If you've decided not to press that issue at present, perhaps you should set a goal for yourself to not ask her, not check phone records etc. for a certain time period - 30 days, two weeks, etc.
Hi Dia,
I like it. Thank you. I now have 2 goals:
1. I think I need to convince W to go to MC again. 2. Not to check phone records for 2 weeks.
Boundaries, they need to be set up in place to protect you as much they protect her.
This sounds very much like an open relationship and in the end that has to be the question you ask yourself, do you tolerate an open relationship, can you share her with someone else.
Regardless of her past history and the sexual assault she suffered at the hands of someone I'm assuming she trusted, She can't use that as a crutch for her actions and tell everyone including you that she is confused and doesn't know who to pick and continue to live life like this with you by her side. Currently it sounds very much that she uses this as a crutch and I could be wrong but it sounds like she is being enabled to do so.
Hi Robx,
I agree with you. This is why I struggle with this issue. I think I am waiting to see if the psych determines she is stable later this week and leaves her meds where they are. If so, I think I will seriously consider this.
Hi Tristan, one thing to remember, if setting boundaries with how people can treat you is wrong then expect people to walk all over you.
Would you let people mistreat your children and talk poorly to them and walk all over them, bully them and make them feel bad?
Of course not.
If the situation was reversed, do you really believe your wife would tolerate you seeing another woman and then coming home to have a friendly loving relationship with her? I'm sure she would give you a size 8 up the old address and let you know that if you can't decide which woman to be with, that she would make the decision for you and kindly kick your a$$ out on to the street because if you acted like that to her, it would be grossly disrespectful.
If you aren't looking out for what's in your best interests and your wife doesn't appear to be taking care of that either, who is currently do this job?
I'm not rushing you into making a decision, in the end it's your life that you're living and the consequences of your actions are experienced by you not me or anyone else on this forum.
I can sympathize with you, it doesn't feel right that we should set boundaries with the people we love, you would think it would be understood that they should treat you with love, care & respect and vice versa. But what should be and what actually is tend to be 2 different things.
I guess you have to find your own threshold of tolerance, how long you tolerate her seeing the OM and you continue to be loving towards her, hoping she'll pick you instead of him. Personally speaking, I would step out of the equation altogether, instead of proving to her that you are better than him (which in the end kind of assumes that you don't really know or feel confident that you are better than the OM and have to do things to prove it to yourself and her), I wouldn't compete at all. I would just say "Choose, you've had enough time to indulge yourself in this process and I've had enough, you either choose or I'll make the choice for you."
And if she can't make the choice, as unfortunate as it sounds, you know what the decision is at that point either that or continue being number 2 in her life (if you even rank that high).
Never compete with the other man, ever. When you choose not to compete you communicate that you don't need to and that she is free to live life elsewhere... immediately. When you remove yourself from the equation, another thing happens, the excitement of the affair tends to drop down quite a few notches, the thrill of cheating on a spouse, the inexplicable excitement that is derived from doing something wrong is no longer as high as it once was. How could it be? You're no longer the LBS waiting for his wife to return, you're now the WAS, you've taken back control of the relationship because you now choose not to be part of it and this is key because all along this has been her decision, she has controlled this and not many people tend to understand the dynamic of power in this type of relationship where one spouse is actively cheating on another.
Think about it, you both made a decision to date, see each other, eventually get married, buy a home, car(s), possessions, have children, etc. These were all decisions you were making jointly together. You shared these decisions, you shared this control. When she chose to have an affair and see the OM, she made this decision without you & your consent, she took control of the relationship and has maintained control of this relationship ever since - proof of this? She isn't the one on this forum asking for advice on how to win back her spouse. She isn't going the extra mile to be the perfect spouse, she isn't 100% devoted to your marriage. She has 2 "toys" to play with, the old familiar one (you), the new exciting one (OM). If she isn't forced to make a decision, what would cause her to stop playing with either of her toys? The longer this situation goes on, the harder it will be to make a decision.
I don't know how long you & your wife have been playing out this story of yours but if several months have passed already, that is far too long in my opinion. Separations are not wine, they don't get better with age and if a spouse is permitted the luxury of having a lover outside the marriage without any interference from your end, what would cause them to stop? They are getting different needs met by different partners and it becomes a very ideal situation: exciting, new & different at one end of the spectrum and safe, secure and backup plan at the other end if the first one doesn't work out.
Ask her to make a decision, if you need to, give her a few days at most, after that, make the decision for her knowing that you love & respect yourself enough to not be disrespected by your spouse and you love her enough to let her be happy with someone else since she can't feel that way with you.
Simple & difficult at the same time, I don't envy your position but I also know it's an opportunity for incredible growth on your part and the example you will set and the life you will live afterwards for respecting yourself in such a way will set a standard for your children to emulate - children learn more from the actions of their parents than from any words that are spoken to them, what would you tell them if they were in this situation and it wasn't you?
I previously hijacked your thread momentarily when breakaway and I had opposing views with what Orich should do in his situation and I didn't want comment on your thread without participating in your discussion.
As for the online predator label, I don't know who you would be referring to so I don't know why you even included that reference along with that website of which i have no knowledge or affiliation - since you have knowledge of these things, I'll leave it up to everyone else to make their own conclusions.
To be clear..that wasn't directed at you. It didn't occur to me til later that you must have thought that, since we are online here.
Again, my point was that I DO have insight into what tristan's wife might be feeling, and further, what tristan might be feeling as my spouse can be very unstable. So I have elements of both sides. The OM in my situation was the online predator. So I have experience with predators. I think tristan's wife is being manipulated because she was very vulnerable at the time she met him. That's what they look for. I do not think she was looking for a toy, or someone new and exciting, or is playing games. I think she is genuinely confused, and has serious trauma issues to contend with while trying to figure out what to do about her marriage.
I rarely comment on anyone's sitches anymore as the whole tenor of this board changed in the last six months, and I have had to do a lot of healing away from here.
Anything else can be said can be on my thread, not his.
I would call someone an "online predator" if they're an adult trying to talk to little kids in chat rooms for the purpose of abusing them in some form or another - that is probably the accepted definition of "online predator" by most law enforcement agencies that police this kind of thing.
Guys who practice skills they learn on line on women may not have the best intentions but I have to believe they are only successful with women that want this type of thing to happen consciously or subconsciously - and I'll leave it at that. I don't think that these guys would be successful on women that are in happy loving relationships and aren't looking to cheat on their spouses. Blaming them for whatever they're successful at doing is just taking the responsibility away from the women they're "successful" with. We all have free will and we all make decisions to exercise that free will - no one can force you to do anything you don't really want to do.
Example: Left behind husband at home calls walk away wife on the phone and tells her to come home now and end this nonsense, we're married and you're supposed to love me. Result: walk away wife would never come home because of this, she doesn't want to.
Example: Guy who learns special pick up skills on line meets up with walk away wife at a club, talks to her, she likes the attention of this other man, he tells her to come home with him for an evening of no strings attached sex. Result: if walk away wife goes home with this guy she met at the club, it's because she wanted to, not because she was hypnotized into doing so, believing anything else is ridiculous.
If those pickup skills were really that powerful, every left behind spouse on this site should learn them and then convince their walk away spouses to come back home & love them and be happily married again.
Walk away wives aren't IN happy loving relationships. That's the point isn't it? Did you read DB or DR? The point is that they've talked and cried and screamed and talked some more and their H's don't listen. When they say, well I don't love you anymore and I want a divorce, then they listen. Well big deal.
WAW's feel rejected, devalued, and uncared for. I have yet to know any woman personally that got involved with another man that was looking for new and exciting sex. You seem to think EVERYTHING is about sex. They were looking for someone to care about them. I wasn't even LOOKING for it...I was friends with this person, online, and it eventually became more than friends as we got deeply emotionally involved. I was naive enough to think it was "safe" since it was anonymous at the beginning, and I had someone safe to talk to. So I let my guard down and then it snowballed from there. It was only later that I found out all this was calculated on his part. I take responsibility for my part, but I was also carefully made to feel emotionally dependent on this guy. I met him in person a grand total of one time, and by then I'd decided to divorce.
All of our situations have common themes, but they are not all the same. BTW, I am the one doing all the work to save my marriage.
Example: Left behind husband at home calls walk away wife on the phone and tells her to come home now and end this nonsense, we're married and you're supposed to love me. Result: walk away wife would never come home because of this, she doesn't want to.
No, she's not your mommy. She's not "supposed to" love you like your mommy does, no matter what you do. Love for an equal partner can die when it's neglected or pissed on. She's also not your child that you can order to end this "nonsense" and come home.
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Example: Guy who learns special pick up skills on line meets up with walk away wife at a club, talks to her, she likes the attention of this other man, he tells her to come home with him for an evening of no strings attached sex. Result: if walk away wife goes home with this guy she met at the club, it's because she wanted to, not because she was hypnotized into doing so, believing anything else is ridiculous.
You're taking things out of context. I'm talking about an attitude of MANIPULATION. I'm not talking about hypnotizing drunk girls in clubs.
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If those pickup skills were really that powerful, every left behind spouse on this site should learn them and then convince their walk away spouses to come back home & love them and be happily married again.
I'm not talking about "pickup skills," I'm talking about pretending to be loving, caring and compassionate to lure a woman. You know what, though, you're on to something, if LBH's talked to their wives the way OM's do, they would be happily married. You're a hypocrite, anyway, as you were giving lengthy details on how to gradually coax a woman into sex while pretending you're not.
Whatever leads to the breakdown in a M, it's hard not to feel hard done by the sinking to the level of allowing an OP in. WASs may feel unloved, but there would be some cases where they are equally unloving. It's pointless trying to measure or argue who was in more pain, but (almost) no amount of pain justifies cheating.
Yeah, I could have been a better husband too. I went into a bit of a funk when I lost a (senior and relatively high paying) job years ago. I could not bring myself to take up "lesser" jobs with lower titles or that paid me less. I tried my hand at business, and my W was right in that I could not really focus on doing it properly. Needless to say, our savings started to shrink. But I felt almost no guilt since I had 2 severance payouts that would have far surpassed the average wage for the 2+ years I spent feeling sorry for myself. I did not appreciate how much it mattered to W for too long, and in the end her patience broke.
Balanced against that was my own resentment over our sex life. We went through 3 periods of no sex for at least 12-18 months, and I just tried to respect her lack of drive for it. I did blow up once, and she broke down and pleaded for understanding. And I left it at that. Could I have twisted this into some warped justification for an A at some point - even if only for the sex? Well, probably a lot more logically than my W could have justified what happened.
OPs are almost always manipulative, and snakes indeed. I saw threads recently on the script for WAWs. Maybe we should do one for OPs too, Tristan certainly noted a gem earlier in this thread. I just can't resist adding this one from W's OM when they started off: "No matter what happens, we must never hurt the children."
What a classic. What a smart prepared back door if the going gets too hot. I'm sure the kids would never have been in remote possibiity of being hurt by two married people choosing to have an A with each other.
Me 42 W 39 Married: 11 Jan 1998, T: Since 1992 First Bomb: Sep 2007 Confirmed A/OM: 4 Nov 2007 Kids: D10, S5 Reconciled and together again after (alot of) time and heartbreak. 3rd kid, S, born 2 Jan 2010.
Monday: W and I had no contact during work hours. I arove home at 7 a little later than normal. W was not there; MIL was watching children. I asked MIL if she knew where W was (she is normally home by 6); she said that she called and would be out shopping. In my gut, things did not feel right and the anxiety began to build up. I played with the children for about a half hour. And then left to walk over and see a mutual friend of ours who knows almost our story.
Friend X is very spiritual and a great person. The fact that both my W and I trust her makes her a great person for support. She had told me to stop by to talk a couple of weeks back. Tonight was a good night to do that. It was good to pass the time. W stopped in at 8:15 and seemed upset. X asked her to sit down, she did. X finished a disturbing story from her childhood. At this point, it felt awkward and I said "I just came over to talk. I hope you don't mind".
W replied, "No I don't mind. She knows everything. I need to go, I am worried about mom." She left rather abruptly.
Feeling the tension in the air. X and I finished the conversation and I left to go back home. When I arrived, 2 girls were upstairs crying. I went up to see them both clinging to W. They were upset that both of us were gone for much longer than normal without letting them know. W was about to explode. I did my best to try to settle them down, but was not all that successful in the beginning. Finally, we got them calmed down and to bed. The one statement I remember W pleading with D5 "D5 please don't do this. You are really hurting me. Please don't do this. You are hurting mommy."
After the ordeal with children. I could tell that W was extremely irritated. M: "Are you OK" W: "I am fine, just tired. I am running a training tomorrow and need to be at work by 8:30. I need to run by Dunkin Donuts and store to get supplies for training. This whole training is just me." M: "You feel overwhelmed?" W: "Yes. That is probably it, I am overwhelmed. Would you like some icecream?" She is distant, not touching. Exact opposite from the weekend. We sit down with the dessert, she seems to be warming up and getting in a better mood as we eat. I mention that I read that it can sometimes be good for spouses to go to the psych appointment and ask if she would
like me to join her?" W: "Why do you not think that I am telling him everything?" M: "No, I just read that it may help me get a better understanding of what you are going though." W: "Oh, OK. No I think I am OK. But thank you for taking interest. Want to see the new outfit I got?" M: "Sure."
Upstairs, she models her new outfit which is very nice (sexy). She asks "You think I can wear this when we go dancing again?"
M: "It's perfect."
After her modelling routine. We get ready for and into bed rather quickly. It was obvious she did not want to talk much. She gives me a quick kiss and nestles her head on my chest to go to sleep. Before we go to sleep, I ask her if she has ever heard of Imago therapy. She is a social worker, so there was a decent chance that she would have; but she hadn't. I tried to explain the little I knew about it. She said it sounded interesting.
Tuesday: I wake W up at 6:30. She wraps her arms around me and stays in bed for several more minutes. After getting up, she hurries to get ready and out the door for work. She comes into the bathroom to give me a kiss. I ask for a hug, I know I shouldn't have (moment of weakness), she gives me a tight and rather long one. Off to work she runs.
I made a mistake this morning and mentione OM to MIL. W told me that MIL already knew, I guess not. MIL was a little taken back by it. She said she knew of him last year, but W told him that it was done. She told me that she was sorry.
These are the last comments I'm going to make about this subject, because I've done too much work to detach and move on and get emotionally healthy to keep rehashing this.
Originally Posted By: Deep
I just have to butt in with my 2 cents worth .
Hey, everyone's entitled to their opinion.
Quote:
Whatever leads to the breakdown in a M, it's hard not to feel hard done by the sinking to the level of allowing an OP in. WASs may feel unloved, but there would be some cases where they are equally unloving. It's pointless trying to measure or argue who was in more pain, but (almost) no amount of pain justifies cheating.
I want to make the point that WAS's cannot all be painted with one brush. I have 6 full threads detailing the verbal and emotional abuse I've been through with my spouse...I didn't just feel unappreciated, I'd been systematically torn down day by day by day. I turned myself inside out trying to please a man who couldn't be pleased. I have no desire to explain it all again, or "justify" my actions. I don't have to justify myself.
I'll tell you I was a sitting duck for someone to come into my life and tell me I was a beautiful person, that I was special, that I mattered, that I deserved to be treated well. Little did I know that this a lovely game he likes to play, getting high off getting hurt women to eat out of his hand and tell him how wonderful HE is. Til he finds the next one.
I would be willing to bet the MAJORITY opinion here is that I deserved it. Well, I didn't deserve it. I didn't deserve to be so mistreated by one person, that vowed to cherish and honor and love me as Christ loved the church, (but those wedding vows are just the minor ones, those can be broken 68 million times without any consequences), that I fell prey to some vulture who took advantage of my pain for his own profit.
All of this experience has brought me to seek deep spiritual healing, and I've been blessed to find it. I made mistakes when I was broken. I make better decisions as I heal.
But WAW's are usually characterized as cartoonish figures that are evil, selfish, cake-eating whores looking for fun and excitement, all while being in control of their H's, with his "nuts in their pocket." Some probably are. In my case that's a crock of sh!t. I know it's easier to just say that then look at the intricacies of the situation.
And really, this morning, I was thinking I don't really care what anyone else thinks about it anyway. I just know other people are out there reading, some probably too ashamed to tell their stories or seek any kind of help, because they'll be told they deserve what they got. An abuser's favorite comment, btw.
Good luck with your situation, tristan. I hope the link I gave you helped out. A good counselor will help you a lot, and help you with your children, whatever happens next in your life. You sound like the type of person who will be able to find your way.
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