I know a lot of people on here now recommend exposing an A. And it makes sense, as they survive best in secrecy - where the thrill is there.
However, show of hands please, how many people exposed and then successfully busted their divorce? How many exposed and it worked in the wrong direction with the affair partners figuring that nothing was stopping them now, may as well go on and leave their respective partners for each other?
No, I understand what you're saying. I'm just curious how many broke off the A and recommitted to the M. I'm not looking for long term stats or where they are today, just a yes, it worked for me to expose, or no, it made it worse.
I'm on the fence about exposing. It seems to be the recommendation right now, but I'm wondering if a non-scientific poll would support it.
And more to the point, its hard to isolate Exposure as being the driver of busting an affair up or not.
Exposure is tricky and this is not a precise process here.
The idea of saying I did x, and that saved my marriage is a bit presumptuous. I can say with confidence that exposure in my case did have a strong influence on my partner, I had countless arguments about who who knows what and how upset she was over it.
Did it cause the affair to end?
How can you isolate a first cause here?
You can ask "how many people have had the affair in their home END and exposure was done in that case?"
Isolating which affairs included exposure as a tactic you can look for some correlation, but heck...
It is further hard to say if exposure CAUSES an affair to aggravate and get worse... how would any of us know with any level of confidence that - ok, I exposed and BECAUSE of that the affair is now worse... how on earth can we say that?
There are SO MANY VARIABLES at play during an affair isolating causes makes little sense.
I can tell you this : There was exposure of the affair in my home, and the affair IS OVER, its been over five months now with zero contact.
How much impact exposure had? Who knows, but I am glad I did it.
And more to the point passenger, exposure offers additional benefits to the LBS -- It isn't just about adding pressure on the spouse to end their affair.
1. Confidence - it feels good to take the fight to the cheating couple
2. Dignity - You get back some respect for yourself by speaking up
3. Support - once your friends know what's going on they might HELP YOU
4. Education - you really learn who your friends are -- and aren't... when you confide in them and they turn away or they help you.. its a test of friendship
5. Family - this kinda stuff brings families closer. It gives them a chance to jump in and help you out when you really need it
I don't recall reading a post here when exposure actually made an affair worse. I have read posts where there was fallout... tantrums, threats, fury, even rage... but never heard of a case yet where the cheating spouse upped the ante as a result of their LBS revealing what they were doing in secret.
Many offences are kept in secret, and they THRIVE there - bullying, child abuse, molestation, etc
When people are hurting someone in SECRET and it isn't revealed, that doesn't HELP the situation, it enables it to continue. These offences NEED the secrecy to thrive. There's a reason why people don't do these things in the open -- They know they wouldn't get away with it without the consequences coming down on them.
And very often when an affair is happening the WS has already run a smear campaign on the LBS in secret themselves... THEY already exposed YOU, the LBS for being a horrible person... This is to help justify their cheating in case they get caught.
"I don't recall reading a post here when exposure actually made an affair worse. I have read posts where there was fallout... tantrums, threats, fury, even rage... but never heard of a case yet where the cheating spouse upped the ante as a result of their LBS revealing what they were doing in secret."
There were several although once things got bad, the posters stopped posting. I think BigJohn was one. There was another post here where the the person exposed to everyone who would listen and they ended up getting engaged.
Just saying that you really can't make blanket statements like that. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Other Forums that specialize in MLC and infidelity actually seem to show that after exposure it made things worse.
"5. Family - this kinda stuff brings families closer. It gives them a chance to jump in and help you out when you really need it"
This is also a bit misleading. The family usually gets torn because they feel they have to choose between one person or the other. And the majority of the time they will side with the one whom they have a blood relation to. That's been shown all over this board. Same as the friends. They feel "obligated" to choose one over the other. I've had alot of personal experience with that. It's tough. Most of them will walk the fence or cut ties to both because they don't want to be included in the drama or be seen as a "traitor".
I'm all for the confidence and dignity though. Although if you want that, you might as well just bypass exposure and go straight for D.
Just my 2 cents.
M-43 W-40 2D - 9 and 5
Emotion, yet peace. Ignorance, yet knowledge. Passion, yet serenity. Chaos, yet harmony. Death, yet a new life.
Actually there's a great forum on the survivinginfidelity website where you can ask alot of WAS's what made them decide to turn around. It was a real eye opener to me.
I mentioned some of the topics we discuss and the majority were pretty appalled that some are advocating going out and shaming the WAS. They said they'd never go back if that had happened.
M-43 W-40 2D - 9 and 5
Emotion, yet peace. Ignorance, yet knowledge. Passion, yet serenity. Chaos, yet harmony. Death, yet a new life.
I am glad I asked it this way because I've already gotten a lot of good insight. I'll continue to read and look for answers inside of myself. My feeling is that with my DH where he NEEDS support and love of others - very insecure - it would help in our situation. I like the idea of feeling like I did the right, moral thing and feeling like I'm not a doormat, so that helps also. Very good insight, thanks all.
I mentioned some of the topics we discuss and the majority were pretty appalled that some are advocating going out and shaming the WAS. They said they'd never go back if that had happened.
I've read that before too, Bond, and I don't buy it. It goes to the heart of "I don't want to think of myself as being so easily controlled" kind of a thing -- sort of like telling a pollster that you'd vote for David Duke, or a behavioral psychologist that you respond to jealousy or something.
One can say "Oh, that would never work with ME!" all they want, but in my experience, human nature is what it is, and the things that work, do, as ugly as the truths are that they reveal.
