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Maybe an EA is Okay?

29K views 241 replies 41 participants last post by  calvin 
#1 ·
i know i am half way into an emotional affair, but i want to know from someone who can tell me when it MAY be better, because the marriage may be best to just let go of.
I am in therapy. It's not making it any better yet.
This marriage is a second marriage, 3 yrs, no kids except from previous marriage, and it seems to have gone cold. or I have gone in another direction and so has he.
my emotional affair feels like it is my only lifeline, because of how stuck i feel in another failed marriage.
I did not see it coming and I sure wasn't looking for it. I had just decided to do the best I could with my job and family and tolerate the distance my husband and I now have.
what i realize-prob with help of the counselor who keeps asking me, 'what do I want?' is that i do not have any good, enriching, uplifting,supportive CONNECTION with my spouse, other than he is here. usually in the next room.
and I am not pursuing my EA, but we work in the same field and when we are together we talk and it just feels way more supportive than what i am getting at home.

what the EA did for me though, was put my husband on notice that something is not right in our relationship and we had better fix it, or i am about to hit the door.

what i also realize is that it does not mean my EA will work out where we end up happily ever after either. I suspect, which could be why I am stuck, is that it will probably end when my marriage ends and I will be on my own completely without any emotional support at all.

i am not sure either if this will make me feel wonderful or horrid.
one way or the other, i think i am ready to let the pieces fall where they may.
 
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#150 ·
I never said marriages last forever. I said a marriage is a lifetime commitment. Obviously your alcoholic ex husband chose not to work on that commitment and you did what you had to do. If your current husband wants a divorce then so be it. Like I said.. give it to him. I suggest you stop the EA until after the divorce however as this manchild of a husband may use that against you.

Whatever you have with this OM can very well wait until your actually single... however he doesn't seem like a good catch imo if he is going after a married woman.
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#152 ·
Oh to this.. "love will not be denied if your heart is open" that could be applied to your marriage btw.
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#157 ·
So, for a 40 something man, what does the counselor say about your husband's video gaming...besides it's like an affair?

I find it odd that he'd use that kind of analogy since you are actively involved in an affair and he knows it. I think that's kind of a horrible counselor you got. I mean, marriage counselors are supposed to help the marriage...not the individual. He knows you're having an affair but does nothing to have you confess to your husband.

Seriously...what in the heck do you want from this "marriage"?
 
#160 ·
we did couples counseling first, trying to determine if it was marriage or divorce counseling, so he didn't know it at the time. but he did say it was like having a mistress in between us, if all his attention is directed to the games, this is not where he is just on the computer, he spends all his free time away with his friends gaming or on the phone talking gaming and on the computer gaming forum. since the beginning of our marriage it's been like this.
 
#159 ·
ok well seriously since your husband seems to not really care about the marriage, why not go ahead and tell him of this emotional affair you have been having and tell him your dilemma and why. I am being totally serious.. What do you really have to lose by telling him? If anything it might open both of you to talk and make decisions on where to go from here.
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#170 ·
the marriage was in trouble before the ea. the counseling came when we said divorce. the couples counseling were only a couple sessions so far. maybe my husband does know, maybe he is having an affair too, maybe that's how far apart we really are. and my reactions to if he is having an affair, then it's no different from what he is doing now. i guess i am really checked out aren't I? I can put myself into something wholeheartedly, but I don't feel it coming from him right now. So even if I did forget about the ea thing and focused upon him totally, he isn't forthcoming either. Right now he has been gone all day playing with his friend in another city. Does that sound like something you would trust? Every weekend?
 
#175 ·
the marriage was in trouble before the ea. the counseling came when we said divorce. the couples counseling were only a couple sessions so far. maybe my husband does know, maybe he is having an affair too, maybe that's how far apart we really are. and my reactions to if he is having an affair, then it's no different from what he is doing now. i guess i am really checked out aren't I? I can put myself into something wholeheartedly, but I don't feel it coming from him right now. So even if I did forget about the ea thing and focused upon him totally, he isn't forthcoming either. Right now he has been gone all day playing with his friend in another city. Does that sound like something you would trust? Every weekend?
Based on what you have told us? I'd trust his gaming far easier than your cheating. But that's JMO.
 
#174 ·
It's not that. It's just that you should have said that divorce was on the table when everyone was saying you should divorce him if you aren't willing to work it out. But you didn't. You let people get all riled up.

You know your situation is messed up, but you do nothing about it and don't really care about your husband's feelings.

Your story is nothing out of the ordinary for cheaters. It's pretty much following the script.
 
#177 ·
so i take it then, that everybody's best friend here is their spouse and they tell them everything. and no one fantasizes about having sex with somebody else when they are with their spouse. but i am a predictable cheater. betrayed spouse is not with me, but he should be allowed to do whatever he wants and that's ok. but if i have emotional needs not being met by my betrothed than i am the worst person in the world for even thinking about getting my needs met. I really would prefer not to live in fear, and it seems most people who keep yelling at me for what i am doing are most fearful if "marriage is not kept sacred" . wtf. i am not a victim, but life is too freaking short to not do your best and be free to feel the way I want to feel. thanks everyone for your concern and vitreol
 
#183 ·
Yes, my husband is my best friend. No, I do not confide my troubles in male friends. I have a few FEMALE friends who advise me when I ask for the advice. I do tell my husband everything. I hide nothing from him... now. When I was cheating, yes, that was hidden (he knew, but had no proof). The only time I EVER fantasized about anyone else was when I was cheating.

And yes, your behavior, as we have seen in your posts, IS predictable. It is a script cheaters follow. I followed the exact same script when I was cheating.

Didn't say he should be allowed to do whatever he wants. But no matter what he is doing, cheating is wrong. Bottom line. No, you are not the worst person in the world for wanting your needs to be met. But you should be focusing on getting them met by your husband, not some POSOM who is willing to hook up with a married woman. Your HUSBAND should be the focus of your affections, not the POSOM.

Wtf does staying FAITHFUL to your spouse have to do with living in fear? Now you are going to say he hits you? GMAFB. If you are living in fear, get out.

Again, if you want to feel free to f*ck the OM, fine, do it after you DIVORCE. But I really wouldn't be surprised to learn that the POSOM is only interested in having you as a conquest because you are married.

But hey, it's your life. You have already decided that you want to cheat, so what do you care about how we feel about the subject?
 
#178 ·
Well, you are married, so you should be focusing on your marriage and working through that OR ending it. And yea, my husband and I COMMUNICATE and talk...even about difficult things.

But you're cheating. Ignoring the issues.

Anyway, not my problem. Good luck with it all.
 
#179 ·
Ummm...IDK....marriage IS supposed to be kept sacred. If your emotional needs are not being met by your betrothed, then you need to tell him instead of checking out and having an EA.

I'd say, listening to you for 12 pages now, the best advice I could give you is to walk away from your "marriage" and be alone for a while. A very long while.
 
#186 ·
If you don't want to be married and want to date someone else, them divorce your spouse and go do so. In that order. Don't cheat. Unless you have no morals and want to be a slimeball. Cheating is never okay.
 
#190 ·
IDK -- first, that you're here on these boards and posting and clearly listening and responding is great. I think there are a lot of us who would have wished our spouses had taken the time and energy you have to try and figure things out. So I want to make sure I commend you for that. It's no small thing to realize when there's a problem and then try to figure out how to fix it.

Second, you sound very unhappy and I believe that everyone has the right to try to be happy. Is your husband meeting your emotional needs? No. Is that okay? No. He shouldn't get a free pass and I'm not giving him one. He has a lot of work to do to get this marriage back on track and if he's unwilling to do that work then you should move on. Marriage is a commitment from both sides -- both have to put energy into making it work.

You deserve a husband who cherishes you in the same way you cherish your husband. And right now, I think that's an issue. Because it sounds like right now you don't cherish your husband. You seem to blame him for where you are rather than accepting the fact that you've chosen to have an affair. It doesn't sound like having an affair was your intent, but nevertheless that's where you are now.

I want to make sure I'm clear: from what you've told us, I don't condone your husband's behaviour but that doesn't make your behaviour acceptable. It's the old adage that two wrongs don't make a right.

At this point it sounds as though you are both working against the marriage and that's going to make it extraordinarily difficult to make it work. The first thing our marriage counselor told us is that we both had to make a commitment to the marriage and to ourselves. That's a step both you and your husband need to take.

One reason you're getting some of the responses on this board (including from me) is because there are a lot of us who didn't realize our spouses were cheating. We weren't given the chance to work on things and in a lot of cases if our spouses had come to us earlier and said, "I have this issue in our marriage, I'm finding myself in or close to an affair" we would have at least tried. That is why so many of us are giving the advice that you tell your husband about the EA and give yourselves the chance to make it right.

My marriage wasn't perfect and we had issues and honestly, I have a much better marriage now than I did a year ago because my husband's EA was a wake up call to both of us and caused us to get serious about addressing issues we'd really put off. I'm lucky because my husband sucked it up, came clean, and then put in the work to make it right. My husband is lucky not only because I was reasonable and patient and gave him another chance but also because I put in the work to make it right as well as well. Both of us had to make that commitment and both of us had to change.

Where you are isn't fair to you and it's not fair to your husband. Has he hurt you? Yes. Does that give you free license to hurt him? No. I'm not saying you need to be a saint and suck it up and live in a loveless marriage, but I'm saying that you need to suck it up, realize your actions are wrong, and do something about it. The something I would recommend would be this:

1. Go no contact with your affair partner. So long is he is there giving you emotional support you're not going to get it from your husband. Will that be easy? No. But you owe yourself and your husband the chance for your husband to step up to the plate. Best case scenario is you fix your marriage, worst case scenario is you endure a few months of needing to seek emotional support from family or from those on this board.
2. Talk with your husband. Lay it all out: where you are, what you need, what you've done. Don't blame him. Being unhappy in a marriage doesn't give you license to have an affair.
3. Get counseling -- both mariage and individual.

You may think you've given your husband all the chances he deserves to step up. If that's the case and if you're sure you've done all you can to save the marriage, then begin divorce proceedings. If you're not ready to leave him, then get serious about trying to actually stay in the marriage. Stop waffling -- I say this with all sincerity. Where you are isn't fair to either of you.
 
#191 ·
no actually he ranted about why would anyone want to be with someone who blah blah blah

Please elaborate on the blah blah blah. It helps if we know what his problem with the marriage is. blah blah blah sounds like you blowing off his concerns.

and i said exactly. so he said, we might as well get a divorce. and i said fine.

It sounds like an arguement, not a conversation. All you did was prove that you are not a willing participant in the marriage. You set him up for the divorce statement, instead of saying you were the one who wants out. Nice job making him be the bad guy.

if he has honesty and integrity maybe he should be saying, this isn't working for me either.

He did during an arguement (which is very common) and you blew him off. See my above comment.

He would never even argue until the day when we started to discuss divorce terms. Like he had been bottling up everything until then.

Most men do not rock the boat. They lay low try to avoid pissing off their wives. Your new guy will do this too. If you want a guy that argues, then pick better next time. But I am sure we will see you *****ing about that too, when it gets old.
 
#195 ·
Life is Short and I don't want to waste another precious second on "working" on a "problem" in a relationship. either it works or it doesn't
Ash Madi$$on fixed it, shortened it, made of it their slogan.
Did you really ask if you look like the average cheater?
Predictably - as any wayward - your circunstances are extreme your are special, unique. You clearly deserve it.
 
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