I may have given you the wrong impression with what I said this morning. Allow me to clarify.
If you actually believe that you and I are where we are today because of some recent “outside influence”, then you are completely naive (I don’t mean that in a negative way) as to what’s been going on in our marriage over the past several years and how I feel about it and you. If you continue to dodge me and the talk I seriously need to have with you so you can understand why we are where we are, then what choice do I have?
Our marriage issues are between YOU AND ME alone, it’s OUR MARRIAGE! OW is completely innocent in all of this and does not deserve your harassment. She’s a good person. Her and OWH have their own issues to work out, as do we, and any effort by you towards her or him, or vice versa, is effort taken away from the core problems which reside solely in our respective marriages.
Lots of posts, sorry guys, so much happening so fast. How do I respond to email above? My first thought was emotional, of course, and now I think the following.
"Until such time as you are ready to say you are breaking it off with her in order to communicate with your wife and try to work on our marriage, I don't have anything that I need to hear from you."
Allen, the last A I broke up by being diligent, checking on him, and finally, getting ready to walk out the door. However, at that point I had GAL and 180'd my butt off, so he was ready to be with me again-I was the attractive alternative. Right now if I said I was walking, he'd say good riddance and thank goodness I don't have to fight any more. This one is different as he's convinced himself that for 10 years he has had no feelings for me. Um, even told MIL that he hadn't been intimate with me for 3 years. She told him she saw me sitting on his lap, cuddling, etc. He said no. She saw with her own eyes.
I may have given you the wrong impression with what I said this morning. Allow me to clarify.
If you actually believe that you and I are where we are today because of some recent “outside influence”, then you are completely naive (I don’t mean that in a negative way) as to what’s been going on in our marriage over the past several years and how I feel about it and you. If you continue to dodge me and the talk I seriously need to have with you so you can understand why we are where we are, then what choice do I have?
Our marriage issues are between YOU AND ME alone, it’s OUR MARRIAGE! OW is completely innocent in all of this and does not deserve your harassment. She’s a good person. Her and OWH have their own issues to work out, as do we, and any effort by you towards her or him, or vice versa, is effort taken away from the core problems which reside solely in our respective marriages.
A: "I'm sorry you feel that way.
Tonite's not good for me, but maybe we can get away for a cup of coffee tomorrow afternoon? I have an appt. at _____ , but I could probably meet with you around _______. Let me know if that works for you.
If you actually believe that you and I are where we are today because of some recent “outside influence”, then you are completely naive (I don’t mean that in a negative way) as to what’s been going on in our marriage over the past several years and how I feel about it and you. If you continue to dodge me and the talk I seriously need to have with you so you can understand why we are where we are, then what choice do I have?
Our marriage issues are between YOU AND ME alone, it’s OUR MARRIAGE! OW is completely innocent in all of this and does not deserve your harassment. She’s a good person. Her and OWH have their own issues to work out, as do we, and any effort by you towards her or him, or vice versa, is effort taken away from the core problems which reside solely in our respective marriages.
LMFAO!!!! Such "SCRIPT." Honestly, I could have written this myself, and saved him the bother.
"Outside influence." Is that what they're calling adultery nowadays? Gosh, I'm SO out-of-touch, my heavens!
You should always listen, but there's no need to jump thru his hoop and accept his first offer at a time. Right now, he's needing YOU to help HIM feel better about his poor choices, and that's simply not your responsibility.
So yeah, you can meet with him, maybe tomorrow or the next day. (Notice I said "appt." -- let him wonder what you're up to). But as soon as he starts lying to you, I'd put my hand up and say "Stop it. We both know you're lying to me right now, and it's incredibly disrespectful. If you do it again, I'm leaving."
If he tries to do the blame thing, say "I'm perfectly ready to face my 50% responsibility for any dysfunction in our marriage, but not while you're having an affair. End your affair, and we can address any and all issues, including mine."
Exactly. Here's the thing: if someone is in an ongoing, unrepentant affair, there are only a few types of conversations/communications they can have with their betrayed spouse, and ALL of them are cheeseless tunnels for the BS:
2) Seemingly POSITIVE ones. So long as they are still in contact with OM/OW and lying to their spouse about it, these are all "bullchit spin" at best, and outright GASLIGHTING and LIES at worse. And the problem is, the betrayed spouse inevitably sees this as "baby steps!" and true marital progress, when they are no such thing. They can lead to horrible strategic and tactical mistakes, esp. if the BS doesn't have a good intel system in place. Reading my old journal yesterday, I was BLOWN AWAY at how stable I was able to be in the face of my wife's deceit, simply because I HAD INTEL TO SHOW ME OTHERWISE. This can't be overemphasized.
3) LEGAL/FINANCIAL ones. These are best handled by your attorney, for the obvious reasons. If you start negotiating yourself, when you are way, way, WAY too emotionally entrenched in the situation (and also often running on too-little sleep and WAY too-little emotional needs of your own being met), YOU WILL MAKE FOOLISH MISTAKES and UNWISE CONCESSIONS.
4) FAMILY/LOGISTICAL ones. These are fine, but best handled via e-mail or text message. A cheating spouse will use these as a ploy to lure you into R convos and worse; SEE #1 ABOVE.
5) SMALL-TALK. This is fine, but only in RESPONSE -- don't initiate it if your strategy is to go "dim" and if it's to go "dark" you shouldn't even respond. If it's "dim," then only respond to one of every several communications, and usually delayed, because you're BUSY and GETTING A LIFE, remember?
What do I tell OWH to do? Expose and do it quick? Tell OW he wants to work on the M and then back off and GAL himself?
You can't tell OHW what to do. All you can do is tell him what is going on - he has to make his own decisions. If you try telling OWH what to do you really are trying to be a control freak; he has to walk his own path- even if it doesn't fit in with your plans - his W, his M; he is not your friend.
Quote:
"Until such time as you are ready to say you are breaking it off with her in order to communicate with your wife and try to work on our marriage, I don't have anything that I need to hear from you."
You have got no bargaining power here as far as I can see it. Your H seems to want to walk. Looks to me like you need to calm this down a notch or two and at least talk to him a bit - still get him to Retro so at least you can learn to communicate effectively.
We all know OW isn't innocent, but just remember NEITHER were you when you were OW and I bet your H used a similar script on you, friends, and family then. One needs to get to the bottom of why he acts like this - ie. he can't say what he really feels in his M's for some reason and so he runs to OW for self validation.
I think there is more to your H's As' than meets the eye and maybe getting to Retro will give you the tools to get him to open up. IMO, you need to start playing a more listening game now that you have busted it open - less controlling. Getting him in MC/ IC may help also. I think there is stuff he is not facing up to about himself as a person.
Ignoring your H will not sort this out.
BTW - Puppy's two posts above are good - read them and read them again.
Saffie me 46 H 46 M in 1986 D20,D18,S16,D13 H's A 01/05 to 07/06 H recommitted to M 07/06 renewed vows 09/06 Going from strength to strength
Man, so much going on today. This is from best man. Do I respond? I know now what H told him.
This is his email Hi .....yeah, easter was a bad time to talk....family stuff most of the day....
I read your e mail, although I didn't go to the sites yet...
The way I feel is this;I am sooooo fortunate/grateful to be able to count both you and H among by dearest friends...and it is clear that you two are going through a very rough time, and i do not want to /can't see any good coming from my getting in the middle of things and interfering....I don't want to lose either of you as friends...
This week is kinda crazy for me....work is nuts/GF's birthday and I am hosting a reunion party this weekend......
Ops...i'm late for work...talk later
My response I was thinking of sending (knowing he may share with H)
Don't feel uncomfortable. I wasn't going to corner you or ask you to get involved or anything of the sort, I was just going to explain that we've been here before, I'm sorry he got you guys involved, I wish he would have just tried to work it out with us, but now all these people are involved. And that's that. If you accept her into your group, there's nothing I can do about that other than say it will help push them together more. I would like to count you among one of the friends of our marriage, which means nothing more than asking you to look inside of yourself and ask what you think is right and moral to do, and then if you believe it's right to support marriage and attempts to correct it, that you just stand aside and tell H not to bring her around and not to involve you until things are settled between us.
This one is different as he's convinced himself that for 10 years he has had no feelings for me. Um, even told MIL that he hadn't been intimate with me for 3 years. She told him she saw me sitting on his lap, cuddling, etc. He said no. She saw with her own eyes.