And the Survey Says....

[OG_Lou]

B sounds like revenge, spite, sour grapes. Dogs do that with bones they don't want. i don't want it but you can't have it either. Why go there?

C (depends on the situation) or A is my choice.

Lou

[Imconfused0807]

Is the WAS truly not in love w/ their spouse anymore or have they just been sucked into the honeymoon of an affair.

I can't speak for this girl, but I feel that this is what she is questioning.

If the WAS truly still loves his/her spouse and deep in their heart it is killing them to leave their family the way they are, then when the LBS starts GAL'ing to the max, it's going to drive the WAS crazy.

Again, I'm only going off of her posts, but she has somewhat started the whole GAL thing. Judging by his reactions to her GAL, he's not in the answer A category.

However, on the other hand if their M has gone way past reconciliation and the affair isn't just a "passing honeymoon," the WAS would probably either (1) not care at all that their ex was GAL and/or (2) not even notice.

I don't think he is here yet. As far as I know, the affair is fairly new and probably still in that chemical phase that everyone talks of.

BTW Red, Nice to see you back and working through everything. It took a lot of guts to recognize the situation you were in...take the bull by the horns...slam it to the ground and hogtie it Texas style. {as Red gets up, dusts herself off, and fires up the grill for some prime grade tenderloin steaks }

- IC

[JennyF]

Hello all,
I am the mystery lady in question here!
First of all, thanks to IC for thinking of me an putting this question out there.

I have a 3 yr old and 4 month old, the bomb came 6 weeks before I gave birth. The pregnancy was planned, albeit a month AFTER the affair started. H had shown some minor signs of resistance to another child (he said it was about timing, not because he wanted out of our M), but I was ovulating and he knew it...so you get the picture. The PA started Jan 2007, I'm thinking it was AT LEAST an EA for many months before that.
He says he is in love. He says they're making plans for the future, hence him pushing fast to sell the house and all that stuff.
Here's the good part, she's 40 (10 yrs older than him), twice divorced, with 3 kids from those marriages. The second divorce was just finalized sometime late in 2007. Is she a man eater?? Possibly...and I think my H is prime right now to be taken for a ride.
H has followed all of the MLC script to a tee thus far (he is only 29, but the 'transitional crisis' fits him perfectly...it's eerie actually).
H did some waivering early on after bomb and showed a lot signs of confusion over the time pre-bomb (conversations with friends, etc). Then suddenly 3 weeks before I gave birth he went full steam ahead with the IT'S OVER and hasn't looked back.
MLC tunnel for sure.

He is giving me NO signs that there is any connection left between us. But, I know him well enough to know that I don't think he is totally comfortable with his decisions. I think he has ulcers or some other kind of related stomach stuff.
BUT, I think it is still early enough in this that he thinks I am the problem and that he will be happier to be in his new life with CFB (aka OW...this is why IC calls me the foul mouthed Canuck!).
We had a relatively good marriage. Every day problems as we all do (that's a loaded statement I'm sure). But he NEVER brought up his discontent with me. When I was 3 months preggo I noticed changes in him and approached him. He said his feelings were changing and he wasn't sure any more, but I THOUGHT we were working on things.

ANYWAY....As RedHeadedWife said...

Is the WAS truly not in love w/ their spouse anymore or have they just been sucked into the honeymoon of an affair.

This is the million dollar question!!
How do you walk out on a newborn and a 3 year old without even trying? It doesn't make sense.
OH...his Dad did something similar although when the kids were adults. Let me know if anyone is interested in those details.

Thank you so much to everyone who has posted. I have to go tend to the kids, but I will come back and reply to your posts later today.
Thanks again...and thanks IC...I said it before and I'll say it again, YOU ROCK!
J~

[JennyF]

One more thing...Saffie, where do I get these boots???
J~

[Lillieperl]

Hi Jenny

This sort of sitch happened to a girlfriend of mine over 30 years ago. She was head over heels in love with her H. They had one girl ~4 and she was pregnant with the second girl. She found out he was having an A, and she divorced him immediately. He married the OW, then divorced her several years later. He has since been married twice more and is currently married. He has maintained a R with the daughters over the years (they are now in their 30s). The younger girl was born after the D and once when she was in grade school, it dawned on her that her parents used to be married, and she said incredulously to her mom, "You mean you were married to my Dad?"

All this is apropos of nothing, I guess, except to say that my friend and I were talking about this at lunch the other day and she said her ex seems to like to be married and she guesses he just stopped loving her. This seems impossible to me. How do you just "stop loving" someone? Even if you meet someone else, you love them both and feel torn and choose one for good or bad reasons...

So far this has not been very helpful to you...

My guess is that he feels that he has gotten himself into a huge mess and sees no way out except to go forward. Like a guy who goes down a long tunnel and gets stuck and feels the only way to escape is to keep pushing forward. For some reason, the idea of backing out doesn't occur to him, or feels like some kind of defeat, when actually it's the most sensible way (since he knows the path) and the simplest.

I suppose it's possible that he's head over heels for the OW, but frankly, that doesn't seem likely either. It seems to me that as he sits in this giant boiling stewpot, he is looking for a way out-- not a way out of your M, but a way out from under the pile of sh!t he has brought down upon himself. If you do want him back, can you make the way back to you the easiest, least messy, most face-saving path? I expect that if he starts making noises about saving the M, the OW will start to pitch a fit and then SHE will become very unattractive. This is all just speculation. I haven't read up on your sitch, just wanted to throw in these comments for what they're worth.

You're in a really tough spot. I know that for my friend to give birth AFTER her divorce (she has a very supportive family and had moved back in temporarily with her parents-- she has six brothers and sisters who, with their children, are still a huge part of her life) was excruciating. To be honest, she's never quite "gotten over" that D.

[saffie]

One more thing...Saffie, where do I get these boots???

Ebay is a great place for all sorts of things......

[ksuer06]

Oh my gosh. I couldn't imagine how I would feel if H left me right before the birth of our baby. I would kill him, yes, kill him. My son is 6 mo old and one time I told H that we needed to really work on our marriage b/c I will leave him if he doesn't start ML to me. Well, he started bawling, not so much b/c I was threatening him, but b/c he can't imagine his life w/out son. How can a true man leave his woman like that? Sorry, don't mean to bad-mouth. I've never been in that sitch, but I'd kick him in the balls, HARD!

[JennyF]

Thanks to everyone who took the time to answer IC's question...even if you didn't know where it was going!

The majority of people answered B and/or C.

If the WAS truly still loves his/her spouse and deep in their heart it is killing them to leave their family the way they are, then when the LBS starts GAL'ing to the max, it's going to drive the WAS crazy. However, on the other hand if their M has gone way past reconciliation and the affair isn't just a "passing honeymoon," the WAS would probably either (1) not care at all that their ex was GAL and/or (2) not even notice.

My gut and my heart tell me it's NOT the latter. However it is my biggest fear and what H is firm on.
Either way what is clear is that I have to GAL. I'm nearing the part where I can totally detach and be ok with the outcome either way. It is my kids I am most sad for at the moment.
What I can't figure is what is so good about CFB that she is the BETTER option? And I don't just mean better than ME. I mean better that being in his kids lives full time. ESPECIALLY when they're so young. It is killing me to be away from them as often as I am and I can't believe she is worth giving that up. It's dispicable and it's why I believe that he will eventually regret not even trying to work on us. Not mention this is all so totally the opposite of who he used to pride himself on being.

And in my situation, if I left my wife it would be because I finally gave up after her not making any real effort for years on end. In such a case, her moving on that quickly would be a sign that I never got through to her and would leave me even more frustrated.

H NEVER gave me the chance to work on anything. He knows that given the opportunity I am all about accepting my portion in the breakdown of the marriage...but he never let me in on his little being unhappy secret when it would have made a difference. And now he says it's too late. In fact, when I first identified something was up at about 3 months pregnant, I did EVERYTHING I could to save this M. I went to counselling (even when he refused to go with me). At one point I even told him I was going to stop focusing on me at all (at 8 months pregnant) and do whatever I had to help him during this time. 4 days later he dropped the bomb saying (and I quote), "I just can't do this to you anymore. You're being so totally sweet to me and doing everything right that wife should be doing in this sitch and I can not return the love or the closeness that you need"


ANYWAY, I have to make these changes for myself anyway. But, I am kind of guessing what those things were because he never gave me the benefit of really talking to me about what went wrong. I know I had faults and things weren't perfect, but I can honestly say that things weren't really that bad. Except inside of him. And in perfect MLC style...he projected all that onto me and suddenly I am the bad guy and the 'thing' that must change in his life.
So...off he goes. To live this new life and realize that the grass isn't greener on the other side...you just have to water it now and then on your own side.
And off I go to GAL and show him that it's B or C....but NOT A!!!
Thanks again to everyone for input...any more is certainly welcome.
J~

[RedHeadWife]

It is so sad the way I've been seeing more & more threads in newcomers or affairs forums where the woman is either pregnant or has recently given birth. I was told by my H that he had in fact consulted w/ a D attorney right before we found out I was pregnant w/ #3.

I guess the only way around here & the best way is the keep reading "the book" Divorce Remedy of course and follow it's advice.

Even though H and I are ok again, I'm still working on ME and finding out who've I've become after being married and having 3 children. We lose ourselves and don't really realize it's happening and then all of a sudden our H's don't "love" us "that way" anymore. It's a tough road to take -- trying to figure out who we are and realizing that "hey, I really do like me" -- maybe it's the anti-depressant I'm now on. Anyone interested, let me know -- I've been on all the "newer" ones - Zoloft, Clexa, Lexapro, etc., but this one I'm on now seems to REALLY be working and I guess it's an "old" one that's not used much anymore.

Ok, I'll quit hijacking, but I think all this info may help Jenny and whoever else is reading this thread. These sitch's we end up in and why we are all here truly SUCK, but in the end, I believe no matter which way it goes -- whether the D actually happens or the M is worked out -- that it's all for the best. Everything happens for a reason and some day we'll think "hey, this must be why." I know for me, as much as the whole D sitch sucked, had it not happened, our M would never have gotten any better and I am prepared to keep it that way. M takes a lot of work and unfortunately, most of us didn't realize that. We figured, "we're in love and that's all that matters." But what happens is *LIFE* -- stress, work, house work, kids, etc. and unfortunately it's the M that gets put on the back burner and we were never warned to NEVER let this happen. Well, here we all are on the DB forums and have figured that out and hope that we'll have that 2nd chance to put our newly acquired information to good use.