You're still thinking of a false dichotomy here--either divorce or cheat. You aren't even admitting the possibility that you could fix your marriage. Not many here would recommend divorce, and the fact that they tell you that divorce is better than cheating is not an endorsement of divorce. It's an acknowledgment that cheating sucks as a solution to any problem. The reason they've told you that divorce woudl be better than your plan to cheat on your wife is because you've decided to end your marriage. You just aren't going to be the one to initiate a legal divorce. Your affair will never measure up to sex as part of a loving marriage, and the odds say the affair will end badly and you'll regret it. You'll be bucking the trend if you manage an affair that makes you happy; if you manage it, you should buy lottery tickets and draw to inside straights for the rest of your life.
The idea that you're not going to try to fix the marriage until your wife magically wakes up one day and decides that she wants to fix it (even though you have no reason to think that will happen without any changes or effort from you) is a roundabout way of saying you're not going to make any effort. The Irish had a very similar arrangement in which each side agreed that it would put an end to the troubles as soon as the other side unilaterally disarmed and declared for peace. That allowed a few hundred on each side to continue a guerilla conflict for decades until people got fed up enough to start talking and making an effort without a 100% guarantee that the other side would capitulate and do what they wanted.
Look, if your wife doesn't want to have sex, there's a reason. It might be chemical, it might be a naturally low libido, but it could be a dozen other reasons too. What it almost certainly is NOT is some kind of irrational whim or evil plot. Even if she made the first move (and you know she's not going to do that, because she could have done it long ago) that doesn't mean you wouldn't need to make changes, too. Like it or not, being the one who sees the problem means you're the one who can start to solve it.
Bottom line: Cheating on your wife is dishonest, dishonorable, and likely to leave you worse off than before. You can ask Cinco, Dancequeen (if you can find her) and others around here how that worked out for them when they tried it. Cheating on your wife means accepting your situation, refusing to stand up for yourself, and actually lowering your self-respect even further than a SSM has already left it. Don't let desperation drive you to make things worse. You can do better.
As always, this advice is worth every penny I charge for it.
I went ahead and cheated. I DID NOT WANT TO, but after suffering 4 years of neglect and abuse, I refused to get drug any further down.
It gave me clarity, in that I KNOW there are plenty in the world who will take me on and treat me great.
It also gave my legs a ton of stability against my wife's "tear downs" she was issuing.
The elimination of sex with me was part of a process in her power struggle. Of course I "lose", because she took everything away.
It was doing no good to hang in there and weather her storm, plus the "use it or lose it" bit. I was not going to have my sex drive and sexuality reduced or removed for the rest of my life.
My wifes attacks and affair and lack of concern for me decreased my confidence. A once firey passion and supercharged libido was stripped to nearly nothing. Of course ED set in, and its mostly mental as most of you should know.
You must leave an abusive situation.
Anyway, I know cheating may be dishonest, but if the other camp has decided respecting you and the marriage does not mean anything anymore, and pretty much has you put "on hold", while they go through and feast in their life... At some point you must take matters into your own hands.
For some of us having short term affair or friends with benefits, is a short term solution while we wait on our spouse to hopefully get back to us. And if they don't, we have already rebuilt our life.
For some of us having short term affair or friends with benefits, is a short term solution while we wait on our spouse to hopefully get back to us. And if they don't, we have already rebuilt our life.
So you feel that stooping down to your wife's level (after your numerous posts about how heartless, unfair, hurtful, etc etc her behaviour has been) is actually "rebuilding your life." Reality check, please!
As for your spouse "hopefully getting back to us"--you do know it ALWAYS takes two to make that happen, surely. And your own affair has just made that a whole less likely.
One of the things that I strongly believe in is "visualization and verbalization." That is creating strong mental images of what you want and also finding a place in private (my car commutes to & from work) where I can verbalize what I want. This includes self affirmations so that I feel better about who I am and what I want to become.
Another thing that I believe strongly in is creating a plan of action for change and writing it down and then monitoring your progress at periodic points. I have some pretty huge weight loss goals and have quarterly goals that I want to try to achieve and that I monitor my progress against.
While I don't think that cheating on a spouse is a good idea, you seem clear in your reasons and clear in what you got out of it. I hope that it was as theraputic as you claim. It also sounds like you want to move on and end your marriage. It sounds like you have decided to move on. It sounds to me like you are taking more steps to explore moving on.
Figure out what you want, create a plan for how you intend to achieve the desired change and then go out and make it happen.
If you ever decide to rebuild your marriage, you might want to figure out steps that can bring you and your wife together on an incremental basis, but one that will build and make the two of you closer. John Gottman has an interesting 5.5 magic hours a week program (in the old link I will post next it was just 5 hours, as he has added some additional things.) Article sumarizing Gottman approach
Good luck to you.
>43 years of marriage--My wife and I are now closer than we have been in decades. I believe that my SSM is over.
I invited her to councelling, did 5 months by myself. It was helpful.
However I never could get her to be interested in her relationship with me. It seems she's just gotten used to treating my badly, and there is no reason to change it.
Its funny on the "cat" bit though, when females do start getting into me, its like she can sense the attraction and she'll throw out a crumb.
I don't like talking bad about her, but feel that the info is useful to others in these situations.
Basically the way it is presented to me is:
1. My wife is not mine 2. My emotional and physical needs aren't her responsibility 3. She's single and can do whatever she wants to do
During her affair, she stopped doing all her "wifely duties". During and after it, she flipped our situation so that I was the bad guy, gave her positive affirmation to the wrong she was doing. Since then, there have been so many reinforced bad behaviors, there is no reason for her to quit.
I learned about the affect of those on someones life, and understand I can't really have her around circles in which I wish to remain, she'll mess it up for me.
Also her act was tearing up my confidence, which was messing up my erections. So when that happens to a man, he starts to pay attention.
Anyway, since "I'm single", and I know it will truly be better to be fully single than with a wife who doesn't want you. I'm making new friends, and it has helped tremendously.
Oh... All my kids ( even the ones with her ) want me to have a "girlfriend" who treats me well.
Anyway, without a forum like this one, i would have been possibly stuck for the rest of my life in a terrible emotional place.
...I invited her to councelling, did 5 months by myself. It was helpful.
However I never could get her to be interested in her relationship with me. It seems she's just gotten used to treating my badly, and there is no reason to change it.
....Anyway, since "I'm single", and I know it will truly be better to be fully single than with a wife who doesn't want you. I'm making new friends, and it has helped tremendously.
Oh... All my kids ( even the ones with her ) want me to have a "girlfriend" who treats me well.
Anyway, without a forum like this one, i would have been possibly stuck for the rest of my life in a terrible emotional place.
I know that one thing that surprised me was a couple of times when my wife treated me badly in front of our children they gentlly took her to task once and said she should really be better to me. It is surprising what kids know and how they really want what is best for us (even if they rebel from us and our parental authority).
I wish you happiness. It sounds like you tried, but for some reason your wife didn't want to change.
>43 years of marriage--My wife and I are now closer than we have been in decades. I believe that my SSM is over.
Your wife did not flip the situation so that you looked like the bad guy when you had an affair. YOU flipped the situation so that you looked like the bad guy BY having an affair. You gave her a new reason (a valid one) to want anything but sex with you. I'm not trying to be unnecessarily brutal about this, but it was a bad move and you're selling it to others as a solution.
And I'm sorry to say this, because I know where you're coming from, but your equation of your wife's lack of desire for you and her refusal to have sex with you with "abuse" is a symptom in itself. Nobody has ever abused anybody by not having sex with him or not wanting to have sex with him, and it only feels that way to people like you and me who are way too wrapped up in a sex-starved mindset.
In my situation, my wife was expirimenting with cheating on me. I have Yahoo instant messenger chats from the year 2007 which was the first time her affair actually confirmed.
The chats have her talking with a single friend of hers, who was egging her on to cheating on me. My wife expressed a guilt in early chats, but later her friend gave her the encouragement she needed to do this right. "Just don't listen to anything your husband says. Listen to your lover"...
Many years later, this has not changed and has been reason for a many of our problems.
Before and during the confirmed affair, my wife was growing increasingly abusive. I'm talking physical, emotional and mental abuse. At its worst, the abuse was not in spurts, it was ongoing and never-endingt.
For the affair that I know of, there was a certain evil pride my wife ugained in knowing she was "beating" me. So a portion of the affair was the selfish lust, and another portion of it was I could not stop her and the prideful arrogance that comes with it.
I have reason to suspect she had actually been cheating several years before I had an actual confirmation.
So you have a guy who has been waiting 5+ years, being loyoal, looking into "his world" as his wife defined it for him. And it was stressful, a hell in itself.
When I went to get help, she did not want to participate. I've heard every sort of deflating or negative comment or come-back that exists. Portions of the abuse were designed for her to inflate her ego, before she went out to a club for example. It was pretty bad. Because I am a man, I am not supposed to say anything. Its not right.
So after watching her abuse me so bad and cheat on me to the point of my libido decreasing and losing my erection power. Watching my mojo decline. Going in for help, having hanged in there year after year...
I went ahead and cheated. And technically the short affair did work. It was amazing at how quickly it worked. Getting the new sex allowed me to see clearly. I was no longer focused on the pain and the world as my wife defined it for me, but future possibilities.
I STILL WANT HER. She would have to treat me well to get me back. Any one who props her up and supports her current phisod. Who supports her abuse of me, is casting stones at "my family".... Oh... Its not mine, I forgot.
So I hope you can take back your comments after I've given you additional information and clarification to whats going on.
Oh... If I put my wife in a SSM position due to a mental issue or physical problem, after a certain amount of time I would expect her to cheat. If I love her, I would probably want her to because it would be better for her.
Its always easier to understand when the shoe is on the other foot.
Originally Posted By: SillyOldBear
Your wife did not flip the situation so that you looked like the bad guy when you had an affair. YOU flipped the situation so that you looked like the bad guy BY having an affair. You gave her a new reason (a valid one) to want anything but sex with you. I'm not trying to be unnecessarily brutal about this, but it was a bad move and you're selling it to others as a solution.
And I'm sorry to say this, because I know where you're coming from, but your equation of your wife's lack of desire for you and her refusal to have sex with you with "abuse" is a symptom in itself. Nobody has ever abused anybody by not having sex with him or not wanting to have sex with him, and it only feels that way to people like you and me who are way too wrapped up in a sex-starved mindset.
Oh. And on denial of sex, like i said I have new feelings.
Mine was not simply denial of sex. My wife got into her mindset that she is in today, from a selfish pride that allowed her to treat me horribly. A portion of it was to remove the sex. Like I said above, it was confirmed that she was cheating on me. Our sexlife was great when she did it, but she wanted to see what an affair was like. I guess she figured I was already tied down and too dumb or mentally dumb not to notice.
In any case. If I caused my spouse or relationship partner to have a SSM situation because of my refusal, or if I am not giving her attention and affection, if I am treating her badly... After a while I would EXPECT that she would cheat, and she should.
