The weekend went ok, but when we got home we started fighting again. It's my fault; I can't let any of it go. We're meeting with the therapist tomorrow night, but I guess I just don't know how I'm going to be able to trust her again. She just wants to forget that it ever happened, and moreover, wants to continue doing it. I don't appear to be able to do that (yet, anyway). I guess it will work itself out in the end though. I'm not going to spend my life with a wife who lies to me.
posted
Don't blame yourself - don't blame yourself. I'm glad you're going to counseling. I think you might benefit some by going by yourself as well. If she wants to keep doing it, then letting it go when it bothers you would be the wrong thing to do. This isn't your fault. It isn't fair to ask you to forget it ever happened if it keeps happening.
I'm sorry. This is legitimately bad. Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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Wait for your therapist's advice, hopefully you have selected a good one. One who can speak in a manner that helps BOTH of you with your specific needs.
What specifically does your wife want you to forget? That she slipped up that ONE time, but she won't ever slip up again?
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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She wants me to forget that the entire time we've been going through this, she's been lying to me. She says that she keeps lying because she doesn't want to fight anymore.
That almost hurts more than anything else, really.
Posts: 1281 | Registered: Feb 2001
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The fight last night was about someone she's continued to talk to. She says they're just friends, but the relationship began with a heavy sexual bent, and although I have no idea if that's continued up to phone calls and emails, I just can't believe her because she lied about the guy from the beginning (saying he was from work, etc).
I have rational reasons for how I feel, what I don't have is the ability to set those feelings aside and be patient while we go through the therapy process - does anyone have advice on how to do that?
Posts: 1281 | Registered: Feb 2001
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A good therapist will be able to help you be patient while you work through the process. Setting your feelings aside is not necessarily the goal. At least not long term. You may need to hold them in reserve for awhile if you have other issues (communication, for instance) to work on first.
Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
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quote:Originally posted by jasonepowell: I don't know that that's true, actually.
The fight last night was about someone she's continued to talk to. She says they're just friends, but the relationship began with a heavy sexual bent, and although I have no idea if that's continued up to phone calls and emails, I just can't believe her because she lied about the guy from the beginning (saying he was from work, etc).
I have rational reasons for how I feel, what I don't have is the ability to set those feelings aside and be patient while we go through the therapy process - does anyone have advice on how to do that?
I honestly think there is a larger problem at work here (I know thats sort of obvious and a cliche statement). I would not presume to dabble deeper into your relationship, honestly just hold on until the therapist can give you guidance. The wife lying because she does not want to fight clearly shows there has been a problem that has gone unaddressed for some time.
The fact the cover has been blown and she still feel strongly about continuing her activities shows that she is beyond feeling guilty about what she does and is in the defensive stage. But don't think that that means she is beyond feeling, she just needs somebody to help her slow the tempo of things down and look at things piece by piece.
From what I can tell I honestly think the wife you love is still in there, she is not beyond saving, just be prepared to go through hell to find her again. May God bless you with the attributes required to heal your relationship
I wish you the very best! Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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I'm so glad to hear that you guys have an appointment tomorrow night.
I know how frustrating this time must be for you - waiting rather than doing. I hope you have a good therapist and that you will both be able to progess under their guidance.
Posts: 5879 | Registered: Apr 2001
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I hope the therapy helps both of you figure out what you want, and how to accomplish that.
Don't forget that you have to be true to your own feelings too. She can't expect to keep having online romances and you be OK with that. You should not be expected to feel that it's something she should be able to do.
Making a mistake and asking forgiveness is one thing, expecting you to ignore this while it keeps going on is another thing completely. I know I wouldn't stand for it. I didn't.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:Originally posted by jasonepowell: i think the barometer is secrecy; if you need to hide it, it's wrong.
So you tell your wife when you masturbate?
I don't think you should feel like you have to hide it, if she asks. I don't think that's in the same category as cyber sex and setting up phone calls and possibly meetings with other people.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:Originally posted by jasonepowell: i think the barometer is secrecy; if you need to hide it, it's wrong.
So you tell your wife when you masturbate?
I believe it was our own OSC who said that to not give constant updates of when we do routine thins is not "keeping a secret".
"I don't tell you that I breathe, either." -Zeforah
I hear a debate starting.
Mastubation IMO is NOT the same thing as breathing, or other basic routines. When it comes to marriage I think both partners should be VERY open about their sexual needs. If the wife is OK with the husband masturbating then no you do not need to inform her of every occasion you choose to do so,(I personally think masturbation is counterproductive to the health of a marriage, but I wont get into that yet.)
Back to this thread, even if the husband is ok with the wife's online Tomasina foolery, he SHOULD be made AWARE of when she intends to engage in such activities. But again in this case I am not about either partner introducing people into the relationship in any sexual way through ANY medium.
Its the principle of openess that I think is necessary.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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I definitely think there is nothing wrong with having privacy in a marriage, my husband does not need to know when I shave my legs or when I go to the bathroom, it's just not an issue. But a relationship that involves some level of intimacy with another person, like cyber sex, that's a breach of trust and it's in a different category.
In our marriage we like to abide by a rule that we don't disrespect each other by even letting there be an appearance of impropriety. For example, when I worked I would not have lunch by myself with a male colleague without calling my hubby and telling him about it. Not because my coworkers and I had anything going on, but just because it might appear or seem to be disrespectful to my husband for me to be out having a quiet meal with another man. I don't call him and ask permission, I just simply say "Hey, I'm having lunch with John today." It has nothing to do with whether or not we trust each other, nor is it a control issue it's courtesy and respect for each other. (and I should note, if he has lunch with a female by himself, he does the same thing - it's a two way street) I should not be in a situation that even resembles a romantic type situation with a man besides my husband, if I am in such a situation I let him know about it out of respect for the bond we have together.
That does not mean, however, that he needs to know I had chicken salad for lunch today between classes, or that while in class I chatted with a male classmate about our assignment - those are routine, everyday things he doesn't need to know nor does he care to know. But had I gone somewhere quiet with the male classmate to eat lunch somewhere secluded and talk - that I would have told him.
Posts: 14428 | Registered: Aug 2001
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Hm, I seem to be having a posting issue with this site. I'm having trouble with the full reply form (hence the five identical posts above) and I can't edit/delete my posts. Could I get a forum leader to delete four of those?
My comment linking masturbation with daily routine was a joke, just in case nobody caught it.
Posts: 23 | Registered: Jun 2006
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Well, my worst fears have been realized - she has had sex with at least one other man. We have an appointment for therapy tomorrow, but she doesn't know that I have found proof of her adultery. I can't decide if I should just spend the night at a hotel tonight and know that she will probably cheat on me again in doing so, or if I should confront her and watch it get ugly, or if I should try to avoid her as much as possible (be dishonest).
What do you think?
Posts: 1281 | Registered: Feb 2001
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Last Wednesday or Thursday - I had left and was staying at a friends house, but we were talking every night.
Posts: 1281 | Registered: Feb 2001
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Crap. So it was after you were aware that there was a problem, and supposedly when everything was out in the open. I'm sorry, Jason, that's rough. Does this change how you feel about trying to make the relationship work?
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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Of your three possibilities, I don't have any advice. If you don't say anything, I don't think that's being dishonest. No matter what, I would definitely bring it up in therapy.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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Noemon - I truly believe that her medication changes are driving the rapid escalation, even if it's not the cause of her unhappiness with our marriage. I have no idea if I will ever be able to trust her again. That's what therapy is for, I imagine.
Katharina - I think I agree with you about it not being dishonest, but I just don't know if I can hide it. I'm afraid of letting it out and then we have a very ugly situation.
I guess the last problem is that if I don't stick around tonight, I don't think she'll go to therapy tomorrow with me.
Posts: 1281 | Registered: Feb 2001
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posted
It sounds to me like you'd still like to give therapy a chance. If that's the case, then yes, you probably do need to stay tonight.
I hate to be the one to bring this up, but it needs to be said. . . sex with people you meet on the internet is a very high-risk activity, as far as chances of disease go. No matter what else happens, if you've been intimate with her since the time you were staying at your friend's house, you need to be tested for STDs. Again, I'm sorry.
Posts: 7954 | Registered: Mar 2004
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I know. That's something else I don't know how to bring up - how do you tell your wife you don't even want to kiss her for fear of disease?
Posts: 1281 | Registered: Feb 2001
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Wow. So, you confronted her about it, left to get some space, and in one night, she ended up sleeping with someone while you were gone?
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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quote:Originally posted by jasonepowell: Noemon - I truly believe that her medication changes are driving the rapid escalation, even if it's not the cause of her unhappiness with our marriage. I have no idea if I will ever be able to trust her again. That's what therapy is for, I imagine.
Sure. I just didn't know if the actual physical infidelity would change your thinking. It wouldn't change mine in that situation, but I can understand why it might with someone else.
quote:I guess the last problem is that if I don't stick around tonight, I don't think she'll go to therapy tomorrow with me.
Right now, your primary goal is getting both of you to the therapy session. Given that you don't think she'll show if you don't go home tonight, the option of staying in a hotel is pretty much off the table. I would guess that confronting her tonight will also lessen the chances of her going, so I would refrain from doing that. Easier said than done, I know, but try to keep what you ultimately want strongly in mind.
I wish I had better advice than that to give.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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Kissing is pretty low risk for STD transmission, but I would think that given the circumstances you wouldn't really need to give any explanation for avoiding any kind of physical intimacy with her.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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Not wanting to kiss for that reason is probably excessive. I'd be more likely to not want to kiss someone due to the feelings of betrayal that worries about disease. But if she wants a level of intimacy you're not comfortable with at this time, I'd say something like "I'm sorry, I'm just so confused about everything that's going on, I'm not comfortable doing this until we get our relationship on firmer ground." If you can honestly add "I love you" on the end of that, it wouldn't hurt. And I'd assume it has the advantage of being true.
Then make sure, as kat said, you bring up your concerns at the therapist. She needs to hear all the ways this has affect your lives together. And you need to listen honestly to her feelings about what brought her to this point. Good luck. Posts: 7954 | Registered: Mar 2004
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You know, all I can say is that it doesn't seem like she's very interested in keeping the marriage going. In fact, quite the opposite. In fact, it seems like she doesn't give a damn about your feelings.
In fact, were I in your shoes, there is no way in hell I would say with her.
Crap. I hate saying that to you, but it's the truth. How can it not be the truth after what you wrote?
I sincerely, sincerely, sincerely hope that you can work things out for you such that you are happy. If that means patching things up, good. If that means leaving, then that is good, too.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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I mean, my God, it's one thing to have an affair when your spouse doesn't know, but when your spouse suspects very strongly and is trying to work things out with you and you sleep someone in your house. That's just...low. I mean, genuinely low.
Fellow Hatrackers, am I off base here? Could any of you stay with your spouse in similiar circumstances?
My heart goes out to you, Jason. Please do what's right for you.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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I don't know how to describe that Jason as anything but "Overwhelming."
Jason, don't look at this recent development as a sign of defeat. She was alone, probably feeling very emotionally unstable, and God knows what that "Fiend" said to her, but whatever it was he convinced her that he could make her feel better about all this.
Don't tell your wife you know, at least give her the opportunity to tell you in her own way, if she is given a good opportunity to come clean and does not, you might have to break it to her. But follow the advice of your therapist, don't let the session turn into "Who has the biggest pile of dirt to throw."
I am sure many of us have done something stupid, hated ourselves for doing it, and then agonized just a short time later when we made it even worse.
I use to have an addiction that I knew was destroying my life, I would be so angry at what it had done to me, at what it had stolen from me, I was so angry at it, I swore I'd give it up, only to collapse into depression as I indulged in it just hours sometimes minutes later.
Hang on Jason, if your marriage fails (perish the thought) make DAMN sure you have done everything you can, and that its entirely her fault. A marriage is worth saving if there is any chance of it being salvaged.
Some of my closest relationships came because they screwed up, I forgave them, and they genuinely recognized how valuable that 2nd chance was.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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posted
I can understand wanting to work things out, Storm. They've got an 8 year foundation for their relationship. That's enough for people of a certain temperament to weather something like this, especially if a change in medication is a contributing factor, and especially if the couple are members of a tradition that strongly discourages divorce.
I went back and read your earlier posts, Jason, to see if you'd ever said whether or not your were from such a culture (whether Mormon or Catholic or whathaveyou), and whether or not you had kids. I didn't see any information on either one, though I could have missed the relevant post.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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quote:Originally posted by Storm Saxon: I mean, my God, it's one thing to have an affair when your spouse doesn't know, but when your spouse suspects very strongly and is trying to work things out with you and you sleep someone in your house. That's just...low. I mean, genuinely low.
Fellow Hatrackers, am I off base here? Could any of you stay with your spouse in similiar circumstances?
My heart goes out to you, Jason. Please do what's right for you.
At one point in my life, I would have agreed, Storm. And it would still take superhuman strength to get past something like this in a partner.
However, I read about the medication stuff which implies mental illness (and forgive me if I'm off-base there) and I think about the past few years with my mentally ill teenager, seeing her "true" self when she is adequately medicated and a cruel stranger when she's not, and it seems like maybe Jason is trying to figure out whether this behavior is that of his true wife... I feel for you, Jason. I hope you can get to the bottom of things, the truth of things, and figure out what you have to do for yourself and for your marriage.
Posts: 628 | Registered: Nov 1999
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I'm not religious in any way, but I'm a very committed person. My own parents split when I was young, and my mother went through a couple of additional husbands before landing a keeper. My life's goal is to not go through that. And look where it got me.
Posts: 1281 | Registered: Feb 2001
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I think you need to figure out what it is you want, what is attainable, what is healthy for you, and go from there. Be strong, man.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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It may be sneaky, but it might be good to wait to confront her about it until your session tonight (so she's already there, you have a third party to help referee if things get out of hand, and you don't have to wait forever letting it eat you up).
Posts: 5879 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
I am so so sorry. I went through exactly the same thing, though with my wife, it was a co-worker. She first simply confessed dissatisfaction with our marriage. I struggled to try to make things better and salvage it. But she was already emotionally gone. More than that, she had developed feelings for a coworker that eventually became infidelity. She became vindictive and cruel. Truly, it was as if another being inhabited her body.
It was later that I learned that sometimes when people know they are going to hurt or are already hurting you, they try to provoke you into getting angry at them, so they can feel better about it. Retaliation to mask the guilt.
I wish I could say something to help, some piece of advice on how to make it work. In the end, though, I learned that no matter how hard you try, you cannot make someone do something else. You cannot make it work if she doesn't want to. Period. Two people must work or it over.
And if she continues to 'see' other people then, even though she may think she hasn't made a choice or is still unsure, the fact is, that IS the choice. I got a bunch of 'I need some time to think,' which translated into her going away with him for a weekend. That's not thinking about 'us'. I know that in her case, there were psychological issues and I know that I wasn't all that I should have been. [*Edit: I consider our failure as much my fault as hers, though she's the one who finally ended it.] In the end, that enabled me to forgive and for us to be amicable.
All I can say is that you are stronger than you think. You may feel that this is so overwhelming and you simply cannot handle this or go through it. But you can and will, whatever 'it' is. Day by day, you get through it. And on the other side, whether wracked with pain at a divorce yet with hope of a new life ahead or having rebuilt a marriage on a solid footing, you will have made it through and know better the kind of person you are and are capable of being.
In the end, that's all I can say. Except that I am sorry.
I think . . . I think, from your posts, that you are very hurt by all of this and care very much about your wife and would like for everything to somehow work out. So, if that is an accurate interpretation, I encourage you to do whatever you can without making yourself crazy to get her into therapy.
Also, I think that by the far the thing you are most upset by is the breach of trust aspect, which in my opinion is exactly what you should be bothered by. Infidelity is huge, and what makes it huge is not just the aspect of sleeping with another person, but the fact that to do it people are generally sneaking around behind their significant other's back, lying, actively choosing to do things they KNOW would hurt someone they have said they are committed to, etc.
I mean, it would be very painful if a man I was dating or my husband came up to me one day and said: "Look, I made a promise to you that I would not sleep with anyone else, but I'm starting to think that even though I meant it when I said that, it's not a promise I can keep. I am so sorry for putting you through this, but I wanted to discuss it with you openly and give you the chance to walk out on me or throw things at my head or whatever BEFORE I did anything. I love you."
But if he just went ahead and did it . . . and got caught . . . and kept doing it . . . what IS that??? A Jerry Springer episode?
Jason, have you had the chance to further explore the impact that medication and/or mental illness is having on all of this? I know I mentioned it before, but I have personally witnessed people I love become thoroughly dreadful people while ill or on medication, and later return to themselves. I don't want to hold out false hope, but I do think it's something worth investigating.
Just close your eyes and figure out what you need to do to be happy with yourself and know that you did your best, and do that. And no more. *HUG*
Posts: 471 | Registered: Jul 2005
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April 04. Lasted a number of months, though I had moved out by May. The most painful experience of my life. We have a son and unfortunately, as amicable as our divorce became, it still has caused him a huge amount of pain. And there's nothing I can do about it.
My heart goes out to all those hurt by infidelity and frivolous divorce. It's so very unfair.
Posts: 1346 | Registered: Jun 1999
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posted
Man, that sucks. She sure isn't putting any effort into making this work, or taking your feelings into account. I went through something similar, and it was a bad, bad time.
Remember that no matter how bad it seems, you will make it through, and in time, things will get better, one way or another. In the mean time, do what is right for you.
You don't deserve to be hurt or cheated on. If she's really committed to making this work, she has to stop, completely. If she won't stop, then I think she's giving you a very clear message about how much the marriage means to her.
Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:Originally posted by MightyCow: You don't deserve to be hurt or cheated on. If she's really committed to making this work, she has to stop, completely. If she won't stop, then I think she's giving you a very clear message about how much the marriage means to her.
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