# Wife's Emotional Affair is claimed as "Ended" - What Do I Do Next?



## ShuffleUp (Jun 5, 2009)

I will try to shorten this but let me know if I need to provide more detail for anyone to please be able to help me with this situation.

- Married 7 years, have 4 year old daughter
- Wife has seemed depressed and bad at managing stress for years, has been complaining about me in alternating areas mainly to do with chores.
- She constantly criticizes her own parenting skills harshly and there is no basis for this. 
- Sunday, I found out (on accident) she has been having at least an emotional affair with an coworker at previous job. Evidently she left her job 2 years ago because of his pursuit, but grew to like him.
- Unsure what amount of physical affair there was but she was almost always home or at work and spends almost all time with me & daughter.
- Says she is not happy with me mainly because of _______. She can't fill in the blank.
- Said me and daughter would be better off without her and she just wanted to run away or jump off a cliff.
- This week sucked for both of us because of this and I finally got upset and said she needed to choose that this double life could not go on forever. 
- Today she is extremely upset earlier in the day but then emails me says it is over with this other guy, and "you win, hope you are happy."
- She seems more talkative since then, and spending time with our daughter. But she is now thinking that she has done enough to make me feel better which unfortunately is not the case. She is now afraid I will be "tracking her down" all the time. Glad she figured that out on her own. 

I am wondering how to proceed. I want to build back up a loving relationship. On the surface she has done what I asked, but I do not know if I can trust her, and things can't just go back to normal now for me. I have read a lot of posts here that say give the ultimatum to cut off contact etc. I am wondering what happens after that? I love my wife and I want this to work. I take marriage seriously. I need to get her to couseling but so far this week she has refused. I don't want to press too hard early because I need her to see that I can be supportive and I know based on the depression she is hurting too. Please weigh in!


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## denver41 (Jun 2, 2009)

I'm going through something similar (my first post is still on the front page). What's helping me is couples and individual counseling (yes, I've started both this week). I'm not sure the end result will be, but the counseling has helped tremendously. I highly recommend seeking it out.


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## ShuffleUp (Jun 5, 2009)

Thanks. I should have also mentioned that I went to counseling by myself today. I am praying that i can get her to go eventually.


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## Deb1234 (May 31, 2009)

Have her read this: 

How to Rebuild Your Spouse's Trust After an Affair - wikiHow


Yes, even though it wasn't physical, it is still an affair.


Typically, the more defensive she gets and the more she tries to turn it around on you, the more guilty she is.


I hope you guys get things worked out, I know how hard it can be, especially when children are involved. Good luck.


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## ShuffleUp (Jun 5, 2009)

Deb1234 said:


> Have her read this:
> 
> How to Rebuild Your Spouse's Trust After an Affair - wikiHow
> 
> ...


Good link I gave it to my wife.


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## ShuffleUp (Jun 5, 2009)

Update: A lot has happened and there has been some back and forth but I think she is trying to settle on what she wants to do and she has it understands the double life cannot continue.

As of Friday night, she told him it was over with them and that he was not to contact her again. I am not sure that at this point she knows if she made the right decision, but she made a decision. Her next concern is how to deal with me and she says she knows I will not trust her for a long time if ever, and she doesn't expect me to, but that she wants things to work back to how they used to be with me. I think that she is still confused but I think she is being as genuine as I've seen recently.

Sat morning I told her that I thought she made the right decision. But I said OK if you decided to cut off contact then the line is drawn and there absolutely cannot be any more contact or there will be extreme consequences. Do not make the goodbye drag on. She seemed to get that. I told her that she was not to follow up with him to make sure he wasn't hurt, that if he tried to contact her in any way, she should not respond but call me and talk to me about how she is feeling. 

She said that she still has a lot in her head and that she 'guesses' she needs to go talk with someone to help her deal with it. It was unsolicited and this is the first time she has talked about getting professional help so I view it as progress for her. Last night she started saying some things we should do as a family this summer so she is trying to think a little but longer term.

At the beginning of this thread I think my frame of mind was that the most important things were: 1. Wanted to try to save my marriage, 2. Wanted my daughter to be OK, 3. Was concerned about wife's emotions/depression.

Now, I think that there is tons of work to do on each of those but the onus had been on my wife to make a decision and she has at least temporarily done that and showed some commitment to it. Now I feel like the onus is on me to accept what she has done. I don't know if I can do that. I was so worried about 1, 2, and 3 above that I didn't think about my own insecurities now that the relationship has been betrayed. 

I need to act supportive in order to make her feel like she has made the right decision, but at the same time there are things that I will require to go on as well. It is a tough balancing act. But I had to create an environment where there was the possibility of keeping the family together. Easiest thing to do would have been to just let her go but 5 years down the road I would have trouble knowing I didn't give it a chance. 

How/is it possible for me to help my wife think about feeling better about breaking it off with OM?


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## Dancing Nancie (Jul 1, 2008)

I am in a situation that is similar to yours, but much different as well. One thing I have done in the past with my wife with no success is chase her. I think she is feeling some loss right now. Do some things for her, but don't chase. Don't run to her when she comes in the door and hug and kiss her. Let her come to you. Something I did this week is hire a maid service to come to the house. It's something that I know she would really appreciate, and know that I did it so she could relax a bit. Try and show her love without pushing your love on her. It's a tough balance for me.


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## jsir (Jun 21, 2009)

i am in kinda the same boat but my wife says that she has done nothing wrong and that i am just being insecure, even though i still think she has had an emotional affair. she will NOT stop talking to this guy. i have even gave the ultimatum of him or me and she just says that im being silly and he is just a "friend" even though i put one of those computer tracking programs on the comp. but the crapy thing is, is that i got stupid and told her about it out of guilt.

maybe it is because she knows that i wont leave, because of my 2 boys and the hope of fixing our marrage on my part.
but now i find myself being a needy, insecure retard (which i hate being) 
I am at my wits end and i dont know where to go from here and i dont know what to do!


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## martino (May 12, 2008)

"Needy insecure retard" 

whoa are you ever immature. :rofl:


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## docj (Jun 18, 2009)

shuffleup said:


> i will try to shorten this but let me know if i need to provide more detail for anyone to please be able to help me with this situation.
> 
> - married 7 years, have 4 year old daughter
> - wife has seemed depressed and bad at managing stress for years, has been complaining about me in alternating areas mainly to do with chores.
> ...


can you email me!


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## Sensitive (Mar 29, 2009)

I can relate to your wife. I have also been depressed and unhappy with hubby. I tell hubby that he doesn't watch the kids enough, and get annoyed when he never helps with housework. I feel down on myself about not being able to be a pefect social director, disciplinitarian and servant to the kids. I chat with lots of people online, and hubby sees my guilt and the whole online experience feels like an affair to me. After my addiction died down, I am left still wanting an emotional connection, and it not found in my husband, online nor anywhere else. Whatever marriage or personal problems I had prior to the affair are still there, and I have no clue what they were or how to move forward. Sorry, I don't have any better concrete advice.


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## sirch (Jan 8, 2009)

Shuffleup, excuse me if I seem alittle harsh here but....it is not your job to make her feel better because she stopped an affair. Let her feel guilty or whatever she is feeling. She chose to be unfaithfull not you. With that said it is great she wants to work and rebuild the relationship, good luck to you in your efforts. I hope everything works out for the best.


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