Why are you still focusing on him instead of YOU? If you are sincere in why you are here, you will not ask us to help you continue your delusion that you are special...if it wasn't you it would have been someone else. I'm sorry to be so blunt, but if you really want to heal yourself you will look at YOURSELF and start clearing the delusion you are still living. That is about YOU. <p>I hope you are sincere in why you said you are here. If you are, your posts will be about YOU and you won't mention him at all. You dumped him...good way to protect your fantasy and never have to experience the reality that he would dump you when he was done with you. It was exercising false power to dump him. True power would be looking at YOUR defects and dealing with them.<p>Again, I hope this helps but I think you would find the help you really need somewhere else. Try starting by finding a group that deals with very low self esteem. Take care.

Well, I think you should be proud of yourself for considering your ways and ending the affair. That guy was a loser all the way around and you know it.<p>I think this place is a good place for you to be. I think you can learn a great deal about how to start protecting yourself from your own weaknesses because when/if you ever become a wife, it is an ongoing process.<p>You can have the best hubby and the healthiest marriage and still be vulnerable to an affair. The key is in learning how to protect your relationship through understanding your spouses' top emotional needs, what the love busters are, and how to fill those needs and avoid the love busters. All the information is on this site!<p>I'm glad you are here. If only I could have had the brains to dump the MM I got pregnant by like you did, maybe I would not have created even more pain in his family's life and in the life of my OC. But everybody is recovered from all that--it happened a long time ago. I am blessed to be married now and I have learned that you still have to work at protecting yourself and protecting your marriage--through open and honest communication, the policy of joint agreement (never do anything without the enthusiastic agreement of your spouse), etc. Keep reading, keep learning... Keep posting--if you dare! [img]images/icons/grin.gif" border="0[/img] <p>http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi5060_qa.html<p>My affair was abruptly halted due to my pregnancy! I don't know how else it would have ended?? I'm glad it ended tho. You should be glad too. Now, you can start making better choices for yourself and for your future.<p>God forgives us for our sins, but consequences do not. Good luck in all your sincere MB efforts.<p>How can you aid MM's "withdrawal" (if any)? MOVE away, change your phone number, change jobs, avoid contact of any kind. Do not contact his wife. Just erase yourself from his life altogether. Treat him the way you would want women to treat your future husband... Personally, I'm happy that you are considering the (your) future consequences. Good luck!

Okay, let's see if I can say what needs to be said without disrespectful judgements. [img]images/icons/rolleyes.gif" border="0[/img] <p>You come to Marriage Builders, name yourself OW, talk about playing with the couple's infant in their marriage bed, title your post that you're ready to be flamed, and then are SURPRISED when you get flamed?<p>Give me a break. <p>Girl, you came here to hurt, plain and simple. <p>Don't tell me that I am being judgemental and "don't understand"... I was an OW once... yeah, I understand. And yep, I was the betrayed spouse too... so I've been on both sides.<p>I know, I know: He loved you for you, it wasn't only sexual, he listened to you, you listened to him, blah blah blah. Every single OP thinks the same thing... why not just add that he made you feel "alive" and he's your "soulmate" and his wife "never understood him"?? <p>If you really want help, find a friend, a clergyperson, a therapist... and get some help.

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by OW:
<strong>I am thinking of me, I am thinking what can I do as a woman so that my husband doesn't make the same grevious error. </strong><hr></blockquote><p>OW,<p>Might I suggest that you are asking the wrong question here? Why would you allow yourself to be used like a whore by a man who had no honorable intentions towards you? My God, he brought you in his own wife's bed.[and you went!] I would suggest counseling to find out why you have such a lack of respect for yourself, not to mention a breathtaking ignorance of the difference between right and wrong.

OW, I am sure you thought you were in love, etc. I am glad you were strong enuogh to end what is and was so wrong. I do hope you will put yourself in therapy. <p>I have heard it is common for daughters... and for that matter sons of adulterers... to committ adultery themselves... somehow thinking it holds an answer or a key. and that an affair can have more love.. and fun than a marriage... Maybe temporarily and immorally and wrongfully? But this is never what is right and good.<p>I have 2 children... and after each birth my h felt neglected,a nd I am very sure of this. <p>I am so sorry that you participated, but I hope you learned a lesson you can grow from and learn form.<p>try church, please try counseling, even antidepressants while you recover.<p>In therapy you can find out why you did this. YOu can pinpoint it.<p>Be careful and don't fall backinto it.... let him go.<p>Are you concerned about his pain? Is that why you ask about withdrawl? I am sure you do care in a sick way for him... realize if you do care... you are really releasing him to have a chance to heal his family and marriage.. Just let go... it is a very difficult thing to do.<p>I am now haunted by nightmares and even harrassing phone calls by ow's who will not leave my life alone. <p>Please realize you have to move on.<p>His pain will cease and he has what he was suppossed to be devoted to right in front of him... his wife and family... he now has a chance to be happy wit h his wife and child. Please allow that... he will miss you, be assured... but bittersweetly...it was a wrong thing. <p>The withdrawl is usaally the most severe in month 1, after a few months it can be completely over with. I am just so sorry that you are upset over it.<p>Remorse is good, and it is good to know you did wrong. Please learn from that... and why you did it... learn so you do not go there again...or reestablish contact with him .<p>H

Welcome, OW. If you are ready to put this behind you, you can find help here. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt that you want to learn from this mistake and offer my perspective as a male BS.<p>First, I would like to speculate that being only two weeks out from the affair, your recovery has only just begun. This is not based on my personal experience, of course, but is gleened from reading hundreds of stories here. There are numerous books you can consult that will help you see better. For your former partner's perspective, I suggest you read Harley's Surviving An Affair for some insight, but are lots others.<p> <blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by OW:
<strong>So many people here have posted that affairs occured when the wife was pregnant or shortly after the birth of a child. I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on why a new child caused enough stress for me to be a part of MM's life, and if there's anything that I should keep in mind for the future-- besides never sleeping with a MM again-- </strong><hr></blockquote><p>Well, IMHO, this guy was no man. He was selfish, shallow and immature to the point that he couldn't handle this new challenge in his life and he chose to use you as an escape pod. Plain and simple. You are as much a victim as his wife and child - albeit a willing one.<p>Frequently, life crises result in affairs - read my sig line for an idea of what contributed to my X's. But one man's ceiling is another man's floor and the birth of a child to a REAL man is an opportunity for growth in a marriage, not a cause to run.<p>How to prevent this when considering a prospective husband? I don't know other than making sure your future husband has the maturity and courage to face challenges without compromising his integrity.<p>For your immediate situation, I suggest you never, ever, ever contact your former accomplice in crime again. Read and post on this board as an honest, soul searching, former OW and adopt the attitude that you want to learn and heal. Convince others here that you are sincere and you'll be embraced.<p>Good luck,

Sorry to intrude, but what's this "other board" you're talking about?

I was just going to ask the same thing? It might be educational to see what the OW have to say

There are so many reasons why a relationship becomes strained during a pregnancy. For the most part, the reason a man would enter into an affair during a pregnancy are much the same as why he would enter into one at any other time. Read the books "Surviving an Affair", "Love Busters" and "His Needs, Her Needs". That will give you a clue.<p>RE: “ But as we all know it is a two way street. I know that people get complacent in relationships”<p>Anytime there is stress in a relationship, it sets the stage for needs not being met. And that sets a stage for an affair. The difference is that some people can weather the stress, others cannot. You see, an affair has nothing to do with the BS. It has everything to do with the WS. Yes marriages go through times of stress, times of boredom, sometimes complacency etc. Each spouse is 50% responsible (usually) for the state of the marriage. But the WS is 100% responsible for their affair. In this case it was the MM’s chosen way to behave.<p>While affairs do happen at times when women are pregnant, I do not think they are more likely to happen at that time. That statistics are that 40%-50% of all men and women will cheat on their spouses and affairs occur in 60% of all marriages. <p>I would venture to say that there is a distinct difference between the reasons why men and women enter into affairs. I say this from what I’ve witnessed both here on MB, in my life and in books I’ve read. Most men, not all but most, have affairs almost as a sport. It’s a diversion. It does not mean that they do not ‘like’ the OW, only that they would never leave their wife for her. Yes, here we have seen some men who are very emotionally attached to their OW. But I have not seen that much of it in my lifetime. What I’ve seen more are MM who are cakemen, just getting all they can from anyone who will give it to them. Cakemen have no problem finding women who are easy to attract with a little bit of attention. There are tons of insecure women out there who will fall for anyone who pays attention to them.<p>As an example, my ex-husband had many affairs the entire time I knew him. He had little or not deep feelings for these women. He simply felt that this is a man’s prerogative. His grandfather did it, his father did it, and now he was doing it. Made life more ‘fun’ for him. <p>I think that usually when a woman has an affair it’s more dangerous to the marriage as she is usually more emotionally attached. I know this is a generalization and as such is not true in all cases. But I do believe that if one were to do a study they would find this is true.<p>As for the pregnancy issue and <p>RE: “but why would a man look for another woman at such a critical time” <p>Pregnancies add a level of stress that can make that a vulnerable time… as can many other life changes. Some of these can be:<p>Some women’s sexual drive goes down during a pregnancy and after. In some cases the woman is self-conscious of her bloated body. <p>Some times women become consumed with the pregnancy, childbirth and child rearing. <p>Some men do not find their wife attractive as her body expands in the pregnancy. They are selfish, boorish and unable to love a woman fully.<p>Some men do not want children and the responsibility they bring. So they seek out someone else because their wife now represents responsibility.<p>Some men are just immature and seek strokes elsewhere when a pregnancy and baby demand time from their wife. Instead of pitching in and helping, they pull away and feel like they are abandoned.<p>Some men (and women) will just any excuse they can find to have an affair. Some people have no respect for their spouses and will do things like bring the OP into the marital bed and even share their children with that person. That you could even consider yourself in love with someone who could do this is very disturbing. It’s a huge violation of his wife. <p>Always ‘listen’ to a person’s actions, not their words. He told you all sorts of things to get you to his marital bed. But what he was really ‘saying’ is that he wants to hurt his wife, to defile her. And he used you to do this. You should not feel honored or loved because he did this. You should feel hurt and used. Some day his wife is going to find out about this. Yes she will. She may already know. He will make sure she does because this was a message to HER. It had little to do with you.<p>Yes some day you may get your just reward. You seem to have little value for marriage, well except for your own eventual marriage. So you will be a high candidate for either having an affair yourself. You will also be a more likely to be a BS. Why? Because you are more likely to pick out someone who has poor relationship skills and low value for fidelity in marriage as you do. <p>RE “... you have all had husbands offer you excuses”<p>In my case, and in so many of them here.. the ‘excuse’ my current husband gave me is “I don’t know why I did it. I love you and want our marriage to work.”<p>In my previous marriage he will weasel and deny the affairs, despite my having plenty of evidence in hand, until the day he dies. Yep, he loved all of those women enough to stand up for them? Right? HA<p>
The affair has NOTHING to do with the BS. It is the WS’s choice to have an affair. A person can NEVER drive their spouse to have an affair. There are no viable excuses for an affair. You see, when a marriage has problems, the way to respond is to work on the marriage not to run off and find someone else to meet your needs.<p>So the excuses I’ve been give boil down to: “All men do it.”, “It’s a man’s preparative.”, “I don’t know, I was just driven and I hated myself the entire time.”<p>RE: I am thinking of me, I am thinking what can I do as a woman so that my husband doesn't make the same grievous error. <p>If you want to affair proof your future marriage then read the material and books from this web site and read those on the web site www.divorcebusting.com. They will make you a better person and a better spouse. Before you get married, involve your fiancé in some engagement encounters with the Harley’s and with Michele at Divorce Busters. Get him to buy in to the same philosophy of marriage as you have. But realize, that even with all of this work, you cannot control his actions. There is a 40-50% chance that your future H will have an affair regardless of what you do. Why? Because affairs have NOTHING to do with the BS and EVERYTHING to do with the WS.<p>You are wise to seek the answers you are seeking. But please be a little more sensitive here. No one on this site has a responsibility to educate you. Your original post was very hurtful. It almost seems like you want to strike out and hurt people with it. It also seems that you are hoping he is having some pain ‘withdrawing’. <p>For get him, work on you. The others here who say that from your perspective it has everything to do with you and not him are right. Look into yourself. Look at how to be a better person, one who makes right choices. And yes, learn about healthy marriages and how to affair proof them.

Patient1,<p>No flame here, you are so right. That’s it in a nutshell. And again it has nothing to do with the BS and everything to do with the WS. <p>Why? Because he has the choice of telling his wife how he feels, of getting involved in the child rearing, of helping his wife cope with the changes and demands. Instead he chooses to feel sorry for himself and go find fun.

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by OW:
<strong> At this point, I'm terrified of getting married and having a child and getting "my just desserts."</strong><hr></blockquote><p>OW,
If you believe at all in the concept of karma, I would be worried about this, too. In my experience, and in hearing the experiences of others, it does seem that life has a funny way of coming full circle--what you do will come back to you.<p>When I was 20 years old and in college, I had an internship in a public relations office for a summer. I wound up falling in love with my boss, who was 37 at the time, and married. I was miserable with the strong feelings I had for him, but never would have told him--until he admitted the same feelings for me. It was all downhill from there. He ultimately left his wife to be with me. The relationship lasted a couple of years, until I met a guy my own age and felt compelled to leave my MM. He was devastated, and I felt guilty for a long time, both for having the affair and then for leaving him in the end, after he changed his life to be with me.<p>I married the next guy I got involved with (the one my own age). We had a few happy years, until I had a baby, and my H grew more and more distant. MY H finally confessed that he was in love with another woman. I was devastated at this news, and became involved an affair of my own--a terrible downward spiral from which we never recovered.<p>Now, my life is a wreck. Everything I dreamed of having--the happy family life that I wanted--is destroyed and so far out of reach. While most people say God doesn't work that way, I can't help but wonder if the devastation of my own marriage is my 'payback' for my earlier sins. Even though I was young, foolish, and very love-stricken, I look back now and think I should have found a way to get out of that situation or prevent it from happening. But, I didn't. Am i now paying for that?<p>So, from someone who has been (truly!) on all sides of this sad triangle, I would beware of history repeating itself. It often does.<p>calla

This is a marriage builders forum. I have absolutely nothing to offer you in the way of advice. Don't be surprised by the 'flaming' you will receive if you continue to post here. I'm sure there are other places more appropriate for your needs

OW,<p>I think your best bet is to get the book "The Monogamy Myth", you can get it at the website below or at amazon.com. I recommend it because it describes how noone is immune to as affair. The best way to not have one is open communication with your spouse. If it is future protection you want it will help, as well as understanding why the MM was involved with you. There is something in the book about events in your life that can make someone have an affair (a new baby is one of them). The A was based on fantasy not reality and even if you did not end it it would have had 3 possible outcomes: wife finding out, husband ending on his own, it would have come to it's naturally end (usually 6 months up to 2 yrs). <p>Read the book and educate yourself.

I won't flame you either. <p>If you truly want some answers, I suggest you do lots of reading. After you've read and lurked awhile, you may feel more comfortable posting. Read the concepts on this web-site, read the books everyone has recommended, read all over this forum, and pray for guidance.

Just woke up and all of your posts. Thank you all so much. Again, I'm sorry if I was hurtful to anyone, and everything that was written here will give me a lot to think about, and a lot to read! Again, thank you for being so open, I DO appreciate it.

OW<p>I think you've got some fixing to do on you long before you worry about a future husband straying. When you marry your job is to be the best wife you can be. <p>If he's selfish & weak & has the opportunity to choose to do some chick, there isn't anything you can do to stop it.<p>So, you start out by choosing a guy with morals, values, good habits who loves & respects you. Your choice of man & being a good wife are all the power you have to prevent cheating. <p>Now, for you...<p>Going to the marital bed...how icky. What, he couldn't afford a motel? Why would you do that? Why would you enter that home?<p>Please don't tell me it's just because he invited you and you didn't think or that you just wanted to spend some time with him and that's where he was.<p>Do you realize that reveals incredibly bad judgement on your part? Being with a MM could just be weakness & lack of judgement, but going to his house and doing what you did is...horrible. And you think it wasn't just about sex...<p>Find a very good counselor.

Hi OW, please do not be scared off by the flamers, there are a lot of posters here that will be willing to talk to you and help you. You are still young, and it is good you want to learn from your mistakes and try not to make them in the future. It is kind of ironic that Cali is crying over how she was treated over at gloryb, only to turn around and treat you the same way. Do as I say, not as I do Cali?

look findingmywayback, I did not in anyway flame OW... I questioned her judgement in coming here and writing the story the way she did. I got roasted and toasted by SmartyPants, et. al. <p>I was trying to prevent a flame war. Prevent the stupid back and forth game that some like to play on both boards... it doesn't serve anybody... especially those in pain whose posts go unanswered.<p>Show me where I have treated OW disrespectfully.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by OW:<p>Well, I'll bite. I'm often met with bitterness or harsh words here when I voice my opinions or advice as a very recent OW and WS myself. But this is a site for rebuilding marriages I must say. I'm here to grow to be a better, happier person and save my M.
That said, affairs are unique just as people & marriages are. They happen for different reasons, depending on the people involved. Needs that are unmet in marriage get filled by the OP.
In my case, my ex-OM too had a pregnant W. I think that fact was merely happenstance in our case. Our friendship formed before she was pregnant with their 2nd child. Many years later when I became pregnant with OM child (long story, it's posted all over here) OM was very attracted to me and often initiated lovemaking during this time, right up until I had the baby and was as big as a beach ball. He also didn't want A to end and had witnessed my transformation from being so focused on our relationship to becoming a doting mother and wife. I guess I don't see the correlation between pregnancy and affairs. Timing and lack of needs being met is what brought me and OM together back then.

Ok OW,<p>I need to talk to you. Can you elaborate on your profile a little more? You sound WAY TOO MUCH like my WH's OW. Would LOVE to chat w/ you.<p>PI