an article from this weeks newsletter. Some good reading!

MB Newsletter May 9, 2008

“I’M AFRAID OF HIS REACTION IF I TELL HIM THE TRUTH”


Dear Dr. Harley,

I have been married 8 years to an alcoholic. This is my second marriage and I have a daughter from my first marriage.

I have experienced neglect, rejection, blame, and emotional abuse throughout our marriage. So when someone from work developed an interest in me, I became a crazy person, emailing this person everything my mind thought. I was so extremely empty. It was a very long time before the affair turned sexual, but it eventually did. It’s now been going on for 9 months.

I finally decided to leave the marriage and when I told my spouse, he made a u-turn. He stopped drinking on his own, and completely stopped being abusive. And to the extent that I let him, he has been trying to meet my emotional needs. He is trying very hard to change. He has many good qualities, and I believe if he is willing to work on our marriage, we could make it work.

I have read your book, “Surviving an Affair,” and for the first time I feel like I may have the tools to make a change in my life.

But I’ve been unable to end my affair. I’ve read about how to do it, and how it’s an addiction, but in spite of trying to break it off several times, I’ve failed.

My question is, do I have to tell my spouse about the affair? I believe it would bring on more emotional abuse. Because of his past drinking, and his history of abuse, I have a hard time trusting him. I don’t know what his reaction would be. There is a possibility that it would end our marriage for good. I am tired of the stress and suffering in my life, and for the first time in quite a while, I’m at peace.

Thank you for your advice,

Betsy



Dear Betsy,

As long as you’re having an affair, I don’t think you’ll be at peace for long. Sooner or later your husband will discover it. And even if you were to end the affair once and for all, you’d be keeping one of the most important facts about your life from him. Remember that when you were first in love with your co-worker, you wanted to tell him everything you were thinking. That’s what people in love need to do to remain in love. They want to share everything with each other. If you keep this affair from your husband, you will never experience the emotional bonding in your marriage that you’ve experienced with your lover because there will be important secrets about yourself that you keep to yourself.

But there are other reasons to tell your husband about your affair. One of them is that he deserves to know. When you married him, you promised to be faithful, and you’ve broken that promise. Granted, he may use that information to divorce you on the spot. But even if he makes that decision, he has a right to know what you’ve done.

He doesn’t have the right to be abusive, however. At the same time that you confess your affair and promise to do everything possible to avoid contact with your lover, make it very clear that you will never again allow yourself to be subjected to his abuse. Your husband will have to decide whether or not he wants to remain married to you. But if he makes that decision to build a strong relationship with you, knowing that you had an affair, it means that he will have to remain sober and avoid making any abusive comments to you.

Another reason to reveal your affair to your husband is that you probably can’t end it unless you tell your husband about it. He will hold you accountable for your time and activities after he knows that you’ve been unfaithful. While you may not feel comfortable knowing that your every move is being watched, and you may feel that he’s being controlling in keeping an eye on you, it’s the best way for an addict to be released from their compulsion to return to the source of their addiction.

To be successful in ending an affair, you must take extraordinary precautions to avoid ever contacting your lover again. The first and most obvious precaution is to find another job. But there are many other ways that you’re tempted to contact your lover. Eliminate them all. Many of the couples in your position that I’ve counseled have found that they must go so far as to leave their city to avoid a rekindling of the affair. Some have had to give up use of the internet, or use of their cell phones. On the positive side, building a romantic relationship with your husband, making sure that you spend a minimum of 15 hours of undivided attention each week, is also a crucial step toward recovery.

If your husband had treated you then the way he’s treating you now, you would not have been as tempted to have an affair. In fact, you probably would have treated your lover’s advances as a joke. But now that you’re addicted to this man, it will take every ounce of discipline you can muster to sweep him out of your life. And telling your husband about your affair will be a crucial step toward achieving that objective.

Best wishes
Willard F. Harley, Jr.

Dang! And I was going to post this when I got home...

How's Texas?

Mark

sniff, finally someone posted to my thread! Thankee, Mark!

Why, Texas is BLESSED, of course! [and hot as hale! :eek:]

I happened to notice Dr. Harley didn't really even go into the HOW she should tell her "abusive" husband in a safe manner. Seems he discounted her wayward fears a bit as someone here would certainly tell her to be sure to expose herself with someone present to protect her should her husband become violent (which is good advice...I'm not objecting about any "someone"). Perhaps he's heard enough wayward revisionist history and he just doesn't buy it at anywhere near face value anymore in these situations.

Mr. Wondering

P.P.P.S. - 70 degrees and sunny here in Detroit today. Quite a mild spring...it was downright chilly this morning.

Are you saying that Dr. Harley doesn't buy wayward fogbabble!?? That is a DJ!!

I witnessed the abuse my father committed - on my mother and myself and my brothers and sister. This woman is describing what happened to my mother. And the reasons my mother became vulnerable to the overtures of another man.

Some of the names my dad called her would seem to indicate that he already knew. But from what I've seen on this board, especially with the women who were abused before PAs or EAs (M R S R O B for short), confession has become license for 3 years of abuse for her - intensified from what she was enduring before the EA - imagine what he'd have done to her if it had been a PA.

This would have been my father's behavior. Even though he is tremendously different from when I was a child toward my mother, there is still an edge. Too much of an edge. I don't know how different he is from M R R O B.

On this point, I disagree with my marriage building mentor. However - I also know how a wayward re-writes history. Not all men were always abusive, nor will they betray their character and integrity to become one even after the betrayal is revealed. It is for those so-called abused waywards that I believe his advice is directed to.

I'm with you Kayla. I was married to an abusive husband. One thing I CAN tell you is that never in a million years would I have had an affair. I was walking on eggs everyday, trying not to make waves.

And if I HAD thought about an affair, I would have had to be certain that I would be out of there - maybe an OM from Africa or China.

That said, it makes me very angry when women having affairs claim to be abused. We have fought long and hard to have society recognize that married women can be abused, and it makes me sick to see adulteress' playing the abuse card.

Kayla, I think he DOES believe that some spouses are truly abusive, but still gives the same advice. And I agree with him. Even an abusive spouse has a right to the truth and Dr H makes the point that dishonesty is more likely to cause abuse than honesty.

In another article, Dr Harley gets more specific about the HOWS of telling an abusive spouse; I think he recommends having a counselor or policeman there [my memory is faulty and none of my links work] and taking steps to SEPARATE from the abusive spouse before she is told. Never have I have seen him advocate staying around for abuse.

What point specifically did you disagree with him on?

I'm disappointed. He didn't give her any information about protecting herself. A woman in her situation could end up dead and because she cheated some idiot judge would give him a slap on the wrist. Things like that have happened. (Of course, when a wife kills a cheating husband she tends to get a much harsher sentence.)

She should tell him but in public with witnesses present. And she should make sure he has an anger management counselor. If it weren't for the fact that he has recently stopped the abuse, I would have said move out and tell him from a distance.

"Even an abusive spouse has a right to the truth and Dr H makes the point that dishonesty is more likely to cause abuse than honesty"

LOL - Melody, an abusive spouse finds enough excuses for abuse when the abused spouse is doing nothing wrong. Abuse has nothing to do with honesty or dishonesty.

The letter writer never said he was physically abusive; he is emotionally abusive. However, where there is a risk of violence, he does say how it should handled in another article. But I imagine he figures most women are bright enough to figure that out on their own without having to be told. I give women a little more credit than that. Sure, some are dumb as stumps, but those are the kind that won't heed good advice anyway.

I found that article:


entire article here

I disagree that the betrayed, but physically abusive spouse has a "right" to anything until he cleans up the abuse or at least acknowledges the problem and gets help.

In no way is he ready to acknowledge his contribution to his wife's state of mind before that time.

That's the issue with my dad. I witnessed horrible things, including the audio portion of my mother being raped frequently. While he has changed and doesn't treat her this way anymore, he has never recognized his harm to her.

Until he can, he will never be able to view my mother's response to a kind, and attracted man in the light that will allow healing from the cheating and the disclosure.

And while your logical brain can say that if your husband were abusive, you'd never dare to cheat... well, not necessarily. My mother resisted advances from other men for 11 years of abuse. My dad began his abuse 3 weeks into their marriage - when my then 18 year old mother asked what happened to the sweetheart he told her married people don't act that way. It was post WWII 1940s. Her father had practically disowned her for married Dad in the first place. My mom was a pretty feisty woman, but Dad tried to beat it out of her and made her feel like NOTHING. He did the same to his children.

As his daughter, I was looking for substitute daddies - the kind my friends had. I dreaded "daddy daughter dates" that the church put together. I looked for fathering from teachers - I was nearly raped by a 65 yr old man due to the need for a father. I KNOW why my mother fell for another man.

Things aren't so cut and dried when someone makes you feel something decidedly different than the curseword of the day.

All of this talk about his being abusive, while we are ignoring the very real and likely even more hurtful abusive behavior of this woman.

Affairs are abusive, period.

So while this woman is complaining about her husbands abuse, she seems to discount and minimize her own abusive behavior.

Not that she deserves to be abused.

But then again, he doesn't deserve the abuse he has received either.

There are TWO abusers in that relationship.

You mean the excuses this woman is using to justify her abusive behavior...

Agree, EE, adultery is just as abusive as rape or physical violence. There is never an excuse for it. She was abused by his alcoholism and he was abused by her adultery. At least she knows the truth about his abuse, it is in the open, he doens't know that she is abusing him behind his back.

Kayla - forgive my "denseness," but could you explain what these intials mean? It's very hard to understand the example when I don't have any idea of what the initials refer to.

Sorry for being so uniformed.

Thanks in advance for your help.

"heaven hold a place for those who pray, hey, hey, heeyyy"

God bless....

Take the Sir name Mrs and Mr and put the rest of the letters together - she started posting more than 3 years ago, after having an EA w/phone sex. Her husband was abusive before, but then it escalated; she is so beaten down she doesn't have the courage to tell their ecclesiastical leader what he's been doing since long before - she didn't in any way want to sound like she was excusing or minimizing what she's done.

Her husband found out she was posting here and banned her from sharing on MB. In light of the abusive situation, it's a fate that she shouldn't have to endure and he won't change until there is exposure. She's suffering the consequences of only partial exposure - meaning - the lack of safety and equality in the marriage was not exposed. Any discussion he perceives here about their situation and he ups the ante on the abuse.


She really needs to get out, confess ALL things to their church leader and allow her husband to deal with the wrongness of his behavior.

Melody,

That's bs. Adultery doesn't make you fear for your life. People can walk away from a cheating spouse without risking their lives. A lot of people try walking away from an abusive spouse and end up dead. Why should we have any more sympathy for an abusive spouse who gets cheated on than a cheating spouse who gets cheated on? If you hit your spouse, you've broken your marriage vows, period. Such a person, until they get help, has no more right to expect fidelity than a cheating spouse.

bullcrap, no one deserves to be abused. People have a right to know the truth about their own lives. Folks don't have an entitlement to ABUSE anyone and then lie about it.

I would also point out that ADULTERY is about the WORST abuse, short of killing the spouse, that one can inflict on a person. It is a far worse violation than physical assault and right up there with RAPE. Lying to avoid consequences just compounds the crime.

So what you are saying is that some people DESERVE abuse. It's the old, if he wouldn't have..., she wouldn't have abused him. We reject such arguments when men try to use them to blame shift out of their physical abuse. For such an arguement to remain valid, we need to reject it in ALL cases, not just in the cases of physical abuse. If a wife is emotionally or verbally abusive, such as an affair, we need to reject such blame shifting every time.

Otherwise, why should we have sympathy for anyone who is abused, using your logic. Chances are any one who has been abused has also abused someone, meaning they deserve the abuse they got.

Now I don't believe the above, but those who say that abusers deserve the infidelity or should not expect fidelity are in essence saying that abuse is earned and valid in some cases. Like I said, the only, if he/she didn't do.... I wouldn't have done ....

REJECTED

I don't think you will find too many who will argue that anyone ever deserves to be abused, regardless what they have done to others.

Affairs are emotional abuse, and no one, not even an abuser deserves to be abused, period.

Wow!



Perhaps we can challenge ourselves to be sympathetic to people who are stuck in life, hurting others and being hurt themselves. That's how I felt when I reached out to YOU when you started posting on MB.

Pep

Using her logic, then the wayward wife in this scenario DESERVES to be abused too.

Mel - I love ya - but we disagree. I have no way of knowing what this woman truly knows about her safety. Most often the threat of violence with exposure is fog talk. But in some, - example - one who doesn't post here anymore - it was very very real.

And in my mother and father's case - well - let's just say, I personally know the trauma of witnessing BOTH the violence and the adultery. One forever deprived me of a true sense of safety, and the other deprived me of childhood innocence. The pain for each is different and not equal. Both very bad. I have prayed to see this through spiritual eyes and know that Jesus alone is the only one who can heal the harm both did. But while Mom knows what she did wrong, I don't know that my father will ever fathom how badly he hurt his children through his temper - directly and indirectly. At least he won't without help from God.

I love them both. They are just now beginning to learn how much they love each other - after a lifetime of hard time. At the end.

I suspect she would know better than either of us, though. She knows him better than we do. The threat of violence exists in EACH AND EVERY case. We just have no way of knowing. More often than not, it never comes to that. Thankfully..

There are avenue's to deal with abusive situation's.

Aphaeresis - Ahhhh....then what your philosophy seems to be is:


"IF 'A', THEN 'B'."


We are back to "personal Standards," what they are and why should someone choose a given set of Standards for themselves.

You seem to arguing for a very "humanistic" sort of "standard" when someone's actions are "determined" by what someone else does.

The issue is not what the "offender" expects, it is an issue of personal Standards that the "offended" person has for themselves as well as their own "Boundaries"('if you do this, I will do thusly').

Spousal abuse is, imho, "marital unfaithfulness," but the "question" is "by whose standards is 'unfaithfulness' to be judged?"

This is the issue of morality and WHO determines what "morality" is and what "immorality" is?

You are "dancing on the head" of your own viewpoint, and then applying that viewpoint to someone else and/or to someone else's situation. By what "universal standard" should someone make such a judgment that the Standards "they" embrace for themselves should apply to anyone else?

For example: consider two apparently differing views;

1. "Spare the rod and spoil the child."

2. "If you spank me, Mommy or Daddy, I can call the Police and have you arrested for 'child abuse.'"


Or consider this "standard," "Do not return evil for evil."

How about "Karma?"

How about "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."


Abuse of any sort is wrong, according to the standards that I have accepted, given by the only true Judge of all behavior.

The question seems to be "what responsive action is 'right' for a person receiving abuse and what actions are plainly 'wrong'?"

Avoiding "consequences" for our actions seems to be part of the desired "foggyness" of the "confession" issue.

IMHO, honesty is ALWAYS the best option. BUT, I do NOT think that in a TRULY physically abusive situation that the abuser is do anything other than jail time. A spouse...wayward or not..should do everything they can to get away from an abuser...for good. I think a major issue here is that women frequently play the abuse card...and I am certain that waywards would play it even more...when no actual abuse occurs.

Dr. H SHOULD encourage people to be safe...it is much more important than a marriage. Abusers have broken their vows and have no rights in a marriage IMHO. They have broken their vows in a way that is just as bad (if not worse) than adultery. It doesn't matter who the abuser is...female or male...they both are dangers that need to be protected against.

If a WS is to tell an abusive BS what has happened...it should occur AFTER the TRULY abused has found safety.

Spite and might had a fight, but might could not win, for spite had started the fight before might even had a clue there was a fight.