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 She said “you’re going to blow our marriage up over this?!”

You see what she is doing here? She has denied you the truth about her A in various ways, and has reinforced her denial via years of stonewalling, delaying, etc. Now, when you are taking affirmative steps to force her into at least a partial truth, she is trying to use reductionism to make it seem like you're threatening to end the marriage over a silly formality. In reality, it is and has always been about basic honesty, a fundamental sign of respect she has consistently denied you.

I'm pretty sure it has been more than 2 months since she promised you that detailed written timeline, the one that would resurrect the deleted texts to the best of her ability. I dont believe you have indicated she has provided that, nor even indicated how far along she is.

Meanwhile, you started this thread about 3 years after dday. Now, its approaching 4 years. Shes stringing you along. You should know she is an expert at this, given the master class gaslighting she used during the actual A. My friend, from my perspective, at some point you are going to have to choose between living with what you've got and staying married, or leaving her.

she is trying to use reductionism to make it seem like you're threatening to end the marriage over a silly formality. In reality, it is and has always been about basic honesty, a fundamental sign of respect she has consistently denied you.

Yes and I made it clear to her that I saw thru that.

On the timeline, she has completed it. It is 17 pages long and now sitting in her therapist’s office We are arranging an appt with both of our therapists for our managed disclosure process. I am willing to that and respect that process, and that appt will happen imminently within a matter of weeks (depends on my travel schedule).

I am not backing down from the polygraph. I am willing to wait for the poly until after the disclosure appt. If she refuses I will institute an in home separation until I can find an apartment and formalize a separation.

Just on the timeline of our marriage post infidelity I wanted to clarify that we are just approaching the three year anniversary. Actually Halloween is an infamous date because that’s when PA began according to her. So we headed out of year 3 and into year 4.

Seeing a lawyer is a great idea. That information is crucial while she is not a R candidate.

When she tries to DARVO, just remind her that honesty is an important and fundamental part of a successful marriage to you. If you cannot have that and verify it, you cannot stay married and her actions over the last few years have not made you feel as if you have honesty in your marriage. Either she gets honest and you are able to verify her honesty or you separate. It's that simple.

It sounds like even if she gets on board with the polygraph, you have one hell of a parking lot confession coming up.

I re-read your recent posts. Your MIL sounds like she neither likes nor respects you. If memory serves, it was your MIL who encouraged your WW to refuse to show you the texts.

It also sounds like your WW, when in the company of her mother, regresses to that same place of "fuck you, Thumos". She tried pull the "you're going to blow up the marriage over a poly" after being with her mother.

The irony in her mother lecturing you about how bad the marriage: "Um, yeah, my wife fucked another man, lied and gaslighted, refused to disclose (with your encouragement), bullied, tried to rug sweep. The marriage is not good. Thank you Captain Obvious."

And your WW: "I've done everything you asked."

Not.

How about: "You lied and withheld and bullied and only after I was ready to leave you have now put in a minimal effort to try to back-fill the giant hole you created in the marriage, but so far I've seen about one or two yards of fill in a hole the size of an Olympic swimming pool."

[This message edited by Butforthegrace at 6:59 PM, November 5th (Tuesday)]

On the timeline, she has completed it. It is 17 pages long and now sitting in her therapist’s office We are arranging an appt with both of our therapists for our managed disclosure process. I am willing to that and respect that process, and that appt will happen imminently within a matter of weeks (depends on my travel schedule).

Weeks? That's a long torturous time to wait for the truth. It's also too long to discuss in a single therapy session. It's going to take hours and hours to read through and discuss 17 pages.

What is the justification for the 'process' that you only get to view the 17 page timeline for the first time while in the presence of both therapists and your wife?

If it's going to take weeks to set up a meeting, then I suggest you reconsider the 'process'?

Consider reading it prior to the meeting.

[This message edited by Robert22205https at 4:54 PM, November 5th (Tuesday)]

These are therapists who specialize in betrayal trauma and they are recommended right here on this website, so I will respect their process.

They don’t stand for blameshifting, minimizing, gaslighting or any of the rest of the bag of tricks employed by waywards.

I believe having the disclosure and then doing the poly will be a useful sequence. She’ll have to answer for any lies she tried in the timeline. So if she’s lying, this actually makes it more difficult for her, not less. I’m not a lawyer but I think of this a bit like the discovery porcess in a trial. Guilty parties can trip themselves up in the deposition and discovery process.

We’re not talking about 8.5 x 11 pages of single spaced copy here. But it is 17 detailed pages and it won’t be locked in a vault. I’ve already waited three years. Waiting a few weeks isn’t as torturous as it sounds when you’re as busy as I am.

Also I’m an exceedingly patient man. I work from the insode out and think carefully. It’s how I caught her dead to rights in the first place.

[This message edited by Thumos at 5:46 PM, November 5th (Tuesday)]

As to the passage of time, I recall that the A occurred over a period of around 3 months, plus or minus, when your son was starting first grade, fall of 2016. This means it must have begun some time around August/September, 2016, and you discovered it and confronted her some time around November/December, 2016. Like around Thanksgiving/Christmas.

I hadn't thought about it that way before. The holiday season must be Hell for you. We've discussed previously the concept of "what Thumos do you want to see in the mirror in 10 years?" Narrowing that concept, this will be your holiday companion, for life. What version of Christmas Eve do you want to live for the next 10 years?

This also means that the time they had sex in your home (the one you know about -- more on this below) must have been around Halloween? Kids at a Halloween party? Parents snick off for a little extracurricular?

When was the period at which he made her feel like no man has ever made her feel before? The thing that you now can't understand because your "immature" views about sex prevent you from accepting that it's okay for her to feel these feelings about a man who is not her husband?

As to the anxiety she appears to be experience about the poly, common wisdom here suggests it's because there are fundamental truths she hasn't told you that will need to either come out, or be reflected as a lie. It strikes me as entirely possible that she is planning to continue to lie to you -- for example, about the number of times they had sex -- fail the poly, and chalk it up to her chronic anxiety.

As to the MIL blaming you for the "bad marriage", I'm reminded how she had re-written the history of your marriage leading up to the A. It seems that your WW and her mother have a way of reinforcing one another on this to construct a shared trope that you are the problem in the marriage, and then your WW uses her expert gaslighting skills to cudgel you with that theme. Even now, post-A, where she is staging some anxiety theater to set you up to disbelieve a "false" on the poly question of "did you have sex with him more than once?"

You might remind your WW and your MIL that, when it comes to anxiety, you live in a hellscape life where you are forced to personally encounter the AP regularly, often several times per week, and each time you see him you are reminded that your wife harbors a secret cocoon of intimacy with him: kissing, touching, sucking, fucking, pillow talk, even in your own marital bed. A cocoon that she has steadfastly refused to open, that she protects against the marriage, which leaves you gasping with anxiety each and every time you see him, wondering what piece of your WW he still owns.

By the way, if the timeline includes specific dates of texts or emails, and quotes, you ought to ask how she could know that. Either she has a cache of this material, or she has asked the AP for info, because there isn't any way a person could recall detail like that from fall of 2016.

[This message edited by Butforthegrace at 6:09 AM, November 6th (Wednesday)]

As to the anxiety she appears to be experience about the poly, common wisdom here suggests it's because there are fundamental truths she hasn't told you that will need to either come out, or be reflected as a lie. It strikes me as entirely possible that she is planning to continue to lie to you -- for example, about the number of times they had sex -- fail the poly, and chalk it up to her chronic anxiety.

I agree partially. With the last part, yes. What I may not have been clear about is that she has generalized anxiety disorder. It’s never been severe enough for an anti-anxiety medication and she would like to avoid that bc it makes her feel emotionally flat. Having been on an SSRI for a short time bc of back pain, I do agree with this. If you’re an otherwise stable person, SSRI’s feel awful.

I don’t agree the panic attack was staged. Whether she’s using it is a fallback position is another question..

Yes the entire holiday season is a flat and ruined landscape for me now — from Halloween all the way thru the New Year. By the way, I used to love Halloween. I’m a big Ray Bradbury fan and he made Halloween special for me as a boy. I don’t see the ruined holiday season changing whether we R or D. So that’s not really a consideration either way. There will always be a taint and shadow and pall over it. Based on my readings, affairs during the holiday season are unfortunately rather common.

I know the precise date and time the sex occurred (the one she admits to). I was out of town but I have independent verification of some things I would prefer not to disclose. But I will say this: I was out of town on a business trip in a meeting and it hit me like a ton of bricks that they were having sex at that very moment. I began blowing up both of their phones with jocular texts. I started having a panic attack in the meeting, though if you’d been with me that day you wouldn’t have known. I seem to be able to control my anxiety until I’m out of eyesight and sound of other people. However, I was useless the rest of the day and spent most of it sequestered in my hotel room. At this time, I was also still implementing the recommended “sea snake” advice from that scene in Gladiator, letting them get ahead of their supply lines so I could cut them off and blow up the affair. I needed proof and I didn’t have it yet.

So her story adds up on date, time and location. It was after thanksgiving in late November. She has said she regrets telling me not because I now know, but because I won’t believe her that was the only time — she has said telling me got us nowhere and that I can’t believe her.

Good advice on the rest of it, thanks once again for your clarity.

[This message edited by Thumos at 9:59 AM, November 6th (Wednesday)]

Blowing up their phones with texts during the deed. They must have been "wtf?" You should find one of those texts, print it with large font, frame it, and bring it to a therapy session. "Baby, I have a gift for you. This is a text is sent you while you were having sex with another man in my bed."

Maybe they did do it just once. It sounds possible that you caught them as it was going physical and nipped it in the bud. Otherwise, it likely would have been more than once.

At the same time I'm mindful of the Neamderthal threads here on SI.

This was also the same day that he later gave her a gift that was sold as a gift to both of us from him and his wife. My wife conned me into calling him and thanking for the gift. I’m not sure I can ever get over the humiliation of later realizing I thanked another man for gift he gave my wife after screwing her. It’s the very definition of cruel cuckoldry.

Now that, my friend, is one of those ultra-shitty facts. Like Waitedwtl whose wife suggested he invest in the APs business, or threads where the WW introduces the AP as a friend and the unwitting BH offers him a beer, or invites him to join the family for dinner.

Where is the gift now?

Long gone. It was an expensive wine fridge. I picked it up myself one day carried it to my truck, took it to a dumpster and threw it in over my head. I’m a big man and strong, but I still can’t fathom how I did that.

The fact that she didn’t dispose of it herself gnawed at me, and still does. And yes, I’ve told her that.

And actually to your point, the AP was often at our house hanging out and drinking wine. He was a friend of mine.

I wasn't aware of the double betrayal aspect.

I can understand why it would be a sore point that your WW wouldn't dispose of all horcruxes of the A.

It would have been epic had you dumped the wine cooler in his front yard or driveway.

Maybe for Christmas this year you can call a landscape company and buy him a dump truck load of gravel to be delivered to his driveway.

[This message edited by Butforthegrace at 5:29 PM, November 6th (Wednesday)]

You’re basically telling us your entire marriage is hanging on the balance, and one thing your wife could possibly do to recover it, or at least help your healing process and now she’s getting cold feet? She really needs to understand the repercussions of her decisions. This kind of trauma she caused you needs some type of consequences. The only common thing that gets wayward spouses to “wake up” or have those “aha” moments is a trip to your lawyers. You should legally get the ball rolling and protect yourself and your children. There is literally no reason not to get the process started at this point you need to put yourself first for once Thumos.

Lowkeyy, correct. You’re preaching to the choir. I have a busy job with travel, so moving as fast as I can. Your observation is spot on, so thank you.

I’d like to ask those following this thread for a temp check: Given what you know about my situation, the circumstances of the affair, etc. how likely on a percentage basis do you think it is that my WW is withholding truth?

Reason I’m asking: the past 48 hours my thinking on this has evolved a little bit. While I don’t think the panic attack was staged, I do think she is maximizing it for her own benefit and I think she intends to invalidate or refuse the poly on these grounds. I’m tired of debating with her about the things I need and most especially about the poly. I may ready to call it quits.

If it’s highly likely she’s still lying what is the rational perspective on even continuing with the poly. What is the rational point of trying to reconcile with someone who would do that for three years and then still try to weasel out of a polygraph? That person is still wayward and not reconciliation material. Part of me keeps saying I’ve come this far, I should at least see it thru. But do I, really?

It’s almost like a Pascal’s wager.

I’m just thinking it through.

[This message edited by Thumos at 1:18 PM, November 8th (Friday)]

I dont think Pascals wager is a good metaphor for the D/R conundrum. Separating and divorcing are neither permanent nor irreversible.

Even if you D, you will have an ongoing relationship with her as you co-parent your child. There are no rules about how that looks. Divorced co-parents do things like take family vacations, etc. Sometimes they date one another, sometimes exclusively and sometimes not.

That said, I often think of your thread as the ultimate example of the adage that what a WW does after Dday is as important, or even more important, to a successful R as what she did before Dday. Everything your WW has done post Dday has screamed loudly that she does not want to R with you. Instead, she wishes you would rug sweep and stfu.

You mention about having "come this far". From where it sit, you have had to drag her kicking and screaming to this point. And what is this point? She has outright refused transparency, for years. Only after you pressured at max levels has she indicated any ersatz willingness to honesty, but by now literal transparent honesty is probably an impossibility. She claims to have created a detailed 17 page timeline of events that occurred 3 years ago. She has not and will not let you see it except in the presence of a third party intervenor. Meantime, you still live a life seeing the AP and wondering what view of your WW he holds in his mind eye. You've had to rid the house of horcruxes of the A. And mostly you've had to tolerate her and her mother blaming you for the A.

Over and over we see that R really only works where the WW desires it, pursues it, promises it repeatedly. I dont see that in your threads.

[This message edited by Butforthegrace at 3:29 PM, November 8th (Friday)]

Her fear and resistance for the poly influences my thinking, so I'm in the 90% and over group. If she wants you and if she is confident of her truth, then the poly should be a no-brainer to me. In my time on SI, those who are telling the truth not only agree to a poly, but push for it.