SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Marc's right on. Transparency, brother. If she is truly ending it and going NC, then she must demonstrate this to you and leave absolutely no room for error. For instance, my fWW installed tracking software on both of our phones then showed me how it works. I always know where she is (her phone, anyway) and I can see all calls/texts that come in or go out from her phone. She did this voluntarily to help me feel safe. I have access and passwords to everything (phones, computers, emails, social media, finances, all of it).

I'm over a year out from D-day and we still have not gone to marriage counselling. My wife stalled and delayed on IC for about six months. Then I gave her the choice to get into IC or watch me file for and then divorce her. Again, she chose wisely.

Hold your ground brother. It's your life.

Huh?

Your not hopeless but she says she needs 2/3 weeks to end it?

What am I missing>

You will continue to be an option and she continues with an A.

Why aren't you saying "this ends now !"?

You tell her that you won't live with a liar and a cheater, and she tells you that she doesn't want to be a single mother.

She will tell her friends not to cheat... just to leave.

Listen what she is telling you here man. Listen.

She wants to leave, but can't choose it. Choose it for her. If she wants to see what life will be like without you, show her. File for D, and implement the 180.

That's my advice.

Keep your chin up, brother.

She wants to leave, but can't choose it.

Exactly. He's a 20-year old who doesn't want to be saddled with a 40+ woman and she doesn't want to be a single mom. So since he won't keep her, which is what she really wants, she'll come back to you, making you her Plan B. As much as your head is saying, "Finally! I'll get my wife back!" the reality is you've already lost her. She is not the person you married.

Question: why two weeks? Why not immediately? Because she wants to have fun and make this last as long as she can until wonder-boy has to leave to go to college, work at MickeyD's or wherever. He's basically told her no, so she's hanging on for as long as she can and then she'll say all the right things to you, assuming you'll welcome her back.

And if you do take her back, when the next 20-year old comes along...what then? Maybe the next time it'll be a 35-year old who will take her. And where will you be?

I'm in R, so I'm not a D at all costs kind of guy, but brother, please. Take control and stand strong.

Hi, DestroyedOne, I have just scanned through some of the responses, and as usual, the members are spot on.

You need to go Shock and Awe. No more playing games. No two weeks to end it.

When I found out about my WH affair, me, the wife, grew a huge pair on D-Day. My way or the highway. No bargaining, no compromise, the WH knew I meant business. I was NOT going to live in infidelity, and I was NOT going to allow him to play ping-pong with my life. As distraught as I was, I knew then and there that I would not tolerate any bullsh*t.

IMO, you have been way too nice. Allowing her to continue her affair right under your nose is soul-crushing. There's no room for three in a marriage.

I'd insist the A has to end NOW, not tomorrow, not next week or two weeks from now, but TODAY. If she cannot comply, then I'd be in the attorney's office tomorrow morning filing.

Promised to end it with OM in fact was (supposedly) already only giving it another 3 weeks at the most.

No no and no. She can have two hours to end it, otherwise you are done with her nonsense.

She sounds like the OM is talking about dumping her, and that will never be satisfactory to you, you will always wonder if you were her fall back plan.

No, not 2 or 3 weeks, two hours to end it, with you witnessing it.

You have given her the benefit of the doubt for a long time now, and now is the time to end it.

If she is sincere that she is truly tired of living the affair life, than it should be instant that she ends it, NOT two weeks.

IMO, again, it sounds like she is being dumped, NOW you stay married on YOUR terms.

As far as MC goes, why. She is the one that ruined the marriage, find her a good IC, one that understands liars and infidelity and have her go there. THEN try MC.

Think you guys are misunderstanding me. She's not taking two weeks to end it, she told me when we first started talking about it last night that she knew there was no future with this guy and she would have ended it in two weeks tops, even if I didn't force it. She knows that she needs to end it with him asap. Hope that makes more sense.

Okay. That wasn't clear. As I had put in my first post to this thread... This isn't a negotiation. Don't let her make it one (this is why most of us were so emphatic in our answers).

So. It doesn't end "ASAP", it ends right now. No emotional heart felt "good bye I will miss you, my muse.." stuff.

she knew there was no future with this guy and she would have ended it in two weeks top

Uhm, no.

If you truly want to reconcile you end it NOW !!

Why are you allowing this to be an option? Him or you?That's the discussion.

She's not taking two weeks to end it, she told me when we first started talking about it last night that she knew there was no future with this guy and she would have ended it in two weeks tops, even if I didn't force it. She knows that she needs to end it with him asap.

She is calling the shots, why aren't you?

Do or did you and your wife have some kind of understanding about having an open marriage??

Do not let her call the shots. She is now saying she sees no future with this OM, wow, what would she be saying if she saw a future with this OM.

Yes, sometimes when the affair is forced to end, that tells you a lot. Like they affair was for reasons such as low self-esteem or CSA. But it does not sound like your wife has these issues.

She says she should have ended it two weeks ago, okay fine, than that should be mean, that she ends it this second.

What is holding her back?

Do yourself a favor: Don't put much emphasis on her words. You have posted 3-4 times today. She could have ended it last night. She didn't. She is stalling. This will drag out forever. Literally, like another year maybe. Or longer.

You have to force the issue. You can do it now, or 2 weeks from now, or a month from now, etc. DO IT NOW while you have the momentum and other life events make you delay. She will never find the "right time." She will need "closure," which will turn into one more F session, which will need another meet for "closure."

Get an appointment for an attorney and make sure she sees it. Then go and file. Tell her you will end the divorce process when you are sure she truly ended the affair.

ACTION is all that matters here.

Don't invest too much wisdom from me, anyway. I am not smart but I have seen so many affairs here that I can reasonably see how each situation likely will work out.

Tell her to end it today. Give her this:

"To Other Man:

I am committing to my marriage. I feel terribly ashamed for how I acted toward my husband and my family.

I have decided to commit to my marriage. There is no way I can be convinced otherwise.

Do not contact me again ever in any way or form. If you do contact me, I will consider it as harassment and will attempt to file charges. I want my husband and my family, not you.

Signed,

Wife Name"

Up to this point you have been enabling her affair with your inaction. On top of that, she has been losing respect for you because quite simply you were allowing her to cheat on you with no consequences.

Think about how you have handled this from her point of view, what kind of man allows a woman to emasculate himself like that? The more passive you are, the less of a man you appear and no woman wants that. You should have went with your first reaction and filed for D right out of the gate. Odds are that might have stopped the A in its tracks at the time. Don't feel too bad though, I made the same mistakes as you did. You can still recover but you need to stop being the nice guy and play hardball.

Now she's tired of this guy and had her fun she wants to come back? What about next time? Are you going to continue to reward her by keeping the marriage together and being a good husband for cheating on you? Oh, and don't think for a second she is just going to give this guy up just because she said. Affairs and just like drug addictions so you better treat it as such. She will most likely "relapse" back into the affair is she is not afraid of losing the M.

MC is a waste of time, she will go just for appearances and will lie her ass off. You need IC to get your self respect back and only then should you consider R.

Okay, so she's telling you that if there was a future in it for her.....

My advice still stands. I think she wants out, but can't choose it.

She'll fish around for one that she does have a future with, whether she's still married to you or not... especially if you just let her walk back in now that she has decided she's not leaving with this OM.

Think you guys are misunderstanding me. She's not taking two weeks to end it, she told me when we first started talking about it last night that she knew there was no future with this guy and she would have ended it in two weeks tops, even if I didn't force it. She knows that she needs to end it with him asap. Hope that makes more sense.

DestroyedOne

So she wants credit for thinking of ending it on her own without any pressure from you. She also made it clear that the reason that she’s even considering ending it someday is because there is no future with him. I think I understand now.

The reason that you’re still in the running for the prize (her) is that there is a future with you. If she doesn't find someone willing to put up with her you will get to grow old with her.

[This message edited by Graywolf at 2:52 PM, May 9th (Monday)]

You need to be careful here friend. At this point words mean less than nothing. As you are now aware cheaters lie, and they lie a lot!

You can only measure her, and only somewhat, by what she does. Period.

You are getting yourself out of infidelity, this is critical. You need to stay in the drivers seat here. We are all aware that you would very much for her to be remorseful, and have the life you had back. We get it. Do not let that feeling cloud your rational mind at this time. Easy to say we know.

Keep posting.

Double!!

[This message edited by RatherBboating at 3:38 PM, May 9th (Monday)]

she knew there was no future with this guy and she would have ended it in two weeks tops, even if I didn't force it. She knows that she needs to end it with him asap. Hope that makes more sense.

Not being an a-hole but not really the point.

She knows she needs to end it?!!? You're lucky the guy is 20 years old with little to give her, imagine the OM was older had a good job, nice house etc?

And why are you negotiating her leaving him! She's married to YOU! How crazy is that? She sees no future but reluctantly she knows it has to end..just not at the moment...but soon.

Again this guy is not really the issue. She hasn't thought this through. Of course she doesn't want divorce, but neither does she want to give up her f*ck buddy hence the "2 weeks" to end it.

You kick her out or divorce, where is she going to go? What's stopping her from going on supermegasugard*ddy.com, getting herself a well to do guy who would put her up?

Stop negotiating her leaving her boyfriend.

First off, if the wayward is truly remorseful and the betrayed is willing to offer the gift of attempting to R then I’ll be among the first to suggest putting forth the effort to R, especially when there are children involved. From your description of your meeting with your WW last night I didn’t even sense the feeling of regret let alone one of remorse from your WW. It just sounded like she didn’t want to get divorced because she knew there was no future with OM. That just makes you plan B until a more viable OM come along.

I very strongly urge you to go ahead with your original plan of making an appointment with an attorney tomorrow. You should tell you WW that you had decided to make an appointment on Tuesday prior to your meeting with her last night. I would tell her that her statement about having planned on ending the affair in two weeks didn’t really indicate that she even regretted having the affair or the pain it has caused you. As a result, you have decided to go ahead and make the appointment with the attorney although you will tell them to hold off serving her with papers while you determine whether she is maintaining NC with OM and is making a serious effort at complying with your conditions to attempt R.

Doing this will show your WW that you are actually ready to D and this is not just an idle threat. So far there haven’t been any real consequences for her actions and her current view of you as being weak and accepting will need to change.

STD testing?

You will demand that and get results in writing, correct?

I'm curious if she will be willing to do this. Part of me thinks she won't.

[This message edited by Iver at 3:57 PM, May 9th (Monday)]

so what is the consequence for her affair ? Did she get away with this for free ?

Did she already send him the NC letter or is the affair continuing ?

Why are you jumping into MC so fast ? Be careful, many bad MC's and some will blame you for the affair. Don't accept this

Listen to Craig, Wk55 and TrenR. You will be sorry if you don't