WAW staying, I'm leaving to give her space..

[jab]

Will you defend your past? Will you indicate to her the she is not seeing clearly? Will you defend yourself? Will you defend yourself? Or will you trust that she is right, and acknowledge her pain.

Answers: No. No. No. No. Yes.
I am validating her feelings and acknowledging her pain. I am not defending anything I did anymore.

Some might disagree with me, but I think it would be perectly fine for you to ask her if there is an OM. Not a specific OM who's name is ???, and lives at ???, whom she works with and went to see on ???.

But just asking the question conveys meaning to her. Lets her know you are concerned, and that she might be crossing your boundary line. Don't do anything to control her, you just would like to know so that YOU can make decisions regarding YOUR life.

COG, I didn't mention it but this is very similar to what I did last night. I think this is part of the reason she freaked out so much but I felt I had to do it. I think this worked. I really don't want to get into the details too much, but IMHO she is feeling ALOT of guilt or nervousness about this, even if she was only thinking about an A and nothing happened with OM. I basically told her that I know I cannot control what she does and I'm not trying to. I only asked why was she being so secretive about things if she had nothing to hide? I didn't reveal anything about what I know other than the IUD (which was easy for me to explain how I know without revealing any of the snooping: I overheard her on phone). She gave me IMHO some very lame excuse about IUD and why she didn't tell me about it. I just said to W if that was the reason then why hide it? And then I STFU about it. I mentioned nothing about anything else I found out from snooping.

I knew more than she knew I knew, but I stayed strong. I think I asked her if she had another man a few times, but not in the context of fear, rather as one mature individual to another.

This is how I tried to do it.

One other thing I did that may have triggered something was that I took the phone bill and laid it on counter and strategically placed it so that OM's # was in plain view as I was going out the door to work. I didn't make it obvious I placed it there like that. I wanted to see if there was a reaction.

Well, I got two reactions:

1) She was so upset at work she came home early and never got out of bed before I left for work this morning. I don't think she was angry but did seem very distressed. I acted ASIF, got the kids ready for school, etc. Said a calm, nice goodbye and went to work.

2) She called me about an hour after I left. W was basically worried how I was going to act when I came home (she sounded sad or nervous, not mad). I said that I was going to 'chill out' and STFU. W was still very worried about me not believing her about not having an A. I said what does it matter if I don't believe you? You don't believe me that I'm going to change? I cannot control what you do, nor am I trying anymore. If you have nothing to hide then why be worried about what I think?

I said, I was upset when you came home early because I knew you were upset so bad that you came home, not because I thought you were with some OM. I care about how you feel and want to give you what you need to be happy. The last thing I want to do is argue with you, fight with you, accuse you, confront you, make you angry, try and control your actions. What I want to do is give you the space you need to 'chill out' so you can start becoming happy again. W mentioned something again about how she is scared of what I might do when I leave and if I continue not believing her innocence. I basically stated, what I'm going to do is become a better person and get my 's***' together for once. I'm not going to bother you if you don't want to be bothered with me. I want to get my life back on track, I don't want things to continue like they have been. I will do what I need to do, I'm not going to just crumble and die. You do what you want. I'm being upfront and honest with you about everything, I just ask for the same. As in the past, you couldn't keep the R afloat by yourself, nor can I now. A R/M takes two. I'm not going back on my word.

So I basically didn't STFU but W wanted to talk so I did. I tried to be very calm but strong, not accusive. Tonite, I'm going to act ASIF and STFU about it. I'm probably not following DB rules but W's reactions the last 24 hours seem to be changing a little. I MUST get DB/DR book ASAP! I need to educate myself quick!