First time poster looking for some direction. 6 weeks ago my wife and I decided to go to counseling individually. She told me she was tired of my negative attitude and how I was dealing with the kids. "When I got mad at them she saw the light diming in their eyes". After much self examination, I did realize that I was directing a lot of my frustrations towards them when in reality it was my wife who I was mad at. She is an endurance athlete and I believe she is addicted to it. Over the past 7-8 years with all her training I was forced to be the main caregiver to our children and the frustrations started to grow. Since my kids were the ones around all the time I did direct my feeling toward them. Just poor attitude, and unpleasant to them at times. I realized this pretty much immediately and made some drastic changes. I was really unaware I was doing it. At the same time, she went to counseling for "she has pushed herself so far away from me that she doesn't think she can every find her way back". Two weeks later, I find out she has been in an affair emotional at first, then physical for about 2 years. I am devastated by this revelation but it is not in my nature to quit on our marriage and want to do anything/everything to fix it. She just wants out because I think this other guys just makes her feel good. She has told me she wants a divorce and that she loves this other guy (just got second divorce and has had multiple affairs including my wife) She cant see any of that. I know that this affair is a cause of our underlying problem that I was so negative and didn't support her in her athletic adventures, according to her.(we rarely communicated about this) It used to be things would get better after the next race for us, but then turned into after the next race, there was just another race. I have always loved her and did support her, not that she sees, but thought I would just let her do what she loved and eventually she would come back to me and be appreciative of what I had done. She cant see all the support that I did give her! All she sees is that I wasn't in a great mood all the time and now all she can see in me is negativity which is really far from the truth! She holds onto 3 times in my life where I got really angry and was probably scary to be around brief instances of maybe 5 minutes each. No violence but just really angry. She is looking at apartments to move out into a nest situation where we will both stay there when its not our days to have the kids. They will stay at our home and we will try to make it easier for them. This will be short term until divorce and then we will have a more permanent living situation. I don't want this. I would love to break my wife's determination to get out of this marriage but don't know how! I really do want to make our relationship.
I know it will be a tough road to travel but I am ready to give it a shot! Help Please!
Last edited by Cadet; 09/12/1601:51 PM. Reason: Carriage returns for readability
You may be on moderation now, post in small frequent replies and stay on this thread until you reach 100 posts (for your thread, you can also post on other peoples threads to give support). Especially on this Newcomers forum, where the posting activity is very active, and your posts can quickly fall to the bottom of the page or even several pages down. Keep journaling and asking questions - people will come! Most important - POST!
Get out and Get a Life (GAL). DETACH.
Believe none of what he or she says and half of what he/she does.
Have NO EXPECTATIONS.
Take care of yourself, breathe, eat, sleep, exercise.
Take the parts of this advice that you need and don't worry if I have repeated something that you have already done.
Here are a few links to threads that will help you immensely: These are known as the homework.
Wow, thanks so much for all the info. Today is the first day that I have truly detached as you recommended. I don't think the W cared much for it. Went to a group session and a church and she sent me a text asking what "meeting" I had. I just told her it was something I was doing to improve me. Was that the right thing to do?
Wow, thanks so much for all the info. Today is the first day that I have truly detached as you recommended. I don't think the W cared much for it. Went to a group session and a church and she sent me a text asking what "meeting" I had. I just told her it was something I was doing to improve me. Was that the right thing to do?
Yes - she probably thinks that your change is suspicious since it is a new behavior. I would not worry about it. She already has had an affair and may suspect one of you.
I suggest you continue to be a great DAD, as this is very important.
No one thing you do is going to turn this around, it takes lots of hard work.
There is no way a 2 year affair has not affected her perception on your marriage. Yes, work on you, but there is a lot of insincerity in saying you were not supportive when she had a relationship with another man. Looking back I yelled at my children a lot last fall and it turns out that is when my STBEXH had started his affair. I think your realizing your stress was coming out in this way is so perceptive.
I don't have much to add because I've just started to go through this about 5 or 6 weeks ago, but listen to the great people on this board. They know what they are talking about. Just keep posting.
M39, W36 T12, M10 S6,S2 Discovered EA 8/8 that started 7/31
Sorry your hear, but welcome to the community. you will find a lot of information that will help you through this situation, and you will come out of this situation a better man.
For right now, the best thing you can do as far as your relationship is concerned is do nothing, do not try and implement things you read right away, really read everything and get a good understanding of the process before trying to implement things. For right now, DO NOT initiate relationship talks, just give your W space, and take some space for yourself.
M - 9 1/2 years 5/5/16 - Bomb drop - 3 week EA 10/31/16 - We sold house 01/10/18 - D Finalized
I would swear I've prevously read your story. It was very similar, but after awhile, they all begin sounding eerily similar. Not saying it lessens your pain or the severity of your situation. The posters here are very supportive b/c they understand exactly what you are currently facing.
Follow Cadet's advice, and read the links he gave, b/c it is important information.
My suggestion is don't try to get your W to see reason about the MR, the OM, or much of anything else. This is not the girl you married, and you will need to look at her as if she is someone completely different from the one you knew.
We will be talking about a lot of things that may sound opposite to what you want to do. Although we hope you can save your M, we want you to save yourself, too.
The more marital history you can give us, the better we can help.
Has there ever been any type of inappropriate contacts with people of the opposite sex, before this affair?
Quote:
I have always loved her and did support her, not that she sees, but thought I would just let her do what she loved and eventually she would come back to me and be appreciative of what I had done.
That's not going to happen. It is not going to happen if you continue to accommodate her (like swap living in an apartment), and taking care of home and kids.......while she just focuses on what she wants without any responsibility for anything other than herself. It is not going to happen as long as you continue the same old relationship dynamics that you have allowed since you took a back seat to her life. It won't happen as long as you say you have no choice, and continue to do what she tells you. Start taking charge of your life, b/c you do have choices.
It is not about what you feel should work in your M. It is about doing the work that gets the right results. Do what works!
I realized I was taking my anger out on my children probably within hours of my W bringing it to my attention. It was an easy change for me to make once I realized what I was doing. It is amazing the change it has made in my relationship with them. I notice a huge difference and I am so grateful for that. My 13 year old notice that I had been reading ALOT lately. That's kinda her thing. She asked me one night,"hey dad, are you gonna stay up reading tonight?" to which I replied yes. She said," why don't you come in my room and read with me". It meant the world to me. If nothing else, my relationship with my children has improved and they are the most important in all of this. I walked in my W room and she was crying and I asked why. She said, "you have just been so different with the kids". Its a start that she sees that and I hope I can outlast this thing and get her to look at me as a good person again!
