It's been a week since I left the house and wrote her the 'Dear Jane' letter. Today was my first day off since I moved out and I have been doing a lot of self reflection. Can I save my marriage? Did I over react? Can I trust her again? Could I ever be the man that I once was when I married her? Unfortunatly, I don't think I have the emotional capacity at this stage to give myself an honest answer. I suppose I should address the issue at hand first before get ahead of myself.
My wife and I have been married for a year and a half, having been the together for 4 1/2 years. However, the last year has been especially difficult. Both off our aspirations for bettering our futures were cut short earlier this year and as a result of our current living condition, which hasn't changed since we met, we have been at each others thoats. I'll admit that I have become emotionaly withdrawn, but in return my wife has been extremely short tempered with everyone. I think things started to fall apart when I called her a "dreamer", a comment that she has never forgiven me for.
As a result she began to hangout with her co-workers more often the normal, and hardly got to see her anymore. When we did have time to see each other she seemed highly annoyed and edgy, like she could be spending her time better on other things that were gong on in her life. We also fought over her spending time with a male friend who was working on a project with her, I felt like a third wheel during the time he was over at our house and was honestly jealous. She seemed to take on a whole new personality and her judgment was laking in some respects.
She told me that she could no longer be there for me emotionally. That I didn't have experience with relationships and could only see things in black and white and not in shades of gray. She suggested that I should see someone else and that we should have an open marriage until her mood passed. I was deeply hurt by this, I felt like I failed as a husband, and did not want to hurt anyone else as a result of the bad blood in hour house.
About a month ago she began mentioning the idea of becoming a dominatrix to make some extra money and humiliating men at the same time. She told me no sex would be involved, as she had no sex drive, and it was just about the money and asked me my opinion about it. I gave her the most neutral answer I could, "you do what you want to do." I knew I should have said "HELL NO", but figured I would have been seen as controling. She said it was just an idea, and I figured I called her bluff. However, she never droped the subject matter.
During this time we were becoming finaclialy independendt of one another after a long stream of arguments over bills. She decided to set up her own bank account after two years of being on mine. However, she did not reveal this to me untill a few days after she did the act. In response I set up a new account with my bank as a means of limiting her access to my funds. This fueled her rage and added to the accusations of secret plots to leave her.
The storm clouds began to appear on Sunday of the week before when she returned home after a shopping trip with some new lingerie and some kinky shoes, the brand of which I recognized from a local sex shop we frequented. Additionally I noticed a new small silver travel case appeared at the foot of our bed the next day. I snooped, no toys but some pretty suspicous clothing. That night I was going to ask her for a seperation, but as I worked late that day I didn't want to drop that bomb right before we went to bed. Tuesday the case went missing, I got worried and checked the "casual encounters" section on craigslist, sure enough an add for a new dominatrix had been posted friday that sounded exactly like her. The concept of betrayal was crushing, but I had no hard evidence.
At first I turned to Iphone tracker to track her movements using my own Ipod. Thats when I ran across the emails, as she had previously used my Ipod and had it set up to revieve her mail. I will not tell you what I found, but it was pretty daming. I went and talked to my mom and a few close friends, and came to to the conclusion that I needed to leave. So last Wednesday, a day we were to have off together, she went to 'visit a friend's 2new college roommate' while I 'went to the shooting range'.
Fast forward to now: a week of tears, lttle appitite, restless nights and emotionally charged text messages. The extra hours at work has helped keep my mind from wandering too much, but still I think. We have talked since then, both face to face and on the phone. She told me that she never went through with the act and chickened out at the last moment. I want to believe her, but that knife in the back is too heavy for me totrust here now if not ever again. She legitimizes her actions because they were not actually sexual, just role playing, and because I gave her the 'OK'.
I don't think either one of us wants this divorce, but I feel like I have been backed into a corner. Her solution to this mess would be to go through with the seperation for six months and 'date' on the weekends. I don't think this will work without seeing an MC, something which she finds abhorant. As such I'm at a crossroads, I really want our marriage to work but don't know if I could ever trust or love her as much as I did prior to this event.
She says the divorce is something I wanted not her. At times I think that she is right, that I over reacted and should learn to forgive her for a mistake as grevious as this. However, I also feel cheated, hurt and deeply saddened by what our relationship has become. I hate the man that I have become, paranoid shell of my former self who would expect nothing but complete submission if we were to reconcile. I believe that a relationship should be based on equality and support and don't know if I can accept her back into my life again on those terms.
I feel like I said a mouthful. Any advice would be extremely helpful.
PS: If 'Mistress Lilith' is reading this than she is a hypocite and needs to stop playing the victim.
Take a few minutes and re-read your post. Then go to the Coping With Infidelity section here at TAM and read posts there.
Your wife violated your trust and I believe it's quite possible she at least had an emotional affair (EA) with her male work colleague. When you mentioned her judgement "was lacking in some respects" what do you mean? Can you provide examples?
In your stories there are a number of things you list that are considered Red Flags for (potentially) cheating on this site. In your case they would include:
-she began to hangout with her co-workers more often the normal, and hardly got to see her anymore
-she seemed highly annoyed and edgy
-spending time with a male friend who was working on a project with her
-She seemed to take on a whole new personality and her judgment was laking in some respects
-She told me that she could no longer be there for me emotionally - This is a huge Red Flag and is also know as the "I Love You But Not In Love With You" (ILYBNINWY) speech.
-She suggested that I should see someone else and that we should have an open marriage until her mood passed - Another huge Red Flag!
-she said she had no sex drive
-Becoming a dominatrix
I could keep on going but I think you get it.
To be brutally honest, I would be surprised if she DIDN"T have an affair (a physical one).
Her emails must have convinced you that I'm right judging by what you said (didn't say) here.
She is most likely lying telling you that it didn't go physical. I also think that she had a physical relationship with someone before the dominatrix episode based on what you've posted. Don't believe her. If she wants to prove it to you, insist that she take a polygraph.
She wants to seperate from you so she'll be able to carry on dating and keep you around if it doesn't work out for her. You are her back-up plan!
You did not over-react to all of this! Somethings way off here and your gut is screaming at you to investigate! Do not have sex with here until you get to the bottom of this! She could give you an STD (and if I were you, I'd get tested NOW because you may already have been exposed)
She is manipulating you like a pro here. She has you questioning yourself about everything.
Here are a few investigative actions you should implement as soon as possible:
Put a voice activated recorder (VAR) under the seat of her car with heavy duty velcro. Cheaters feel safe talking in their vehicles
Get cell phone detail billing statements and look for an abnormally large amount of texts/phone calls to a single number or two that you don't recognize. Make note of the time of day these communications happen
If she's still in the house and using a shared PC, put a keylogger program on it
As toffer said it would be a miracle if she didn't have an affair. It probably started before she became a dominatrix, most likely with the coworker she hang around with. Once she became a dominatrix the gates opened and very likely she had multiple affairs with multiple guys.
You should have left way back when she asked for an open marriage. Usually that term goes with serial cheaters, not the regular run of the mill cheater. You might want to check if she has secret accounts on hook-up sites and her phone bill if she has been getting calls from strange numbers.
Do you have an idea what they did with the college roommates? Or if she was even there?
Quote:
She says the divorce is something I wanted not her.
True but she was the one that destroyed whatever was left of the marriage. Divorce is only a paperwork after this point as this is not a marriage. She is shifting the blame on to you, do not accept an ounce of the problems she created.
Sadly we both moved out of our past residence and both of us have been making great strides to get our affairs in order. I no longer have access to her car as she took her key to her back weeks ago, so the the audio recorder is out of the question. I no longer have access to her phone plan or her computer either. I don't think she would be down for a polygraph, just another reason for her to say I was controlling her. She also changed her passwords to her Itunes and email accounts so I can no longer track her that way.
In terms of the bad judgment calls, I guess I should start from the beginning. My wife was really hoping to start a new career as a tattoo artist this year. When her apprenticeship fell through instead of deciding to look for another one she decided to start out on her own. She has the equipment thanks to me and her mother, but none of the experience necessary to fulfill this dream. Additionally a few friends of ours decided to donate a travel trailer as a mobile work space for her. It needed a lot of renovation and we simply didn't have the funds or practical experience. Enter the co-worker and leaving me the poor sap to pick up the tab with my credit cards and pay checks. Hence the dreamer comment that started this whole thing.
In some ways I felt obligated to follow her dreams. She helped put me through college by taking control of the bills while I was in school. Additional, due to the poor economy, I only been working part-time through the period of our marriage. I have been trying to look for full time employment, but things are fairly cut throat at the moment. I have also been courting the possibility of entering the navy this past year, hoping to get into an officers program. When that failed my wife wanted me to look into going enlisted. Unfortunately, I don't think I have enough trust in her to leave her alone for extended periods of time without constant worry being a factor in my life.
I think I have stated the other judgment calls. The dominatrix thing for sure, open marriage, and not announcing the separate banking account. There is one more thing that is a huge secret, but I don't want to be pulling out to many skeletons from the closet. She also told me she doesn't want children and considers her self damaged material when it comes to marriage.
She was the one that was pushing for both during our engagement, and now has done a complete 180.
She also lied to me. I confronted her about the travel case and the kinky clothing, she said she didn't have anything like that. I also tracked her phone to a Portland location on the night I left, when she said that she was staying with some friends in Vancouver, WA the whole time. I also found out that she had some business cards printed out for her new service, so much for the fantasy aspect of things.
She has admitted to being sorry, but not taken any responsibility for her actions. She also said she took me for granted, but freaked out about thought of losing me, it was like I was betraying her and breaking our vows. She keeps yo-yoing emotionally, saying she will give me the divorce and later telling me I will have to take her to court.
I wish I could get back the women I fell in love with, but at this point things are possibly to far gone.
I think her grandmother suffers from something. Its never been diagnosed, but she goes through periods of deep depression followed by giddy exuberance. Possibly bi-polar disorder if I had to take a guess. I know that my wife would never go to a therapist to talk about her own personal issues. She just considers herself a broken individual and leaves it at that.
Sadly we both moved out of our past residence and both of us have been making great strides to get our affairs in order. I no longer have access to her car as she took her key to her back weeks ago, so the the audio recorder is out of the question. I no longer have access to her phone plan or her computer either. I don't think she would be down for a polygraph, just another reason for her to say I was controlling her. She also changed her passwords to her Itunes and email accounts so I can no longer track her that way. - HUGE RED FLAGS HERE!
In terms of the bad judgment calls, I guess I should start from the beginning. My wife was really hoping to start a new career as a tattoo artist this year. When her apprenticeship fell through instead of deciding to look for another one she decided to start out on her own. She has the equipment thanks to me and her mother, but none of the experience necessary to fulfill this dream. Additionally a few friends of ours decided to donate a travel trailer as a mobile work space for her. It needed a lot of renovation and we simply didn't have the funds or practical experience. Enter the co-worker and leaving me the poor sap to pick up the tab with my credit cards and pay checks. Hence the dreamer comment that started this whole thing.
In some ways I felt obligated to follow her dreams. She helped put me through college by taking control of the bills while I was in school. Additional, due to the poor economy, I only been working part-time through the period of our marriage. I have been trying to look for full time employment, but things are fairly cut throat at the moment. I have also been courting the possibility of entering the navy this past year, hoping to get into an officers program. When that failed my wife wanted me to look into going enlisted. Unfortunately, I don't think I have enough trust in her to leave her alone for extended periods of time without constant worry being a factor in my life. [COLOR="DarkOrange"] DON"T BLAME YOU AT ALL
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At the crossroads... 
