I have turned out the lights and gone to bed many nights, just havent locked the doors.
I don't know of any place these days that people are safe in their homes at night going to bed and not locking the doors. Doesn't she have a key? By you leaving the door "unlocked" you might as well be standing there with your arms held wide open for her. It makes a statement about you.....and not a good one.
I agree that a man should let his W know how disrespectful she is behaving when she has children at home and she's acting like a wild irresponsible teenager. If I were in your shoes, I would let her know with no mixed words--and then the next time she come home late....she would not find her H & kids there. I would find someplace to spend the night and the next day. I would not give her any idea that what was going to happen, not leave a note for her to find, nor would I call later....b/c she apparently shows no concern about her family while she's out. The shock of coming home to find her family gone, might do her good. At least you would be underlining the statement you made.
Sandi
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!
Not to throw off anything younare saying, doors are all locked except for the garage to the house. I do like the idea of her coming home to an unsuspected empty house. I cannot refer to it as a home with her right now. It's my and my kids home, to her it's a house.
Hey Shocked. Hung over? Water, Gatorade and giner ale.....my favorite remedies besides sleep. What is the confirmation and what has happened between her and whoever?
No hangover. Didn't have too much, just enough to make tired. She confirmed that thhere has been some physical contact, I didn't ask what it was. She tried to make it clear to me that it wasn't sex, whatever. I will never take her word on that. I know that will be a fight between us at some point when I won't accept that, whether we are working things out or not she will be pissed that I don't accept it.
Her word means diddly-squat right now -- she's lied to you, repeatedly, and she's going to keep ON lying to you. I say that not to judge -- we each have our own flaws -- but just as a simple FACT that you need to keep at your forefront as you deal with her.
They also usually will admit to one level LESS than what the truth is:
- "inappropriate friendship or feelings" = "full-blown Emotional Affair" (EA)
- "we've never been physical" = "full-blown Physical Affair" (PA), or sometimes it had BECOME physical, but they've temporarily cooled it, either voluntarily or due to outside pressure
As guys, we need to come to grips with "it's just sex." It's amazing, but only men will say "well, it's JUST an EA; so long as it's not a PA" and then we fall to pieces when we find out it got physical.
I did.
Ask any woman. Ask the women on this board. "Just an EA"??? A deep emotional attachment is MUCH more devastating to a woman than a one- or a two-night stand that really IS "just sex."
I'm not trying to hurt you with this, but rather want you to try to prepare your heart if you find out more about the physical stuff.
Hey Shocked. Ok. There you have it. Now, you have to decide if you can recover from that. I think you can. Millions of couples do and have stronger marriages in the end when they do recover. Are you ok with that? My H did have a full blow EA and there was some physical contact with her, kisses or an "eigth grade hook up" as I call it. Does it make me sick? You betcha. Is it something I can come to terms with? Yes, I can. But not everyone is able to do that and I understand.
I was told by a good friend "You have to proceed as if he did cheat on you, that he did have sex with someone else. If you can forgive that, then you can move forward. If not, then stop now."
I am able to move forward because my H did these things when we were officially separated. Granted, it makes me sick because we are still married, but like I told my H last night "I believe all of this happened for a reason and that reason was to get my attention because a year ago, I wasn't hearing you when you tried to tell me you were unhappy."
And it's true, I didn't hear him, not even once when he tried to reach out to me. That's my crappy part in all of this, how we got here.
What is your next step? And what is your outline, your plan in genenral here?
