What can I do to save my marriage? Help

[Sleepy]

I am a 47 yo male physician with 3 children, twin girls 13 and a 9 yo son. Married 15 years. I never thought this could happen to me. I have provided well for my family which I “thought” was my major role. I have been faithful to my wife and love her dearly and never, myself, would even consider an affair.

My wife is a stay at home Mom, 40 yo. Two months ago, I found out that she was having an affair. Things just didn’t seem right and I checked her cell phone records (multiple long calls, and texts) then confronted her. She admitted that it was her former high school boyfriend (first love). She just said that she had lunch with him a few times. He made her feel young again and she felt safe with him. After I discovered this, she turned 180 degrees. She became evil. She says that she has never loved me and this marriage was a mistake. She is mean and hateful towards me no matter how nice and kind I am to her. I began to suspect that much more was happening.

She said she broke off the relationship and no longer sees nor talks to him. I am having a hard time trusting her.

I admit that I haven’t been the ideal husband, I am self absorbed. I work long hours. I am a high achiever and I go all out in my hobbies. I am an Ironman triathlete ( so is she). Our kids our involved in multiple activities and there has been no time for “us” for a long time. Things started to go downhill after the kids were born. Her affection for me started to dwindle. I later ended up putting career and my hobbies before my family and instead of stepping up and seeing what I could do, I pulled away. I take full responsibility for this happening. She said I was “having an affair with myself” Some of the advice on this board says.. get a life. I had one. Now I am focusing on what is important. We have never sought out counseling, and I thought things were as good as they get at this stage in a marriage. This event came as a huge shock to me.


Immediately after I found out, I quit my triathlon hobby, didn’t go to the World Championships as scheduled, and am in the process of selling all my equipment. I have turned to religion as my savior which helps me cope with all of this. I have been reading all I can on relationships and I am focusing all my free time on my kids and trying to save my marriage. I have used the “Love Dare” as a guide, but I don’t think a cookbook is the answer. Through this experience, I have become more thoughtful and giving and less selfish. I have been reading C.S. Lewis books which have helped me immensely. She thinks I’m a nut, a psychopath. In the past, I have been able to work hard and achieve any goal that I set my mind to. I realize that this one is quite a bit different because it involves another persons will. No matter how hard I try...Nothing works.

Word has got out in our small community about this and it is making me look like a saint and she looks bad. This has pissed her off even more. I confided in a few friends and it was my fault that the word got out. The rumor mill has probably painted the worst picture. She just wants to crawl into a hole. She seems to think that this was my plan all along... To ruin her. “I am grandstanding to show what a great guy I am”, but nothing could be further from the truth. I just want to focus on what is really important in my life. I can’t even touch her now. She pulls away.

Now that I have a better relationship with my children, she thinks that I am manipulating them against her. I talk to her friends and try to find out what I can do, but she thinks I am trying to turn them against her too. She believes that my greater interest in religion similar to that of a prisoner on death row asking for last minute repentance. Everything I do is wrong. I am so frustrated.

She is very high strung and most of the time yells at me when I am trying to do things domestically around the house to help out. She tries to criticize my efforts. I suppose she wants me to stop. All I am trying to do is make her life easier. I keep doing them. I suppose I am frustrating her more.

I work long hours and when I get home I spend time with the kids and help out doing household chores. She sarcastically calls me “Mr. Fun Guy”. I don’t understand it. She said I didn’t participate that much in the kids lives, now that I do, she resents it. I have become a better parent too. I don’t have time for exercise and frankly I don’t even feel like doing anything anyway. I get the feeling that she doesn’t have any respect for me.

When I seem to give in to the fact that I will go through with a divorce she is nice and calm, but when I tell her that I will fight to the last breath, she gets very angry. She says that “I don’t respect her decision”. Last weekend she hit me multiple times in the head and almost destroyed the James Dobson book I was reading (she gave me) that spoke of the effects of divorce on kids. I just stood there and took it. I have never ever hit her and I never raise my voice. She hit me so hard that she thought that she fractured something in her hand. I took her into the hospital and had one of my hand surgeon buddies look at it and xray it immediately. It was OK.

I am seeing a counselor, but she refuses to. I got her to go, reluctantly, to a few sessions, but she refuses to listen to any criticism he gives her. “It’s all my fault”. She says she doesn’t have time to go to counseling and would rather” jump off a cliff”. My counselor tells me that he hasn’t seen anyone as “hell bent on destroying a marriage”. She is unrelenting.

Currently, I am sleeping in another portion of the house and she has the master bedroom. We still see each other in the main portion of the house, but after the kids go to bed she slips away and hides in the bedroom. She hides there a lot. She says she can’t stand to be in the same room with me. I told her that if she wants to leave that bad that she can walk at anytime but she won’t. How can things just change like this in a number of weeks?

She recently got a part time job. She says “so I won’t worry about what she is doing” I brought her lunch the other day and she thought I did it because I wanted to “check up on her”. I reality, I was doing it because I love her.

Presently, we are stuck in our home financially ( most of our money is tied up in the house) and the market isn’t moving. She can’t leave because she doesn’t want to uproot or leave the kids. She feels trapped and frustrated in her situation. She is cleaning the house up and getting it ready to sell and she wants to put it on the market in the spring. This is not my choice, but time is on my side. I suspect I will be getting served with papers after Christmas.

I want to work on my marriage but I can’t do it alone. I am asking for help and suggestions from all of you out there to help me in my seemingly hopeless situation. I don’t think she is still having an affair and her current anger is mainly generated towards my past behavior and what she has conjured up in her mind.

I love my wife and I am willing to do anything to save my marriage and my family. What can I do to help her come around and at least work with me on this? I feel that if I can get her into counseling willingly that we can resolve our problems and our situation. However, she says that doing any exercises in a book just takes the life from her like being she is being suffocated. Is this really hopeless? Where do I start? Everything I do is wrong. How do I handle this?