Hi Cutterbug - Read many of your posts over the months I've been dealing with this. I aprecaite your comment on my post.
I moved out primarily because the situation was getting very difficult to deal with for both of us. My wife is having an EA with somemone 2,000 miles away. Somone she once had a crush on in high school and found each other agin through FB. I know that I did pretty much everything wrong for DB from the first moment and it was a downhill battle from there. Anyway I was spying on her, letting my anger get the better of me, feeling constantly on edge all the time, etc. I told her on several occassions that I thought that she should be the one to move out - but utimately it was agreed that it was better for the kids if I did. Kids need mom more than dad was the prevailing wisdom. Why is this? I do not understand why you would walk away when it is you who wants to be in the marriage. How do you children feel about this? I'm not sure if I can go through all of them but will try to give short examples of things:
Bad - lost my temper several times, once even tried to shred all the pictures in our wedding album, threatened to tell the kids why we were divorcing, confronted OM thriough an e-mail, contacted OM's GF exposing the EA, talked about M(R) alot, tried negotiating, convincing why we should work on M, persuing etc. Forgive yourself for wedding album. That was over the top. But your human. I would have told the children the truth. That you do not want a divorce but Mommy ... They need to know. You need to teach them some lessons here. They will find eventually. Dr. Hartly speaks of this. I will get the link for you. But remember your actions will be forever lasting with your children. As for exposure. Never appologize. Speak the truth always. Do not shield her from her unappropriate actions. The rest is just duck soup. Grief does some crazy things. Be thankful you had the courage to fight yourself through this. You realized your mistakes. You adjusted. Good - 180's , GAL, Exercising (lost 40 lbs.) started detaching, focused on realtionship with the kids, etc.
Now I should point out that some of the reasons my W used as why she felt that the way she did and was 'vulnerable' to an EA were:
1)I was not as supportive emotionally as I should be - she's an artist and even though I love that about her and have always been proud of her work I've never really raved and lavished praise constantly on her for it. I have been supportive but one day before all this happened I came home after a bad day, the kids were running wild the house was a mess and and she had been painting. I made the comment - "Is this all you have been doing all day - doodling? :-. You are going to have to forgive yourself for this. And learn from this. This a great window to teach yourself how to communicate after a hard day. Not for now but down the road. Also a great place to toss in an act of service. 2) Was showing decreased affection ( ie. seemed I didn't care anymore) I admitt I had been withdrawm some. 3) Became very pesimistic,moody and angrier- -I have been dealing with bouts of clinical depression for nearly 3 years now - some of this I attribute to that. These two are linked. I am thinking that all this kicked your butt into gear to deal with the depression. I am guessing that you have not been very happy for years. Its ok for us LBS to not be happy about the marriage as well. You turned into yourself. What are you doing here to help yourself? How are you turning this around? I bet the EA made you get to work. And made you think. I am done with being sorry about myself. 4) She devouted all her time an energy to the kids when they were younger, was a great wife and mother but felt that she wasn't getting what she wanted out of life and felt that it was time for her to start doing things for herself and I was standing in the way of that. ( sounded like MLC to me -still does)and I didn't agree with that but did acknowledge why she would feel that way. Script. She can do stuff without stepping out of the marriage. Do not agree with this fog BS. Oh - and no we didn't get married to be friends but friendship was always a cornerstone of our relationship. So on some level I would prefer to have at least that than nothing at all. You can be civil without a friendship. Friendships are built with respect and trust. You have neither of them with your wife. Sorry for the long post I hope this sheds some light and I appreciate the coments.
