Hi there,
I'll ignore the telling of the OBS stuff since that is obviously a sensitive topic.
This is going to be a long one, but all of these posts have given some serious food for thought.
You mentioned that you had not asked for transparency in her devices because you feel that is only something you would do if you were leaning towards R, and you're not sure if you are there yet. The thing is, most would recommend full device transparency regardless of if you have made your mind up yet or not. Simply because it is a way for your wife to show you that she is making positive changes. BUT it has to be on your terms, because she has given you no reason to trust her.
I can tell she is partially trying to be honest with me. She came to me, unasked, and told me that she had contact with OM yesterday to tell him that they weren't going to talk anymore. Of course, these were sent via work IM so I couldn't see them. So who knows, it could be a lie.
There is no such thing as partially honest, or trying to be honest. There is either full disclosure, or there is lying. So far, your wife has proven herself to be a liar, so you have to assume that everything she says to you is a lie unless proven otherwise. This is why you are questioning whether her NC instant message to the OM is real. You used to be able to trust your wife when she said things, but now you cannot. You have to remember that they are also scrambling to control the narrative, so they are liable to hide rather than to disclose. The only way to attempt to prevent that is through full transparency, in devices, and in all communication with you.
I think there are a lot of BS who expect that their WS should just know all of the things to do to make themselves a safe spouse for their BS. The thing is, they obviously don't have the emotional maturity to handle these situations, because a mature person would not choose an A under any circumstances. Even if we assume her NC discussion with OM via work IM is true, a rational person who had their head on straight would not initiate contact with the OM without telling their spouse, even if that contact was to discuss no contact, and they certainly would not do it in such a way that it cannot be traced.
The WS needs guidelines from you. They need a list of things that they have to do in order to regain your trust. That can include things like weekly IC, writing out a detailed and complete timeline, delivering a No Contact letter to the AP in a format that you can verify that it was sent, complete device transparency at all times, complete access to all social media, or even deletion of all social media, access to all email accounts, even work related ones etc.
When your WS's affair includes a coworker, this often means quitting their job, though I understand your concerns re: alimony especially if you've had multiple attorneys advising you against it. Also, when the A includes travel, this can mean that you require your spouse to give you the address and contact info at the hotel of any place she travels to from now on, as well as hourly check ins via FaceTime so you can actually hear her voice and see where she is rather than via text or phone call. This could even mean that she has to tell management at her job that she cannot travel for the foreseeable future, until you feel comfortable with it.
You might give her a list of required reading, with some "homework" assignments about writing down her thoughts on each chapter for you to discuss with her. You might require a weekly check in meeting with her to discuss how you feel she has held herself to these standards vs. how she feels she is doing. There are so many options, and you get to choose what works for you - remember that she does not get to tell you what makes you feel safe again, only you can determine that. You wouldn't trust the person who knowingly paddled into class six rapids to be the one to get you out of them safely, so do not trust that the person who brought you into infidelity will take you out of it.
Asking all of these things of her does not in any way mean that you are definitely giving her the gift of R. It means that you are considering it as a possibility down the line. This is her trial run to see if you will even think about R. You can still divorce her down the line at any point. You can even file divorce papers now, end up getting a divorce, and then still end up dating each other again, even getting remarried later if things work out. There are no set rules here, only what is right for you.
The point is, that you need all of these things in order to even determine if R is possible. How will you know if you can trust your WW again if you do not give her a list of things she must do in order to regain your trust? IMHO, based on the hundreds of posts I've read here since signing up in Nov, the likelihood that she will just do them on her own is low. If any WS was the perfect spouse who automatically tried to think about how they could earn their BS’s trust back, then implemented all of those things immediately, then they likely would not have had an affair in the first place. That kind of forward thinking and conflict resolution are not part of the waywards’ strong suits. A lot of people will say that this means she is not remorseful and not deserving of R, and I believe that is true too. It also does not mean that she might not become remorseful, only that she is not capable of being remorseful right now because her way of thinking is completely effed up.
The difficult part about WSs is that the type of thinking that led the to the affair is ingrained in them. If the wayward spouse were capable of clearer thinking and more rational decision making and conflict resolution, then they would not have had an affair. Period. This is why you will see time and time again people on SI referring to the waywards as "broken." As firenze said in an earlier post:
most people who have affairs are, at their core, people whose moral decision making is based less on a code of honor of some sort and more on what they think will make them feel good.
This is not to give them an excuse for their behavior, but rather to give them something to work on. Their poor decision making, lack of boundaries, resistance to conflict resolution etc. are all problems that they have to fix in order to move forward and work toward building healthier relationships. You mentioned she is going to IC tonight - was this on your suggestion, or did she take it upon herself to set that up? Do you think she will go into it with an open mind, or is she just looking for confirmation of what she is feeling? A counselor can only work with someone based off of the information they are told, so you are lucky in a way because your IC knows the story from your point of view, which means your WW cannot omit information. Since you happen to know the IC, do you think the counselor will hold her accountable?
Just because the WS needs guidelines, does not mean that you have to do all of the work. What Stevesn suggested about telling her to research what she could do to make this right is great advice. Put the work on her. Tell her that you expect that within three days she will come to you with a list of what she can do to improve. Ask, “Do you understand why I cannot trust you?” Then listen to her response. Ask, “What are some ways that you can earn my trust back?” and give her a time frame to write them out and present them to you.
If she does decide to make a list, then critique it with her. Tell her which things are good, and where she can improve. She offers to let you see her phone whenever you ask, she'll just enter in the password for you. You then counter with, that's a start, but I should have full access at any time. I need to know the password at all times, and the rule is that you are not allowed to delete anything that comes to your phone. If you do delete anything, the consequence will be ______. Do you understand why this is a better way of earning back my trust than just handing over your phone when asked?
I know it sucks. You did not sign up to be your wife's babysitter. But unfortunately, when it comes to affairs, the waywards have to relearn boundaries, communication etc. almost as if they are a child. It totally blows that your world was shattered, and now you have to go into all of this monitoring etc. It's even more work for you now, which is completely unfair because you're not the one who caused all of this. It just is the way it is unfortunately, if you want to R.
However, these boundaries are also there for you. It is a way for you to delineate what you need in order to start trusting her again. You can set clear consequences for not adhering to these guidelines, and enforce them as the WW slips up. These are just as much for you as they are for her. It gives you your agency back. Your WW took away your ability to choose when she hid the A from you. You were fighting for your marriage, but you were unaware of the true battle you were fighting. By laying out these standards, you take back the power to decide for yourself how you choose to proceed if she chooses not to respect your boundaries and adhere to these new guidelines.
For example, if you ask her to make a list of what she can do to earn your trust back, and she refuses to do so, you need to know in advance how you want to react to that. Will you ask her to move out? Will you drop all contact with her and file for divorce? You've mentioned on a couple of occasions that you do not feel you are a decisive person. This is why having a set consequence in your head is imperative, because when faced with the decision in the moment, you might just let things keep going as they were and not hold her accountable, just because you don't want to make the decision on what to do. But remember that when she fails to play by the rules you set out, NOT doing anything is just as much of a decision as actively doing something.
You don’t have to set any boundaries if you don’t want to. If you would rather just go straight to D, then make that choice and move forward. But just like the waywards have accountability for every choice they make, so do we. You can choose to set strict guidelines, or not. You can choose to delineate clear consequences for breaking these guidelines/boundaries, or not. You can subsequently choose to enforce those consequences when they inevitably slip, or you can choose to ignore them.
Once you set these boundaries though, you have to realize that the outcome of how she chooses to act is out of your hands. She is her own person, and will make whatever choices she makes. You could set all of these boundaries, insist she gets all the help she needs, and then she could choose not to do any of it, and you will have to make a decision about how to move forward from there. But you can expect with absolute certainty that NOT setting any boundaries will only leave you exactly where you already are - with a wife you cannot trust. At least if you choose to set them, you have a chance of things changing. You are setting these boundaries for yourself - letting her, and yourself, know what you will tolerate, and what you will not. It sounds like you are already on the way to doing just that. Stay strong, and do not set a consequence that you will not back up with action should the need present itself. If she fails to adhere to one of your guidelines, and you rugsweep and do not give her any consequences, you will never get out of infidelity. I'm not saying this to be mean, just from experience - there are a LOT of things that I rugswept over the years with my husband, and I wish I could go back in time and change my reaction to each one. I would be in a much different place if I had stood strong at the time instead of giving in to his excuses.
Later I saw some texts to her mom. The gist was that she thinks that I am just angry at her, that I just want her to feel the way that I feel, that I want her to beg for me to come back, that I think she should have to fight and I shouldn't, and that she thinks I don't understand how badly she is impacted by depression right now.
Yup, wayward thinking at it’s finest. My personal favorite is that you think that she should have to fight and you shouldn’t. What she is not recognizing is that you setting these boundaries and enforcing restrictions IS your way of fighting for your marriage. She also sounds very prideful - the idea of her begging you to take her back seems ludicrous to her. She is trying to hold her ground to see if you will cave. Don't give her the satisfaction.
It seems your wife has chosen to focus on her "post partem depression" as her main excuse for the affair. Whether or not that has been diagnosed I guess you could find out with more prying, but even if it is self diagnosis, it could be a real issue. Just because it is coming up after the exposure of the A does not mean it is not happening, she could very well be incredibly depressed. But even if that is true, it doesn't take away from the fact that she has inappropriate coping mechanisms when it comes to stress/depression. Having depression does not make you less accountable for your decisions. She seems to think that it gives her carte blanche to do whatever she wants. It might be a reason for her behavior, or even one of many contributing factors, but it is not an excuse. Those are things she needs to be analyzing with her IC, as well as through personal introspection and self help. You are a good man, so you will of course be empathetic to the fact that she is dealing with depression. But you can be empathetic, and also still be angry at her for doing what she did. Holding her accountable for her actions is not you ignoring "how badly she is impacted by depression right now," so don't let her convince you of that.
Again, to quote firenze:
when you're the kind of person who's more concerned with feeling good than doing the right thing, it's easy to start to see your spouse as the bad guy because that relationship is a currently source of conflict and your AP-in-the-making as the good guy because they're currently a source of positive, flattering attention.
She is like a teenager who thinks that their parents are just out to get them, and are only enforcing rules to be controlling assholes. The parents know better than that. You know better than that. Even the teenager and your WS knows that deep down - it's just easier for them to blame it on someone else than to hold themselves accountable.
To give an example of waywards = teenagers, consider this. I can think of an instance when my step daughter was clearly lying to us about her phone usage (as WS always do). Our agreement in regards to phones was always that we will pay for it, as long as they agree to use it responsibly, and we can have access anytime we want to verify. We rarely checked it, as we had no reason to distrust her (your wife had given you no reason to distrust, so in the past you had never checked her phone). However one night, we received a notice from Verizon that she had sent 300 text messages in one evening. We knew something wasn't right, and we demanded that she hand over her phone immediately (again, most BS do not start checking until something in their gut tells them to, like when you decided to check your wife's watch). She scrambled as she walked from her room to our room, obviously trying to delete whatever she could. We grabbed the phone out of her hands, and were able to catch the one thing she didn't delete, which was a Tinder account that had some pretty risque photos of her on it (nothing nude, but definitely not something a teenager should be posting online).
From then on, we had to enforce incredibly strict rules surrounding her phone. We checked it every single night and every morning. We installed a secret parent/child tracker on it so we could see what texts she was sending and receiving, as well as which apps she downloaded. We then questioned her on these texts and downloads to see if she was telling the truth. We had to have many discussions with her regarding why putting up photos like that is inappropriate, how unsafe it was, how anyone could now save those photos and post them online without her permission, how online dating can be dangerous because anyone could pose as anyone else etc.. much in the same way that a BS might scream at their WS "What were you thinking? How did you not think about the exposure to STDs? Did you seriously not consider how this will affect our relationship? Are you so naive that you couldn't see how this will affect our children?"
She hated us through the beginning of the process. She was stubborn, and resentful, and rolled her eyes every time we asked for the phone. She minimized, and told us "it's not that big of a deal, jeez." She found new ways to hide certain communication - downloaded different apps for secret texting, which we then discovered and had to have even more discussions about. We had to dole out tons of consequences, often in the form of extra chores, then had to supervise to make sure those chores were completed. It was so much more work than either of us wanted to deal with. BUT, had we just let it slide and not upped our level of monitoring, she would have continued down a bad path. It SUCKED. But it was worth it to us, because we wanted our daughter to learn to make better decisions for herself. What you have to decide is, is all of this work worth it to you? Like your therapist said, it's ok if it isn't!
We in fact asked her, "What can you do to earn our trust back?" To which she replied "Stop texting late at night, and stop using dating apps." When push came to shove, she was able to come up with the solution on her own, she just needed to be pushed. Eventually, she stopped being so resistant. She stopped trying out new apps, because she knew we would find them. She stopped texting late at night, because she knew we would call her on it. And ultimately, she knew that the consequences were just not worth it. Hopefully she will be a better person, and will be more informed of how her actions can have consequences because of this process. Hopefully your wife will come up with some solutions rather than excuses. It is the only path towards healing. But don't expect her to do it of her own volition.
Just as you are now having to learn new things and adjust to a new reality in which your WW had an A, so too is your WW adjusting to her new reality where she is being held accountable for her actions. Right now she is in limbo. Yes, feeling like you are angry with her sucks for her. Not being able to contact her AP sucks for her. But ultimately she is not having to do very much right now. If you were to look at it as if she is a teenage child you are punishing for sneaking out of the house, right now you've basically just sent her to her room, when instead she needs a full grounding with no TV, no internet, no phone access, and no friends until further notice. Plus a few extra chores to boot.
Similar to dealing with an unruly teenager, when dealing with conflict, most teenagers/waywards will take the path of least resistance. If you get angry at your teenager just for sneaking out of the house, and you punish them for that, how likely is it that they will come clean about the fact that not only did they sneak out, they also stole some alcohol from the convenience store down the street and trespassed into a local vacant lot with their friends? If they have any reason to believe that you do not already know these things, I'd bet your ass that they won't tell you. Instead they will do everything they can to hide any evidence of it, and pray to God that you never find out. This is why you don't reveal your sources until absolutely necessary. Next time you catch her on camera, try not to bring it up. She what she will do next instead. Maybe ask her during one of your weekly check-ins "Did you go into my room?" and then see what her answer is. WSs will slip up. It's whether they choose to lie about it that really helps you determine their state of mind.
I think that most BS fail to remember that lying is now one of their WS's habits. It takes a lot of time and effort to break any habit. It seems obvious that lying is what got them in this mess, so why would they continue to lie, right? But then it is also their habit to avoid conflict - and what better way to avoid conflict than to lie about it and avoid the discussion altogether? I know it's ass backwards, but I honestly think that is how they think. Same as the teenager in trouble, your wife will likely continue to hide things from you, finding new ways to hide them that are even sneakier than before. You have to assume that if your wife is giving you access to her phone without you asking for it, that it has been scrubbed of any information that might lead her to get in trouble with you. Just like children, waywards will do whatever they can to minimize conflict and to not be held accountable. Until they do enough inward thinking to recognize their toxic patterns of behavior, they will not try to change, they will only learn to hide things better, as that is an easier route than doing the real work of becoming a better person.
She has already seen the consequences of you knowing about everything so far, and she obviously does not like them. Unfortunately this means that if there are other things you don't know yet, she will do everything she can to hide them and avoid more consequences, thus the TT, and multiple disclosures that so many BS run into. This is why so many people consider making them take a lie detector test. First off, it shows that you mean business. Second, it’s your only real way of holding her accountable to any timeline or evidence that you turn up. Let her know that if she does not do all of these things that you have asked of her, that if she does not pass the polygraph, the consequences will be much more dire than anything she has experienced thus far. You can also let her know that if she refuses to take the polygraph then you will take that as a sign that she does not want to rebuild a new marriage with you, and you will file for divorce. This then gives her the opportunity to come clean, and it presents the decision to lie or to be fully honest as a choice with specific consequences i.e. be completely honest, and I will consider R, tell any lie, and R is off the table. It presents her with the opportunity to earn back your trust, if you want to give her such an opportunity. I wish that I had demanded a polygraph at my first DDay. Even if he refused (which knowing his defensive personality he probably would have) I would still feel better knowing that I had called his bluff.
When it comes to stuff like calling you out for having a camera in the bedroom, don’t let her deflect and put it on you as if that is unfair. She is like a thief getting mad at the store he just robbed for installing security cameras that would make it harder for him to rob it again. Just simply let her know that her actions have consequences, and this is one of them. But also remember, if the thief really wants to rob the store again, they will find a way to circumvent the cameras. Similarly, if your wife wants to continue with her infidelity, she will find a way around your camera system. If I were you, I would make a big deal about taking down the camera in the room, but install something else that is more discrete. There are all sorts of cameras that you can order that look like other things - alarm clocks, etc. Once she finds out the way she is being monitored, it becomes much less effective.
She will continue to deflect and minimize. Sounds like she is looking for sympathy from her mom, rather than asking for advice on how to fix this. You might come to realize that your wife refuses to be held accountable for her actions. That is what happened with my husband, and trust me I know how much it sucks. You think to yourself how if they would only own up to it, things would be so much better. But remember that even if she does not own up to it, it doesn’t make the fact that she had an affair any less true, and it doesn’t make that affair any less selfish and horrible.
I am not in R. My WH has no interest in it, is clearly in limerance with his AP and has decided that I am the bad guy who caused him to step out. But regardless of if I was in R or headed to D, his wayward behavior is pretty similar to your wife’s and every other wayward out there- blame shifting bullshit. According to him, all I ever did was tell him what he did wrong. In actuality, I of course told him things he did wrong and held him accountable to fixing those things. I also consistently told him when he did things correctly, and gave him a lot of praise. I told him I appreciated him and how hard he worked on a daily basis. But the point is, he did not want to hear those things. He already had low self esteem, so he focused on me "telling him he did things wrong." He chose to ignore all of the times when I told him what he did right, because those would not justify him having an affair. This is what waywards do, they focus on all of the things that you did that "forced" them to have an affair. But this means that their emotional capability for having an affair was there all along, they just needed the excuse. They are trying to take their own agency out of the equation, because agency = fault, and fault = blame , and blame = consequences.
Could I have done things to be a better wife? Yes, absolutely. But every single thing he did during the EA and subsequent PA was a conscious decision that he made ON HIS OWN. He could have typed out an entire text to her, and that would be its own discretion, but he also could have typed the whole thing out, then chosen not to send it. He could have pulled up her name in his phone, and then decided not to call. The point is, he did not. He told himself, and continues to tell me, that my actions pushed him to it. But ultimately, he did a lot of messed up things during our marriage, and I never stepped out on him. The thought did not even cross my mind.
You are in the same situation. She needs to own up to the fact that her decision making through this entire process is majorly flawed. You had plenty of issues that you were dealing with when it came to your marriage, but you never saw an affair as a solution to those problems. These things did not happen to her. They were not accidents. They were conscious, calculated decisions, that required a bunch of micro decisions that added up to each action. She had every opportunity to stop the A, but did not. She responded to the first text, then to another, and another, then when he gave her the address she got in her car, turned it on, drove there, parked the car, got out, went to the hotel room, knocked on the door, let him kiss her, took off her clothes, etc. you get the picture. No matter how it all played out, at every single point in that process she had the opportunity to make a better decision. She chose not to.
You said she has accused you of being controlling, and now she cannot trust you because you want to make her feel just as bad. Good. She had all of the power for quite some time. She took away any control you had by choosing to have an affair, and then by choosing all of the lies after that. Let her feel out of control for once.
Remember, no matter what excuse she gives you, or whatever crap she feeds her mom about you just wanting her to feel as bad as you do, she KNOWS that what she did is wrong. She would not have hidden it from you if she didn't. As my therapist said when we discussed this very aspect of the affair, "Good news is, he knows it was wrong, so you're not married to a sociopath. Bad news is, he knows it's wrong and did it anyway, which means he's an absolute asshole."
You are doing a great job. There will be days when you feel like you are conquering the world and doing everything right. There will be days when you feel defeated, and you won’t want to move. There will be days when you swing back and forth between these emotions every couple of hours. This is all normal. This is by far the most difficult thing I have ever gone through, and that includes dealing with my husband’s masturbation addiction, my brother’s multiple relapses for his alcoholism, and my other brother’s six week stint in the psychiatric ICU for a manic episode, so you know it’s pretty effing bad.
But as my now sober brother keeps reminding me, remember that this is probably the worst thing that will ever happen to you, and you are getting through it. Try to do little things for yourself each day. You mentioned wanting to get yourself an expensive hair cut and buying some new clothes - make sure you go do those things for yourself! It is easy to get swept up in trying to fix this huge problem, and you can definitely lose yourself in it and forget all about self care.
Remember that your kids are crying for their mom because they are used to seeing her all the time and having her in their lives - just let their tears serve as another reminder of how she turned your family's world upside down, not as anything you are doing wrong. Do as much as you can with your kids to distract yourself from the shit show and remind yourself that no matter what happens with your wife, you still got these two amazing little humans out of the deal.
You will keep searching for answers, it is part of the trauma. You will ask yourself "Why?!" more than you like. You will also ask your wife "Why?!" and you'll get a bunch of excuses.
As Cooley said earlier:
Everyone wants to know why. To a cheater it comes down to they wanted to.
In oh so many words, your wife has told you that she did this because she wanted to. With a lot of counseling and introspection, she might be able to come up with a better answer than that eventually. But right now, her actions are only telling you that same thing, "because I wanted to." Only you can decide if that is a good enough answer for you.
[This message edited by HeHadADoubleLife at 5:47 AM, January 10th (Thursday)]
