rysmom's story

[Jack_Three_Beans]

...

If you keep looking at his computer your doing this to yourself...oh yeah AND blaming him.

He might be the worlds biggest idiot for not cleaning out his history, but your a close second for keep putting the fork into the wall socket.

You do this to yourself.

IF he is in MLC then your doing your own damage to yourself.

You KNOW what to do RIGHT...you just choose not to. You KNOW what to do WRONG and for some reason you keep doing that...

Heal yourself.

You burden him with your guilt to make him feel badly and he will keep running and lying to you.

[seeking answers]

I have a question rysmom. Why do you think the pregnancy test kit info is on your H's computer in the first place? Why would anyone need to look that information up when pregnancy test kits can be bought anywhere. Might it be that your H knows you're looking into his computer and he's putting it up there on purpose knowing it will drive you insane??? If this is a possibility why would you even go there?

[rysmom]

No I dont think it's on purpose. I access it from my computer and he is at his mothers house with his computer. The way I can see it is that i can get in his business email on google and then at the top of the page it says web history of the web sites he has visited but it doesn't say what date so im hoping it is from awhile ago. Or on the right side next to the emails there are ads that come up from cookies to similar things that were looked up.I am trying to put this out of my mind. I can't look at that anymore.

This morning i sent him an email telling him all the qualities that i loved about him, and apologized for not being a good wife in some ways. I also said" if you don't want to be with me and our son , we will go on with our life and make the best of it with Gods help".

When I talked to him tonight his attitude was nicer. I don't think I complemented him enough when we were together. I think he only heard my criticisms and I did not give enough praise. so he went to someone else for it.
He said " listen to me. i am not getting married, or having kids, or moving. All i am doing is working all of the time". He sounded very sincere.

[rysmom]

i have found in the past that detaching for to long seems to push him away.i know last time we were separated I think he felt rejected when if I detached for to long. He just went on with his life until I started inviting him over. He wouldn't make the first move he has to much pride.

[TrentC]

From the email newsletter Standing For Your Sweetheart

Will the MLCer Marry the Alienator?

Relationships that begin with infidelity rarely last. The statistics vary and I have found only book sources rather than formal surveys of statistical collections of data. A cursory Internet search brings up several sources misrepresented across multiple websites. How many cheaters marry the alienator and how many of those marriages eventually fail? That's what you really want to know.

Dr. Jan Halper surveyed 4126 men who were successful career professionals. 82% (~3383) of the men she surveyed cheated on their spouses.[1] (emphasis mine) 3% (~124) of those surveyed eventually married the affair partner.[2] This was a specific survey that focused on high-level career professionals--numbers may differ for men in different industries and at different professional levels. The 3% is out of the entire 4126; 18% (~743) of those men claimed uninterrupted fidelity, thus the 3% is not 3% of those who cheated; that figure is (~124)/(~3383) or 3.7%. Those who reference Halper's study sometimes fail to point out that it focused on a certain population of men--high level career professionals--and I did not find a single instance where it was noted that the 3% was from the total survey number of 4126 which included men who claimed uninterrupted fidelity. Halper's study is helpful in that the survey size was large, but she did not offer data about the length of the marriages that resulted from infidelity. Did most eventually end in divorce? We may assume that to be the case, but assumptions have no place in statistics.

Annette Lawson is misrepresented as stating that less than 10% of men leave their wives for the affair partner in her book Adultery: An Analysis of Love & Betrayal. Here is what Lawson said regarding those who participated in her survey:

While over 70 percent of the faithful remained married to their original spouse, this was true of just over half of the adulterous, and the more liaisons a person had, the more likely it was that they would not remain married to the first spouse. If they did divorce, only about 10 percent…married their lovers…Given the number of liaisons in total, these forty-seven serious affairs represent barely 2 percent of all liaisons.[3]

Lawson did not state the 10% statistic was relating to how many cheating men leave their wives for the affair partner; rather (emphasis mine) she stated that 10% who do leave their wives marry their affair partner. In This Affair is Over!! Nanette Miner and Sandi Terri report that "Most affairs do not end blissfully, with the man and girlfriend together. Of our survey respondents, less than one percent of the men left their wives for their girlfriends--although nearly 53% said that they would. In some instances, the man did leave his wife, and yet still did not commit to his girlfriend."[4]

Now most of you are already in the situation where your spouse has left and for many of you, your MLCer seemingly left for the alienator and they are now living together even while you remain legally married. From your place it doesn't matter what percent leave their spouse, you are already in that number, so how many who marry the affair partner eventually divorce? Sorry, but I have thus far found only one reference repeated multiple time across the Internet.

References to Frank Pittman state that 75% of marriages that begin with infidelity eventually fail. This is referenced as though it comes from a formal survey. Here is what Dr. Pittman actually says:

There is something inherently doomed in those marriages that began as marriage-wrecking affairs. It is possible for them to work, but it is unlikely they will do so. In my practice, while over half the people who get into romantic affairs end up divorced, only a fourth marry the affairee. Even then, three-fourths of those romantic marriages end up in divorce. (emphasis mine) There is a greater likelihood that the divorcing partner will be back with the original spouse in five years than that the romantic affair will be a stable marriage at that time.[5]

He does not state that his numbers are from a formal survey, but rather they are from his patient samples and those referencing Pittman ignore that he states that a fourth (25%) married the affair partner--much higher than the other surveys just mentioned. Pittman does not give the sample size--the number of patients in his practice. This was not a flaw on his part, he was not making claims that this statistic would hold true under rigorous testing, rather it is the fault of others who have taken this reference and implied that it came from a formal survey.

Most affairs do not result in marriage and of those that do most will end in divorce. That is true for your MLCer as much as it is for someone who is not in a midlife crisis. (emphasis mine) It is true even though your spouse hates you and is head-over-heels in-love with the alienator. Just because your spouse seems to mean it that she hates you and is in-love with someone else and will marry him it does not make it true; most say those things and yours is not the special exception that is more stubborn or more in-love.

Sources

1. Halper, Jan. Quiet Desperation the Truth About Successful Men. New York: Warner Books, 1988. page 205.
2. Ibid., page 22.
3. Lawson, Annette. Adultery: An Analysis of Love & Betrayal. New York: Basic Books, Inc., Publishers, 1988. page 287.
4. Miner, Nannette and Sandi Terri. This Affair is Over!! Bristol CT: BVC Publishing, 1996. page 21.
5. Pittman, Frank. Private Lies. page 246-247.

This is why we keep telling you to take care of yourself. Regardless of whether or not your husband ultimately returns, every day that you spend worrying about stuff that you cannot control is a day that you do not heal. Infected wounds eventually cause more problems than the original injury, and the same goes for emotional wounds.

You don't have to sit around worrying what is going to happen with him. What you are going through is not unique, and there is so much reading material out that that you can use to strengthen yourself.

You say that you are worried that he will care less about you if you detach. Consider this -- you think he doesn't know or care about the pain his actions are causing you, but what if the pain he is causing you is pushing him away? He thinks that the best thing he can do for you is leave; what if you can relieve him of that burden by detaching?

[rysmom]

Thanks for posting the article it game me more peace of mind.
Today i went running at the park it was a beautiful day. Then I went to the race track with my mother and son. We bet on the Kentucky Derby. We stayed for about 3 hrs. it was fun. I bet $30 and I won $20 so I only lost $10 which wasn't so bad. At least my horse came in second.
Then we came home and went to the dog park with my greyhound and whippet. I love watching them run. I had a very fun day. oh, and when we were at the track my son saw my h there, but we didnt say hi. Son didn't want to, which was a little sad. It was so crowded I can't believe we saw him. H didn't see us. H knew we were going there today.
Hope you had a nice day. You are blessed to live in such a beautiful state.

[TrentC]

It's been pretty good so far.

I hope the rest of your weekend is good as well.

[1000ships]

Rysmom,

i have found in the past that detaching for too long seems to push him away. i know last time we were separated I think he felt rejected when if I detached for too long. He just went on with his life until I started inviting him over. He wouldn't make the first move he has too much pride.

We have been over this before. I will discuss the comment above in a moment, but here is what you said a few weeks ago…along with my response.

I dont know if detaching works well for him because last time it seemed to cause more distance between us. I think he felt rejected and lonely and ran to her.

Your comment is evidence that you would detach as a manipulative technique to get him to come home and that you have no idea what detachment really means. Manipulative detachment is not valid detachment and you would lose likely remove the mask once you get your way.
Of course it brought distance between you… healthy distance.

Did you look at the Pursuit & Distance links I sent?

I’m sure someone has given you this Detachment link or you’ve seen it on other threads.
http://www.livestrong.com/article/14712-developing-detachment/
Go read it, then come back here and tell us what it means to you and how you are going to work toward applying it in your life. Talk to us about it. Ask questions. Tell us what you don’t understand, believe or where you disagree with it. Maybe someone can explain it when we know your confusions and concerns.

Those questions were not rhetorical. Sometimes the concepts are difficult to grasp in the beginning—and regardless of how long this has been going on you are in the beginning mental state. If you talk about what you have read, we can help you to understand. If you never comment on it and continue to seem to misunderstand, many of us will assume you have not read the information and may then take that further and assume you are not paying any attention to the advice given here…that will cause some to stop posting to you. Use this board and the people on it.

For me it would be helpful if you could define detachment in your own words. We can then help you fine-tune and revise that definition—as needed. Could you do that in a response on your thread?

About a week ago you made the following comment.

I felt very content with detaching, and focusing on my own life today and most importantly doing it for me.

That was much better! And you will cycle, that is understandable. But last week you felt good with detaching and now you are allowing your fears to pick at you. Last week you felt content. So look at the flip, since you feel detaching doesn’t work with your husband, do you think it is appropriate that you feel discontent? Do you think discontent will make you a better DBer? Do you feel that focusing on your own life is detrimental to DBing…and if so, why? Do you have a history of taking care of others at your own expense—not doing things for you? Is that healthy for you?

Okay, let’s return to your recent comment about detaching. You believe that it pushes your MLCer away.
If he is in MLC, he is in escape mode and going away—he doesn’t need a push from you—though he’s getting pushed by you from your beg-n-plead behaviours. MLCers run and a true return takes years. Your MLCer has not had a true return yet. It sounds as though you are confusing detachment with being busy—which may include Getting A Life—or even with ignoring. I live with my husband. We have a good relationship with the normal challenges of marriage. I am detached. He has problems with chronic anxiety, I don’t—I need to keep my head when he is having an attack. We are connected and functional. Think of the definition of panic.

Panic: Sudden unreasoning fear where a person is unable to help themselves.

Attached, you are in panic mode and unable to help yourself. If you are unable to help yourself, you are also unable to help anyone else. I hope you aren’t on an airplane with dangling oxygen masks.

MLC gets worse before it gets better. Then it gets even worse and then even worse than worse. Your MLCer is reacting normally for MLC, he is getting worse, but at expected behaviour, you panic and come to the conclusion that what you are doing is not working and change your behaviour. To a degree that fits with MWD’s Do What Works aspect of Solution Oriented Brief Therapy. But sometimes it takes a long time before something works, or before you see the signs that something works and more importantly, it is meant to work on you. Working on your MLCer is a secondary trickle down effect that takes years. Change yourself and others may eventually respond and choose to change also—or they may not, the choice is theirs. If you are DBing with the solitairy goal of getting it to work on your MLCer and fix him; you will fail.

You are talking about him making the first move…now? In the midst of crisis? It doesn’t matter who makes an initial move toward each other right now; it will fail. The only move either of you should be making is towards the mirror where you can face your own Selves. Someday maybe it will be appropriate to make the initial move, or he may surprise you. But it is not yet someday.

It is important that right now he goes on with his own life and that you do the same. I know that is scary, but that may be one of your lessons of this journey.

My comments about failing are not meant as scare tactics. I’m not trying to shout or be in your face with emphasis. I simply mean them. For most people it eventually kicks in—and that can take many months or even a few years. But I’m more worried about those for whom it takes a few years because some do get permanently lost and destroyed. I am worried about you, wondering when it will kick in and wondering if there is anything we can do that will make a difference. I hope so.

HUGS

[rysmom]

I posted under need help and I don't know how to move it here.things are not good now . I think another ow pregnant. I know he wanted another child.

[rysmom]

I call him because I have no one else to call.I became co dependent on him and it was a mistake I don't know how I would make it on my own in this economy.