Chevelle

First I am glad I found this website and I hope that others can help me in this situation.

First a little history.

My wife and i have been married coming up on 9 years and have had some minor marital issues for the past few years (basically her being involved and doing everything for everyone else instead of her own family. In a nutshell, the umbilical cord has not been cut from her Mom.) About 4 months ago I had enough and told her that I felt the relationship was over and I as ready to call it quits. I told her that I feel that I am just a friend to her but that I have enough friends. I need a partner, lover...etc. Long story short she convinced me that she was going to change and be more involved. To her credit the past 4 months have been great, it's like when we first started dating and like before we had our son who is now 7. Well last night I was paying bills and noticed the Cell Phone bill was a little higher then normal. I went a head and logged on and checked both her phone account and mine. Well...when I checked hers I noticed a number that was not familiar to me being texted to a lot during the evenings and weekends. I then went and checked the phone logs and noticed several 20 - 45 minute calls to this number after work hours. This raised a flag so I went and checked her cell phone when she went to bed and noticed the number was affiliated to some guy that I have o idea who he is. One of the texts said, "I found the shirt I was telling you about", another on a Sunday said "Hey it's me calling you" then I noticed a picture sent of his dog sent to her phone but that is all. I then cross referenced the time stamps to the logs and noticed that a TON of texts were deleted. I was furious. Well...I printed out the logs from November until now, highlighted this number and proceeded to waker her up and ask who this guy is. She was like "what are you talking about" I then let her wake up a little bit and she then told me it was a coworker and that he is just a "friend" (typical line) We then continued talking and I got out of her that they flirt but she says that is all and that he is not her type. I didn't buy it and continued to ask her questions. I finally got a statement of "I have always worked in offices that were all females and now that I am in an office with a mixture of guys, it is nice to have people tell me that I dress nice and am pretty. (I tell her that all the time.) Then she tells me that they get along because they are the same age and that he is nice to talk to to have an outlet from the other things in her life. Basically saying that she doesn't have to talk about family or work or anything like that. I dug some more and then she told me that yes she was attracted to him but would never jeopardize her family (me and our son) did I mention that we are trying for a second child? I looked a little closer and noticed that SHE is the one that starts the text conversations and that SHE is the one that calls him first. I asked her what she says to him and she says that she calls him just to tell him that she is thinking of him. Are you serious??? I tell her "you are thinking of another man at night when I am home and in the car when you are driving with our son. She says nothing has happened, they haven't gone to lunch or met outside of work at all and that it is strictly text and calls. I did just find out that he is currently separated.

I feel nauseous, betrayed and have lost ALL trust in her just when things were starting to get back to normal. Am I over reacting? I have a feeling that she is lieing but I have no concrete evidence. What should I do or how should I handle this? I am at a loss for words. She swears that she is faithful and wants to continue expanding our family but to me, why is she thinking about another man on the weekends and at night.

Help please

cody5

I have no advice for you. I just want to give my opinion that you are NOT overreacting. Just start reading other threads in this section. Make sure your wife knows that what you have found/what she has admitted to is already an affair. She needs to know it's bad and she needs to stop. She then needs to be honest with what she was searching for outside of her marriage and that she needs to commit to fixing it.

I'll let you decide if you want to pursue finding out if it was physical or not. You never will, however, and it will just eat you up alive. Doesn't look like it necessarily was. You didn't mention any real smoking guns and she was pretty casual about leaving a trail.

Good luck.

GAsoccerman

I don't I would really think about it. I have plenty of female friends.

I am the coaching director of my soccer organization, I ahve a female coach that is the same age, that I ahve become very good friends with, like a sister. we face book, text, cell, etc.

So much so, I said to her, I really better get to know your husband better, I don't want him thinking anything.

So I went out of my way and talked to her husband and made sure that he knew we were just friends and nothing more, that she is like a sister to me, he appreciated me talking to him, I also Facebooked him, so he can see our conversations and posts to each other. He also joined our soccer league to pay with me.

So, can a man and woman be friends? yes, I always delete my texts, I like to keep my messages clean.

I would ask to get to know the guy before assuming anything.

cody5

Gasman. did you read the entire post? She's attracted to him? Initiates all of the contact? Wants to be told how pretty she is? Texts just to say she is thinking of him?

I also work A LOT in a volunteer capacity with a married woman in my kids sports as well. I see her, email, text and call her every day during the season. Never ONCE just to say I'm thinking about her.

1700 posts and you're THAT far off on this one?

Male friends: yes. Male friends like this: NO.

BigBadWolf

Your woman is already having an affair.

Whether this has turned physical or not is merely a matter of time.

Any advice contrary to these facts is simply in denial.

Unless you repair your relationship, and stop the communication between your woman and this affair man immediately, you will lose your woman.

Here are the facts:

Your woman is not sexually attracted to you.

Therefore she is not emotionally connected to you. This is the "just be friends" situation and is a bad place for you to be.

It is just a matter of time before it is this affair man or another affair man that your woman will leave you in the dust.

Here is what you need to do:

Understand the woman is attracted irrestibly sexually to the man that is in control of himself and his environment.

Right now you are not this man.

Your goal is to become this man.

Determine what has changed in you between the man your woman fell in love with, and this man you are today. Fix these problems, and communicate to your woman what has happened, what you are going to do about it, and why.

I invite you to see my profile, over 100 posts and it is easy to pick a few to read for a few minutes of your time that deal with this same issue time and time again.

I wish you well.

jessi

I have to agree when I first found out about my husband's affair he said he was just helping a co-worker with a problem she was having, and then a week went by and then they fessed up that it was a full fledged affair. She was texting him and he back to her 3000 times in a 3 month period only had the records from the phone company for 3 months. Not really sure how long it was actually going on before I found out.
The people that are capable of an EA or a PA are also very good liars and they go to great lengths to hide and cover their trails.
I hope this isn't happening to you, but no good comes from this kind of emotional connection with any other person than a spouse.
I do agree that men and women can be friends but why didn't she tell you, she didn't say anything until you discovered this new friend. My husband kept it from me as well.
I think texting has made it so easy for cheaters to connect, I figure with the # of texts my husband had with this woman, it was like 45 a day.
keep checking she probably isn't telling you the whole truth

Chevelle

Thank you for all the responses. Here is an update.

We had a discussion the other night to lay everything out. I actually found out that about 2 weeks ago, she told her best friend that she was starting to grow an attraction to this coworker by no means physical but that she thinks about him a lot because of how well they communicate. Her best friend told her to stop which she said she would. The next day she told her friend she ended it which she did. She told this guy that they could no longer talk outside of work.....however the next day when she saw him at work, she missed not having that verbal connection with him so she went looking for it again. She said the rush of secretly texting, wondering what he would say to her, looking at him to see if he was looking at her overpowered her....she craved his attention. The mystery of how he looked at her and not knowing what was crossing through his mind was the challenge that heightened her interest. It was the shear curiosity that kept this going.

I am not sure if I can chock this up to a midlife crisis (she's only 34) or something else. Well she finally admitted that she screwed up royally and can not believe how her childish actions overpowered her so much. She actually told her Mother and here sister was there to hear as well. She also went and talked to her true best friend and they all were in shock and told her "are you crazy, what are you thinking" She never realized how something so innocent in her eyes could become so wrong. She swore to me, and everyone else that NOTHING physical ever happened. They never had contact outside of work, no lunches together, no drinks after work...nothing. She knew what she was doing was wrong but that she felt in control. She could control the Texting, she could control the phone calls but she said she would never put herself in a situation she couldn't control which was seeing him outside of work.

Well we talked some more and she said that she wants nothing more to do with him and that she never meant to hurt me or her family life. Yesterday she went to work which was the first day back after all the talks and i was scared as hell. She had told me that she was going to take care of it and that she wanted to talk to him and have closure. She did tell me that seeing him yesterday at first made her angry and upset and she gave him the cold shoulder at first. When they finally had a chance to talk she told him that I knew who he was and that they had to stop the talking and had to go back to keeping it a work relationship and this time she felt comfortable about it because she knew it was leading to nothing. Well they didn't get to finish but she said today she was going to do it for her own closure. She mad a mistake that she didn't realize would hurt the ones she loves.

I am trying to cope with it the best I can and as every hour passes by I feel a little more comfortable. My thoughts though are that I believe once she settles this situation, she needs to quit the job. The constant reminder of seeing him everyday will I believe slowly open things back up but I could be wrong. My wife has always been a strong person. She hates those that lie and cheat and that is what is shocking to me and everyone else....the fact that she was slowly turning into exactly the person she can't stand.

We are together trying to work this out but of course me as the victim am having a hard time. I know because this is so fresh that is why and as time goes by with her proving to me that I can trust her again that I will start to feel better. She genuinely feels bad and in her exact words to her family "I f***ed up and possibly ruined my marriage over words."

That is all I have now. I hope she is truthful in her words and that she can overcome the feelings she started to develop for this guy and concentrate on what she has already.

Thanks

cody5

I'd never heard of an emotional affair before I came on this forum. Weird stuff. I've always thought that the "perps" in these situations may not even know they are in an innapropriate relationship. Your wife looks like she may fall into that category. Looks like she now knows what she did and wants to fix it. Yours looks like it may have a happy ending after-all.

Good luck.

BigBadWolf

This is good to see you have stopped your woman's affair in it's tracks.

Also good to note, for you and anyone else reading this later, it is NO SMALL THING what is a womans' sexual attraction. It is strong enough to make her leave the most loving husband and even children and home and years of marriage in the dust, so overpowering it can be to her.

This is why I say the things I say, even to the point of sounding like a broken record!

To be the dominant man is to use the incredible power of a woman's sexual attraction to reinforce the marriage.

To all good men, ignore the power of a woman's sexual attraction at your own peril!

So also do NOT just sit back and "hope" your woman is doing right, but make sure to always calmly, confidently, and deliberately make her know you are jealous of her, and are proud that she is your woman and you are her man.

I am hoping things will continue to improve for you.

GAsoccerman

chevelle, time to be the man again...

Send her flowers...text her naughty thoughts, become the guy who flirts with her...

I still flirt and tease my wife after 20 years.....she loves it.

Glad to she acknowledges it and wants to correct it. Remember women are attractive by personality to males.

the problem is usually when people step over the line. Hopefully teh other man backs off as in respect to you. usually when I have a female friend that has grown to close to me, I often back off.

New Beginnings

Just to add to some of the advice given. Words from my therapists own mouth. A spouse who has cheated (regardless of how far yours went), they nearly always go back to it once more before they finally stop the affair. Since yours works with the OM, I would not put it past her or frankly anyone no matter how much you think of their standard of morals etc, the temptation is still their and she needs to recognize this and correct her own circumstances to avoid future as she called them F*** ups.

I like you also thought my own wife could never have done what she did, wasn't in her moral fiber to be that exact type of cheating person who lied to a degree I never thought possible. Guess what, I was dead wrong. Most of the statements you made in your posts, I heard word for word from my own ex, all the while they were living with the OM and cheating the whole time.

MEM11363

This is very simple.

Stop trying to conceive immediately.

1. It is frightening that she deleted a lot of text messages. It really is. You now have no idea what was happening.
2. She is attached in some unhealthy way to this person. It is at least an EA if not a PA.

Am I right in saying that you threatened to divorce your wife because the sexual part of your marriage had pretty much ended and she was making you a low priority overall?

And when you threatened the big D - suddenly she was willing to have sex and actually started to pay attention to you? Is the sex itself good for her too or does it seem like she is mainly doing it just to keep you happy? Does she ever initiate?

Does it feel like she really loves you OR is this a case where you earn a lot more then she does and she doesn't want to disrupt her lifestyle?

The sad thing is your only chance to really find out the truth in these situations is to monitor someones text/emails for a bit without them knowing. And that chance is now blown.

I think you hold off on the baby and go meet this guy and ask him why he is spending all this time talking to your wife. Is the other guy married? Does his wife know how much time they talk/text?

angelj

Chevelle, I've been on both sides of an emotional affair. I worked with a woman who was in a different department then I but I work in computer support so I'd see her often. We clicked right away which is odd for me because I tend to keep to myself. We talked quite a bit about work and family in passing. A couple years later she accepted an open admin assistant position in my department and that's how it all got started. We were talking all the time. To be honest it was me who visited her office on a daily basis. It wasn't long before she started visiting me and we'd visit with each other for 10-15 minutes at a time several times a day. I couldn't tell how she felt about me but I got a rush out of seeing her, making her laugh, smelling her body spray and capturing her attention. A few months later my wife got a job here also in a different department and it turned out we became friends with her and her husband. We went on double dates together and weekend getaways together which was great. Even though my wife was around I still got to spend more time with this other woman. I was so wrapped up in the exhilerating emotions that I felt when around her that I never considered I was in an emotional affair. The feelings however came to an immediate stop the day my wife and I found out that we were matched with a foster child that we were going to adopt. My life took a huge turn and my focus went back to my family. Had this not happened who knows how far I would have taken this affair. Looking back on it now I realize this has happened to me once before and I prevent myself from falling in that trap again.

Back in the summer of 2007 my wife reconnected with a male friend from jr. high through Classmates.com. They started emailing which was cool and once in a while they would talk on the phone. We'd been married for 16 years and she never tested my trust for her so it didn't bother me that she was talking to another guy. In Sept of 07 we bought our first house and it wasn't more then 3 weeks later she said she wasn't in love with me anymore. It was a shock but it wasn't until a few weeks later while paying the bills I noticed our cell bill was 3x the amount then usual. I did the same thing you did. I pulled up the call records and found that she had been texting this guy 60+ times a day and calling him 10 times a day while she was at work or on her days off when I was working. I called her on it and she got all defensive and said I was being jealous and posessive. We separated for a few months, got back together, separated again and we were on the verge of divorce. In what I call "the 11th hour" she called me and said she was ready to work everything out. My only ultimatum was that she stop communicating with this guy. It was like pulling teeth but she agreed and for the past 2 years she's kept her promise. We're all better now and stronger for all that we went through. She also said the emotions take your mind and body over and you lose all sense of what's right and wrong. Now that you have your wife back its up to you to keep her and never lose her again. Good luck.

AJ

lovegonewrong

i know i am probaly going to get hate messages for this one but, my husband and i were seperated and i started talking another man threw text, NIGHT AND WEEKENDS ALOT AT NIGHT! my husband and i have been off and on for the past 8 months he knows about this other man, but let me tell you something from a woman who is doing the same thing, ITS NOT INNOCENT AND SHE IS HAVING AN AFFIAR! IF NOT SEXUAL ITS EMOTIONAL!

Paula

I really don't know, but I feel I'm also in for trouble. Because my hubby has a female AM and he always had a soft corner for her. She has recently been back from US and since that day I can see calls to and fro between them. They are in the same office and team and I really don''t know how to tackle this. Because when I had called my hubby before marriage one day despite my telling him to call me at the appointed hour and informing that he has returned from the party, he brought that lady home and didn't bother to call.. Apart from that this lady also hugs him and they consider themselves as brother and sister. I'm clueless.. PLZ HELP