SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

She is worried that if she quits her job (which is a decent paying job and she has ten years there) and I still leave she won’t be able to support herself and her kid

You know, Beencrushed, that is a very interesting response of hers. Her concern is what SHE would do if she quit but then you still leave and she won't be able to support herself and her kid. I would have expected a response more like "What!?!? You're going to divorce me over just texting my friend!?!?" I mean, it sounds like she's already thought 10 step into the future on the situation. In other words she knows what she is doing is wrong enough to make you want to possibly divorce her, hence her deleting her texts and claiming you would just take their conversations out of context. She is being defensive in the self-preservation form.

That isn't good. That ought to tell you that your WW and this "co-worker" have taken it things WAY too far to the point they both know if it came to the surface they would be judged harshly.

I struggle with if I can get over construction worker affair, she says they never had sex I don’t know if I believe it he was 19 years younger then her what else could there have been? So I beat myself up with did they or didn’t they? Not sure I want to know the truth, or just think the worst case and try to rebuild our marriage . I’m afraid if I find out later they did for sure don’t know if I could except it. So confused!! Do you think I need to know truth? Or just assume they did (not knowing for sure) and TRY to move on. Not sure I want to know. Which one will drive me more crazy, knowing for sure or assuming they did but not sure?( So confused right now)

You will want to know, Beencrushed. At least you will want to know the truth about what happened, maybe not necessarily all the little details of these affairs. But, you will at least want to know if both instances got to PA. I want you to pay attention to the little voice inside you that says a PA is a deal breaker for you. I'm not saying D her if you do find out either or both were PA's but I don't want you to ignore that voice either. It gets to have a say in the matter. More importantly, it gets to define the requirements you may have for R should you consider PA to be that deal breaker but are willing to give your WW the gift of R. That voice is telling you a very important part of you that needs to be healed if R is the course for the BOTH of you, not just you. Same with if D is your path ahead.

I divorced my WW and then remarried a new woman a few years later so I'm much further down the road from my own situation. I'll tell you from my experience that your own worst enemy right now is FEAR. I chose D when I was 43. The reality is men in their 40s will not have a problem with dating and finding a new woman as long as you take care of yourself, are employed and have your own place to live. You already know being a single dad isn't an issue either. Thus, ending up "alone" isn't going to ever be an issue unless you decide to hole up in a covenant and swearing off all women. Your fear of losing the marriage should not outweigh your fear in being a rug-sweeping doormat to a WW who continues to push your boundaries to the point she's "befriending" every co-worker, milf hunter, player that crosses her path and ultimately turning you into some cuckold. Always remember, it is YOU that is the prize.

I would take the approach that GoldenR suggested. It is simple and to the point. It is basically telling her "Either respect my boundaries or go bounce." In order to save a marriage, you must be willing to lose it. I unintentionally employed what GoldenR suggested in my situation. The thing was, I had decided to D when I told my XW then to "go bounce". Her demeanor completely changed. All of a sudden I'm the person of her focus and not the OM. All of her emotions were directed toward me. It completely flipped the script on her and she was a snot dribbling crying mess the day she found out I had a new woman in my life. So yeah, this detachment, doing the 180, setting hard boundaries shit really works. But, you got to DO a lot of this boundary laying and not just saying it.

Go talk to an attorney to go over your rights and options again. Have the attorney draw up a petition to the terms you want in D then take your copy home, sit down with you WW and tell her-

"I'm serious. Like I said, either go no contact with your AP and find a new job or your non-compliance means I have this petition filed. You tell me which is important to you. Having inappropriate friends against my wishes or staying in this marriage with me?"

If she tries to argue the point again that you may leave anyway if she quits her job tell her "That may be a possibility and I cannot guarantee that I may or may not stay in the marriage with you, but I definitely CAN guarantee that your continued contact with your affair partner will have me leaving this marriage soon."

You're going to find out real quick what's more important to her right then and there. If she tries to argue this issue rather than give you an answer, her avoidance is your answer right then and there. You go ahead and file. You know divorces don't happen overnight so there will be some time for your WW to stew in the terms of your requirements to stay married with you so she may surprise you the next day or next week with "Ok, I quite my job and sent a no contact message to my co-worker." At that point THEN you can lay your terms of requirements for R.

Again, tackle this one at a time. Determine if she wants to stay in the M with you. If so then lay out requirements for R. One of those requirement is the complete truth, laid out in a timeline of BOTH her claimed EA's. Decide later if it does come out that she indeed have PA's if you want to D her or not. It may seem unfair to her but again you did not earlier guarantee that you would stay, right? She took the risk of losing the marriage when she started fucking around with these OMs', not when she decided to work on R. Your gift of R is but a "chance" to stay in the M, not just save it. It comes with no guarantees.

Maybe the money for a polygraph would be worth it? If there was nothing physical maybe she keeps her good job. She should get a recovery program and show you all the deleted texts. She's got to be honest with you and prove there's nothing between them.

Did anyone mention using Dr. Fone on his wife's phone to recover the deleted texts yet?

I don't know how to do the screenshot of posts, but from Man of Integrity today:

"....It is not hard to tell which girls are up for crabs.." I think you meant grabs, but this works too!

Hey, we have to still be able to find some humor in the madness.

Basically you need to know what you want to reconcile. Otherwise it’s like signing a contract blindfolded. Would you buy a car like that? You don’t know the car, the price, the history, but you sign the paper. You may not need to know if bolt #3210 had enough torque but you’ll want to know if the car had been in an accident or three or found at the bottom of a lake.

From what you wrote, it sounds like your wife wants the safety, comfort and love that you provide while playing the dating game. That’s called cake eating. “How dare you trying to stop her from flirting with other guys?” Hmmm, it sounds like she’ll need to have her bubble burst.

Like the others have explained (better), you need to tell her that she’s free to date as much as she wants, but not as your wife. Then do the 180, detach, sleep in another room, do your own stuff, go to the movies with your kids, but without her, and go talk to a lawyer.

That’s incredibly hard to do but a good way out of infidelity.

Maybe she’ll wake up and you’ll have something to work with, or maybe not. But there won’t be any pick me dance and you’ll be out of infidelity and a whole lot happier down the road.

Until you come from a place of power and strength- she will walk all over you.

Others have suggested the 180 and advising her of your intention to leave her if she continues contact with the AP.

Those are two of the best suggestions. They work to put you back in control of you and your idea of how you want your marriage to be.

Be very wary of her lying about evding contact with the AP but still secretly cheating. It does happen often. Just b/c she says she has ended it - you need to be able to verify she actually continues to maintain no contact.

Consider a polygraph test to get the full truth. It's likely she will confess (if it was a PA or more than 2 guys) the morning of the polygraph test.

First, purchase the phone recovery software "Fonelab. Don't use "Dr. Fone", it sucks.

Then either get her phone yourself or demand access to her phone. She'll probably give it to you because she thinks she is slick deleting texts.

Then recover the deleted content from her phone, which will include texts, photos, videos, call history, and a ton of stuff from "cheater apps" like whatsaapp, viber, kik and so on.

Someone suggested above that SHE gets the software and recovers the deleted texts. DO NOT DO THIS! That will give her information she can use to evade you and this software also provides permanent unrecoverable deletion.

Be informed. Recover the deleted information before you offer any kind of reconciliation. You may be shocked at what you find.

Also check her phone bill to see match up her texts to texts that are sent and received to her number.

If they are Imessaging, that won't show up on the phone bill. However, if there is an old phone on the same Apple ID, you can most likely see those Imessages in real time, as well as see where she/her phone is located at any time, with pretty food accuracy.

You can also add a different Apple device she doesn't know about to her account to monitor her.

Any texts that show up on the other device will not be deleted when she deletes them from her main device.

There are versions of phone recovery software for Android devices as well.

[This message edited by faithfulman at 12:39 PM, February 23rd (Saturday)]

Duplicate post.

[This message edited by faithfulman at 12:38 PM, February 23rd (Saturday)]

She's given you reason NOT to trust her, she's giving you even more reasons now. She is fully in the wrong but appears to give little concern to your feelings and needs.