Dealing with ongoing affair -which may now be over

[PeterV2]

25yearsmlc, thank you for your thoughtful questions. First let me clear a few things up.

And do you have 2 sons and a daughter or 3 sons? I thought I read you had 4 kids, but must have confused you with someone else.

My W has one daughter, 27, from her previous marriage and I have 2 sons, 20 & 23 and one daughter, 18, from my first marriage. None of them live with us.

Why do you believe she is envious of you having time to read? B/c she doesn't? B/c she works and does housework, and you don't but you do have time to "read and relax?"

My W doesn't live in our house. We bought a 14 room seniors retirement home (RH) in Dec 2012 and she moved into a room there in Nov 2013. A month later I discovered the A.

Maybe you ought to work (for money) so you can ease your wife's anxieties AND you won't be working much more than now, yet you'll be earning money.

I have my own business and I work from home. The RH is a corporation in her name and she runs that business. Right now the RH has 7 vacant rooms which we are trying to fill, however the business is not making money and my business is subsidizing hers. Once the rooms are full then her business will make good money. I am her maintenance man and work there almost daily fixing things that go wrong, and things are constantly breaking like any household.

So I live alone in our matrimonial home. I do all my own cleaning, laundry and chores and some cooking when I feel like it. She comes and visits me here once in while, and grabs some different clothes from her closet.

She lives in the RH and has a nice suite (which I built) with an ensuite bathroom. She eats at the RH. She does her laundry at the RH. The staff does the cleaning, although she does clean her own room. But she does a lot of grocery shopping and running around getting stuff for the RH. She also goes out and sees friends and takes good care of herself. I encourage her to take time for that.

Right now she's on a vacation and I told her not to phone the RH, that I would take care of her business while she's gone; that she needs a complete cold turkey break from the business. I told the staff to call me if there are any issues. I did the grocery shop yesterday for the RH and did the payroll.

That's a LONG time to put up with a sexless (loveless??) marriage. 10 years...why do you think it fizzled out?

I mean, I know that no sex for a decade kills most marriages - but why did that happen in the first place? (I assume that is what you are referring to when you say it "fizzled out". )

So, any insights there?

As for my first marriage, I made the mistake of telling her that I didn't marry her because of her looks but because of her personality. She was insulted and I don't think ever forgave me for that faux-pas. It's true I loved her personality, although she wasn't unattractive. But I think that sort of started the decline. We didn't sleep in the same bed for a decade because I snored. So I slept on the couch or with one of the kids if they needed me. We did love each other and did have a lot of good times. I was trying to spend more time listening to her and validating her. I have a problem with validating my partners, and this I have now identified and am working on validating as much as I see fit - don't want to go overboard. So my first wife had an EA and then asked me to move out to "give us time". I took that as a good-bye. After a couple of month I found out it was a PA and then we got D. I worked hard to minimize the impact on the kids and I would say they're happy & well-adjusted.

And how are you showing increased empathy?

As for empathy, I am very consciously seeing things from my W's point of view. I'm trying hard to listen very closely to what she says and to read between the lines / read the body language and delivery.

Not sure about how you know she "felt anxious" but I can easily see how she'd see a frantic "too busy to live" approach in you.

My W told me that my rushing made her anxious. I stopped rushing.

Hey, no offense, okay? But this^^ implies that SHE must change HER behavior. The reality is You do as well. What are you doing to keep your needs in check? How are you working on NOT asking so much of her, so often?

How are you doing learning about what she does like and enjoy, so you know you are not again asking her to "endure" something she does not enjoy?

We were talking about this the other day and she realizes that she needs to stop trying to please me - I told her I was fine with that. I also am trying very hard not to make any requests for her.

you rush at your peril.

Amen. I know I need to give her lots of space and time.

You think it's hard to detach when you are together but i the next sentence you reveal you do not want to detach' you want to show her the new you. But you can do both at the same time, detach AND show the new you.

IN fact in your situation being detached would be a 180 and would also show her the new you but you also have to show somehow that SHE and spending time with her are your priorities.

How do I detach and then also spend lots of time with her?

Why do you believe she is envious of you having time to read? B/c she doesn't? B/c she works and does housework, and you don't but you do have time to "read and relax?"

What can you do to help her so she doesn't do all the work? How can you help her have some free time and what can you do in your free time to help around the house or finances?

She told me she’s envious of me having time to read. She told me her mind is too scramble to read. I think she’s still in withdrawals from her recently ended A, but that is just mind reading. I don’t bring that up any more.

Yeah, I know she’s worn out, exhausted, burnt out. That’s why all she can do is watch TV in her down time. She’s sleep deprived. I’ve hire a HR firm to find her a live-in caregiver so that she can sleep through the nights. Hopefully we’ll hire someone in the next couple of weeks. She needs the help.

I help her every opportunity I get. I just spent a month reshingling the roof on the RH to save her $10,000. So needless to say I haven’t been reading much this past month. But now I have to go as I’m reroofing our matrimonial home now. I want to have it done by the time she returns from her vacation.

Thanks for all the advice 25yearsmlc. So did you R with your H?