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Long story, so bear with me if you wish...

My D-Day occurred a little less than 4 weeks ago, so I'm still a baby in these dark woods compared to a lot of others here. What really strikes me is the similarity between so many other stories and my own:

2nd marriage for both of us, married 10 years this December, endured the typical marriage problems but nothing (so I thought) we couldn't work through - although W's oldest son / my stepson (21) is severely autistic and that certainly added unique stresses and problems. But the last 8 months were better than ever; got along well, did a lot of things together, great sex...seemed like we were on the high road.

Mid-November she reconnected with...

...wait for it...

...wait for it...

...now everyone say it with me...

"An Old High-School Friend on Facebook!!!" How many times have we read that? Fortunately he lives 1500 miles away, so I really didn't give it a 2nd thought; was very happy she found an old friend (who we will lovingly refer to as the OF for now).

Weeks go by; lots of Skype sessions late into the night. Texting increases and seems to become more secretive. W decided to fly out in February (over Valentine's Day, of all dates) to visit OF but her sister would also join them; seems they were all good buddies in high school. I'm getting antsy, but I reluctantly go along with it. Off she goes.

W arrives in OF's home state and Surprise! sister can't show up after all. Am I coming unglued? Oh yes indeed, I am. But all I can do is wait for her return.

W returns, seems very happy to see me and to be home, and is very affectionate so I gear down a little. But that little voice in my head - the one we all have heard at one time or another - is telling me something is amiss. A few evenings after W's return she has gone to bed and left her phone on our desk. I do what any nervous paranoid spouse would do: check the texts and usage. Hundreds of texts sent over the last few months, some still in the log saying,"I love you." "I miss you." "Can't wait to see you again, baby."

We have the confrontation, and I get the ILYBINILWY line, followed by the "I've never really loved you at all" line. Yes, she is in love with the OF, who has now graduated to the OM. She swears up and down it was an EA, not a PA. Why should I believe her? She's been lying to me about our marriage and her feelings for almost 10 years. The first week I was a mess and did all the typical wrong things: begged, pleaded, cried, cajoled, criticized...and lost about 8 pounds.

I dove into the Internet and read everything I could on EAs, PAs, loveless marriages, divorce, reconciliation and found this huge community of others who are going through the same crap. Found out abut the WAW / WAS syndrome, doing 180s, going dim, going dark...all worth its weight in gold. After about 10 days of pathetic self-pity, I got back into lifting weights, walking / running, rediscovering my love of God and his Grace, taking care of MYself, reconnecting with my old (male) friends and started to Get A Life.

And I'll be damned...I started to feel OK! I began to feel empowered, not emasculated; independent, not co-dependent; and confident, not weak. I'm still dealing with the bouts of anger and sadness, but in a more healthy way FOR ME and it does seem to have changed the balance of power in the home. So for now, she is still here. She has not clue #1 as to what she wants,whether she wants to stay, go, fish or cut bait. I have completely backed away from discussing the EA, OM or anything related to that. I'm staying upbeat, even if I feel like banging my head against the wall. Conversations are cordial if superficial, but for now it's all I can hope for.

So thanks to all of you for sharing your own tales of woe and intrigue on this forum. It has been the single greatest resource of inspiration and hope for me. Even if she steps into the role of WAW and I am the LBS, I will keep on keepin' on.

Oh yeah...got my motorcycle license, too. Guess what I'm going to reward myself with?

Good for you! Sounds like you are on the right track. I am going thru the same. My H left recently and I am still in the cry at the drop of a hat stage, but too discovering my love of God and trying to stay busy with friends. Hang in there at least she is still there.

Thanks, StaciG. This is one hell of a roller-coaster ride, though. Just when I think I'm doing OK, something happens or I will look at a picture of the 2 of us and I'm reduced to a weeping pile of bones.

The part of this that is the hardest for me to deal with is the way my W has completely cut me out of her life with surgical precision. She shows absolutely no remorse, no sorrow, no second-guessing about anything. During our entire marriage we would always contact each other throughout the day just to say hello, to see how the other's day was going, to say "I love you"...things that (supposedly) happily married couples do. Today - nothing. We barely speak to each other. But she is on the computer from the time she gets home from work until late at night, and alternates from that to her cell phone. I look at her and say, "Who is this woman?"

This morning I took the trash can from her in-home office to empty and saw some familiar papers in it; she had thrown away cards and love letters I had given to her over the years. That nailed me. So today I am in the "Is this marriage worth saving?" phase.

Looks like I need to come up with a signature for my posts. Watch This Space...

From what I see on the boards, the SOP here is to reply to your own thread if you want to comment, ask questions and/or vent rather than start a new thread. Did I get that right?

When W dropped the bomb on 3/7 I was numb, devastated and in shock. I couldn't imagine life without her. Over the next few weeks, the pain of being cut out of her life was nearly unbearable.

4 weeks later, I'm keeping myself reasonably sane and healthy and feeling OK about it all, which seems unnatural. Last night I looked at my W as she spent another countless hour on the computer Skyping with her sister, surfing Facebook or playing Solitare. And I said to myself, "Do I really want to save this marriage if it will never get better than this?"

It seems premature to be thinking this so soon after our D-Day, but my initial feelings of panic and sadness have been replaced with apathy. I look at or think of my W and feel nothing; not anger, not hopefulness, not even love as I used to feel it. It's like I am the one with shark eyes.

Everything I have read tells me to give it time; 6 months seems to be the minimum I should be devoting to not making any major decisions. But if W has never loved me in the 9 1/2 years we have been married - her words - how can I believe that will change? 1 month, 6 months, a year...will it make a difference? I see many people here have been dealing with separations and trying to save their marriages for years. How do they find the strength and determination to endure that kind of pain and stress for so long? During our most recent discussion about everything I was very firm in telling her I would not remain in a loveless, passionless marriage. She replied, "I know."

Am I tearing up my ticket before the horse race is over?

Journaling...

6 weeks from D-Day; W remains aloof and distant. We are cordial to each other but no more than that. She claims to have broken off the EA weeks ago, but her constant texting, phone calls behind closed doors and general attitude of secrecy lead me to believe otherwise. I am fighting every urge to confront her about it but have no real "proof". It is my pride that is suffering the most at this point; I feel like I am being played. I continue to take our autistic adult(20 Y.O.)stepson to his day program each morning; W cannot take him due to her work schedule. I do at least 50% of the house work, buy the weekly groceries, make dinner on the evenings she works late, get the 2 of them breakfast in the morning and generally try to remain upbeat. The few times we have discussed our situation she has fallen back on the "I don't know what I want" line of defense. I would believe her and be more patient about everything if her EA was indeed dead and buried, but its presence makes me angry. We have discussed her moving out but she is in no position financially to do that.

Still working the 180s...when she is home I try to go out with friends or my 2 adult kids, work out in our basement "home gym" or compose / practice my music...really, anything to avoid being in the same room together. We still sleep in the same bed but that is going to change soon as I plan to move into my son's bedroom now that he is out on his own.

My desire to repair-or really, replace-our M is a real roller-coaster ride. One minute I want to do everything I possibly can to bring us back together, and the next minute I want to tell her I feel like I have been deceived and lied to for 11 years, that I deserve better and to just leave so I can get on with my life.

This doesn't have to be over unless you want it to be.

Of course she said the infamous "I never loved you" BS. They always seem to do that when they have the excitement of a new relationship waiting in the wings.

I never will understand how jumping from one relationship into another helps anything.

You're right, DG, I'm trying to gain the power to steer the situation where I want it to go. We had another "heart-to-heart" this evening; she admitted she is still in love with the OM but said their communication is "non-emotional". Uh-huh...I said I was not going to tolerate another person in our marriage, I was not going to be #2 and if she could not commit to having no communication with the OM then I did not see any point in continuing to try to R. She nodded, said "I understand" and reiterated that financially she is unable to move out. I asked, "Is that what you want to do?" Answer: "I don't know." It feels like I'm sparring with smoke; there's nothing to zero in on. Tonight she's back in her office with the door closed Skyping with her older sister. And I'm riding the roller coaster...yes, I want to build a new marriage out of the ashes of our old one...no, I'm sick of this crap, please pack up and leave.

I can honestly say I have not thrown my full efforts into detaching and going 180; I am the one who initiates the conversations about our M, and I know that puts me in a position of weakness. Perhaps in focusing more on detaching I will feel less of the ups and downs and be able to GAL without all the extra noise in my head. Right now this all seems like a slow, agonizing death, even though it's only been 6 weeks for us. In typical "man" fashion, I want to heal it or bury it and just move on.

Telmark - Welcome. I am sorry your find yourself here. I am just getting caught up on your sitch.

It sounds to me like you are doing a good job on the GAL.

Remember to focus on things YOU can control. Unfortunately you cannot control your W's relationship with the OM.

There's a saying around here in regards I'll pass on if you haven't seen it already - "believe none of what they say and 50% of what they do" or something similar. I would say that's somewhat true, although my DB coach has enlightened me to different interpretations of what my W says. For example, 'I don't want to give you false hope' can be intrepreted at face value or it could be something she is saying to herself.

I think at this point, initiating conversations about the M should avoided. Work on detaching more and GAL.

Her problem, not yours, Telemark. "Don't do the crime if you can't do the time," kwim??

Your WORDS are saying "I won't tolerate another man in our marriage," but your ACTIONS are saying otherwise as long as you allow her to remain in your house, texting and skyping and God-knows-what-else with him.

It seems to me that you're at a decision point. If she's truly ended her contact with OM, and wants to work on your marriage, then forgiveness, compassion and a SH*TLOAD OF EFFORT are called for. If she's playing you for a fool, however, and still in contact with him (and it seems like she is), then an entirely different plan is in order.

If it were me, I'd get some confirmation, one way or another.

Starsky

Thanks, jbnati. "What a long, strange trip it's been". I found out just how dangerous it is to talk about the M or R this early in the situation. We had another "talk" later last evening where I told her I had researched the divorce process in PA and what recourse I would have if she refused to move out.

Bad, bad move.

She went completely ballistic, called me all kinds of creative names and said "Go ahead and file". I told here I was trying to protect myself if the situation with the OM did not change, and that my first priority was to keep us together. She would hear none of it, and then went into listing everything I had done wrong during our entire marriage, bringing up incidents that occurred years ago. Her memory never fails to amaze me. I started to fire back - a bad trait of mine that certainly helped cripple our marriage - but stopped, remembering instead to let her rant, listen and try to validate her feelings. It ended with me apologizing for causing her such angst.

This morning, she was still angry and started in where she left off last night. After she said what she wanted to say, I calmly said, "(W), neither of us have treated each other with the love, respect and patience that we each deserve. We have looked to our own needs first and neglected each other. We have been quick to anger and have felt the need to protect ourselves from each other. That is no marriage, and I no longer want our marriage back."

She stared at me.

I went on...

"We deserve a new marriage, one based on faith, love, trust, intimacy and passion. I want that new marriage with you. I want to bury the old one and build a new one. I think we can accomplish that, but it will take a superhuman effort from each of us. I'm willing to start right now. I will fight for this. And even though I am certain you do not feel any love or desire for me, I still love you as fiercely as the day we married. That is as unconditional a love as I can give." And I quietly and calmly left the room.

About 20 minutes later I went upstairs to our bedroom to finish getting ready for work. W was sitting on the bed staring at the floor. She apologized for her words and behavior. I apologized for my words and behavior of last night. I sat next to her, took her hand and repeated what I had said about starting over. She burst into tears and gave me a tight hug, the first I had felt in 6 weeks.

Damn, I'm tearing up just writing this...

And then we each went to work. Are we on a path to recovery? I have no idea. I'd like to think that I bridged the gap between "doormat" and "tough love". More to come, I'm sure...