Unilateral Disarmement - 3

[Wendylon]

[/quote]
Was there infidelity involved in your past instance(s)? What sort of boundaries (counseling, transparency, etc.) did you guys put in place after you last reconciled? Starsky [/quote]

Thank you, Mr Bond, for your previous question and thank you, Starsky, for this one.

My H claims that he is not having an A and that if he leaves me it will be because of me not because of someone else. I have told him that I don't feel I can go through another A and his response was that I don't need to.

A month ago, he took a woman out to the theatre. I was upset as he took her to see an adaptation of "A Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night' which is about an autistic boy. The woman in question is a 30 yr old photographer who has worked with him on an exhibition of photos of a Slovakian residence for autistic people where the carers are Romas. H thinks it's an interesting set-up that could possibly be replicated.

Sorry about the level of detail but the point is that our youngest son (now 13) is severely autistic and we both retrained and became behavior analysts. Yet he took this woman to the play who has very little to do with autism apart from taking photos at one institution with him. To add insult to injury, I had seen the tickets arrive in the post for that play a few months ago and had asked him about them. When he said that he'd ordered 2 tickets, I said that I'd be keen to go and and he'd said sure. A month ago, he denied ever having agreed to that as he claimed he'd ordered them in the first place to thank OW (not sure she is exactly that) and therefore would never have agreed to my coming along. He then said that if he did lie about it, which he couldn't remember doing, it was only because he knew that I'd react the way I was reacting, ie, paranoid and neurotically. He then said that he didn't think we could ever get over his A and that I'd never trust him again. The fact is that I don't trust him. He hasn't earned it.

He definitely has a crush on her and has admitted that he isn't indifferent to her looks. He mentioned that they were looking for more institutions to photograph and that Slovakian place wants them to go again. Looking back, I can see that he was really looking for a fight when he came back from his trip with her to Slovakia which was in March. In fact, he feels as if he's been spoiling for fights all year.

The night of the opening of the exhibition he got me to take our son home and stayed out past 3 am celebrating with her and others after. She is attractive and she mentioned in her talk what a privilege it was for her to be able to spend time with H as he was such an expert on autism. He never introduced me to her. I'm not even sure he really wanted me there but because he wanted our there it was difficult for him to keep me away. He made it clear though that he didn't mind whether or not I went and only told me about it a couple of days before the show.

He's been coming home late and going out for extended periods of time. Last weekend he was out a total of 3x6 hours, supposedly looking for something to wear to wedding we're going to tomorrow. He hasn't found anything to wear. During the A, he kept shopping for shoes (supposedly) and coming back empty-handed. It all feels very familiar. He's been getting home much later in the evenings and looks as if he's been drinking.

Tonight he got home at 8.30 (we usually have supper as a family around 7) and acted overly loud and jovial and then went to bed at 9.15. He undressed without being discrete even though D15 was around. He seemed weirdly uninhibited.

There is definitely something up. I'm just not sure how much of it is alcohol related and how much of it is photographer related. Two nights ago, he got back late (supposedly after a school's governor meeting but they don't usually run past 9 and it was 11.15pm). I heard him go down to his study. At 2 am, I woke up and noticed that he had still not come up to bed. I went downstairs and he was asleep in the dark on the floor of his tiny study. When I asked if he was coming up, he responded with "Oh, I must have fallen asleep during my meditation". As far as I know, he doesn't meditate so I really don't know what that was about. I could smell alcohol.

He doesn't have a history of alcoholism but we do have a history of him feeling controlled by me as both my parents are/were alcoholics and I'm very sensitive to it. He does have a history of sneaking/lying. This past year, he's been lying about smoking. I could tell he was smoking but he denied it. He sometimes does sneaky eating whereby he hides the wrappers in his study but complains at the same time about not losing weight even though he's not eating. Last week, he lied to me about having had a bath when I could tell he hadn't. I didn't even want him to realise that I knew he was lying because the whole thing seemed so ridiculous. I could tell that he'd gone back to bed for a nap and he must have thought that I'd disapprove.

Despite all mistrust on my part, I'm not keen for us to separate right now. We have S17, D15 and S13 (special needs). I really don't want to be dealing with a D now. My first goal is to detach and to see if I can find some peace in my life at the moment. If, down the road, when S17 and D15 are off to university and through with exams and if things are still as difficult, maybe I'd want to separate. I sometimes wonder if that is his plan.

I need to GAL and detach. I've started implementing some 180s. I'm no longer asking him about his whereabouts. No R talk. I'm not initiating contact throughout the day. My only worry is that I'm allowing him to cake-eat. I somehow doubt that he's having a PA. I just don't think he'd have the stamina for it but I may be kidding myself. He is 52 and on statins which have affected his performance/libido in a major way.

I look forward to any feedback. I do remember that this board was a godsend and, unfortunately, I haven't kept up a lot of the good habits I got into when I first joined. In the past year, I've been asking him for reassurance and having quite a few R talks--which led nowhere good. He did say on Aug 14 (my birthday and the day after taking OW to the theatre) that although it might not look like it, he did love me very much and that there was absolutely nothing going on with OW.