Help please

[Maybell]

Thank you all so much for responding.

Yes, I definitely have some accountability for the failure of the marriage prior to the A.

In the couple of years leading up to the A, we had a financial crisis of sorts that led to us selling our house and moving into a TINY rental. It took six months to sell the house and the actual sale was kind of nightmarish. The rental house was VERY small and a little bit humiliating for a guy who is doing very well in his job and also who needs a certain amount of "cave" time to feel refreshed. He definitely felt VERY stressed during that time between work and home and there was very little I could do to alleviate that; nor did I get much opportunity to; nor did *I* handle those changes well during that time. I had tried to talk to him about feeling like we needed to do more to tend to our relationship but it was a bad time for both of us and neither of us did a good job of communicating AT ALL. Additionally, H insisted throughout that it was all fine, and though it clearly wasn't, there's not a lot you can do when he won't engage and I'm just frantically rushing around trying to make everything comfortable for everyone but myself. It was a very troubled time that only ended when we made a cross-country move back to the East Coast. Unfortunately, during the transition while I was still out west and he was here is when the affair started.

When he confessed the A (15 minutes before I received an email from OW's baby daddy detailing it), part of the confession was a request that we get straight into counseling. So my thought was, great, we can finally get all this straightened out and get on a good footing again. Then the lying started and he resumed contact with OW. My anger with him is ENTIRELY with his behavior following my finding out about A. How he came to be in an affair... that, I'm sorry to say, I get. And although I never had an affair, I do know what it feels like to be so disillusioned with the marriage. We have done, and are capable of doing, a lot better.

Of course, my behavior following the confession was ENTIRELY exemplary. Not. So I do have that regret as well, though in my defense I didn't know any better. For what that's worth.

That said, Thornton is right. I wait fifteen minutes and miss him like crazy and am totally willing to forgive him. Which kind of scares me, I don't want to expose myself or the kids to this kind of hurt again.

Yes, backing off seems to be making an impact. He's traveling internationally for the next three weeks and then I take the kids on our annual family vacation without him, so I have a month when it will be pretty easy to stay quite dim.

Thanks for the reminder to believe none of what he says. My friends and family have come out of the woodwork reminding me of all the ways in which we had a really enviable relationship not that long ago, but still, it's hard to hear.

Appreciate you all!!!