>One of the emotional needs is honesty and openness. <BR>As with all emotional needs, when it's met, it makes a person feel very good, and when it's not met, it makes the person very unhappy. When your most important emotional needs are met, you fall in love with the person who meets them, but when they are not met, you lose that feeling of love. Your wife may find her love slipping away and draining her love bank if you cannot meet her need for honesty. Dishonesty does more than ruin your love for each other -- it also prevents you from finding solutions to your problems. After all, how can you and your spouse solve a problem if your cards are not on the table.<P>Here are some links I thought might be helpful to you. Maybe reading these would help you understand how your wife feels.<BR> <BR><A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3405_dishonesty.html" TARGET=_blank>Dishonesty</A><P>Read about the "Love Buster" Dishonesty <BR><A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi5505_qa.html" TARGET=_blank>How to Overcome Love Busters</A><P><A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3325_hon.html" TARGET=_blank>Honesty and Openness</A><P><A HREF="http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi5062_qa.html" TARGET=_blank>Coping with Infidelity: Overcoming Resentment</A><P>Read, read, read and work on it.<BR>Hope this help and best wishes for your marriage.<P>Take care.<BR>

Hi AH,<P>As you can see from all the posts, truth is essential to a good marriage. You chose for a long period of time to deny that to your wife. <P>You really need to apologize for that grave error. This must be done with sincerity and know that she may not take you at your word. Then what? Now you have to earn her trust back. <P>Let me give you an example. Truth was important in my family. My dad demanded it to us and from us. For this I am grateful. But I was not always so appreciative. When I was about 14, I told my dad a 'small lie'. Can't even remember what it was about just know that I was caught. It was not enough to stop my world but the effect did. <P>My dad informed me that I no longer had his trust. He even said that the trust he would normally give a common stranger would not be available to me until I 'earned' his trust back. Was this severe? Yes. Did it need to be? Yes. Why? Because, the lesson I learned from that one incident molded the rest of my life and plays a big role now in this much bigger issue with my trust in my H. In my case, it took 4 years to earn my dad's complete trust back. Oh, he loved me and never denied me as his daughter but I just knew that there was always a bit of doubt in my word to him. Then one day out of the blue, my dad took me aside and said: "L., I just want you to know that I now trust you again." That was all he said and I cried. I still cry thinking about how I wasted those 4 years of my dad's trust. Big impact and I am glad to have learned that lesson.<P>So, I share it with you. You and your wife are both welcome here. I share info here with my H (he was the WS) and I believe it helped him. It is now my H's primary responsiblity to make sure that 'he' earns his family's trust. <P>If you share this with your wife, I would like to let her know that I understand how she feels and if you can meet her need to know and she does have love in her heart for you, then this can heal and you are actually in a better chance for recovery than you both realize. <P>To both, take care of each other. <BR>L.

As a BW, I can only tell you to please, no matter how painful it seems, tell you wife the whole truth and nothing but the truth. It can't make things worse can it, it can only help. As a BW, I would love to hear all the truth and be able to ask anytime about anything I wanted to my WH, but he wouldn't do it either and he left 3 months ago because he wouldn't seek counseling or open up to anyone. You must seek some Christian counseling for healing for yourself to forgive yourself and tell someone the whole truth, it is the only way to clean you heart and mind of the affair and also your wifes. Tell her you will go to counseling or anything to make her be able to trust you again, that is the problem, the trust has to be rebuilt step by step. This is what I wanted more than anything, to be able to discuss it with my H so that he could quit stuffing it and be able to forgive himself, but he left and has now filed for divorce and he still has told noone the whole truth. I trully believe it will drive him to do something crazy. He is drinking heavily, lifting weights compulsively, working too many hours, etc to self medicate his guilt, it can only be removed by confession and the asking of repentenence from God first, then your wife! Hope this helps, she will be glad you did! SEF