I found out my husband was having an affair 5 months ago with a co-worker. I had been questioning him about this woman for about 1 1/2 years prior to finally finding out the truth. No matter how much he denied the affair, I had a feeling deep down that I was being lied to. I finally picked up a very explicit message from his voicemail while he was out of the country that confirmed my suspicions. 5 months into this, I am still terribly hurt. He takes all of the blame and has been extremely remorseful. I've asked him a number of times what I did to cause him to turn to another woman and he continues to tell me it wasn't my fault. Well, I know that's not true, there was something I was not providing other than sex and he either doesn't know or refuses to tell me (like anything could hurt me more than the betrayal).

The affair is ended. I know that. I love my husband, I'm just finding it hard to talk to him about my feelings. He is not a good communicator anyway and I think he thinks as long as I don't bring anything up, everything is just great. Well it's not! I need to know the answers to so many questions. I think that would help me heal but he thinks it would just hurt me more. How do I make him see we need a little help?

I'm sorry that you're having to go through this, but this is a good site for support. Let me be the first to say, however, that your H's affair was NOT your fault. Your M may have been ripe for an A, but the two of you probably contributed to that together. That said, your H could have chosen to take another path with his unhappiness. For example, he could have told you he was unhappy and suggested marriage counseling.

If your H is truly remorseful and willing to help rebuild the M, you might start by filling out the EN questionnaire. I think you can download it from this site. If you're both honest in filling it out, you should be able to identify the areas of weakness you and he need to address.

You should also start asking those questions that you feel are necessary to have answered. Be prepared to hear some pretty terrible things, however. You may want to start seeing a good therapist together before you start exploring the deeper issues.

Good luck.

My marriage of 23 years has ended because my husband had an affair that lasted for over a year that I know of. I know all too well the "roller coaster". I am in a relationship with a new man now. My biggest problem is that I cannot trust. This man has never given me any reason not to trust him but I am so afraid that if I do I will get hurt again. If my husband of 23 years will cheat on me what's stopping a man I've only known a few months? If anyone out there has any words of wisdom to help me.... Please. It is causing a big strain on my new relationship but I just don't know what to do to be able to completely trust someone again.

Dear Ritza,

I'm so sorry for your pain! You really can't move on if you need the details for your own healing and you aren't getting them. Read the articles at www.dearpeggy.com . There are some really good ones there and one especially on needing to know the details and why it is so important to your healing.

Keep posting! There are a lot of other good resources out there. Don't beat yourself up about the affair being your fault. That's really old school thinking. He had choices no matter how bad things were or weren't in the marriage. Now the choice is whether or not you both want to improve the marriage and try to keep it healthy. Partners in a healthy relationship and healthy within themselves as individuals are less likely to engage in an affair.

Hang in there! I'm just 4 months from d-day, but I've done a lot of healing because I got my questions answered early on. You need answers too and you are very right that you need them to heal!

Stillwed

</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by Tattoogirl:
<strong>My marriage of 23 years has ended because my husband had an affair that lasted for over a year that I know of. I know all too well the "roller coaster". I am in a relationship with a new man now. My biggest problem is that I cannot trust. This man has never given me any reason not to trust him but I am so afraid that if I do I will get hurt again. If my husband of 23 years will cheat on me what's stopping a man I've only known a few months? If anyone out there has any words of wisdom to help me.... Please. It is causing a big strain on my new relationship but I just don't know what to do to be able to completely trust someone again.</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Maybe you shouldn't be in a committed relationship right now seeing that you still haven't recovered from your emotional wounds caused by your ex-WH's A. You are not being fair to yourself or to the new man in your life, and sooner or later he will loose enough love for you and he is going to leave you. Better to go back to being friends, with the potential of developing a true committed relationship in the future, than to permit the friendship to die as well. So get emotionally healthy first.

Tatoogirl, you've gotten good advice. I'm still in a relationship of 24 years where my WS has had 4 A's. Talk about a flawed relationship. I'm still in it and I still have hope for it. Where could trust ever come from such a damaged relationship? Only from actions and not words. The next few weeks & months will give us the answers if we decide to go that far.

I hope you can take a step back and ponder the cause of your lack of trust. Were the issues in your 1st relationship ever confronted? Were they ever resolved? You say the relationship ended for whatever reason. Don't take with you into your new relationship that which destroyed your first.