Love, PAIN and the Whole Crazy Thing

[mcol]

I'mmmmm Baaccckkk!!! Friends...I will try to summarize the craziness of the whole thing with a couple of pointed quotes from you and some of my own ramblings...my other post got deleted(dang internet)

This is old business but should provide a frame of reference. The issues are still valid but I am nowhere near the point where I can tackle any of them due to the OM.

[quote=mcol] mcol, now that the EA/PA has been disproved, will you describe the current relationship between your W and the guy previously suspected to be the OM?

This was the first anvil to the head...what was I thinking? Nothing had changed with her and OM despite my new found belief in my wife's honesty.

mcol,

I'm sorry, but I'm not buying. You strike me as a sharp, sensitive guy, and you suspected SO much that you made the drastic moves of separating your finances and seeking out legal counsel, as well as involving family members. Now, you've totally done a 180.

I asked you yesterday, "By what evidence have you come to the conclusion that your wife is not having at least an EA?", and you responded:


Quote:
I completely understand what you are saying and you are not the only one who has mentioned this same concern. Quite frankly, I have my own concerns. One thing that W said yesterday that sticks in my mind is "If I wanted to have an affair no one would know about it". I believe this to be true. I do believe she has trusted in this guy for emotional support...to what level I would call that an emotional affair, not sure.

Trust me when I say the scenario is not lost on me but I have to be honest that at this moment I am more concerned for the other part of our R that were identified last night and not a possible EA.

I will have to wait and see because I am far from re-kindling anything. But my wife has a very hard time lying and her level of emotion she was dealing with last night makes it very difficult to think she was lying about her relationship with him.
Time will tell...even if it was an emotional affair, she has been called on it and I believe that she wants to save our marriage as well. Me not being there has had a significant impact on her...that and not having her dad right now is just very difficult.


(emphasis mine)

You do understand, don't you, that if she HAS been unfaithful, that all infidels lie? She would NOT tell you the truth about it. Unless I'm missing something, what I'm hearing you say is, "I believe her because I believe her."

You suspected it; even her own family suspected it. You are the people who know her, and the situation, the best.

You at least owe it to yourself to get some unbiased, 3rd-party proof, one way or another. It will either put your mind at ease, or it will give you the information you need to deal with the situation wisely and effectively.

Put a keylogger on her computer, and/or hire a private investigator, if you can afford one. I had to put a keylogger on our PC and eventually put a voice-activated recorder in my wife's car. I had a friend of a friend follow her. I INSISTED the entire time that everyone on the message boards was wrong, that my wife was asexual, if anything, and that it would turn up nothing.

Instead, it turned up that she was meeting her 29yo (my wife and I are 47) personal trainer in department store parking lots, meeting up at his friend's house for sex, and heavy petting in her car, that I was paying for!

Choc, you are quickly becoming my hero...thanks for challenging this man....anvil to the head #2

From mcol's sig:
Top areas to work:
1) Communication
2) Making my wife first in everything
From my evening's reading:
Quote:
As a therapist, I've worked with couples where the woman insisted that she should be her man's number one priority. This is a recipe for disaster. A man must make his passion his number one priority. By doing so, he gives his woman (or women) something to be attracted to. Once he makes something else his number one priority, he loses the masculine energy that naturally attracts feminine energy.

I am pretty sure I get this

Originally Posted By: chocolateeyes

You do understand, don't you, that if she HAS been unfaithful, that all infidels lie? She would NOT tell you the truth about it. Unless I'm missing something, what I'm hearing you say is, "I believe her because I believe her."

You suspected it; even her own family suspected it. You are the people who know her, and the situation, the best.



Choc...I am with you however, I need to explain that the W I married changed drastically when her dad died and I deployed. I think the whole family does not understand the new person that they are trying to deal with and as such they do not understand her. To that end, I believe that we were applying our understanding of the old W as opposed to the new W (very difficult to type exactly what changed) which is why we thought the affair. Communication is the key man.

She was afraid that she was going to lose me over here so she blocked me out of her emotional response. As such, I believe she started to live life without me because something inside her told her that she needed to prepare for the worst. Unfortunately, that side took over which led to her change of heart and the subsequent letters. I think she determined after losing her father that it would too painful to lose me as well. As such, I think she decided to try to get me out of her life so she would not have to face that pain again. I am praying that once I get back she will do a 180 on me because I am out of danger. She has always said that due to my occupation she has never been able to seriously consider a future with me because I might get killed. I will delve into this with her tonight to see her response...depending on her mood of course and how she is feeling about all the crap that went down in the last several days.

Yesterday we had a little snag. We were IMing and in an attempt to try to connect I was asking her lots of questions about her friends. I felt like it was prying so I asked her if she felt like I was snooping to which she said "it is starting to feel like it". I immediately recoiled and stopped watching her chat room and apologized. I thought my response was appropriate in saying that in my attempt to get to know her again I wanted to get to know her friends. Clearly, she has found something in them which is comforting and provides haven. If I can tap into that then it may help build trust and start repairing our R.

I contemplated hiring a PI and almost went through with it but at the end of the day I realized what I need to do is listen to my wife and believe her when she tells me things. This side of our R needs the most work. We need to hear each other and empathize with what has happened to the R we held dear before her father died. Then maybe we can go forward.


Originally Posted By: burgbud
now that the EA/PA has been disproved, will you describe the current relationship between your W and the guy previously suspected to be the OM?


Burg...the relationship is the same, they call each other to talk about the things going on in their lives. I am not crazy about it but I am in, as I see it, to make demands of W. If I feel like she is sidetracking me in favor of him then I will likely address it.

That quote was intense but I have to tell you that she said the part of her heart that felt anything for me hard and cold. I have to find a way to spark that flame again. I think the first major step forward is coming home. I believe that she will not be able to reconnect with me until she knows that i am generally out of harm's way. Although driving on the interstates in America is more dangerous than being here, statistically.

My answers to anvils #1 and #2...with blinders still affixed.

With all due respect, you are being incredibly naive. What you have done is listed all kinds of reasons and excuses why your wife might be DRAWN toward an affair, and/or away from her husband, but that still does not excuse her if she ACTED upon those reasons.

And I believe she has, and I believe so do you. You're just so wracked with some combination of guilt and also fear of losing her if you "spook" her, that you're willing to emasculate yourself and you're going all "needy/grabby" on her, which is NOT attractive to her, I can assure you (women, jump in here if I am wrong).

I am NOT trying to be a hard-ass here, but rather speak the truth in love. I do not know you, but I do know what I went thru, and what I've learned from it. My way may or may NOT work, there is no guarantee. But your way absolutely will not, and you'll be left with regrets for the rest of your life that you should have been more forceful.

This is what got me to start see the light that nothing had changed except for me and what I was willing to tolerate....so here we are. I will post new material and responses to questions in my next one.aaaaaaccckkkkk