SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

One week ago today, New Year's Day, I confirmed what I had suspected for a while. My wife of nearly 10 years was having an affair with a man at work. She went on a business trip the first week of October. Her boss at the time made a pass at her and I found out about it a few days later. I asked her about it, and she lied and denied. I specifically described how it happened, since she had told our common friend, and she admitted it. She said it was unwanted and she rejected him. She was up for a promotion at the time, and he had been very involved with helping her be in a position to get it. She told me then she asked him if he’d helped her because he wanted her. He said no. Anyway, I had trust issues because she lied to me and I ended up going to therapy. She began treating me very poorly about that time and was not the same. We had never really had issues before that I thought were too serious, but she said she was angry at me for years of being inattentive and unavailable. I’m not perfect, but had no idea it was that bad. I am not very chatty and never have been. She knew that. But after going to therapy and part of it working on those kind of skills, she withdrew from me. I put all the effort I had into being a better husband and addressing what she identified as what she was missing, but the more I did the worse our relationship was. Thanksgiving was a terrible day. I was determined to make Christmas better. But that was awful too. And I noticed a new purse and wallet combo - clearly expensive - that rekindled my trust issues that I had worked out in therapy. So, New Year's morning I could no longer stand it and looked at her phone when she left it unattended. And saw just that morning she told her former boss (who is now a co-worker because of her promotion) that she loved him. I confronted her and she admitted it. How could you? I asked. Your first husband cheated on you!! You know how it feels!! How could you?? You’re an adulterer!!!! The balance of the day was spent with her making it clear how poorly I had treated her for years with lack of communication and attention, with occasionally saying she was sorry she hurt me. Then going over it again how I was not what she needed, and she’d told me, etc. I ask why did you not raise the alarms and tell me that I was not taking what you were saying seriously enough? Why did you not ask to go to marriage counseling? How can you go to cheating? We've been to one session of marriage counseling with my therapist and she referred us to someone she feels would be better suited to our situation and so that I can still see her. My wife says she still loves me and always will. She is willing to go to the counseling. I demanded New Year's morning that she send a message to her man that she will try to work things out with me and their relationship was over. But they work together. How will I know? And I am not sure she has not kept right on messaging with him via instagram outside of work, and just deleting the conversations when done. I asked her to change her purse and wallet back to one of hers, and she did. I love her. Things have been awkward at our house the past week, like in a haze for me. I no longer have any idea what she is thinking. Like I said I’m not perfect and I admit I probably should have tried to be more attentive sooner than I did. But no matter how much I think about it, I can't understand why she would not try something in between telling me every now and then that she needed more conversation and attention and going to another man. An older married man who also has a child who looks to be an older teen or early 20s. I did reach out and tell the other man's wife New Year's morning. She had suspected. She asked me not to let my wife know she knew so that she could get things into place. I have not yet heard anything about that. We have a 5 yo daughter. What will this do to her I wonder? I love my wife, and at the one week point I am inclined to save our marriage. There has not been one day where I have been tempted to leave, or ask for a divorce. But I have felt pain, anger, betrayal, and shock. I've cried, and felt fury. I just cannot believe she did this. She has not broken down crying in front of me, begging for forgiveness and in fact when we have discussed our marriage in the one therapy session and once on our own, she stays focused on how I was not what she needed, she doesn't know if I even have the capacity to be what she needs, nor does she even feel attracted to me anymore. She doesn't think therapy will be beneficial. Very painful to hear, when I thought just before that trip that we were fine with normal marital ups and downs. My life has crashed down and I am lost without her. And sometimes I feel like a sucker for wanting to salvage this marriage. The guy at work had been working on her friend at work via text message before he got shot down and apparently turned his attention to my wife. I rather think he is probably a serial adulterer, a smooth talker and played up my wife's unhappiness to his advantage. I just don't know. I just want my wife back. I guess it's a good sign that she is willing to go to counseling.

Sorry you are here. But you are playing a pick me dance. Hard 180 is what is needed. Serve her with divorce papers. A hard wake up for yoyr WW is needed. She will either wake up or dive further down a rabbit hole. Wait until the OBS serves up OM's justice. He will throw your WW under the bus to save his own sorry ass. Then she will either committ ir falter the rest of the way.

Sorry you're here. This is a great resource to help you navigate these waters, but it does suck.

Reconciliation takes 2. Your wife isn't participating. While you may want to save your marriage, it doesn't really sound like there's real reciprocation coming from your WW. In fact, there's no remorse, and nothing to indicate that it's savagable. Quite the opposite. She's telling you she doesn't find you attractive, adn doesn't think the marriage is worth saving. That's the reality.

You did the right thing contacting the OBS and letting her know. It's imperative that you get yourself tested for STDs. You might also consider contacting HR for your wife's company to let them know that an inappropriate relationship has taken place between co-workers. You really need to blow it up for her so that she sees the consequences for her actions.

You'll get through this, but you need to get your head right. Read through the healing library, learn about the 180, and start working it with your WW.

I am so sorry to read your story. I have to be honest. Your wife has made it clear that she does not want to be with you. You are playing the pick me dance. You need to stop and reevaluate how you are approaching this. She says you are not what she needs. Believe it. She wont let you because she is allowing another man to be that. File for divorce. Please ready The Healing Library which is on the top left in the yellow section. Start the 180. I would also consider informing HR of their affair. I suspect that it started in October. File for divorce and mean it. She may completely change her tune if you file. If he is married, inform the OBS. Blow up the affair. Inform family and friends. But dont wait on her to come to her senses. That may never happen.

Dknig, I’m sorry to tell you but your marriage is over. What everyone else has said so far is spot on. Especially the part about notifying HR.

Get tested, see an attorney, have her served. At work.

She’s totally betrayed you and made it clear she doesn’t love you and hasn’t for some time. Could you ever trust her again? There’s no regret much less remorse.

Time to read “No More Mr. Nice Guy” and do a 180.

And there is nothing - NOTHING - that you have done to justify her cheating. It’s all on her.

Dknig,

Welcome to the best club nobody wants to join.

Yes, it sounds like your WW (wayward wife) is done. Believe her. The worst thing we see around here is the BS (betrayed spouse) working so hard to get WS (wayward spouse) to join them in reconciling. I've been here 2 years and I've never seen the Pick Me Dance work. It only lowers the status of the BS and raises the status of the AP (affair partner).

The best thing can you do right now (and probably the last thing want to do) is let her go. Kick her out. Tell her she broke her vows and committed adultery. She no longer deserves to be in your home. Let her pack her bags and go. Then call an attorney YESTERDAY and file.

100% when the AP's wife starts making his life hell, he'll kick your WW to the side and she'll come scampering back to you. DON'T TAKE HER BACK!!!!! At least don't offer R (reconciliation) right away. It's way too soon for that.

She'll be in damage control mode and will say anything you want to hear in order to not be divorced from her comfy life. DON'T BE HER PLAN B!!

Read about the 180 in implement it. It's a technique that allows you some emotional and mental space from her so that you can focus on yourself and make decisions for you and your child.

You're in for a hard journey, my friend. We'll support you either way, reconciliation or divorce. But we highly suggest that you don't simply forgive and try to R. That's called rugsweeping and it almost always leads to another D-day.

Good luck. Keep posting.

You need to without warning expose this affair to

the OMW and work.

Contact the HR dept and the CEO and explain how your

WW slept with her boss to get a promotion.

That is if you want to have your best shot to

kill this affair forever.

I totally Agree with Oldtruck!!! Your wife is viewing as a weak husband who is afraid to do anything. You must now stand up and protect yourself and your child.

Best to you,

Bigheard

I did reach out and tell the other man's wife New Year's morning. She had suspected. She asked me not to let my wife know she knew so that she could get things into place. I have not yet heard anything about that.

Informing the other man's wife was the best thing you have done.

Joint counseling before WW getting IC and trying to nice your wife back are some of the worst things you have done. The former usually results in the wayward listing all real or imagined faults of the betrayed as justification for the affair. The latter simply NEVER works and actually make the whole situation worse. It rewards the wayward for bad behavior, it indicates that the wayward is the prize and you will do anything to get them back. It shows you as weak and OM as strong because he takes what he wants.

You, a faithful husband are the prize! If she says she doesn't love you then tell her you'll help pack her bags and she can go live with OM because you know there are other women that will be happy to replace her as your wife!

Sorry to hear about your situation Dknig.

What I have to say may sound harsh but it's the truth and right now that's what you need most. Stop reading now if you're not interested.

You are doing everything wrong. You're playing the pick-me game. It's a game that makes you look weak in your wife's eyes and pushes her toward the other man. Why do you think she's saying you may never be right for her? You're no different than you were when she fell in love with you. She's the one who's changed and she's changed for the worse. The other man has become the better/stronger/more decisive man in her eyes. You need to change that quickly.

You're taking responsibility for her bad choices. Part of the cheater's playbook is to make you think you're the problem. In that way, they accept no responsibility for their bad choices. This is classic cheater behavior and you, like many others before you, are falling right in line and accepting that it's all your fault. Stop it. If a partner has morals, there's nothing the other partner can do to make them break their vows. This has nothing to do with you and everything to do with her. Again, you look weak compared to the other man.

She wasn't unhappy with her marriage when she met the other man. She was fine with you and fine with her life. The other man complemented her and played to her prideful nature and she fell for it like selfish people do. She loved the attention and when it was time to pay for the attention with sex, she readily obliged. Then in order to absolve herself of any responsibility for her wrong behavior, she decided that she was unhappy in her marriage. The only thing that had changed in the marriage was her guilty conscience.

If you still want your cheating wife then you have to bring yourself to admitting that she isn't who she claimed to be, that she has destroyed your family, that she's not a good person, that she's a poor roll model for your children, and that she's betrayed you and your and her entire families and friends with her behavior. Take her off of the pedestal you have her on. She never deserved the position and now she's given you proof.

Once you get your head in the right place, get off of your knees and stop begging your torturer to come back and deliver more blows. Then tell her to leave now if her life and marriage is so bad. Tell her that she is the one responsible here and that you will not take any blame for any of this. Let her know that the next time she even hints at blaming you for anything, you'll pack her bags for her and help her out the door. And tell her you expect one of them to quit their job. She also sends a no-contact letter or email.

While getting your act together and putting your wife in her place, you need to inform human resources at her work that she's been having an affair with the other man. You also need to start the process of separating your assets. Then see a good men's divorce lawyer and have a post-nuptial agreement drawn up, signed, and filed in case there is any future transgression on her part. It's important that you don't reveal what you're doing. The element of surprise is critical to success.

You also need to do these things quickly because the other man's wife is putting her affairs in order. In other words she's likely going to divorce him. Once this happens, he's free to entice your wife into joining him full time. He's going to come to her at work with the news so be prepared. If that happens and you haven't prepared, you're going to be in bigger world of hurt than you currently are. Protect yourself and your kids and do it quickly before any more dust settles. You'll have plenty time to grieve and go to counseling later. Right now you're in the midst of a battle for your own future. It's important you get yourself and your affairs in order now.

[This message edited by Dismayed2012 at 4:46 PM, January 8th (Tuesday)]

Excellent post Dismayed except I disagree about the post nip. This marriage is history. Or at least it would be for me.

If they work together or have any contact the affair will continue. Just because you know doesn't mean it'll end.

She is rewriting your marital history to justify her affair. It's a very typical cheater action.

You can't nice them back and doing the "pick me dance" just lowers your status while making her other man look even better.

I know you're in shock but you need to wake up. Quickly

Squid has given you an excellent roadmap to follow. I second it.

Hang in there.

Your WW is probably still in an ACTIVE A, if they work together one of them must quit otherwise the A will most likely continue deeper underground or resume in the future. Your WW is not a candidate for R by a long shot, she's not remorseful, just regrets getting caught, get tested for STDs, file for D and have her served at work, D takes a long time and can be stopped if she comes around, ends her A, commits to full on demand access to all her electronic devices, commits to NC FOREVER with OM and does the heavy lifting to restore the M she destroyed, if D papers don't shock her back to reality nothing will, in that case just let D run its course, either way you get out of infidelity.

The "pick me dance" NEVER WORkS, you can't nice her back to you, you look very week, she's blameshifting and is in full control. EXPOSE her A with all family and close friends, she betrayed them too and needs to apologize.

I am sorry for your situation. I could only wish I had found this site when I first found out. So while it's unfortunate you are in this situation, there is a lot of good information and people here.

IMHO this is way too early for you to be making any decisions on what you want to do (ie. staying in the M). You need time to process what's going on and your WW also needs to figure out what's going on that caused her to stray. As such I would suggest she be in IC and MC be delayed until there is an actual marriage to be worked on. Right now there is no M. There is an A. Don't forget in all of this, if your wife had issues with your behavior she had a choice to sit down and talk to you about her needs allowing you both to figure out a way on how to proceed. Instead she did what so many have done. They didn't and made the decision to stray. That is 100% on her, however you are very clearly playing the pick me dance here. I know because I did this and it didn't work out well for me.

This is a very critical point in your relationship. Without taking the time to think about what you really want and blindly saying you want to stay and work on it can lead to a lot of unexpected consequences that you are not capable of seeing now, but are very real.

At the rate your going, your basically telling your wife what she did is OK. Your accepting your faults and telling her her affair was justified. Your telling her that there are no consequences for her actions (she gets to keep you while she's still messing around with work boy, if she comes back she hasn't faced any hardship from you. Life goes merrily on). All of this does nothing to correct her thought patterns that caused her to do this so it's likely she will do this again (read the countless posts here of numerous affairs).

So NOW is your chance to take control of this and show there are consequences and also give yourself the space you need to figure out what you want to do.

- Tell HR

- Tell her family

- Get STD check and tell her she needs to go for one

- stop MC until you have a marriage to work on

- read the 180 and implement it (during this time most importantly it give you the safety and space to figure out what you want and need.

NOW if your chance to do something. Take some time to read the countless post here of people that have experienced multiple affairs. There are several of them that say I should have listened to you guys.

Hello, feel sorry for you're situation. Some terminology.

Blame shifting: the cheater seeks reason's to justify the cheating. After 10 years of marriage there are always mistakes, fights, communication problems, etc. What the heck, nobody is perfect. It is not like you are constantly using violence or are a serious drug/alcohol addict. She tries to shift te blame to you. YOU are not the one to blame.

Rug sweeping: The betrayed spouse who loves his wife does not take any action at all and sweeps it under the rug. Cheating and blame shifting will continue. Wife holds the power and BS loses his confidence and this will lead to depression.

Pick me dance: BS suddenly will be doing all the things WW wants and demands. Bs will try to be the best husband hoping the wife choose hubby and not the other man. Wife hold power here and cheating will continue. Wife will never pich weak hubby. She will always choose strong other man. That is how woman work. Strong man will give strong children and therefore woman will choose strong man.

Important if you want to save marriage don't make the mistake to accept blame shifting, don't rugsweep, and most important. Dont do the pick me dance. Wife holds power and will not choose the weak man.

The 180: Suddenly turn 180 degrees. Be the strong man. Do not accept anything and grow some balls. Threaten with a DNA test for kids. Threaten with divorce. Do not have sex with WW. Do not speak to her. act like she doesn't exist anymore for you. Hubby is now strong and wife is weak now. If she really still loves you she will choose for you. If she doesn't love you anymore she will choose OM. But the case is lost then. You can't expect she will stay is a Marriage is she doesn't love you anymore. There isn't a magical way you an rekinkle her love for you.

Reconciliation: If BOTH parties are willing to save the marriage. WW has to take the lead in actions for reconciliation. She is the one who cheated.

Report: Report to OM wife. Report employer, Report parents, report to friends.

Employer: They cannot work together any longer. Or OM has to leave or WW has to leave.

Time: Give it months or even years to heal.

Don't drink alchohol, eat good and drink lot of water. sleep enough and hit the Gym. Work on you're confidence or at least show a lot of confidence.

Dknig, its not right at all. You tried to do what an honest, loving person would do. You offer her fairness and kindness and still she is selfish and willful. You want to protect your family and she thinks only of herself.

She is in the cheaters mind right now. Awash in chemicals of attraction and making up foolish reasons to excuse what she knows is wrong. Shes not going to see reason. Im sorry she has been hurtful about the past. If she had wanted to strengthen your relationship there were many ways to do so. Why didnt she make the effort?

You would think now she would be a mess, horrified that she has done this and desperate to change. But her current stance indicates otherwise. If you are to have any chance at snapping her out of this, you must act now and decisively. Giving her the kind helping hand has not made any difference. Please protect yourself now. See a lawyer. Maybe it doesnt come to that, but just in case please know your rights and how to not get run over in case her and OM are planning something.

I know what you are thinking, one more try...it didnt get me anywhere. Stand up for whats right, insist on new rules. She chooses you completely and is 100% honest or shes on her own. You deserve someone who loves you and honors you. Life is short.

Dknig,

I am seeing this a little different than the others, but I do agree that she is shifting the blame to you unfairly.

If it makes any difference, every single one of us has had our spouses blame us, and re-write our relationships prior to the affair in an effort to justify their actions.

But from there, I would take a differing stance.

Firstly, I would stay in contact with the other mans wife (OMW). Depending on what she does will make you efforts easier or harder.

If the OMW says she wants to work on her marriage, that gives you two sets of eyes and it will probably result in the OM throwing your wife under the bus.

If the OMW is filing for divorce, it will probably push the two of them closer since he will want companionship and your wife will see that he is available.

As far as contacting the employer, I think that is a bad move for now. If the employer terminates your wife and then divorce is filed, you will be stuck with spousal support.

One thing you absolutely need to do is contact a lawyer, and ask him what your options are. He can give you advice on her employment situation, and further steps to take.

One thing that you don't recognize is that YOU are now in the drivers seat. You have the control, whether you know it or not.She has burned the bridges behind her, and she is the only one that can find her way back by repairing her mistakes. You can't make her change if she doesn't want to.

What I strongly encourage you to do is take care of yourself first, and make your child a priority. Without that focus, your kids are stuck in the middle.

I can tell you that everyone here is on your side, and some of the advice is going to be tough to hear, but right now, we are pulling for you more than you will ever know.

Take care,

Fire

[This message edited by Fire96 at 3:31 PM, January 9th (Wednesday)]

Pick me dance does not work. Ever. If anything it makes you the less attractive choice and allows her to continue the affair. It hands over all the control, decision making and power to the WS.

What usually works to resolve the situation either way. Is going full carpet bombing on the two of them. It will either kill the affair fast than you'd believe possible, kick the legs out from under the WS and force them to make a decision which often times is them crawling back.

What you are doing right now, is killing any chance at R as well as weakening your own position for a D.

Dknig, I'm so sorry for what you're going through right now and for the pain you're experiencing. While you may feel desperate to save your marriage and feel the advice you've been given is harsh, please remember that this advice comes from people who have gone through the exact same thing you are. We've all been there. There's a saying here that "you have to be willing to risk a marriage to save a marriage". Your partner must see that you are willing to walk away.

Please continue to post so that the knowlegable folks here can advise you.

Take care of yourself. Everyone here supports you.

[This message edited by MaggieNow1960 at 4:22 PM, January 9th (Wednesday)]