Here is an update. I may have gone downhill from the last version. Still a bit wordy, but I'm running out of energy to update it.<P>Any advice appreciated. In particular, the OM message is changed a bit. My wife told me his parents would disown him if he had a relationship with a married woman with 2 kids, so I'm trying to leverage that. Hoping he'll be upset she told me.<P>------------------------------<P>Dear <Wife>,<P>The letter I wrote to you last summer to convey my love for you came from the bottom of my heart. Much has happened since then, but even today I still love you and want a chance to repair our relationship. This is despite knowing about your relationship with <OM>. I am painfully aware that I was not meeting all your needs as a husband, and I apologize for my part in creating an environment that helped make your relationship with <OM> possible.<P>During the past year, I have been reading and learning about relationships and marriages. I know that we allowed our relationship to be un-nurtured for too long. We did not spend enough time to work on us as a loving couple. It is easy to see now, but it was too easy to ignore in the past. This does not mean it is too late to begin rebuilding our marriage and deepening the love that we developed for each other. I know that by focusing on meeting each other’s needs in the future, we can have a much healthier and more satisfying relationship than we have ever had. I have learned from my mistakes, and have worked on making changes in myself over the past year. I am enjoying many aspects of my life, especially my children and my new job, and I am excited about my future.<P>More than anything else in this world, I want you to be a part of my future as my loving wife. I would like to be able to put the mistakes of the past behind us and build a better life together. I want us to learn to meet each other’s needs and avoid making the same mistakes that got us to the place we now find ourselves. I want to help create the kind of life for us that is better than we ever dreamed. It won't happen overnight and it will take a lot of work, but we owe it to ourselves and to the children to try hard to make our marriage work. Choosing not to try is the blind way out and it leaves the same problems unsolved and creates more difficult ones.<P>This past year was the most emotionally traumatic period of my life. Despite the constant pain that I felt, I continued to maintain hope that we would reconcile, in part because of the numerous conversations where you stated that you “might be back”. Your concerns about what we would do with your house and furniture in the event of reconciliation also gave me hope. However, the pain and shock that started last June when you first stated your intention of leaving our marriage have not gone away. I waited each night for you to come home until you left in November, yet as painful as it was to know where you had been, I am thankful that you continued to sleep beside me until you moved. I endured this emotional distress because I had one goal in mind, and that was to restore our marriage and our family back to the way it should be.<P>But we cannot recover as a family until you end your relationship with <OM> once and for all - and maintain no contact.<P>Until then, I will minimize all contact with you. Please initiate communication with me only via email or voice mail. I will try to have the children answer the phone when you call, and I ask the same of you when I call your house to say goodnight to the children. Of course, in case of an emergency, I will suspend this request. I realize the children’s needs may require direct contact from time to time, but I will minimize this and I ask you to do the same. When you come to pick up <Son> and <Daughter>, please remain outside when you arrive, and I will do the same at your house. I will assume that you will continue to work Sunday, and drop the children off one day early, for the weekends that you have the children. Please leave an email or voice mail should this ever change.<P>You must know about the suffering I have endured because of your relationship with <OM>, and the fact that you have also involved him in the lives of our children. They cannot yet understand the role he has played in the destruction of the family life that they so rightly deserve, but it has hurt me deeply. I simply cannot associate with you any longer until you end this permanently, and are willing to stop deceiving me. It is just too painful. I am weary and I cannot fight for our marriage alone anymore. I am also simply unable to continue being involved in any kind of relationship that is not based on honesty. I still love you, but I cannot see or talk to you under these conditions any longer.<P>I hope that you will understand that I am not doing this to hurt you or punish you. I am doing it to protect my feelings for you and any chance of reconciliation in the future. It is also a necessary step to allow myself to emotionally heal from the pain I have experienced since last June. I ask that you please respect my decision to separate in this way.<P>I want you as my wife, and I want us to be the united parents for <Son> and <Daughter> that we always wanted to be, together, in a happy marriage and as a happy family. <Son>, <Daughter>, and myself can help you become happy for the rest of your life. We are a permanent reality, committed to you forever, for better or for worse. Similarly, you can make the three of us very, very happy. We want you and need you to be home with us. I will support any need you have in a non-judgmental way when or if you decide to recommit to our marriage. You can come to me knowing I will embrace you. Even if you are not sure, I will understand and provide empathy. Forgiveness is not an issue, for I have already forgiven you for your relationship with <OM>.<P>As soon as you are willing to completely and permanently sever your relationship with <OM> and acknowledge what happened, I will be willing to talk about our future, and the future of our family that we built with our love. I want to be your best friend, someone who is always there for you when you need me. And I want you as my best friend. I want to spend the rest of my life being your loving husband, and provide you with the love and affection that you deserve.<P>I feel like I have spent my whole life loving you. It took me 30 years to find you, and the next 7 I spent with you. As I reflect on the past and the future, I know that I made the right choice. I found the woman that I want to spend my life with, and that woman is you. I fell madly in love with you when we were brought together, and I love you right up to this day. I just cannot be around you or pretend to be friends as long as you are involved with <OM> and you continue to deny what has occurred.<P>I hope that you understand my decision. I am doing it to protect the love that I have left for you, and it is the only way that I can preserve this love for some additional period of time.<P>I Love You,<P><Me><P><OM>: I love <Wife> with all my heart, and have never given up on our marriage. I miss my wife and am willing to wait for her to give me the chance to help her find happiness. If your parents would truly disown you if they knew of your relationship with a married mother of two children, then I do not understand why you continue this immoral behavior. I ask that you do the honorable thing. End your relationship with my wife, and stop confusing my children by spending time with them.

Rick,<P>May I be a bit candid? I know you are tired and this is soo hard for you. But you need to use this plan b letter with all the force it can have. <P>I am not an expert, but I have used similar to my H. I started out with the fact that I loved him and wanted our family to be together and intact. As you said, this can not happen as long as their is contact with others external to the family arrangement. Then I showed him the impact of his influence on our son. What our son said and did as a result of his dad's actions. Children's viewpoint carry a lot of weight. <P>Finally I ended it with how the needs of myself and son are now a top priority in our lives. We (son & I) have the need to give love and receive love and care from a husband and father that cares for us. This is not an option but a necessary requirement for our family to continue existing. There is only 1 person in the whole world at this time who can fulfill that need. Should that person choose not to be there for us, there is no guarantee that we can be there for him in the future. It is not a threat, just reality since we have been hurt and wounded in such a grave manner. Protecting the love for our family is now something that I as the BS must now do. So, my love, I must give you this request and say that communication must be kept to a bare minimum. Down to 3 matters: money, mail and visitation/dealings with our son. This is important for the health and safety of myself and son. Please respect my wishes. If you later choose to try to find your way back to your family, we may or may not be available. This is a chance you take. I have done the best I could so far. <P>The above is a recall of what I wrote and told my H. As wordy as I get, I did keep it to a minimum. My H is a man of a few words and OW is very talkative. You see, it did not matter who he was with, OW, by himself or someone else. H was away from his family and not able to meet our needs. His needs were no longer priority for me. That is what I communicated to him. <P>My advise is to shorten it up a bit. You are good at expressing your love for her. Share with her the impact of her current conduct, in a loving manner. Show her where you and your family have been hurt. I may get flamed for this thought but it did make H think. H did know he was hurting us but he did not recognize until it was put in his face. <P>Just my 2 cents. I think you need to sleep on this and will feel stronger to deal with it tomorrow. <P>Take Care,<BR>L.<BR>

Rick - Orchid makes some good points, but I don't know if you're past the point of diminishing returns. We may all be guilty of word-smithing these letters way beyond what the WS will be willing to comprehend.<P>You can noodle this thing forever - but I don't see any show stoppers. Simply put - she should melt. If she doesn't, nothing can do it.<P>WAT

I understand your point Orchid, and yes, what I'm saying in this letter is not what I really want to say to her. But what I really want to say is very judgemental. So I can't do it.<P>I also cannot imply that me and the children must be protected and if she doesn't want to be a part of them...bla bla bla, because that would fall on completely deaf ears...you see, she does not see (or let on that she does) what this does to them, she acts like everything is normal, and we officially have 50/50 custody, although I get them at least 1 day extra each week.<P>But in her warped mind, she has them more, because two of the days she has them each week, she is off work. She doesn't consider that she gives them up at least 1 day per week when she doesn't have to, and I take time off work sometimes to be with them (my bosses are very nice to me).<P>Being candid is appreciated, and I am taking a few days to consider this letter finalized, so who knows what I'll do to it over the next 2-3 days.<P>She asked me this morning if we can spend time together on Sunday. I had to answer yes, but I may be in Plan B then. I suppose the fact that she wants to do it is good. I bet OM is away then, otherwise there wouldn't be a request.

Rick<P>I do not know much of your story, but I always see your name posted. I just read your last post. I too have a problem with my marriage, not as drastic as yours but slowly building. My close friends have given me some realistic advice..."Take care of yourself". Apart from the nightmarish situation you and I live, we must survive. What I see happening is that your slowly killing yourself as I do. It´s easier said than done but considering the situation it may be the best thing you can do.

I don't have much advice, but do concur with you regarding stating the impact on the kids.<P>When the walls of rationalization are so high, they just don't see it. Sad but true.<P>My H hasn't a clue what this is doing to his 12 year old daughter, but I do. I think I mentioned to you that he told all three kids about the baby (he's their half sib, so they do have to know)... But of course didn't mention anything about the mother. He pretty much said our littlest will think it's "cool"...(so you can see he is still in the jr. high mental state)<P>But, my 12 year old D, who still shows love towards her dad, and won't really talk to me about much of what she feels, told her best girlfriend "My dad got together with another woman and had a baby" The friend asked if she has seen the baby yet. SHe said "no", in a what are you thinking tone. She added "I'm really angry at my dad for this".<P>So that's where she is.<P>Sad but true...as much as I've hung in there trying to protect my kids from this mess... all I can do now is educate them....and I don't have to say to much, just be consistent with my own behavior.<P>Whether my H wants to believe it or not, he has lost something very important.<P>I wish you the best with your letter. Hopefully the OM will have some sense and back away, especially due to his parents comments.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by tootrusting:<BR><B>Whether my H wants to believe it or not, he has lost something very important.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>So true, so true. You'd think my wife would be extra sensitive of this after the loss of our younger son - instead, despite her good intentions, she's making our surviving son suffer. She is too immersed in herself to see what she's doing.<P>WAT

Rick,<P>With all due respect to terri on the post below, I maintain that you should say all you want to say from your heart so your personal healing process can begin. However, if you cannot right now without being judgemental and bitter, don't. Good letter.<P>I would however completely leave out the postscript message to OM. It validates their relationship in a way and the argument about parents disownment angle is weak at best anyway. Hey, I'd tell my soon-to-be-14-year-old the same thing. But, I'd still love him. The argument doesn't hold water and this is a deal between you and your wife. Keep it on that level. I mean, what's he going to say? Gosh! your right! I'd better cut it out.<P>See, I think you got to the crux of the matter when you said that your wife never had a "single and dating" phase, so she's having it now. As a result, she is forming, emotional, but immature relationships. Do you think marrieds actually give a damn about "the parents" or how it looks? Course not. I mean this is High School crap. Don't validate their relationship. She isn't choosing him over you, she's choosing a lifestyle; one that always runs its course. Trust your instincts.<P>Be strong and good luck.

Totally agree w/Managing in leaving OUT the note to OM. You say this marriage should be YOU AND WIFE, do not give him the satisfaction of believing that he is a part of your life or that he is a threat to you.

Thanks for additional responses.<P>Regarding the note to OM, Steve believes in having one. I'm definitely sending OM a copy. There are already references to the relationship, so I think that is acknowledged anyway.<P>I had never previously even though of not having a note, so I'm interested in any other opinions.<P>The "disown" angle is something I've felt was important. He is from a culture where the parents typically have more control over their childrens actions (thats all I'll say about that). His position to my wife has been all along that they can't have a future, because of his parents, but that "let's take it one day at a time"...probably to keep her hanging on so he can have fun.<P>However, I was told by my wife early on, that "there was an interest, but his parents said they'd disown him...", and I believe this one item. I think I was told because I was onto her, and she wanted to eliminate my belief that there was anything happening.<P>It is not that I'd expect him to suddenly disappear, just think about the fact that his behavior is not secret, and that she has told me something that could be private in his mind.<P>Maybe I think too much Advice always appreciated.

Nuff said about the parental influence. Obviously Steve H. has lots more experience in these matters so I'll defer, but I just think that in some way the deference to him is empowering. Besides, it's treating the symptoms instead of the disease. Doubt your wife needs any kind of serious relationship right now with this guy or any other of her "friends." But, hey,if you want to get a reaction, send the copy to his parents! Just kidding. Sorry, but what a wimp.<P>Again, good luck. You're doing great.

Rick,<P>I, too, share 50/50 custody with my wife with our two daughters. One week here and one there. So I know where you are coming from. This has been going on for about two months now and the girls are tiring of it. My oldest dreads the Sundays she has to go back to her mother's. In fact, she has become somewhat combatitive (verbally) with my wife on it. My wife purposefully took a week's vacation last week as soon as the girls' school year was over to spend time with them. She got the idea of taking them to Cape Cod for a few days to spend some "quality" time. The oldest refused to go go and stayed with me. I'm hoping, like the Harleys state, that this will take a toll on what she thinks she is trying to accomplish. So far, my wife seems oblivious.<P>I's also like to know how Steve Harley felt (I'm just assuming you spoke with him) about you being somewhat open on the conditions that you would talk with your wife again. You stated you would "minimize" contact with her in your letter. Steve pretty much told me there shouldn't be any reason our intermediary couldn't handle any situation that would come up. He wasn't for contact even by e-mail. This is probably why I failed so miserably on my first attempt at Plan B.<P>I'd also like to know what Steve thought of your note to the OM. I love it, especially the part where you accuse him of "confusing" your kids. I'd like to use that in my next attempt. But the very fact that you are accusing him of something seems a little dangerous. Could they use that against you in some way?