Oh boy, I am very proud of you, I really don't think you backslide to much after all you didn't say anything about the cell phone. I think it took alot for you not to. I honestly can't say if I could have done it, I probably would have blown a gasket. I do agree w waiting until after your trip, & I also agree w you that there are alot of positive things going on. If your W is still talking to the OG, but not seeing h maybe the better the things get between the both of you s will not feel the need to talk to h & eventually break of all contact. I know it's so hard to be patient, & I know it would kill me inside to know that they were still talking, but I think the more s is pressured not to or confronted (as bad as it stinks) it won't encourage h to become even more closer to you. I still think of everything just about everyday, maybe it's a good thing so hopefully there will never be a repeat, as much as ILH I think if this happened again I would walk & never look back. See when I was pregnant w D2 my H did something similar to me I don't think my H had an PA, there was just this MOW that h used to talk to & told me things like h didn't know if h loved me anymore & so on. Mind you I was pregnant & h was emotionally treating me so badly this went on for about 2 months then one day I left & everything turned around & was ever since at least so I thought & so h acted until all this other crap went down (which lasted about 6 months)H never stayed anywhere overnight this time h always stayed at home. Like I said I really don't think anything went on w h, but everything hurt none the less & I don't think I was quite over it then h turned around and had a real A. My H turned 31 2yrs ago (the age thing really really bothers h) then right before h turned 33 h got all weird again. I'm hoping this is not a pattern (every 2yrs.) I won't be able to handle it. My 2 youngest children will be older & in school & I will leave in a heart beat. I am so afraid because ILH and h knows that & I took h back after all of the crap h has put me through that in his mind h think h can do anything & I'll always take h back. Crazy! I really don't know I wish I could jump inside h head & see what h is thinking sometimes AH HELL all the time. When is your trip? The end of the month? Boy am I envious, plus I won't be able to talk to you while your away, & it really has helped me alot. Last night was a good night we sat outside & had a fire my H was very very affection, I wish h would be like that more often, but I am not complaining I'll take when I can get it. Well I hope you have a good evening, I think your doing great. By the way does your W know you visit this site? Mine doesn't, h probably would think it was weird. ~~K~~
Sitting around a fire sounds nice. Some of the best times I remember with my W in the early days (pre kids) were camping up in the Sierra mountains. We still go camping - we have a weeklong trip scheduled for late July - but with the kids and other families, so it's quite a bit less romantic than those early trips.
No, my W doesn't know about this site. She wouldn't really understand and would probably think it's a little weird too. Actually, she'd probably get jealous of you! I've thought about having her read some of the various threads, thinking that maybe she would better understand me and what I'm going through. But I wouldn't want her to read the stuff I've posted, I'd feel inhibited if I knew she could read it. This is the only place I can talk about this stuff. The only person I've talked to, other than my W, is her best friend. She is very supportive of us staying together, and is very encouraging, but I worry that anything I say to her will eventually be told to my W, so I don't say too much.
The age thing is/was definitely a factor in my W's decision to have an A, I think. She is 39, and has talked a lot about not wanting to turn 40. She's been a little overly concerned with her looks lately (which started before the A), including losing weight, going to the gym regularly, getting a breast lift/implants, getting her teeth whitened, tanning, getting manicures/pedicures, etc. She looks great, and I don't mind all of this, except that she seems to have lost a little perspective about the important things. I'm 41 now, and I did a little mourning at the end of being 39 myself, but I didn't do anything crazy or obsess about it abnormally.
Kim, if you think that your H may think that you will always take him back, no matter what, then I think you should tell him that you won't. I'm sure that you could do it gently, but firmly. I agree with you, I won't be put through this hell again. If possible, I'll see the M through this crisis, but another A would be the end. Come to think of it, I'll probably have to have the same talk with my W, to make sure she's crystal clear on that.
I don't know if I'm going to be able to follow through on my earlier decision to wait until the end of the month to confront my W about her "secret" cellphone. I'm not sure that it makes sense to wait, and I'm just getting angry and driving myself crazy over it. She has used the phone another 104 minutes in the last 3 days, including 45 minutes yesterday (she was supposedly out running errands, including buying a Fathers Day gift for me. Aw, thanks hon). I'm pretty sure that all of those minutes are talking to the OG. I thought I could handle it, as long as she isn't seeing him (Mostly, I still continue to think that she isn't, but I'm losing faith in that, too). But I don't know now. It's eating at me, continuously. Since I found that I could track her cell minutes 3 days ago, she has been talking to him every day. They've probably spent more time talking than she and I have.
I wanted this to be her decision, without pressure from me. Maybe that's just a fantasy though. I'm beginning to think that she won't stop talking to him ever, and that our M would be doomed because she would always be holding on to a piece of the A, so that the next time we hit a bump in our M (and there are always bumps along the way), she'd be gone. I can't sit around waiting for the other shoe to drop.
To this point, I've avoided giving her ultimatums. I've strongly hinted that if I ever found out that she slept with him again, that I would kick her out of the house. But I've been careful to not say it explicitly. And while I've tried to tell her (often) how much it would hurt me and our M if I found out that she was still talking to him, I've never threatened to kick her out because of it. But I think I'm getting to the point that I just can't stand any more lies, and I can't keep putting in the effort I make every day fighting off the doubts and bad feelings, and trying to be happy. I'm tired. I think I'm quickly getting to the point of being ready to issue an ultimatum, and mean it.
What if I do? She will most likely agree to it. But she hates it when I try to control her (she's always been rebelious, and she has "control" issues stemming from her relationship with her father), even if what I demand is completely reasonable (e.g., not being in contact with the OG). As I see it, there are 3 main possible outcomes:
1. She continues the contacts, being even more devious about it. Inevitably, I found out about it sooner or later, forcing my hand. I kick her out of the house and let everyone know what is going on. Do we divorce? Who knows?
2. She doesn't contact him anymore, for awhile. She resents me for it, misses him too much, and eventually, restarts the A. I find out about it, etc.
3. She doesn't contact him anymore, and reinvests herself in our M.
Which one would it be? I honestly don't know. I really do feel like we've made a lot of progress, and it seems that whenever we are able to spend a significant amount of time together, that we can really have fun and reconnect. But our schedules don't allow for a lot of time together, and what little time we do have competes with the time she spends talking to him. I'm more competitive than most, but I'm tired of this competition.
My new plan is to confront her sometime next week, after Fathers Day, and let the chips fall where they may. I'll be calm, choose my words carefully, and let her know that I still love her. But enough is enough, and it's time for her to make her final decision.
when my h first started to come home (after a d seeking 6+ month seperation) he had reactivated an old cell phone (a secondary one) it was not hidden from me but I did not like it because calls could be erased, while his other cell phone does not allow calls to be erased they must be bumped out by new calls...so anyway..I hated this second phone..saw no need for it..his justification for it was that the other didn't work everywhere so this was a backup..to me it screamed a phone to call ow with...I made my stink a few times about it but then just stopped as it seemed to do no good...then low and behold one evening on our way out the movies h says "i thought you'd like to see this" and flying out the window of the moving truck goes the cell phone...sure I'd rather have seen ow go flying out the window but the phone was nice.
what am I saying to you???
well she has this phone that she "may" be using to call om...if you make a stink about this phone more likely than not all you will have done is make a stink and nothing will change...it is not about this phone it is about her...that phone could be gone and you'd still find something to make you doubt what w is up to.
so decide if you want to mention the cell phone or not. at this point I would say not...stop snooping at how much she's using it too...it's not doing you any good.
I read your request for company on Sage's thread. Thought I'd say "hi". I've only had time to read the first and last pages of your situation, but it was enough to get the picture.
I'm struggling with simular issues myself. (As many of us are, actually)
I will check back when I have a chance.
I'm over in "piecing". I think I need my own forum though. Let's see, how about - "Anger Management"?
Bri, Hi, I agree about the talk but I just don't know when it would a good time to do so. I'm sure you know what I mean. Everything still seems to be going pretty good, last night was our night out, we had a nice time, H again was very affectionet, it really makes me feel important. Things seem to be so much better, I just hope it continues to stay that way, I try so hard to do the things that make him happy, not that I mind but sometimes it ticks me off, probably because I don't want any of this to happen again, & I feel that I'm working at it harder & it wasn't me who did the dirty deed, I try not to dwell on it though. It is probably very normal to feel that way. Like you said I wish my H could really know what h put me through & what I am going through now. But to be honest unless the shoe was on the other foot I don't think h would truly understand. I wish my H & I could go on some kind of trip, but it is hard enough to find someone to babysit for a couple of hours once a week. I finally found a babysitter (a girl who lives 2 houses down) s 19 & during the school year had to be home by 10 & now that it's summer I asked if s be aloud to stay later now s can stay till 11??????? It really blows my mind when I was 13 I babysat till all hours of the morning & that was several blocks away. It is very irritating to know you have to home at a certain time for the sitter to go home. But none the less I am so glad to get to go out w my H even for only a couple of hours. Well have a good evening & a good weekend.
Hi Brian, just to introduce myself....seems we're in the same boat with this cell phone business. Just wondering what you're thoughts are now. Have you decided not to confront...if it helps, and I'm not sure at this very raw stage of my dilemma that anything I say would help someone...but H still leaves his phone in his car. I had to duck out for milk late on night after he had parked me in and decided to snoop. I looked at the phone, but it's a new one that has something of a standby code on it. He punches in the code, then if it's not used for a certain time it goes to sleep mode and requires the code before accessing anything. B*%%%$##! I guess the positive thing about this is that I now know that there is no point in snooping. i was obsessed with checking it previously, and it only got me into trouble. The more I snooped the more I found, the more we fought. I guess the only thing now is that I want him to show there is nothing to hide by bringing it back inside and removing the code. However, any conversations about the phone have in the past only caused chaos..so as I've been busting my butt to be happy and positive, I'm not willing to take 2 steps backwards by pushing the issue.
this may be the wrong thing to do, but I figure with time..he may make the move to stop hiding it of his own accord. I just can't bear to be going backwards at this point, when I know that we only have a few weeks before another stressor gets thrown into the pot.
I now know the truth of the A, and despite the fact that I still WANT to check the phone, by not doing so, I am not seeing any calls to her, therefore am not imagining anything. Also it is a work phone, so I don't have access to the bills!! I can only trust that he is sticking to his promise not to contact her. If he is contacting her...I will find out eventually and that will be the end of the trust....something I'm sure he knows I mean with all of my heart. Also as they are now more than 12 hours away from each other, I personally don't see that he would be getting much out of the calls..except frustration...hell bring that on...let him experience a tiny fragment of what I've had!!
Hope this helps, but we each have to do what we feel is right anyway..so I wish you luck with whatever you decide. We can only hope that all of her calls are to a phone counsellor!!!!
Things continue to go well for you, that's great. What's up with a 19yo having to be home by 10? You need to find a new babysitter, for sure! My W and I are fortunate to have family nearby and lots of teenage girls in the neighborhood, so finding babysitting for a night out is usually not a problem. Arranging this 2 day trip to Vegas, though, was a struggle.
I'm still going back and forth about the cellphone confrontation. About half the time I'm satisfied that it's the right thing to do, and the other half I think that I should wait until July.
I'm trying to notice the little things that my W does to try to improve things between us. Yesterday, she called twice from work. Not real long calls, but as long as she can reasonably have from work, and she was chatty and pleasant. She often doesn't call at all, or just makes a perfunctory call, so that was nice. Actually, she called a third time just as she was leaving, just to let me know that she would be on time. That was nice (even if she was probably talking on the cellphone to the OG all the way home, grrrr). I had heated the spa, and we went for a dip after she got home. It was a short night, though - she had to get up early today to work again.
Tomorrow we're going to get up early to go jet-skiing and have a picnic at a local lake with the boys. Usually we get together with my extended family - parents, brother, and 2 sisters, and their families for Fathers Day and to celebrate June birthdays. But I just wanted to spend the time alone with my W and kids. I think my dad was a little surprised when I told him we wouldn't be joining the party; we almost always go to family get-togethers.
I'd like to think that my W might surprise me with some special gift for Fathers Day. I wonder if she knows that the best gift of all would cost her nothing. Just 3 little words.
Hey, Monte, thanks for stopping by. Thanks for sharing your story. After I had intially found out about the "secret" cellphone, I had decided to try to stop snooping. Then after about a week, I tried, but couldn't find the dang thing. It's certainly true that I didn't obsess about it nearly as much when I didn't snoop. But then I got too clever for my own good, and found out how to access her cell account online. So now I can find out daily how much she's been using it. That's a double-edged sword, to be sure.
I'm still deciding what to do. Unless the calls stop, or I see at least a pattern of them slowing down, I'm definitely going to confront her. It's just a matter of timing. If I don't do it within a couple of days, I'll probably wait until I see the cell bill in early July (that could produce some 4th of July fireworks!). I don't know. I know that I won't simply wait it out, like lostlove, a few posts up. That woman must have the heart of an angel and the patience of Job. I really admire her ability to sustain hope. That takes incredible strength and faith. Me, I'm more like you. I want to see progress, and I want to see it NOW.
Actually, I think I've been very patient. The problem is, I don't function very well in this state. My work is certainly suffering, as are my relationships with other people. I need to have things improve at home, before I lose too much more of everything else. This confrontation may or may not be the best way to achieve that.
Quote: I need to have things improve at home, before I lose too much more of everything else. This confrontation may or may not be the best way to achieve that.
if you take some time to look around you will see that things are improving already...sure she's got a cell phone that you supposedly don't know about that she may or may not be using to call om...BUT...there are things that are going well in the r for you right?? things are improving right??
what if you tried to focus on the positive (hey that's the name of my current thread...after all I am not the angel you think...I want things all better like yesterday, but I've learned the hard way..it just doesn't work that way...wanting it NOW may make the wait longer) you will spend less time pondering those evil thoughts of "she's talking to him the whole way home" etc...
I understand your reluctance to accept the positive for positive always serching for the BUT...ie.."she called as she was leaving to let me know she'd be home on time...but I know she was talking to him the whole way home"
thinking that way or alowing yourself to wallow in the BUT instead of simply basking in the what IS...will not bring you peace...it will create tension...a tension that may serve to push w further toward om rather than closer to you.
I've had my share of blow-ups...believe me...and some of them well warrented..but they did not get me any closer to my h. heck if you want to know the truth...ow is still a customer of h's...just waiting for her to sell her house...my h has a cell phone..an office phone..a pager..a po box...all these things for his business...I don't have access to them and I suppose that's a good thing because like you...I would be looking..snooping..trying to find that BUT...and if the BUT isn't there or if I made an assumption about the BUT then I'd feel like a BUTT and pull away myself.
