# EA ...for the third time



## Urban (Mar 29, 2013)

And it's, of course, our good friend Facebook.

Two years ago I found my husband communicating with a woman long distance, someone he'd met through FB. Flirtations, he lavished her with praise, you're so beautiful, my sweet so and so.

I confronted him and demanded he end it. After a week of fighting, he finally did and vowed he'd never do it again.

Last year, same thing. Befriended a woman, long distance, sweet talk, kiss kiss, hug hug. I also confronted it. He debated. He sees nothing wrong with what he's doing. These women are far away and he has not cheated and never would.

Then shortly after, I found that he'd befriended again woman #1. He denied remembering that she was the same woman.

For the past 6 months we've been in marriage counseling and I've been giving every shred of me, sincerely, openly and lovingly, to make this work. And now, today I've found in his Facebook a correspondence with yet another woman. My angel, my sweet, (she has a corny pet name for him), I believe he's deleted some of the messages, but one message, that happened since we've been in marriage counseling, said "if you need me I'll be there for you to take care of you and blah blah blah, I am always here for you." 

It's weird, there's no sex talk, just a lot of affection and romantic words of caring and support. He even talks about his "family" not in terms of me specifically, but he kind of paints this picture of himself to this woman as a wonderful husband and family guy. What is he getting out of this?

I am at a loss. I've poured my heart out in MC and IC to save my marriage and I thought we'd reached a point where we were making progress, only to find that he has been saying things to this other woman that I have been starved to hear myself. 

He knows that this hurts me, and yet he believes that it is just a matter of opinion. He does not think that his behavior is unacceptable.

He's out with friends now. I have tried to call him and have messaged him on his phone to tell him that I'd like him to come home asap. In almost 9 years of marriage I have never pulled him home for anything. I think it's going to be a long day. I am gutted.

Why does he do this? WHY? I just don't understand. I am dying inside right now. How can I go on with MC knowing that this whole time he's been carrying on like this? We don't have counseling until May, when we have IC and then June is MC. I am just so screwed. 

Anyhow, thanks for letting me vent. I'm just sitting here blowing spit bubbles waiting for him to come home, of course now he'll probably stay out later knowing I want to "talk".


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## Urban (Mar 29, 2013)

Well, he's gone. He walked out of the house. In his eyes it is all my misunderstanding and that he has been persecuted and will continue to be persecuted for ever. He maintains that he has done nothing wrong. It is all me, and the way I choose to see the situation. 

Before he left he wrote to this woman and said goodbye and deleted her from his facebook, at my demand. He threw his mobile phone at me and told me I can check. 

Then he said he's had enough. He's done with me, this is the last straw. His marriage vows were a mistake. He regrets all of it. He's done, marriage counseling, this marriage, all of it. 

So I am to believe this is my fault? That I should have a sense of humor and understanding towards his conduct with other women? 

He says it all means nothing to him. The communications with these women, and now me. He says he no longer wants to try.

The thing is, we'd come to a point in marriage counseling where we were really getting to the heart of things. Really opening up and trying. Or maybe it was just me. Maybe I was the only one trying, and was blinded by that. 

I am so confused. I do not see any way to engage him further. I have loved him through and through. I still love him. I only wanted him to love me back. But I think I'm beginning to see that maybe he doesn't love me at all. He says he's done with me.

I am gutted.


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## PreRaphaelite (Dec 15, 2012)

Urban said:


> Well, he's gone. He walked out of the house. In his eyes it is all my misunderstanding and that he has been persecuted and will continue to be persecuted for ever. He maintains that he has done nothing wrong. It is all me, and the way I choose to see the situation.
> 
> Before he left he wrote to this woman and said goodbye and deleted her from his facebook, at my demand. He threw his mobile phone at me and told me I can check.
> 
> ...


It is absolutely not all your fault. Very far from it. He created his own little fantasy world and he hid it from you. The problem is that his fantasy world included real women. 

It was a clear EA, multiple EAs sounds like and you had every reason to call him out on it. 

His reaction to you is despicable. SOunds like he was looking for an exit and he got it and ran with it.

I know it hurts, but he ain't worth it. Let him go.


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## canttrustu (Feb 22, 2012)

All of the drama he just displayed is typical for a person caught in the middle of an affair. His response is very very common and called gaslighting.

When I called my H on his EA initially-He did the exact same things. Though he never left he threw his phone and yelled and basically made a complete ass of himself. Told me I was a "jealous nutjob who needs to see a dr"......yep he was 10mos into his EA at that point. If only I'd known just how classic those signs were I could have spared myself and our marriage alot of pain.


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## A Bit Much (Sep 14, 2011)

Totally did you a favor.


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## Urban (Mar 29, 2013)

Thank you all for taking the time to respond. 

I regret that I have not printed out these conversations.

He came back into the house and has gone to bed, back facing refusing to talk, shutting me out. I am not begging, but I told him that I am calling our MC to get an emergency meeting. He has told me, "Good, you go alone. I am done. It's all my fault. I don't care any more."

The thing is, marriage counseling is part of an agreement we made last fall. Over the summer I was making divorce preparations, had consulted an attorney and a real estate agent friend who I trust about how to afford to move on. I kept it all close, but after three months he snapped out of denial and realized that I am planning to go. He begged me for another chance. I told him I would only do so if we go to marriage counseling so that we can get to the root of our problems and make lasting changes as we go forward.

He was dragged into marriage counseling, but I was the one who ended up in the hot seat for my mistakes and I have taken many lumps, gladly because I really do want to save my marriage, and I expected to take even more. He has yet to be called on the carpet so to speak. So this is really the first time he's been asked to step forward. And he throws in the towel. 

It's as if he was willing to go along with it as long as he maintained his own position, but the moment things get uncomfortable he runs away. 

Unraveling this marriage is fraught with problems. Money problems, family problems, all kinds of complications. I can not make idle divorce threats. one thing I realized last year, as I was pursuing divorce is that my life will be very, very hard to seperate from his and will be awful as a single mother.

I feel played.


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## A Bit Much (Sep 14, 2011)

> Unraveling this marriage is fraught with problems. Money problems, family problems, all kinds of complications. I can not make idle divorce threats. one thing I realized last year, as I was pursuing divorce is that my life will be very, very hard to seperate from his and will be awful as a single mother.


Oh I can think of something *more* awful than being a single mother.

And you feel played because you're being played. As long as you are there in the trenches and don't say anything about his behavior, everything will be fine.


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## Urban (Mar 29, 2013)

I am tempted to message this woman. When he typed his goodbye, he even started to refer to himself by her pet name for him, and I nixed that. I am sure that she is confused by the abruptness and may try to contact him for an explanation. I want to write to her and expose him, and tell her that he has done this before with other women and that I made it very clear that his communication with other women was to be strictly friendship or professional, and he crossed the line. And tell her to never contact him again.

Is this a good idea?


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## that_girl (Jul 6, 2011)

Stop the drama.

File divorce.

He's cheated 3 times now. When is enough enough?


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## A Bit Much (Sep 14, 2011)

Urban said:


> I am tempted to message this woman. When he typed his goodbye, he even started to refer to himself by her pet name for him, and I nixed that. I am sure that she is confused by the abruptness and may try to contact him for an explanation. I want to write to her and expose him, and tell her that he has done this before with other women and that I made it very clear that his communication with other women was to be strictly friendship or professional, and he crossed the line. And tell her to never contact him again.
> 
> Is this a good idea?


Here's what I think.

When he left abruptly and in a huff, he found a way to contact her again to tell her he was having a moment and to disregard his latest outburst, blah blah blah. She's still around.

This isn't about her so don't go there. Your husband is the problem. The end of this starts squarely with HIM. NC means NC and if he can't and won't do that, you have a choice to make.

And this is his 3rd strike. How many more does he get?


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## justonelife (Jul 29, 2010)

Urban said:


> He was dragged into marriage counseling, but I was the one who ended up in the hot seat for my mistakes and I have taken many lumps, gladly because I really do want to save my marriage, and I expected to take even more. He has yet to be called on the carpet so to speak. So this is really the first time he's been asked to step forward. And he throws in the towel.


Have these Facebook messages come up in MC at all? I don't understand how you can be in counseling for months and not talk about multiple EAs. 

He doesn't want to confront his issues so the only thing you can do is let him go.


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## Urban (Mar 29, 2013)

I told him there won't be a 4th. Looks like I was right. 

Thank you everyone, I know what you are all saying about "how many more times" is true. I told him plainly in the past how I felt about this, and set boundaries, yet he continued to see it as open to interpretation, even though he knew it hurt me. 

I guess it doesn't matter any more now, he's chucking it all away. I am a mistake to him. This whole marriage was a mistake to him. 

I guess now I know for certain what I mean to him. This sucks so bad.

I appreciate all your advice. I'm really lost right now.


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## Urban (Mar 29, 2013)

We are in MC with two counselors, one for him and one for me. He says that he has brought this up with his counselor, or rather that she brought it up with him because my IC knows about it and shared with her. My husband says that she said to him that often when marriages are in trouble to begin with, small matters become escalated. He maintains that the fault is mine, for misinterpretation and for not trusting him.


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## A Bit Much (Sep 14, 2011)

PLEASE for the love of all that's good, DON'T fall for the manipulative talk he's doing. It's just another means to control you. He did make a mistake, he married a woman that will not put up with being disrespected. TOTALLY his fault. His doormat picker is broken.


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## twin (Feb 24, 2013)

Sadly, you could be talking about my husband. All so very familiar.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## Urban (Mar 29, 2013)

Y'know, these past couple of days have been truly eye opening. 

When I approached my husband the other night about this latest EA, I went to him not like a shrieking emotional shrew. I calmly laid it on the table. It was clear that I was angry, but I kept it focused and was firm. And I can see all the mind games he played on me in retaliation. Accused me of anger management problems, tried to turn it back around on me as my fault, calling my judgement into question, and then in the end, he was down to personal insults and attacks.

This is my life, people. This is the way it has been from the start. This is what he does whenever I have tried to stand up for myself in our relationship.

I have been turning over and over in my mind, Why does he need to communicate with these women? It may seem like a pointless question for a spouse to ask, since it's his problem and not mine, but I really truly wanted answers. 

He won't give me any, but as I piece things together, the clues are all there. And I think the answer has helped me see something about our dynamic with a bit more clarity.

The communications with women aren't about sex. There is nothing sexual about them. But they're loving and supportive and caring. The women are all different, but share one important thing in common. They're all lost souls in some way. Pretty, smart and talented women who are tragically vulnerable, insecure, lonely, and craving validation. In the past, H has said to me that he's just trying to be nice and help them. 

But I think it goes deeper than that. To read the way he talks to them, I think that my H loves to feel like the knight in shining armour to all these women, and to read their messages in response, he is. 

When I think back to when my husband and I met, I was traveling for my work, from city to city, country to country, I had no real home, my country of origin was really nothing more to me than a passport to use at every airport. In many ways I was very strong and resilient, a survivor. But personally, I was adrift and had sort of given up on planting roots anywhere. I did feel lost, I guess. He came along and we fell in love, and I felt a desire to plant roots. 

I was glad for him. Was he my knight? Yeah, I'd say so. I am a strong person, but felt comforted by having a strong man in my life.

Throughout the course of our marriage, though, I have never felt strong. Actually, I was often confused and unbalanced. I often felt manipulated. I have often felt like I don't even know which way is up. And it was weird, because in almost 9 years of marriage, my husband has never been the anchor. He's always been the storm. 

He's always loved me most when I'm weak, and has attacked me when I'm strong.

The other night when I confronted him, calmly but firmly, about the EA, he reacted the same way he has in the past when I have tried to stand up for myself in this relationship, pulling out every trick in his bag to tear me down to a position of submission. Gaslighting.

And since the other night, he has treated me every minute of every day like I am a piece of dirt on the bottom of his shoe, like an idiot because I fail to see the truth, which is really this fantasy world he lives in. 

I've been weak for so long, but I'm actually a very strong and resilient person. I actually have lived a remarkable life. I just happen to have gotten caught up in a very sick relationship that will only become sicker as long as I stay in it, because my H does not want to see me strong and flourishing. The stronger I become, the less he loves and needs me. 

So I think it's pretty clear what I have to do. I spent the past day thinking hard, and I can do this. I can support myself and my child, and create a home that is healthy and supportive and loving. I can come out of this and be stronger, and can raise my son to be a healthy happy man. I have to do this. I really don't have much choice.


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## Openminded (Feb 21, 2013)

Yes, he needs someone weak so he can feel strong. He has problems he doesn't want to fix and instead wants to make them your fault. 

There will never be an end to the women out there who like his "knight in shining armor" persona. He feels important in that role. 

I once had someone like him in my life. He still doesn't understand what he did wrong.

Your husband likely won't either.


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## Mr Blunt (Jul 18, 2012)

> I've been weak for so long, but I'm actually a very strong and resilient person. I actually have lived a remarkable life. I just happen to have gotten caught up in a very sick relationship that will only become sicker as long as I stay in it, because my H does not want to see me strong and flourishing. The stronger I become, the less he loves and needs me.
> 
> So I think it's pretty clear what I have to do. I spent the past day thinking hard, and I can do this. I can support myself and my child, and create a home that is healthy and supportive and loving. I can come out of this and be stronger, and can raise my son to be a healthy happy man. I have to do this. I really don't have much choice.



*Your husband has proven for a few years that he has a twisted mind and rationale.*He is not going to change without a real hard jolt; and even then he may not change much or just for a short period.

You seem like a woman that can see reality very clearly. You also have stated a very appropriate path for you to take. Concentrate on you and your children. Don’t be too surprised if he comes back making all kinds of promises when he sees that you are strong and not going to put up with him any more. Remember that words, emotions, and tears mean very little. *The only thing that you can really trust is actions for a long period of time.*

You are a young wise woman and have a lot of life left and it can be a good life. You can not afford to have some man beat you down like your husband has done.


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