Hope to find some support here. It is hard to compress my story in few words, so this will be a long post.
I am married for 5 years, both my wife and I 40 y.o. We do not have kids together, she has three and I have one from previous marriages.
My son first lived with us and then moved in with my ex-wife. I felt it was in part fault of my wife and because of that I have been resentful and angry with my wife for the last two years and afraid pushed her away. I threatened with divorce several times but each time got back to her within few days for reasons I cannot clearly define.
Last break up happen two weeks ago because I noticed my wife is exchanging multiple e-mails with her ex-husband and then she went to a charity party in which he participated as well when I was out of town seeing my son (she did tell me about it). I did not want to be controlling and allowed her to go there, but then realized I cannot stand this fact and so the fight/break-up occurred.
We reconciled next day, but there is no closeness between us. She said I am smothering her and she needs some space. I have been reading about similar situations and followed one of strategies that suggested that one should not try to breach the gap as that would only push your partner further away. Instead I said it was a good idea and we both need some space. I got a haircut, bought a few things for myself that I have not done in a long time and went to a couple activities by myself. It felt good. I also started reading forums and self-help books. I started talking more to other people and today went out with a male friend I made. We had a lunch and talked. After that, we had good interaction with my wife and then I went upstairs to work on house remodeling.She was laying in bed sick but then she suddenly appeared upstairs all dressed up and said she is going out. She mentioned I went out today too, so there is no reason she cannot do the same. She also went out last night with some "friend" to bowling, or so she said, and returned after 1:00 am. Tonight will be probably the same late arrival.
Now, after reading all these books I took a very different view on our relationships. First, I realized I was a bad communicator and let my masculine side turn into more feminine. I also projected jealousy because of insecurity. I have some traits of "nice guy". I decided to work on myself, let go of jealousy and look at this experience as opportunity for spiritual and personal growth. Still, it is very hurtful when my wife goes out by herself late into the night.
So, I am pondering what should I do? Is this a test she is using to see if am I still jealous and insecure? Is she simply taking advantage of the situation to meet someone new and start new relationship? Is she trying to heal herself by trying to meet new people and has no romantic agenda? There are a lot of facts here I have not mentioned, like her recent break-up with her mother and half-sister which left her very angry, but I hope you get a general picture and could offer an insight.
My present position is given that our marriage has been traumatized in so many ways and some of the wounds are still very fresh, not to make rush conclusions or decisions and try to stick it out for at least few month and see if things get better with me keeping my cool, engaging in activities with male friends, working on my spirituality and masculine side of myself. If she does decide to cheat on me, I will be hurt but I figured I will come out better man in any case. I also made decision not to spy on her in any way. Am I completely misguided here and trying to save something that is already gone?
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Problem #1: You don't know how to communicate and resolve conflict. Breaking-up or threatening divorce is passive-agressive behavior, probably stemming from your lack of appropriate conflict resolution, learned as a child. Read Harville Hendrix book "Getting the Love You Want", on Imago.
Problem #2: Who is your wife going bowling with? If it's a guy, you are in for trouble. I still firmly believe that it's difficult for men and women to have a "friendship" as one is, or will become, attracted to the other and potential for infidelity will arise.
And you indicate there is no closeness--as in growing distant? You may want to look at the whole picture. You need to rethink your position on no spying or snooping. But, counseling is definitely warranted in your situation.
Thank you for the replies. I know it does not look good but I still hope. What is the advantage of the snooping? Catch it while it's still at early stage? She still would not want to come back to me until I re-gain her trust. The disadvantage of snooping would be to reinforce her fears that I am controlling. I told her that I am not going to spy on her now if I do I am not true to my word.
Workingitout, thank you for the link. I will get this book tomorrow. I am reading "way of superior man" and "no more mr nice guy". last two weeks i am coming to realization how many things i did wrong, including the passive aggressive thing. I am working on making a lot of changes in me and part of it not putting my wife in the center of my world as it "smothers" her. so i do activities on my own and this looks like her reaction to these changes.
What is the advantage of the snooping? Catch it while it's still at early stage? She still would not want to come back to me until I re-gain her trust. The disadvantage of snooping would be to reinforce her fears that I am controlling. I told her that I am not going to spy on her now if I do I am not true to my word.
Typical betrayed spouse fears.
Privacy is when you go to the bathroom, secrecy is deceit. Nothing about controlling therein.
Dig Dig Dig, your gut and your words tell us that your wife in very-very likely to be in an affair. So snoop gather the evidence, ask who her bowling friends were, call them go check the club to verify when they finished. Who participated, any men etc.
Check her phone if it is locked and you do not know the key - red flag
Check her email contents, if you do not have access - red flag
Load a keylogger , you need circa 8 days typically to confirm an affair if you chase all the paths of investigation.
So change your controlling behavior. Here is news for you, all affair persons tell their spouses they are controlling, it is part of the script.
And you indicate there is no closeness--as in growing distant? You may want to look at the whole picture. You need to rethink your position on no spying or snooping. But, counseling is definitely warranted in your situation.
827Aug and other posters, first of all thank you for taking the time. see my last post about my thoughts on snooping. at this stage we are past being distant. I am trying to breach the gap without being needy or begging but I feel our time is running out.
OK, here is update:
my wife was back 1:30. i tried to calm myself before she entered, not quite succeeding. we got down to talking shortly after. instead of hiding it, i said "i feel anxious and nervous" "aren't you always?" was her reply. "yes, but now i am talking about it" - answered i. so, was holding her hand and telling her what is on my mind. 1. I am not angry with her. no matter how our conversation turns out today, i will not freak out or threaten divorce. 2. i feel that is is healthy for both of us to have some space, but I would like to know where she goes and with whom - i said i have been telling that that on few recent occasions when I went out to a party at our gym and another had a lunch with a recent male friend of mine. she answered she basically had no way to verify where i was. 3. i said i was surprised at her sudden taking off. she explained it was because when she tried to talk to me about my lunch with my friend, i did not give her details about it. My explanation was that she asked me not to pry into details of her conversation with a close female friend she has and I though I had the same privilege.
At that point, to me it sounded like it was her test/payback for me not being completely open with her. my first reaction was to tell her the details of my conversation with my friend. i suppressed this urge as this would be yielding to her test (not good). instead i was talking about wanting to have healthy relationship with her, how in last two weeks i come to realize many negative things in my behavior, am working to fix it, I understand she would not trust me that I change until I will do it on consistent basis and expressed my fears that while i am working on myself and time passes, she might be too far gone, that i feel our time is running out rapidly. I also told her that even if she is cheating on me, i understand the reason because I was not emotionally available when she needed me and so even if she cheats, I am prepared to work on our marriage.
toward the end we were both teary. For me it is highly unusual behavior - I used to be very closely guarded emotionally and indeed prefer to go into "i will divorce you" mode at the first signs that she was unhappy with me. I felt I achieved few important things:
1. I did not give into jealousy bouts
2. I was calm and expressed my feeling rather than suppressed them
3. I said I am very worried about our marriage and working hard to fix it and understand she cannot regain trust in me overnight.
4. I did not fail the "test" and kept my conversation with my friend privet.
Your thoughts/insights are very welcome. Honestly, just putting my thoughts together here helps me great deal.
Oh yes, I also said I would like to go bowling with her tomorrow to have quality time together. She was not sure about it.
1. Should I persist with the bowling idea?
2. I planned to going salsa dancing tonight - I invited her but she said it was my thing. Should I go by myself?
So change your controlling behavior. Here is news for you, all affair persons tell their spouses they are controlling, it is part of the script.
That is an interesting point. While I respect the point of view and being pro-active and trying to figure out what is going on may be the right approach, I am not 100% sure that is a way to resolve the issues we are having. The majority of the issues lay with me and spying will destroy the little trust she may still have in me (e.g. what if she is just confused with abrupt changes in my behavior and testing me, see if i get back to my old routines or trying to make me jealous because now she thinks I may be having an affair). So if she is not having an affair and finds out I am snooping, this will be very detrimental to us. this is an external factor. the internal one is i am trying to rebuild my integrity and be a better person she would fall in love with again. Now, if I do the snooping, i will undermine my intentions at the fundamental level and probably fail with my quest to better myself miserably. I have all the technical knowledge to do the snooping, but at this stage I am taking a step back and just plan on continuing talking to her (not intrusively), work on myself and see if what she is doing is a pattern or just a glitch.
If she is in an affair what are you going to do, your behaviour and hers raise a lot of red flags for each other.
I suggest a couple of parallel strategies:-
You snoop and verify if there is an affair or not?
You buy the "his needs her needs book" by Harley, both of you read it.
You both stop behaving like singletons and do things as a couple, You go bowling together, you go dancing together, if one can't go you do not go. No parties where either of you are off the radar. It is called transparency.
You spend 20 hours a week with each other , you talk you date , you start filling the emotional needs for each other.
You book yourselves in for counseling and/or go to the marriage builders web site or affaicare web site and start working on your marriage together, you are equally responsible for the marriage having problems.
Eli-zor, my gut is in knots. I think it is more possible she is meeting with a female friend to get support, but there is 20% chance she has met a male and having an emotional (not physical) affair.
Still would not snoop. I will just observe and see if it's pattern for now.
Now, while it looks like a good idea to spend more time together, i do not want to push it and overwhelm her. and I believe I need to change first and prove the change to really increase the interaction - otherwise she will just keep on complaining that I am smothering her.
I also feel that counseling will be good idea and I will need to be more transparent to her - this part I can control - I cannot FORCE her to be transparent to me.
Some councilors are not skilled so do be warned you want a pro marriage counselor not one that asks what so you want to do. Choose wisely.
If there is an affair no amount of counseling is going to help!! Thats why I said snoop verify then step back or break the affair should you find evidence thereof. Please do not think you are wise at this and can ignore the advice given. You are to close to think clearly.
So if she is not having an affair and finds out I am snooping, this will be very detrimental to us.
Trust me; if she is having an affair and it is allowed to continue, it will be a lot more detrimental.
Quote:
Originally Posted by on_the_edge
but at this stage I am taking a step back and just plan on continuing talking to her (not intrusively), work on myself and see if what she is doing is a pattern or just a glitch.
If she is having an affair, you just as well go talk to the wall. You can't talk to someone in the grips of an affair. That is a total waste of time.
Your thread title speaks volumes to me. You obviously strongly suspect an affair. You are to the point where you need to know. The key to everything is "knowing" for certain--either way. Do you detective work without her finding out. Keep your emotions in check until you have an absolute answer. Once you know for certain, then you'll know what you must do.
Quote:
Originally Posted by on_the_edge
Oh yes, I also said I would like to go bowling with her tomorrow to have quality time together. She was not sure about it.
1. Should I persist with the bowling idea?
2. I planned to going salsa dancing tonight - I invited her but she said it was my thing. Should I go by myself?
Excellent idea. Go with option #1 and insist on it. I did that routine a couple of times and had much fun with it. My estranged husband would announce out of the blue he was going to his boat (an hour drive from the house). On at least two occasions I insisted I would come too. Boy, some fights ensued with that. He ended up canceling his dates those times. I could tell he was ANGRY as were some girlfriends.
OK, you guys were right. I went to s a lsa, had fun there. She would not come with me, of course. On the way listened chapter of "no more mr nice guy" audio book - highly recommend it, by the way, and they have great forum too. I went back and my wife asked me why I am stomping around. I said I has been thinking about her going out last night and that I cannot accept that she is screwing out our marriage. She said we already discussed this and why do I need to raise this issue again.
I requested that in the future she would tell me where she goes and with whom. She jumped almost to the ceiling (and we have 10' ceilings) and said that the more I try to control her, the worse it would get. Saying I am getting back to the my angry self, that I am threatening divorce AGAIN. I was assertive but not angry and repeated I am not OK with her going out in the middle of the night and if she does something like this again, our marriage is over. And that it is not me threatening divorce, but she would have the choice to have relationship with me or not. She says "you are jerk" I replied, again without anger but with deep satisfaction "and you are laying cheating *****", at this words something shifted on her face, shade of guilt?
Next thing I know she gets out of bed, partially changes into street cloth (with pajama top under) and storms out of the door. I tell her as she passed by me that is she gets out I am filing for divorce and our relationship is over, spelled it out for her: O-V-E-R. She naturally ignored it and drove away. As I took my bags and was walking toward the closet, she drove back. apparently she just drove around the block. I keep on packing up my things and she is saying what, I am going to threaten her again just for that? I said I told her explicitly if she goes out our marriage is over and she did got out. That she will be served tomorrow. Then I walked out.
Gets better. I got a proof that she was banging her ex-husband. The kicker is that we cheated on him during our initial dating. Karma goes around, I guess. The guy is mental case and she drove him to a serious suicide attempt (she told me she had nothing to do with it, of course). She does have a daughter with him, but apparently starved him from sex and he molested her half-sister when she was 15 y.o. Coincidentally, recently my soon-to-be-ex was saying that her half-sister must have been lying or exaggerating about that episode to get some attention. She was married to this guy twice and both times drove him almost to extinction.
Anyway, she was now telling her girlfriend how sex with this guy is so "super awesome" and sex with me is so "boring". Complained that I did not want to be adventurous (meaning sleeping with other women) even though she indicated she wanted that. Calling me computer nerd and dweeb. I may be some of that - and that is what I was awaken to and working on - but I also did martial art for 20 years, black belt, fit, attractive, inventor with ~50 patents, VP in my company, play guitar, good dancer and have sexy foreign accent. I will let her reconcile with her screwed-up suicidal two-time ex, let her have her 5th marriage and let him take care of her 3 kids from two husbands.
Well, naff said. Filing for divorce tomorrow. If she came clean this morning during our talk and I did not see her derogatory e-mails, I might have tried working on our relationships. Now as I laid it out I see how crazy this relationship sound anyway.
possible infidelity? 
