I am finally learning the truth, but not from my H

[trustinginHim]

Thanks, Ellie, for your sentiments. And you're right, it is not looking good at all for MIL. My H is not taking it very well either.

In other news, I emailed BMOW's fiance this morning with some questions I had and BMOW responded to me directly. Her words are in blue, my few comments are in red:

Hello LG, I think it would be best if I try and answer your questions so that I can tell you as much as possible accurately. I have to admit that I am torn about all of this simply because even though this is a release for me and knowledge for you, there is so much pain for both of us and I really hate that. I had hoped that through the past months that we had all been able to move beyond all of this and I thought that your H was sincere in his attempts to do right by you and your marriage. It looks as if he is still playing games and believing that he is above any repercussion from his behaviors.

I think I have some insight to a lot of his behaviors etc, he shared a lot with me about your relationship. Of course, now I wonder how much of it was actually true. As I have studied infidelity, I have learned that 90% of what is stated about the problems within a marriage aren't true. I was so blind to so much.

I would listen to him tell me about how he would manipulate you, and for some reason it never occurred to me that he would be doing the same to me. Of course he was. I personally think that he is a master manipulator. I believe that it's 2nd nature, he does it without even realizing or thinking that's what he's doing. Then there are the times that it's very well thought out. That's when it's most dangerous.

I know that he cheated on his first wife, he cheated on you, and I have no doubt that there were things going on with other women even when I was in the picture. I don't have proof, but the pattern is there and there is no reason to believe that it would be otherwise.

He's a very complex person, I really do believe that he really cares about the people that he comes into contact with, he is a generous soul to a fault... but there is an underlying illness there for sure. He told me when he ended things with me that he was going back to his fundamental religious beliefs from his childhood and that he had been sexually molested as a young boy and that these were also the reasons for his incurable depression. That without the religion and without counseling to resolve the issues that he was apparently having with the molestation he was never going to get well.

It wouldn't seem now that he hasn't addressed any of this and that the religious comment was just more talk that had no basis. It was because of these comments that I really believed that he was going to finally be honest with you and with the counselor about his past and I believed that he really wanted to be a better person.

I honestly pray that he's not still seeing other people, after everything that you both have been through, how could he possibly think that he could get away with that?? That just blows me away. He told me that he was going to move heaven and earth to work on things in counseling with you, that this was his main priority in life. That he did NOT want another divorce and that he wanted to continue his life with you.

It's so sad that a year later, it's only now that your getting the truth and that things that I should have seen are being confirmed for me. I feel like a total idiot and hope to never return to a place like that again in my life. It was my lowest point ever.

Anytime there was an opportunity for us to spend together we took it. This is hard to explain, but you have to understand that through our entire relationship I was constantly sent mixed signals by your H. He would declare his undying love for me, but at the same time maintain that he also felt as strongly about you and that his greatest happiness was making you happy.. so in my mind (obviously not healthy at all at the time), I thought that if I could do something that made you happy, that in turn made him happy.

It was a really twisted way to think but he was good at manipulating and I was blind to it and bought into it. He never once said that he would leave you, he always stated clearly that was not his intention. But he also made it clear that he had every intention of making me a permanent part of his life somehow. He was trying to figure out how to do that. At one point he even took a life insurance policy out on himself with me as the beneficiary. That policy got cancelled some months later because of the expense. I guess that was his way of showing some sort of commitment??

OK, the 3 women that he told me about that he met before me on AFF were:
D, (this is the one that he met in XXXXX), she spent the night with him at the hotel.
L, is the one that he met at the park in XXXXX. They didn't go to a hotel, they actually had sex in your car. He had removed the 3rd seat to make accommodations (LG--Eeeeewwwwww!)
LX, is the one that he met at least 3 (that I know of) times at the Motel in XXXXXX.

He supposedly ended things with all of them after we met and started seeing each other. I chatted briefly with L and LX online a few times, but they never gave me any indication that he was still seeing them. I have no clue what their AFF handles were. I do know that he had an account on Yahoo for email and chatting and that's where he chatted with the majority of anyone he met online. There was also an MSN Hotmail account that was used for correspondence and chatting. I used to have the passwords for all of these but they have long since been changed.

Fetishes aren't exactly what I would call it where I was involved... more about fantasies, in particularly multiple women at once. The name of the 3 woman that we met and had "encounters" with were;
JX
C (we were actually with C in a hotel room the night you called him on the phone and you got into a fight about where he was and what he was doing, this was right before he left for the convention and before you moved out). (LG--This was the experience that prompted me to move out and sadly I still remember it so vividly.)
RX

Trust me, I myself would prefer not to go into details here either and I won't for both our sakes.

I had remained in contact with RX, she and I became friends and she was the one that was there for me when everything ended between your H and I. She was the one that actually drove me to return everything to him last April and then drove me home. She has since moved back to Maine. I know that for a while she communicated to your H for me, but she and I have parted ways and I don't know if they still talk. If I needed to though, I could re-engage contact with her to see if she is in fact still talking to him.

As far as fetishes are concerned, I guess you'd say it was for Larger women. He would tell me "skinny women hurt" and that larger woman "feel better", whatever that means. I do know that all of the women prior to me and with me were all larger women. He also enjoyed taking pictures and video taping. There were dozens of pictures on his laptop and there is also a video tape that he had. I had hoped that he had long since deleted everything and destroyed the tape, but at this point from what you've indicated, it may be highly unlikely and it may very well still be there. I used to have the bootup and logon ID for his laptop, but I have no doubt that has changed long since.

If you ever have an opportunity to gain access to the laptop, I am now a certified MSCA and can tell you how to quickly find and extract any information or data that may still be on the laptop. There is also software available that you can remotely deploy to his desktop at work and the laptop to gain access to anything else you need or want. It's not expensive and it's not hard to do at all. I'll help you with this if you think it's necessary to go that far.

I was never involved with prostitutes. There were prostitutes that he went to on a regular basis in years past when he was traveling to OKC and San Antonio. He even indicated to me that he saw the one in OKC on such a regular basis that she no longer charged him for their encounters, he would bring her little gifts. (LG--How nice.) I believe that this was either in the summer of 2001 or 2002, I can't remember exactly, but I'm sure you'll know when he was frequenting those cities and can put 2 and 2 together.

Your H basically nickel and dimed his money away, never used any of it to pay down bills as intended. I had promised early on that I would never nag about his spending habits, but he was never known for his financial self discipline.

The only thing he ever told me about in San Antonio was the prostitutes. He did admit that when he went to a convention in 10/2003 that he and his first wife had an interesting time and he told me that she had "come on" to him and asked him to sleep with her.

He claimed that he did not, but honestly, I never believed him. Something told me in my gut that it was probably the other way around and they more than likely slept together. But I have no proof, just a gut instinct. I do know that his first wife only wrote to him on his work email account and that was the only account that I didn't have access to, that's what made me suspicious. Of course there could have been numerous accounts out there that I didn't know about.

But he seemed to feel that after that convention they had reconciled in a sense, but he also mentioned numerous times that he could never tell you this and would not share this information with you.

LG, I cannot begin to tell you how horrible I have felt over the past year. I can't apologize enough for intruding on your life and betraying a trust that should NEVER be betrayed. I can only say that I myself was so broken and hurt that I was not thinking or acting with a clear mind at all. As I have worked so hard in the past months with my fiance and with my own counselor so much has been clear. I cannot justify the behavior, but I will NEVER repeat it.

There was a time that I was convinced that your H's feelings for me were genuine and I tried to convince myself that I was not being used. As I have reflected over the past, it was glaringly obvious that I just put blinders on and forged ahead oblivious to any repercussions for my own behaviors.

I have now been blessed enough to have gotten out of my VERY unhealthy marriage and into the healthiest relationship I have ever had. My fiance means the world to me and as you can see, there are no secrets between us. He has stood by me through so much and will continue to do so. I am truly happy for the first time in a very long time, but I too still have a lot of work to do in regard to self esteem and self image issues. It seems that self improvement and enlightenment is a never ending process ) I know that you and I probably won't ever really be friends because of the circumstances, but I truly sincerely wish you the peace and happiness that you deserve.

As for your H, it's still taking some time to find forgiveness , but I'm getting there... and I'm sure that eventually I will. First I have to forgive myself. This has opened some thing up for me again that weren't really healed, so I guess it's time to start working on that. When you mentioned that he was still blaming me for everything, that just floored me...

You seem to have such determination when it comes to standing by your H through all of this. If you can stick it out and find your way through it all, I believe that it will be worth the effort. I know for a fact that he loves you very much, that your happiness has always been important to him. He's just sick, he actually admitted to me once that he believed that he was a sex addict.

I am hoping and praying that he truly wants to heal. He has an incredible family and hopefully he will also reach out to everyone that is willing to be there for him. He sees himself as the patriarch of the family and I believe that if he can put his enormous ego aside and let them in, they will all rally around him and be totally supportive.

Wishing you nothing but the best... BMOW

Well, between my H's manipulation of me and my mother's manipulation of me (another story for another BB) I am feeling a bit gang-raped today.

LG