Almost WAW - Do I need to reveal affair to H?

[Ophelia]

What you are saying is how I think my H felt in the time leading up to him leaving me and having an A.

All I can say is that I wish on a daily basis that we could turn back time and that this time H would come to me and tell me the problems he was having, instead of telling other people about them instead. I wish he had have let me know how he was feeling, so that I may have been able to do something to help fix things before it got too late. I feel that he robbed me, and our M of that chance.

I realise that you don't think you should have to spell it out. Your H should know that you're miserable, and if it's gonna take you beating him over the head with it, then that's just another sign that you're not meant to be together, because he doesn't already know. If he really cared, he'd have noticed, and would be doing something about it, right?

My H said that he must have been a good actor if I didn't know that things were that bad and he was that unhappy. I guess he figured that if I really did give a damn about him that I would have picked up on it. I eventually did pick up on it, only when he started spending less and less time at home, and then when he'd stop kissing me goodbye in the mornings when he left for work.

If you've been going out a lot more and spending less time around your H, chances are he is starting to realise that something isn't right. So why isn't the doing anything about it, you ask? If he really cared, he'd be making some sort of effort, right? Because he's scared. He's scared that if he asks the "Do you want to leave me?" question that you'll just up and leave. He doesn't really know what's going on, but he probably does know that there's something that's not right. He doesn't stand a chance unless you're honest with him about how you feel right now.

Yes, it'll probably kill him. When I finally found out how my H felt, it pretty much killed me. But I didn't find out until H was so unhappy that he felt things were beyond repair. He decided the fate of our M without my being involved. I suppose you could say the same in reverse as well. Neither party is blameless. I realise now things that I should have done more of, and if I'd done them, then maybe H wouldn't have ended up so unhappy. But at the time, I didn't realise. I just didn't know how he felt.

Your H's attitude may very well be getting worse because he doesn't want to rock the boat for fear of losing you. I know that when I was in that place right before the sh!t hit the fan and H left that I ended up with this sense of foreboding which all but paralysed me. I kinda knew that something big and bad was gonna come, but maybe if I stood still then time would as well and it'd never come to that.

Bottom line is that your H deserves to know how you feel about the state of your M, so that at least when he has all the info, he can make an informed decision about his actions and his attitude. Tell him you are unhappy. Even if you write it in a letter, tell him. Don't be mean about it. Don't put him down. Don't attack him. Just tell him how you feel. Tell him that you want to work on the M, that you want to try to make things better. Tell him that if you don't work on the M, that ultimately you may not be able to stay anymore. Just let him know what's going on with you. He deserves that.

And whether or not you choose to tell him about your A, (past or present, because yes it is currently an EA), if you want to give your M a chance, you need to cut off contact with OM. It's the only way you'll be able to focus completely on your M and your H and give them both the fighting chance they deserve.