SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

I am the WS. A 38 yr old mom of 3 kids, married almost 14 yrs. I had a reckless 6wk affair & had aspirations of leaving my husband for this person . Within 24hrs of DD a months ago I realized I never wanted to throw it all away and I regret it so deeply. I just but you want to reconcile with my husband and he has been back-and-forth with me the last several weeks and I really thought that things were going to head in that direction. Now he just wants to separate and I am feeling devastated and don't know what to do because we have three kids & I want to try and make it work. I believe that what I wanted in the first place was a better marriage and someone willing to put the work in... Problem was instead of communicating with my spouse, threw it all away. For nothing. I don't love or miss the affair person at all. I don't want to lose my husband. All the horrific very explicit details of the affair are out and all of my intentions as well. My husband is now in daily contact with the spouse of the OM, and it's become very Jerry Springer like, The horrible aftermath , which is somewhere I never thought we would be. Is there any hope? He did want to reconcile various times throughout the last month but now it seems that he is done. I can't sleep I am losing too much weight and am paralyzed by the inability to focus on anything. I feel nothing but panic. The only person I have to talk this through with is a counselor who have started seeing weekly. Is there anything I can do to get my spouse to be open to being with me again and working on the marriage?

felicity...

You're so brand new into this pain and turmoil, you have to be patient and steady with your actions and reactions. Be honest. Be transparent and above all...be patient.

Give your husband the freedom to flip back and forth...his emotions are all over the place right now.

It's great that you're in counseling. Has your husband shown any interest in joining you?

You can't make your husband do anything.

You need to calm down, for your kids, and work on what you can control - yourself. If you let yourself slip into a panic you're going to look like your nuts. That will NOT convince your husband to work on reconciling. If you work on yourself though, maybe he'll see the change in you and he'll decide to give things another try. Maybe not, but you'll never know if you don't improve yourself.

Let go of the outcome of your marriage. Behave as you would if you were to reconcile. The worst that will happen is nothing changes from where you're at now, the best is that he sees the changes and he changes.

Good luck!

thank you for your posts. I appreciate the support, as I have no one to talk about this with who understands.

I am hurting so much and feel like a murderer. My husband continues to tell me today that he doesn't want to be married to me. I am so exhausted. though they didn't speak today, there is now & seemingly always will be the looming possibility that the OM's wife will get back in touch w/ my husband again for more details and more questions ---torture for me, and deeper torment and reason for my husband to not want to reconcile.

felicitybroken...

Have you confessed to all parts of the affair? Is so, nothing the MM's W can say to your husband should come as a shock to him and cast more and more doubt.

Are you sure you've told him everything?

I have told him as much detail as I could remember w/o trying to withhold like I did in the beginning. He also retrieved all the texts & phone logs. He feels that it was not just the affair but that I have "hated" him for so long before ( and clearly my actions didn't honor him at all during the Affair.)

We r here in the same house, & actually both spent time w the kids together this evening. However this is the 2nd night he refuses to sleep in bed w me. Up til this point he'd be mad at me & then we'd still end up having sex--probably the best sex we've had since we met in 1997...and it wasn't just sex but intimacy & talking that we hadn't had where we'd say we still loved each other.

We have a family vacation planned to his parents in Fl in 2wks. This was book 10 a wk ago as a reconciliation new start vacation. A month ago his mother started out caring--she still even sent me a bday card--and telling him to wait to make any big decisions. Now she has told him, when he's had enough he should just end it. And that's where he says he is.

I feel like as long as we stay together under same roof w kids as our focus maybe there could be a way back together. He wants me to prepare for the amicable separation & how we will tell the kids. He still tells me I have nothing to offer him...that I'm not capable & never was. He feels our whole marriage was a sham & doubts my love for the kids.

A few observations here:

1) If you haven't already, buy the book "How to help your spouse heal from your affair". It's a short read. You can get it from Amazon by clicking the shop now link on the left.

2) The advice my BW got after the last DDay was to pack up all my stuff in hefty bags (or scatter it across the lawn), and FTG and never look back. I'm glad she hasn't. My point is that what matters is what you think and what he thinks, not what Mom thinks. His mom is going to want what's best for him, but it's really him that needs to figure that out.

3) You can sleep in separate rooms for a while. You can even get a short term apartment and live there. Or he can. And so forth. That doesn't mean things are necessarily over. The more threads you read here in the wayward forum the more you'll see that nothing is written in stone. Folks have even gotten remarried after being divorced.

4)

He still tells me I have nothing to offer him...that I'm not capable & never was. He feels our whole marriage was a sham & doubts my love for the kids.

This is normal. His words are coming from a place of hurting, sadness, and anger. Like you his emotions are all over the place. One moment he might be talking divorce, the next you might be having sex. That's why it's really important to give it time. General consensus around here is to give it 6 months. You've been married for 14 years and have 3 young kids, what's another 6 months. And if he really feels you have nothing to offer him, then you haven't really lost that much time in the grand scheme of things.

5)

the looming possibility that the OM's wife will get back in touch w/ my husband again for more details and more questions ---torture for me, and deeper torment and reason for my husband to not want to reconcile.

The key to healing your marriage, your husband, and yourself, is empathy. Now more than ever you have to open yourself up and be vulnerable. The more details the BS has the better they can heal - not knowing can cause more mind games for the BS than knowing. In fact, the folks who stand the best chances of recovery, are the ones who proactively offer up as much info as possible. Write out a detailed timeline about where you were, and what you did (leaving out only the goriest of details unless he asks for them). Leave no room for him to doubt whether he has the whole truth or the whole story. Offer to take a lie detector test if need be. Give him all your passwords to anything electronic.

Get comfortable being uncomfortable, and be humble in all that you do or all that you're asked. If he doesn't want to talk one day, you give him space. If he does, you answer all his questions calmly, even if they're the same questions you've already been asked.

You're in for a long road, regardless, so strap in. Keep reading and posting - start with all the articles in The Healing Library in the yellow box up top.

No disrespect to my IC, who was a very good listener and somewhat insightful, but it was really all the good folks here at SI that I credit with saving my soul and asking me the tough questions. In many ways this journey is less about your marriage and more about you. You have to be able to look at yourself in the mirror again and be proud of what you see, regardless of what else happens. Regardless of what else happens you still have to be a good parent to those precious kids of yours. So start digging. As you do the hard work of introspection you will eventually find your peace. In the meanwhile, make time for yourself to relax. Take baths, walks, massages, do something different. I let my shame and depression really consume me in the beginning. I even bought a zen garden for my desk to move sand around.

Good luck, and welcome. You're in good company.

Hi, I'm sorry you are going through this. As someone who had a short PA I know how it is to shake your head and fall into self loathing. Don't do that. You screwed up. You may not be able to save your marriage. It takes two to be married and you can't make your husband forgive you. All you can do is work on yourself and be patient and honest with him. You aren't a bad mom. That was a hard one for me because as a Ws we are insulted and belittled a lot online and in real life. If you get into the cycle of self hatred it won't help you, your husband or your children. There is a difference between remorse and self pity or hatred. Accept you screwed up. Work on your issues and move forwards and upwards.

The internet can be a discouraging and helpful place. I avoided trickle truth because of it but it did not help the self hatred. Remember that your story is your own and neither you nor your husband's future is guaranteed by sucess stories. But it also is guaranteed to fail.

Has your husband read about rewriting history? Did you do that in the texts? It seems he is having trouble with what you told this OM. Was it true or did you blow things out of proportion to justify your actions? Has your H gone to IC? Would he do MC?