Originally Posted by happydan

Most definitely not!



Still trying to digest everything being said.
Posted via Mobile Device

Originally Posted by happydan

Most definitely not!



Still trying to digest everything being said.
Posted via Mobile Device

Originally Posted by wifeinsa

I belive she is telling you the truth. I dont know why she would admit to a kiss and oral but not reguarl sex. it just does not make sence if she were gonna hide things she would just not say anything.

My husband started an emonational affair. He did meet the women, (and x) he claims he did not kiss her or anything (still not 100 percent sure) but in my eyes it was cheating.

I told him he had to cease all contact. Also He (since he messed up) needed to find us a marrage therpist, and also find a seperate person for himself.

He said he was willing to do anything to save the marrage.
So he did what i asked.

Our therpist said that affairs are not about sex, there is usually a problem in the marraige. She said going outside the marriage is of couse wrong, but its usually a symptom of problems not the main problem.

Our therpist was great. We went to our first session 3 days after i cought him. I could barly look him in the eye, i had cried for 2 days straight. A few months later i started to see the light. There were things we both needed to work on. Now i feel like we are actually closer. I am still pissed about what he did. But we had been in trouble long before this happened. we were distant, or he was i guess. he had issues with me but would not tell me, so intead he reached out to this other women. Now he can really be honest and tell me stuff, good and bad. Whats stupid is the issues he as with me i felt like were non issues, like if would say this or that bothers me i would have been willing to fix it, but he tried to keep the peace and say nothing. So he got bitter and resentful, then went do the idot path of talking to someone else.

Anyway i would demand no contact with the guy, and therapy. If she does it then maybe you have a shot (if you think you can learn to forgive someday) if she doesnt then she is sending you more clear messages about her commitment to your marriage.

Originally Posted by Shaggy

Her "deep" analysis of her path to cheating is pretty obvious and trivial. Summary: she got close, it was nice, she forgot about, she offered to have sex with him, he rejected her, she ran home to you.

Originally Posted by wifeinsa

No. The time i cheated was with my first husband. I remarried several years later. This issue i am talking about on this post is with my second husband.

Originally Posted by Beowulf

You mentioned counseling. What form of counseling? Marriage counseling? Individual counseling?

Originally Posted by Beowulf

Is she prepared to continue transparency for the entirety of the marriage if you so choose? Have you asked her this?

Originally Posted by Beowulf

What about work situations? If she could this easily lower her boundaries in just a study situation how will she react being approached by an amorous coworker?

It seems like her boundaries need a lot of work. Are you willing to spend the next two to five years constantly checking up on her to verify her whereabouts?

Originally Posted by Beowulf

For quite a while every time your wife is not in physical proximity to you you are going to wonder and worry about where she is and who she is with. Are you prepared for the eventual triggers and mind movies that you will have to face especially when she is absent from you?

Originally Posted by zugzwang

1:
How much of this reconciliation effort is about wanting YOU back? Difficult to tell for us, but might be easier to feel, for you.

Originally Posted by zugzwang

2:
And this goes for you too – a high school dating sort of flippant approach to your wife’s activities - how could you not be alarmed by this frequent cross-gender joint study sessions – please note that if they had used any context other than ‘study’, probably your spousal antenna would have been up.

If they had said they were discussing work, you would have questioned the quantum of time spent on it. If she had said: I could really TALK to him, and would like to do that often, you would have probably said no. But they use the ruse of ‘study’, and you let it go.

Originally Posted by zugzwang

Glad to hear that, Dan.

I impudently mistook your patience for probable penitence.

Please accept my apology, my brother.

Originally Posted by Shaggy

Her "deep" analysis of her path to cheating is pretty obvious and trivial. Summary: she got close, it was nice, she forgot about, she offered to have sex with him, he rejected her, she ran home to you.

How about her answering these questions:

1. What if he said yes.
2. Why should you try with her? Hint: I/You love you/me isn't sufficient an answer.
3. How is she going to want to be treated in a year fom now? Will she still be fully transparent or does she think this is a temporary probation?

Originally Posted by Acabado

She's not telling you why (beyond she got attached to OM and then horny), she likely needs time, self examination, perspective and a good, challenging IC for this. She's telling you "how". That's a good start in my book. She sees now clearly how it happened for her. The detachment, the self gaslighting, the rewtiting, the blameshifting, her justifications back then. She's describing the fog.

Originally Posted by happydan

Thanks everyone, I had to take a couple days and think things over. Many people had some good questions to ask and I needed the time to ask my WW, and also do some self-reflection of what I want.



She's scheduled some IC for next week.



She said she's ok with that. Problem is, ever since year 2 together, we've operated as an open book. From then on I already knew all her passwords, and she knew mine. We always kept a transparent relationship, and told each other we'd stay that way forever.
...and this still happened! More on this later.



She said she would do her part on this, and let me know every address she goes to/is at, whenever I want to know it. As for her work, I guess *I* can't stop that, but she told me she's never cheating again, with anyone, in our marriage or any other relationship (if I choose to divorce her). She said she never wants to put someone she loves through this ever again.



I am prepared to deal with this, I consider myself a strong person. If I commit myself to something, I put as much effort as I can into it. I'm worried more about my wife caving in again, before issues start with me.
Side note: I don't think I mentioned this before. But the OM has the same name as me! It hasn't been a trigger for me... but still...ugh!



I feel that she wants me back. The past couple days, when I've felt distant from her, don't want her around, etc, her comeback is to stand her ground and say "but I'm still your wife". It's been a strangely powerful statement. She says it in a way that says, "Yes, I did something wrong, but we're still here, and I'm not leaving you".
That's just one example. But the feeling I get is that she genuinely wants me back for me, and not other superficial reasons.



Very true, I never even thought about it like that. But because she said "study", I totally let her do whatever she wanted under that reason. It goes back to what I said above, about how open we kept ourselves, from early on. I think as time went on, that openness extended to us having no boundaries (she let me do whatever I wanted as well). We thought that made us special, that we could trust each other so much.
Yes - big mistake, I know now, a little too late. But that's where it came from, at least on my end. I got so used to us being "completely open" and knowing "everything about each other", that I was blinded that she could stray from me.



No worries! I know everyone is just trying to help out!



1. I've mentioned before, I told her for all intents and purposes, I consider that they did. And she recognizes that if she got what she want out of it (at the time), it probably would have continue'd longer. And yes, this thought sickens me. But I also have said before I don't like to live to much into the world of "what if". I know what happened, and how far she was willing go. After that, it's all "what if"
2. I touched on this in an earlier post, but in recap, she seems genuine about winning me back, and pre-OM neither of us had any major issues with each other, and were building a great foundation to start the rest of our lives on. (that's in recap, more details in previous post)
3. She understands she's caused long lasting damage that will take years to help reconcile. And even then, she knows that decades from now I might still get a trigger.



She's hoping to find those answers through IC, which she'll be starting soon. From there we're going to decide on MC or not.


Now, more of my own thoughts:
For sake of argument, I'm accepting two things as fact right now: That she's told me everything that happened in her affair, and that she's never cheated on me in the past. If anyone wants to give me more advice, I ask you to assume those things as well. I am working on setting up a polygraph to confirm those (and some other) things. IF my WW is lying about those things, it's automatic divorce, and she's aware of that. I gave her a chance to "come clean", and she said there was nothing more to be said, on that. So for the moment, I'd like to assume that's the truth, because if she lied, it's over anyway and you don't need to convince me of that anymore!

So...I'm still looking for reasons to do R. I only want to commit to R if I sense my WW is not stringing me along - ready and willing to put in major effort.

She's put the OM behind her. She's had no contact, doesn't want to contact, and has no urge to contact him again. She's going to start IC. MC to possibly come later. She's been saying all the right things. We've set up fresh boundaries.

She's been transparent about everything. Seeing a friend? She tells me the address. Buying something when I'm not around? She let's me know, so I can approve the purchase. I have access to everything in her digital life (e-mail, facebook, phone, etc). My problem with this is, as mentioned above, this is similar to how things were pre-affair. We already had full openness between us (except for the friend/address and buying things, that's new). So, it really doesn't feel any different from before, as far as transparency goes. The only difference now is I'll have to patrol that digital life more often, and make sure she isn't starting anything new

She asked to meet me for lunch, which we've never done before (her work and my work are just out of reach for a lunch meet-up on most days). I accepted, and so that happened yesterday. We didn't talk much (I wasn't in the mood to), but again, the effort on her part was there.

Is that enough? Does it feel to others that she's serious about giving R a chance? For whatever reason, it doesn't feel enough to me. But I also don't know what to expect. I think a lot of that has to do with the transparency thing. For most couples, I read on here, that seems like the tough hill to cross. For me, it feels more like "things going back to normal" since it's what we did pre-affiar anyway, and that didn't stop her the first time!

I'll end by saying something that really offended me. She's been begging me to sleep in our bed together again. I finally told her yesterday she could... but only if we used a long pillow we have to separate us. She said the pillow smelt moldy and she didn't want to use it. I couldn't smell it (granted, my nose sucks). I said it has to be pillow-separation, or she had to go back to the sofa. She chose the sofa because she "couldn't stand the smell of the pillow". My thought is, even if the pillow did smell, she has to take that offer, right? She can't "suffer" through that to sleep closer to me?
I told her my opinion in the morning (was today), and she said she didn't see it that way, and that she'd sleep with the pillow separation now, if I still wanted it. But she should have thought about that the first time, right? I kinda feel like she thought an inanimate object was more important than me.
Sorry, that's probably more of a rant and might be trivial. She has been putting in good effort in other areas, as I mentioned.


[wow, super long post! didn't realize that got so big!]

Originally Posted by MEM11363

HD,
You are clearly a decent guy. From reading your posts, I like you. Regarding the pillow - I want you to think about something. She was putting herself out there asking to share your bed. And it wasn't her first request.

While it is your right to insist on a pillow - you were being hurtful. She feels BAD. And that response - made her feel worse. So she declined. Guess what - she needs to have her own boundaries as to what she finds acceptable in this situation.

Originally Posted by Jibril

I'm a bit conflicted about the pillow thing, actually. I see where MEM11363 is coming from, but at the same time...

I mean, she willingly put some stranger's smelly, sweaty !@#$ in her mouth, but she can't sleep with her husband on a moldy pillow? Really?

Maybe I'm thinking selfishly, but I sense defiance, not hurt, from her choosing to sleep on the sofa.