OW/OM INFO NEEDED!!!!!!

[Accuray]

There are really two schools of thought about what to do in an OM/OW situation. The consensus seems to be that you can't really do anything to improve your relationship while OP is present, because they are absorbing all your WAS' emotional energy and are generally pitted against you were you are bad and the OP is good.

Here are the two approaches:

1) The "Other" Approach (non-DB): This approach says that you widely publicize the affair. You tell your family, your spouse's family, members of the church if you belong to one, etc. etc. The theory is that taking away the secrecy takes away a lot of the excitement and attraction, and that the public scorn generally makes it harder for them to go out and enjoy themselves / social pressure may help things end sooner.

2) The DB Approach: The DB approach is really to NOT tell anyone about it because doing so will (a) make your spouse resent you more than they already do, (b) push WAS and OP closer together in an "us versus the world" sense, and (c) further solidify you and your spouse as being at odds. The DB approach is to work on yourself, be the most attractive spouse you can be, and simply wait for the affair to run it's course, while creating and defending adequate boundaries to protect yourself.

Unfortunately, there is precious little scientific data on which approach is better because it's pretty much impossible to collect since there are so many variables. Personally, I do believe a WAS generally leaves the relationship with a TON of resentment, and doing anything to make them resent you more is just digging your hole even deeper.

The other thing to consider is cake-eating. There seem to be two general categories of OP situations (1) the WAS is "done" and can't wait to move out and threatens immediate divorce, and (2) the cake-eater who stays at home, continues to have sex with their spouse, runs hot and cold, and claims to be undecided about how to go forward.

In the first case I don't think publicizing is a good idea at all. In the second case, there's something to be said for forcing a crisis to get the WAS off the fence because you should never allow yourself to be a second choice. The Dobson book talks about this and driving things to a crisis where the WAS says "no more cake eating" from a position of strength -- i.e. "I won't be in an open marriage, if you want to date OP you will not also be involved with me"

Once again, no data on how effective that is in isolation, but it is generally not a good idea, in my opinion, to tolerate ongoing cake eating.

Hope that helps.

Acc