Moving On

[SteveLW]

We talked about him moving out this morning. He is continuing to refuse. His idea is to move to the office or the basement. I said I didn't think he could fully experience what it would be like to be S and what an R with AP would look like in either place, also that it would be incredibly painful for me. He doesn't buy this. He doesn't believe that I won't get over this and magically be his best friend once I get over the initial shock of him leaving me for another woman.

He says I can't make him leave. I said I will file for D. He said he'll fight me for the house. It got nasty fast. I discontinued it. I told him I found a studio apartment for a decent price, which sparked his interest briefly and then he dismissed as "must be a $hithole" because of the price. Should I lay out what it might look like and be acceptable for me if he lives down here? From some things he said this morning, I think he thinks he can move down here and people won't know about the A or even that we're really S. But I see this as a total half-a$$ed move towards S, total cake-eating, with a veeeery long time frame before they get to a point where she'd MO here and he'd get a place with her, with him not really experiencing the loss of the MR and me not being able to heal.

Pure. Emotional. Abuse. "I don't care what you want or how it affects you, I am going to do it the way I want. And if you do not allow me I will escalate!"

may, he is right. You can't make him leave. But you can kick him out of the MBR, file for D, and then just see what takes place. He may fight you for the house. He may not. But you are right, he is cake-eating. Badly. And do not let the distance fool you. Yes she is 5000 miles away, but that could change once he really does S or D. She is probably taking a "wait and see", to see how serious he is about being with her. Note, this does not change what you need to do. Whether they are physically together or not, they have been. And will be again, whether you respect yourself and stand up for yourself or not.

[FlySolo]

Hi May

I am so sorry it's escalating like this. I have a H who escalates with threats when he doesn't get his way and my response (rightly or wrongly) is to not engage.

I am not a fan of ultimatums because I believe when people are pushed into a corner they come out fighting. But in your situation I would consider it. You have been hear before. You have played this game.

You have a good sense of who you are and what you deserve but you are letting fear get in the way.

I don't know what the laws are where you live, but I assume your H is correct. You cannot force him to move out. And I don't think he will move out of his own volition. Neither do I think will he give up his "mistress". So, irrespective of what you say, what ultimatums you pose, what you threaten to take away (your friendship) he will move into the basement/office and he will engage in intimate activity with her.

But that doesn't mean you have to continue to be his bff. You have choices. By disrespecting you like this he is firing you as his wife. Stop listening to how 'confused' he is (this is pure narcissism) and telling him about how 'painful this is for you' (he doesn't care). Stop acting like his wife. You can choose to live your life (with him in the home) without deference to how living your life impacts him. I am not saying go out and find a man - but I am saying you can choose to not listen to his sh!t. You can choose to say "No" when he asks you to join him in something. You can choose to make plans which don't include him and don't require his approval. Start living your life as if he were not your husband but instead someone who lives in your home. Your actions will speak in the way your words never did.

If he still doesn't listen, then let her have him.

[may22]

Also what is the after-the-LRT because I suspect that is what I need to be doing?!

I just looked at it again-- after-the-LRT is basically NC. And actually regular LRT is basically what the board advocates anyway-- stop all pursuit behaviors, GAL, and be cool and careful not to go overboard when they do show any interest. End all interactions first. Etc. So I actually think folks are suggesting after-the-LRT in my sitch, not the LRT which is what I did back in January.

Alison, this is so hard. I am struggling so much right now again with detaching.... I know this is not going to be an easy or a straight line path, but that doesn't make it any easier. I have never stopped believing in my heart-of-hearts, as much as I tried to posture and detach, that he was going to choose his family. That he would never actually leave. That this was a horrible rough patch that we will need to get through but then becomes part of our story and our R is better and stronger because of the lessons we learned through this crisis. It is very early in the morning here and I woke up when H got up-- he usually starts work much earlier than I do. I know if I went into his office and told him I was having a rough time he would grab me and hold me until I was calm. I won't do it, of course, but the compulsion is just so strong right now. And it wouldn't have been, back in January. We weren't really physically connected back then, not a lot of hugs. Over the past four months we've been slowly doing more of this. It just makes it all the harder to detach now.

I have so much fear for my children and anger towards my H for putting us all in this situation. To the very core of my being, I believe that when we chose to have the two of them, we made a family and far more so than our wedding vows, to me this was a sacred promise to them never to break up the family.

(By the way, I'm typing in bed right now and think I should go get a cup of tea to enjoy!! )

may, he is right. You can't make him leave. But you can kick him out of the MBR, file for D, and then just see what takes place. He may fight you for the house. He may not. But you are right, he is cake-eating. Badly. And do not let the distance fool you. Yes she is 5000 miles away, but that could change once he really does S or D. She is probably taking a "wait and see", to see how serious he is about being with her. Note, this does not change what you need to do. Whether they are physically together or not, they have been. And will be again, whether you respect yourself and stand up for yourself or not.

Steve, I hear you. I do believe he hasn't been carrying this on for the past four months, that the recent contact is what sparked this back all up and pulled us back into this same spot. So I don't think he HAS been cake eating this whole time. He did for two years, stopped for four months, and is now back to cake, cake, cake.

I'm going to sound like a sad LBW for a second here, but I know you'll be the one to shoot me down so here goes. Here is what I think. He never fully recommitted to the M or truly let her go in his heart. He made the decision to break it off with her for logical and strong reasons, but for reasons of pride and unwillingness to do this "my way" he refused to block her numbers, etc-- he felt like it was more important for him to make a daily choice not to contact her rather than to have that choice taken away from him. And that worked, mostly, until it didn't. I am 100% sure he was starting to get over her and turn back towards the M. I saw all these little clues in how he talked to me, about us, about our future, and when we did talk about the A, in how he spoke of his feelings for her. not just the words he used but the emotion in his voice wasn't there anymore. (It definitely is now.) And he finally started to consider the enormity of what he did and take responsibility for the A in a way he hadn't to date (always been my fault for putting him in an untenable situation due to the SSM).

So, because she's not blocked, he gets her message that she's moving on, right around the same time we are finally starting to talk about the A again (we had taken a break for two months during the quarantine). So on one hand he's looking at what work he'll have to do on himself in staying in the M and on the other realizing she may be gone forever, he can't hold onto this idea that well, if it doesn't work out with May, I'll have a chance with her. And so he texts her, opens back up conversation. And he says it wasn't till the fourth day after his text, after he talked to her on the phone and learned she'd slept with someone else, when he got hit with the OMG maybe this is my one chance at happiness-- he said it was like blowing on the embers and the flames shot back up.

I don't know why I'm writing all of this. I guess because I'm holding onto hope that it was working, before. That maybe this is a relapse instead of a total collapse. He said she had called him on his birthday and they had a short and fine conversation and it had actually helped him on his road to recovery. That he felt happy to hear from her, glad she was doing well, and recemented that he'd made the right choice, they could no longer be together. But then this last conversation and the fear of totally losing her forever as plan A, B, whatever, kicked us back into January. So is it like fool me once, shame on you-- fool me twice, shame on me? Or is it like this is a hard and long road, he slipped, I can give him some time and space and maybe he makes the right choice-- and do this better the next time around, should he make that choice, because if we decided to try again, this time there would be no question that it would have to be 100% cold turkey, phones blocked, etc?

Also... I simply don't know that I can be the one to file for D, be the one to kick him out of the house or pack up my own bags and go. It goes against everything I believe in. And still, the thought of looking at my children and breaking their unwavering trust in us as a family and in love. I know that they believe we love them unconditionally, forever. They also believe that H and I love each other that same way. What will it do to them to see that break?

I know, H doesn't love me as an H should love a W. That the children are resilient and we both love them and will be good parents. They'll be fine. And H, not me, put us all in this situation. But I still do have choices. And I simply don't know that I can be the one to make the choice to not have both parents under the same roof.

Pure. Emotional. Abuse. "I don't care what you want or how it affects you, I am going to do it the way I want. And if you do not allow me I will escalate!"

Playing devil's advocate for a second... when I read this, it actually makes me think that this is how H sees me. I don't care about his feelings for AP, I don't even care to understand them (=not caring about wanting to understand HIM, therefore not caring about him). I don't care how sad and sorry you are about losing someone you love. You'll get over it. But I will never forgive you if you do something to hurt the children and oh I also won't be your friend.Plus, you can't live in the house you love and have put so much time and energy and love into.

I think this is how he sees me-- threatening to take away things that are incredibly important to him and unwilling to accept that his love for AP is real and may never go away. He never had a long-term GF before me, never told anyone he loved them before me. So he doesn't know how to break up with someone.

Anyway, I don't know what I'm getting at here. Just that one thing that still hasn't changed for me from where I was in January is that I don't want to be the one to break up the family. He is free to go. But I won't help him by making that choice for him.

Pommy, I probably miswrote that. I don't even know that it is something she said to him in this past week when they've been back in touch-- I know it was in January/February. But I know she told him within the last week she was GOING to block her phone because she couldn't handle being in touch with him. (she didn't.) And then I think Saturday they had a whole talk where she said she didn't need kids actually and she just loved him so much and their R had been so difficult all this time it was worth seeing what it would be like if they gave it a real chance.

I do think he made it clear that their R was over in February. He said he fully expected her to move on at that time. Also because one of his reasons for ending it was because she didn't want children and even though she'd been backsliding on that in Jan/Feb, he knew it was important to her and something he wasn't willing to do. But I do think in both of their heads they were both holding onto the flame of maybe at some point in the future. I know he was for sure. On her end, who knows/cares. She has given him ultimatums throughout all of this and then backslid. It sounds like they broke up half a dozen times because she didn't want to be with him unless he left me. But then a few weeks later one of them would reach out and it would start back up. I thought this time would be different because it was him that made the choice.

Dilly-- thanks for the virtual hug. I need it.

FS-- thinking a lot about this and how/if I can pull it off. I want to spend a little more time just trying to get my head in a better place so that I can really work on how I can take back even a little bit of the power here.

[wayfarer]

So I'm here I'm watching and reading and thinking of you, May I hope you know that. There are a few things I want to say with out telling you what to do because you seem to be getting a lot of that. I'm just going to tell you one thing: May be kind to yourself. Please, please be kind to May in whatever you do going forward. Don't beat yourself up over what you did or didn't do right up until this point. Don't beat yourself up if you need time to mull over your next move here. Don't beat yourself up if you are totally incapable of detaching right now. Don't over analyze what you say or do right now. You are being taken down with the ship. You are not responsible for anything you say or do until you get your bearings. That's not a free pass to be evil, but it is a free pass to survive this any way necessary, ok? Be kind and forgiving of yourself.

Next he was leaning in. He was letting go. But he's hard headed and wants to do things his way. And this relapse or collapse whatever it maybe is entirely because he was unwilling to accept that any one knew better than him about how to let go of an AP. He wasn't fooling you the last 4 months. They weren't a lie. This idiot has been honest to a fault in the last 4 months. I truly believe he does love you. I truly believe he does want his family. But he very much wants his fantasy regardless of the fall out it will have on the former. The question here isn't if he was lying this whole time. He wasn't. Question here isn't who is going to D first or if H should get the h3ll out yesterday. The question here is is it time for May to just love May more. More than her marriage. More than her old life. More than her fears for her children. More than her H. Is it time to love yourself more than you love anything or any one else? Is it time for you to be the one making self involved choices so that you can come out on the other side of this being the May you want to see on the other side?

I have some comments on the way emotional abuse is being thrown around here, but I'll keep those to myself because I don't want that hijacking your thread. But I'm sure you can figure out where I'm going with that

Thinking of you often xoxo

[cardinal]

Yes, I second what WF says about not beating yourself up, period. I’ve spent time wishing I was more detached and I’ve definitely spent time overanalyzing, and ultimately, I think it’s hard not to do either, ever. Best to let yourself be. It’s okay, and you will get to where you need to be. Maybe a good time to sit outside and do a few minutes of meditating, or close your bedroom door. Maybe “You control how you play” over and over.

When I am calm and not overanalyzing, when I just feel at peace for a bit and focused on me, I do still feel this same resolve:

Anyway, I don't know what I'm getting at here. Just that one thing that still hasn't changed for me from where I was in January is that I don't want to be the one to break up the family. He is free to go. But I won't help him by making that choice for him.

At the simplest level: my H has made a choice (though can’t seem to act on it fully); I have made a very different choice not to be the one to file. I can own my choice (though I give myself permission to change my mind in the future), and I want to give H the freedom to own his choice. Obviously, there are complicated, difficult consequences that come with, say, choosing to leave your family to try out a fantasy R with someone else. Your job isn’t to hold his hand through this or make him feel any way about his decision. Or to feel pressure to file or not to file, all things considered. It’s to take care of yourself, whatever that means in the moment. And allow yourself the time you need to get your bearings. You are okay, may, however you are right now.

[may22]

Wayfinder, Cardinal... thank you so much for this.

So I'm here I'm watching and reading and thinking of you, May I hope you know that. There are a few things I want to say with out telling you what to do because you seem to be getting a lot of that. I'm just going to tell you one thing: May be kind to yourself. Please, please be kind to May in whatever you do going forward. Don't beat yourself up over what you did or didn't do right up until this point. Don't beat yourself up if you need time to mull over your next move here. Don't beat yourself up if you are totally incapable of detaching right now. Don't over analyze what you say or do right now. You are being taken down with the ship. You are not responsible for anything you say or do until you get your bearings. That's not a free pass to be evil, but it is a free pass to survive this any way necessary, ok? Be kind and forgiving of yourself.

I needed this. I am not detached. I am spending time wishing I had kept my head down DBing for another month or three. I did something not DB this morning after I said I wouldn't. I saw him in the kitchen and looked at him and we hugged. I said ILY and he said ILY too. I said I know we can be happy together if we gave it a chance. Do you have a spark of that hope inside you too? He said yes, May, I do. If I didn't I'd be gone. We sat there for a minute and then I went to my zoom call and he went to his. No need for 2x4s, folks, I know. But this is just hard and I'm not fully up to it quite yet.

Next he was leaning in. He was letting go. But he's hard headed and wants to do things his way. And this relapse or collapse whatever it maybe is entirely because he was unwilling to accept that any one knew better than him about how to let go of an AP. He wasn't fooling you the last 4 months. They weren't a lie. This idiot has been honest to a fault in the last 4 months. I truly believe he does love you. I truly believe he does want his family. But he very much wants his fantasy regardless of the fall out it will have on the former. The question here isn't if he was lying this whole time. He wasn't.

WF this validation is really important to me, somehow. I do believe this, I'm a good observer of human behavior, and H's "I was just trying and saying what I thought you wanted to hear" and "I never stopped loving her" is gaslighting and reinventing the past. I get that is how he feels now. But that is not where we were. Of course, that just circles me back into regretting starting our R conversations back up on our own, maybe we should have done video sessions with our MC. I also am thinking that we never got to the point of thinking positively together about our future MR. I don't think he's spent a lot of time there. I had thought we had to wait till she was out of his head.

But... I can't change the past, I can't control how he thinks or what he does. But I CAN trust my own truth in this. I wasn't deluded.

The question here is is it time for May to just love May more. More than her marriage. More than her old life. More than her fears for her children. More than her H. Is it time to love yourself more than you love anything or any one else? Is it time for you to be the one making self involved choices so that you can come out on the other side of this being the May you want to see on the other side?

I have to sit with this. I was thinking-- I know I don't love myself more than I love my kids. But if he leaves, would I be able to cut him out of my life as much as humanly possible while still being a cordial co-parent? I think I can. That will be the after-the-LRT cold hard NC. And he is right in that those behaviors will not be in the best interest of our children. Of course it would be better for them for us to still be friends. So I *do* have a line where I know I'll love myself more, because I have to be healthy and happy and fulfilled if I want to be a good mom to them, and I don't think the path to that is through being friends with my ex under these circumstances.

But I just don't think I'm to the point right now-- not that I can't get there with time-- that I can be the one to take major action. Maybe LRT but not filing. I think at this point I am just not yet to a place of calmness where I can really think through all these questions, plus others posed by Alison, Scout, and others, to figure out what I want and need. I still am at the baby steps of re-focusing on me and detaching from him.

Yes, I second what WF says about not beating yourself up, period. I’ve spent time wishing I was more detached and I’ve definitely spent time overanalyzing, and ultimately, I think it’s hard not to do either, ever. Best to let yourself be. It’s okay, and you will get to where you need to be. Maybe a good time to sit outside and do a few minutes of meditating, or close your bedroom door. Maybe “You control how you play” over and over.

Thanks, Cardinal. It is funny-- I am actually recognizing my own process in all of this. First I spin and freak out. From the last time, I KNOW yoga or meditation or that you control how you play video will help me. I know. I keep thinking I should do it. But I can't stop the thoughts binging around in my head enough to actually do it. I got out the yoga mat yesterday and set up to practice while H and the kids were out, and I ended up doing something else. But you reminding me about that control video is giving me what I need to actually DO it. So thank you for that!

I often feel like things happen for a purpose, though. This week I had signed up for this compassion training, every morning M-Th. A great deal of the curriculum was guided meditation, and so I had to do it. The first day was painful. The second day, even more so. I had to sit one of the exercises out. But it got better and now I've just finished the last session. I feel calmer and better and like I can start in on these self-care practices again that I know will help me. If I hadn't had this course already on my calendar, I don't know that I'd have been able to get back to meditation. Now I'm feeling that I can.

I know if I continue to settle my mind, focus on me, I'll gradually be able to detach again and think of the great future possibilities in front of me where H isn't part of my life. I think the problem is I've been holding on for so long to this vision of M2.0 (after letting go of my vision of M1.0) and everything that comes along with that, the dreams of traveling one summer all through Europe when the kids are in HS, all the things you can do when M and D are still married, the finances, the house, etc. There are some very significant financial benefits to staying M to H that will simply be gone if we D. He is retired military and so we have inexpensive health care forever and a pension. (I could probably sue for a portion of it if we Ded or use it as leverage for the house, since pensions are community property in my state. i wouldn't get half automatically because we haven't been married long enough.) We have our old place as a rental that even now has positive net income over the mortgage and eventually will be fully paid for. These things have always been our safety net-- I knew we'd always be fine, since we had the pension, we had a place we could live, we have health care. He'll still have those things when we split (assuming I get this house and he gets the condo, which is worth about a third of the house). But actually divorcing him means I lose a very significant safety net.

At the simplest level: my H has made a choice (though can’t seem to act on it fully); I have made a very different choice not to be the one to file. I can own my choice (though I give myself permission to change my mind in the future), and I want to give H the freedom to own his choice. Obviously, there are complicated, difficult consequences that come with, say, choosing to leave your family to try out a fantasy R with someone else. Your job isn’t to hold his hand through this or make him feel any way about his decision. Or to feel pressure to file or not to file, all things considered. It’s to take care of yourself, whatever that means in the moment. And allow yourself the time you need to get your bearings. You are okay, may, however you are right now.

The way you put this really helps me-- what is and isn't my job. It isn't my job to help him make this decision, or to support him through the process. He is an adult and this is his work to do. Right now I need time to focus on me and start the work all over again of detaching. My work is on me.

Something I think is important for newbies-- I do think that detaching is a fake-it-til-you-make-it kind of thing. You just need to start doing it in order for it to catch. But it is also important not to fool yourself about how far along you are in the detachment process, because at least for me, when you really get maybe 50-75% detachment your WS will start to feel that. But before that, they know when you're faking it, as long as you're around them enough. (I assume you can fake it through texts and short personal interactions, but not if you live together... at least not me). You can't do things to force any particular outcome. You have to do it for you. You have to really drop the rope and mean it for the rope to actually fall. And I don't know that I'll be able to really take any big steps or make any major decisions until I've journeyed back along the detachment path for some ways. It feels all over like a weird Escher drawing of stairs, or something. So hard to define how to get on the path and then how to get to your goal.

I love you guys. xx M

[SteveLW]

Pure. Emotional. Abuse. "I don't care what you want or how it affects you, I am going to do it the way I want. And if you do not allow me I will escalate!"

Playing devil's advocate for a second... when I read this, it actually makes me think that this is how H sees me. I don't care about his feelings for AP, I don't even care to understand them (=not caring about wanting to understand HIM, therefore not caring about him). I don't care how sad and sorry you are about losing someone you love. You'll get over it. But I will never forgive you if you do something to hurt the children and oh I also won't be your friend.Plus, you can't live in the house you love and have put so much time and energy and love into.

I think this is how he sees me-- threatening to take away things that are incredibly important to him and unwilling to accept that his love for AP is real and may never go away. He never had a long-term GF before me, never told anyone he loved them before me. So he doesn't know how to break up with someone.

One huge difference.......you don't want any of this. You want your H back,and your family intact! By way of comparison, he FIRED you as his W.

LBSs often struggle with the difference here. Not letting him cake eat is NOT emotional abuse. It is not threatening to take things away. It isn't even not accepting that the love for the AP is real and may never go away. In fact, not letting him cake eat REINFORCES what he has already stated he wants!! The only thing he is doing is delaying until Plan A firms up. Until then he needs his Plan B firmly in place. Because having two unfirm Plans is unstable for him.

Taking the stability out of Plan B is EXACTLY what you should be doing.

Kick him out of the MBR.
File for D.
Hire a great lawyer.

Unless you are okay with being Plan B........................

[SteveLW]

I do think he made it clear that their R was over in February. He said he fully expected her to move on at that time. Also because one of his reasons for ending it was because she didn't want children and even though she'd been backsliding on that in Jan/Feb, he knew it was important to her and something he wasn't willing to do. But I do think in both of their heads they were both holding onto the flame of maybe at some point in the future. I know he was for sure. On her end, who knows/cares. She has given him ultimatums throughout all of this and then backslid. It sounds like they broke up half a dozen times because she didn't want to be with him unless he left me. But then a few weeks later one of them would reach out and it would start back up. I thought this time would be different because it was him that made the choice.

You think that because........YOU WANT TO.

And this all proves everything I said in my last post: Plan A is on shaky ground.....that is the only reason he is still holding on to Plan B. We have a saying around here: A monkey doesn't leap from the branch it is on, until it identifies another branch that can support it.

Also, believe nothing he says. I see a lot of "I think" and "I know for a fact".....based on his words.

He is a lying cheater. One thing about lying cheaters is they will lie, and cheat, for the furtherance of their own purposes. Do not stay in denial. Denial is something that will work very badly for you in your sitch. I see a lot of LBWs that struggle with denial. And it really hurts their DBing. Face the reality, assume everything he says is a lie, and act according to the principles you have learned here.

Oh, and I agree with those above that said be good to yourself!! The best way to do that is to not tolerate mistreatment from others.

I know you asked me to come to your thread, and I detected that you wanted me to because I was able to R with my W and you wanted to know the best way to get there with your H. The problem is that there can be no true R as long as a third person is involved. So to have hope he has to jettison this OW....and you have no power or control to make that happen.

[may22]

Thanks, Steve.

I totally agree that not letting him eat cake is not emotional abuse. It was just interesting to me to see this from his eyes for a second.

The main reason I was really interested in your perspective-- and perhaps I should have sought it out a month ago and I wouldn't be here-- is that you R'd with your wife without a physical separation. You talked about watching her go through the grieving process of losing her EA. I was interested in how you knew she was moving into piecing. From what I recall, it didn't happen right away, correct? How did you behave with her once she ended the A and before you decided you were actually in piecing? It seems like most if not all of the situations I follow here had a physical separation, during which the WS realized what they were missing, etc. (or not, in which case the LBS continues to focus on themselves and generally is happier without their ex.) And then when their WS is ready to reconcile, there is no confusion. I feel like that is probably not an overnight change for most WSs and that it takes time for the WS to realize and process, and generally doesn't happen under the direct gaze of the LBS.

All moot in my sitch at this point, but I was curious about that.

In his mind, he isn't currently in an A, or in a relationship of any kind with AP. She's dating other people (though still in love with him). He broke it off in February and is now questioning that choice. He's scared he's going to lose his chance with her. I know whatever he does is completely outside of my control, and I need to drop all expectations and accept what is happening right now. It is difficult for me after the past four months. But I'm working on it.

I'm probably not going to file for D at this point. I know it would be justified. But it is not in alignment with how I see myself and who I want to be. I may at some point in the future, and I'm ok with that. I need to meet with an L and figure out what is best for me financially.

Focusing on me and what I need right now, and avoiding R talks is about the best I can do today.

[BlueSea]

May - came by to read your thread, since you had posted on mine. You have a huge collective of ppl here that are saying basically the same thing - he has to go. We have similar situations...I totally get the difficulty of doing asking him to leave...and, on the flip side, understand the difficulty of having them in the house. The difference being my H would leave the house to be with his OW, three plus nights a week and that will tear your heart out.

What both of our H's have not experienced is the loss of us and family. They don't know what they will miss because they haven't had to do without us. Though we are in-house with them trying to DB, they still have access to us, and easily manipulate us. And with the kids around, things just move along and before you know it, your lax on the DB front.

Our husbands seem to share the jerk, arrogant, narcissistic gene - what mine told me was that he knew it was time to end it long ago, and I think only until he felt me dropping the rope - it was the push he needed to drop her. Its only been a week, but I am extremely wary/suspicious of everything - trying to learn from your situation - to keep up DB efforts to avoid backsliding.

For how hard I hung on to him thru these past months to stay in the house - I know EXACTLY what you feel - but - you will destroy any legitimate stand you have in your marriage if you don't send him packing (did I just say that? please be sure to tell me the same thing when/if my H goes back to the OW). If he won't leave, file D, and the judicial system will weigh in on his exit.

For our weak minded husbands, this might be the jolt he needs to drop her - because if yours is anything like mine, he thinks YOUR weak and will take advantage of you as much as he can so he can enjoy his side adventure.