No affair, no feelings...is there hope?

[Olya]

My dear friend... your wife is having an affair. AND she is cake eating too. I finally understood what that means. Cake eating doesn't mean that the spouse is seriously hiding an affair and leading a double life. It means that the spouse wants to have complete freedom while retaining all of the support that LBS used to offer. (Except for sex. We're staff now.)

It almost felt like a normal date. Best of all, she didn't text once during the whole outing! We went home in the evening and watched movies and ordered takeout (cooking has essentially stopped in this household due to W throwing up her hands at responsibility and my refusal to pick up the slack). Overall, I was feeling very positive and everything was very natural up until it was time for bed and we retreated to separate rooms.

Sooo, this means there was trouble in paradise. Either they had a squabble or he was unavailable for a while. Your wife seems to be looking for a landing pad. She does not want to be alone. Alone leads to thoughts and feelings about oneself. I don't think your wife can handle that.

I will tell you this: she will only leave you if things work out with him. If not, then she will stay with you until she meets someone new and the cycle will start again.

You want her to admit to the affair and to make a choice to break it off and stay with you. You cannot make her do it. However, that is what you should be looking for.

Yesterday wasn't so great. I GAL'ed for the first half of the day and then W wanted my help with some yard work we had been neglecting. It was hard work and she made a lot of critical comments about how a lot of it was caused by me not finishing projects (okay, yeah like when I'm the only one that picks up dog poop because I need to mow the lawn and I sometimes leave the bags on the patio). I tried to validate her frustration, didn't argue, and took responsibility. But, this was one of those moments where I feel like I am "cowering down" and I'm not sure what to do about it (more of those to come). She also wanted to throw a bunch of stuff away that I could have repurposed, but I didn't fight it because I guess I don't care about doing any of that stuff now. It was hard to work through the comments about "when she moves out of the house" and other vague references to the fact that I will somehow be magically disappearing in the near future.

Don't you think that you validate her a little too much? Start telling her that you are busy.

Six days before I found out about the little whore my husband was complaining that I should be getting repairs done on the undercarriage of his car.

I told him that I was busy then and my answer will not change going forward. That car will not be serviceable by the time he gets back. If he wants to be with his girlfriend, she can fly down here, she can drive his car once a month, change his oil, and take it to get repaired. So, in reality, by the time he gets back the engine will stop and the tires will rot.

You need to be busy too. There is a reasonable yard state that you need to maintain for your dogs. Anything more than that - you're busy. She can do it herself or she can get her texting buddy to do it.

Then the day just got worse. She told me in the afternoon she "might be going out tonight". "Cool". She asks me if I'm going out tonight (she seems to understand I have a life now at least). "No, I'm not planning to." Well, she went to take a nap and asked me to wake her up at 8pm so she could get ready. I said okay and went about my business tackling my messy closet.

No. You are not her maid. Start telling her to set an alarm.

So, I went. I know, and I knew, that this was the wrong move, but this was a DB battle I just flat out lost. The night was fine and I essentially tried to make myself invisible and not bother her (O don't worry I'm well aware of the pathetic-ness of that statement). She said she had a good time and thanked me for driving. But, man I want my balls back! What was I supposed to do? She had already gotten the intel that I was available, so I couldn't lie and say I was busy. Is flat out refusal the best option?

Why in God's name did you go!? Why? Your conversation should have ended at taxi. Learn to leave the room when you have made your point. Just walk away. If you're not busy, pretend you are. Done with your homework? Tell her you're working on the next assignment to get ahead because you have plans for next weekend.

I am continually faced with these moments where she is just so expectant. I will be sitting in the office working, while she is upstairs, and she will call down something like "can you bring me my iPad from the kitchen?" Uh, sure, I guess I can stop what I'm doing, get up, and fetch your things, when you are just as capable. She has always made these type of requests and before I never really minded (maybe this is part of the problem?). But now, I can't understand how she thinks it is still acceptable. Do I need to sit down and have a specific talk about it? Clearly I need to learn how to say no, but for some reason it is easier said than done. It is already so ingrained in the status quo.

Then yell down "are your legs broken or something!?"

You have to stop this. You are not her maid. Talk to a lawyer, learn about your rights and stop waiting on her hand and foot.

Overall, I still have a lot of work to do. But I'm not letting the bad days discourage me.

You're right. But you need to decide that you are done with acting this way. I hate the word "man up" and I do not believe in traditional gender roles. What I do believe is that no spouse should be reduced to the level of hired help. You need to grow a spine and that spine needs to stay there for the rest of your life. I'm not talking about growing hard - I'm talking about getting self-respect and knowing your worth and you, my friend, are worth more than this.

Small update on her texting/EA/"just talking to friends" situation. She has greatly reduced the amount of texting she does during the day. However, I am rather concerned/horrified to find that she texts all night! (Remember they are on very different time zones). This is the extent of "snooping" I have done if you even want to call it that. But, and I'm not sure if she has thought about this, it is very easy to see when she is online or when she was last. The past few nights, I have woken up at various odd hours (probably subconsciously thinking about it) and can see that she is online or has been recently. I am baffled as to how she even sleeps. I'm talking 3am, 4am, 5am, etc. Something is definitely not right. Part of me wonders if this is why she insisted on sleeping in separate rooms. But, I'm trying not to get too hung up on it; I am letting go and have no reason to care. I don't think it's sustainable and it will likely run its course anyway.

And this is why I tell you that it's an affair. It is also not a healthy attachment either. How is she supposed to perform at work?

It also seems to me like she is putting more into this relationship than he is or, at the very least, he is starting to create demands. They are now conforming to his time, not hers. And she's fine with it. I'm sorry, but I do think that she is obsessed with this man. Do I believe that it will fizzle out? Yeah. But it will take much longer than you might think.