Why not be straight with your partner?

[PhoenixRise]

 

It does seem that the attention does get shifted to the WS as you mention. I guess this is because they are the spouse that strayed from the marriage and is therefore the bad person in the relationship.

 

distinction between blaming a BS for the affair and the BS taking responsibility for the marital climate preceding the affair.

 

My marriage pretty much sucked pre-affair. And much of it was from my own inattentiveness.

 

I think in a marriage there are inevitable ups and downs. Nobody is the perfect partner 100% of the time. In my marriage we had some issues pre-affair. Some of those issues were my responsibility.

 

Did the attention get shifted from our issues to his affair in the immediate aftermath after dday? OH HELL YEAH. To do otherwise would have been like giving emergency aid to a paper cut instead of dealing with the gaping knife wound in your chest.

 

Pre-affair I would have been willing to listen to whatever issues/pain he was feeling. I tried to get him to talk to me, he insisted nothing was wrong. Immediately after dday not so much.

 

However, to truly reconcile, you do need to examine every aspect of the marriage and take your share of the responsibility for the state it was in. My H and I got to that point...but not until my gaping knife would had started to heal a bit.

[MadMission]

But I don't consider him to be a dishonest person.

 

Well, here's the definition:

 

Dishonest:

 

1. Disposed to lie, cheat, defraud, or deceive.

2. Resulting from or marked by a lack of honesty.

[Indypendence]

JustJoe, maybe it's me.....

 

I'm a grown up. I know there are no guarantees in life, especially when it comes to relationships.

 

I said to him: "Why didn't you tell me you had developed feelings for another? WE could have tried to work it out. We could have separated, gone to MC to see if there was a relationship worth saving. I, too, could have pursued other relationships in the event you decided to commit to her."

 

That would have been grown up, mature and honest.

 

As much as it would have hurt, I and our children would have respected him owning his choices and making a mature plan that included imput from all of us.

 

It is the lies and deception that kills.

 

But hey, who knows? Maybe it IS what keeps that secret, forbidden sex so highly charged and romanticized...the drama of it all.

 

When I discovered her existence, I told him to go get her.

 

The relationship went.....psssssst.

 

Not as much fun?

 

Or did he not want me to have the same fun he was having? Afraid I'd find a better man and well, that would be that.

 

There is something very controlling about secret affairs; control of the BS's actions, life, perceptions.

 

Not fair. And certainly not "grown-up," IMHO.

 

I just told my husband during a conversation the other day. "What puzzles me about this is, you are always so meticulous with details, it's hard for me to believe that you had no plan for......What if? What if my wife finds out? What if I develop feelings for this person or vice-versa?"

 

"You had me sitting around wondering what's going on with our marriage" (never in a million years considering this) "wondering alone" "all the while you have someone to laugh and talk with" "what the heck kinda sh*t is that?"

[jennie-jennie]

Well, here's the definition:

 

Dishonest:

 

1. Disposed to lie, cheat, defraud, or deceive.

2. Resulting from or marked by a lack of honesty.

 

Good, that does not describe my MM.

[jennie-jennie]

Maybe we should be a little careful how we label people. Calling someone a monster because they cheat on a spouse seems a bit overboard. He may treat her like a princess otherwise, and he might be the best dad in the world. We don't know these things. Not saying I agree with his choices, but that certainly doesn't make him a monster.

 

This is a very insightful post. :bunny:

[donnamaybe]

I can see I've upset some people with a practical and truthful answer.

 

That may be YOUR truth or a FEW people's truths, but certainly not the be all and end all, universal "TRUTH." When you made that statement, you were basically saying that EVERY M that ever involved cheating and has recovered still has an OW/OM involved. You couldn't be more wrong. Talk about sweeping generalizations.

[donnamaybe]

Well, here's the definition:

 

Dishonest:

 

1. Disposed to lie, cheat, defraud, or deceive.

2. Resulting from or marked by a lack of honesty.

 

Sounds like it would fit to a 'T' someone who has been lying to his wife for years and hiding his extracurricular activies from her and pretending a marriage.

[bentnotbroken]

But I don't consider him to be a dishonest person. I consider him to do the best he personally can in a bad situation where he is torn in two directions. I read one analogy by Francesco Alberoni where the MM's situation was compared to the woman in the Bible who has to decide which child to let the emperor kill. That is how precious both relationships are to the MM. You are not a dishonest person because you lie in a situation like that.

 

 

The story was a child died in the night and two women claimed the child. The King, Solomon I believe decided to split the child in half and let each woman have a piece. He knew the real mother would rather give the child up instead of have him killed.One woman wanted to split the child in half(sounds like what MM is doing to his family...time with you = time away from them)The real mother's true love was evident in letting the child go to be free and happy instead of being selfish and willing to let that child die. Something your MM could learn from by not willing his wife to die an emotional non loved death to suit his selfishness.

[jennie-jennie]

The story was a child died in the night and two women claimed the child. The King, Solomon I believe decided to split the child in half and let each woman have a piece. He knew the real mother would rather give the child up instead of have him killed.One woman wanted to split the child in half(sounds like what MM is doing to his family...time with you = time away from them)The real mother's true love was evident in letting the child go to be free and happy instead of being selfish and willing to let that child die. Something your MM could learn from by not willing his wife to die an emotional non loved death to suit his selfishness.

 

I hear ya. I'd better go back and look at that analogy, seems I am not remembering correctly what Alberoni wrote. I know it was a very strong analogy in the context of affairs. I will get back if I find it.

[Spark1111]

I just told my husband during a conversation the other day. "What puzzles me about this is, you are always so meticulous with details, it's hard for me to believe that you had no plan for......What if? What if my wife finds out? What if I develop feelings for this person or vice-versa?"

 

"You had me sitting around wondering what's going on with our marriage" (never in a million years considering this) "wondering alone" "all the while you have someone to laugh and talk with" "what the heck kinda sh*t is that?"

 

It is the height of selfishness. There is research and evidence to support that the WS has emotionally distanced themselves from the marital relationship, even to the point of falsely blaming it for whatever ails them, way before they crash into a prospective affair partner.

 

Two common characteristics of those who commit infidelity:

 

Conflict avoidance, whether within themselves or within their marriage AND poos communication skills.

 

It is what makes Individual counseling so important to a reconciliation, in addition to marriage counseling.

[jennie-jennie]

Sounds like it would fit to a 'T' someone who has been lying to his wife for years and hiding his extracurricular activies from her and pretending a marriage.

 

Donna, I believe the difference lies in if the dishonest behavior towards the wife is an exception to the rule of honesty in this man's life or if it is truly a character trait of his. One reason I believe my MM has gotten away for so long with hiding our relationship is because it truly is a behavior which is contradictory to his character.

 

So the question to ask would be is it the behavior that is dishonest or is it the MM's very character that is dishonest?

[Spark1111]

I think in a marriage there are inevitable ups and downs. Nobody is the perfect partner 100% of the time. In my marriage we had some issues pre-affair. Some of those issues were my responsibility.

 

Me too, Pheonix! But what is often forgotton is that while no marriage is perfect, not all spouses choose cheating as an option to fix a poor marriage.

 

Did the attention get shifted from our issues to his affair in the immediate aftermath after dday? OH HELL YEAH. To do otherwise would have been like giving emergency aid to a paper cut instead of dealing with the gaping knife wound in your chest.

 

Pre-affair I would have been willing to listen to whatever issues/pain he was feeling. I tried to get him to talk to me, he insisted nothing was wrong. Immediately after dday not so much.

 

Yes, all of us BS who truly loved our spouse and were committed to improving the marriage scratched our heads as our spouse emotionally checked out on us, not knowing why.

 

However, to truly reconcile, you do need to examine every aspect of the marriage and take your share of the responsibility for the state it was in. My H and I got to that point...but not until my gaping knife would had started to heal a bit.

 

Yes, whether it be substance abuse, infidelity, verbal or physical abuse, gambling away the family fortune, the gaping wound has to first be healed before we discuss who is taking out the garbage, who needs more attention.

[donnamaybe]

The story was a child died in the night and two women claimed the child. The King, Solomon I believe decided to split the child in half and let each woman have a piece. He knew the real mother would rather give the child up instead of have him killed.One woman wanted to split the child in half(sounds like what MM is doing to his family...time with you = time away from them)The real mother's true love was evident in letting the child go to be free and happy instead of being selfish and willing to let that child die. Something your MM could learn from by not willing his wife to die an emotional non loved death to suit his selfishness.

 

Yup, BNB. A selfless love story.

 

Look - I have no problem with someone falling out of love with their spouse and moving on with someone new. The problem comes into play when someone else's life is being f'd with - wasted. It's just wrong, no matter which way you slice it.

[donnamaybe]

Donna, I believe the difference lies in if the dishonest behavior towards the wife is an exception to the rule of honesty in this man's life or if it is truly a character trait of his. One reason I believe my MM has gotten away for so long with hiding our relationship is because it truly is a behavior which is contradictory to his character.

 

So the question to ask would be is it the behavior that is dishonest or is it the MM's very character that is dishonest?

Well, you might find out if you call him on what I perceive to be the BS - that being this dangling you AND the wife on a string for years. If you never make him choose, he has no reason to be honest with you. You may THINK he's being honest with you (and he might be, but IMO he's not) when all he's really doing is stringing you along. Since you continually make excuses for his behavior, he's gonna keep being a happy man with two women at his beck and call.

[bentnotbroken]

Yup, BNB. A selfless love story.

 

Look - I have no problem with someone falling out of love with their spouse and moving on with someone new. The problem comes into play when someone else's life is being f'd with - wasted. It's just wrong, no matter which way you slice it.

 

 

I understand falling out of love with a spouse, did it more than one time while with Mr. Messy. What I don't understand is the choice to not just leave. Leave if you are so freaking unhappy. If you have found your one and only true love, "soul-mate", whatever ever. Don't force me to live a lie, waste my life, expose me to psycho OW, or STD's. Get the hell out and let me find a life on my own.

[Spark1111]

I think in a marriage there are inevitable ups and downs. Nobody is the perfect partner 100% of the time. In my marriage we had some issues pre-affair. Some of those issues were my responsibility.

 

Did the attention get shifted from our issues to his affair in the immediate aftermath after dday? OH HELL YEAH. To do otherwise would have been like giving emergency aid to a paper cut instead of dealing with the gaping knife wound in your chest.

 

Pre-affair I would have been willing to listen to whatever issues/pain he was feeling. I tried to get him to talk to me, he insisted nothing was wrong. Immediately after dday not so much.

 

However, to truly reconcile, you do need to examine every aspect of the marriage and take your share of the responsibility for the state it was in. My H and I got to that point...but not until my gaping knife would had started to heal a bit.

 

I understand falling out of love with a spouse, did it more than one time while with Mr. Messy. What I don't understand is the choice to not just leave. Leave if you are so freaking unhappy. If you have found your one and only true love, "soul-mate", whatever ever. Don't force me to live a lie, waste my life, expose me to psycho OW, or STD's. Get the hell out and let me find a life on my own.

 

Yes, to not do so is the height of either selfishness, conflict avoidance, immaturity or fear of the unknown.....all at the BS's expense of being set free to find their own happiness in life.

[White Flower]

It wasn't the practicality or the "truthfulness" of your answer that people are questioning. I think the majority of BW who post here would say those "practical and truthful" reasons don't apply to them. I know they don't in my case.

 

I hope JustJoe does start the thread. It will be interesting to see what answers we do get.

I see PhoenixRise, thank you.

I know exactly what you mean!

 

I was talking about almost this very thing on another thread today...the responsibility of the BS for the issues in the marriage. And how this is different than saying the BS is at fault for the affair.

 

It does seem that the attention does get shifted to the WS as you mention. I guess this is because they are the spouse that strayed from the marriage and is therefore the bad person in the relationship.

 

I do take a lot of responsibility for what happened in my marriage before my husband's affair. I feel like I've talked about it ad nauseum here on various threads.

 

And I've been told that I shouldn't take any blame but there is a fine distinction between blaming a BS for the affair and the BS taking responsibility for the marital climate preceding the affair.

 

My marriage pretty much sucked pre-affair. And much of it was from my own inattentiveness.

You are the rare example of someone who looks to themselves for some of the answers. In Janis Abrahms Spring's After the Affair, she tries to direct BS to look to themselves for at least SOME of the pre-affair conditions. I didn't mean to suggest that all BS contributed any factors. What I was suggesting was that many tend to sweep a lot of stuff under the rug because they're so grateful the M remained intact. Not all but many.

That may be YOUR truth or a FEW people's truths, but certainly not the be all and end all, universal "TRUTH." When you made that statement, you were basically saying that EVERY M that ever involved cheating and has recovered still has an OW/OM involved. You couldn't be more wrong. Talk about sweeping generalizations.

donna I think you know I'm one of the most introspective posters on LS. If I'm at fault I have no problem admitting it. And you misread my post entirely TBH. I never said that. What I said was...

You won't get answers like...

 

I like our retirement portfolio, how good he is in bed, how much he makes me laugh, or anything like that. You'll hear how he worked his arse off to prove his love to her but even that can be faked. Just ask the OW they're still sleeping with. Sorry. Sad but true.

But I agree that it may have been stated in too general of a way. I obviously didn't mean that all MM stay in their A after D-day but it does happen and it happens while the BW works on the M wholeheartedly and thinks she is fixing her H and M. So so sad. Still, many are so grateful the M is intact that they lose focus on deeper issues.

 

BTW, after this thread is exhausted, I'm going to start another one about why BS'S would take their WS'S back, so stay tuned.

I hope you start it still Joe. I'm sure it will be interesting. Maybe I'll even post on why I took my exH back after his A.

 

Yes, to not do so is the height of either selfishness, conflict avoidance, immaturity or fear of the unknown.....all at the BS's expense of being set free to find their own happiness in life.

A great statement and hard for the OW to say because she'll be accused of having a conflict of interest. But I stand beside you and echo your thoughts.

[jennie-jennie]

I hear ya. I'd better go back and look at that analogy, seems I am not remembering correctly what Alberoni wrote. I know it was a very strong analogy in the context of affairs. I will get back if I find it.

 

OK, I found it. My bad, it was not the story from the Bible.

 

"Yet love was not created to work harm or do evil: it's not like love to cause the loss of children, or anyone's suffering let alone death. Rather, love is designed to bring with it the establishment of a new community, which is to install itself around the lovers and allow for a likewise-new, happy living arrangement, one so ingenuously concocted that everyone feels comfortable with and fulfilled by it. The stark fact of others' negative reaction, however, dashes these hopes for harmony and forces the lovers to make a choice between their old world and their new one. In a word, the whole process of falling in love is the process of first refusing to choose and then learning how to choose. In the early phase, in what we have called the ignition state, however, this asking lovers to choose assumes the dimensions of a full-scale dilemma. It would be like asking a mother whose children have been kidnapped to choose which of them must be killed. There is no solution, no way out. The presence of a dilemma is a constant, something that inevitably crops up in the course of any collective movement or in any private experience of falling in love."

 

Isn't this exactly what the MM are doing: refusing to choose? Unfortunately it seems like many of them do not go on to the second phase of "learning how to choose".

[jennie-jennie]

Well, you might find out if you call him on what I perceive to be the BS - that being this dangling you AND the wife on a string for years. If you never make him choose, he has no reason to be honest with you. You may THINK he's being honest with you (and he might be, but IMO he's not) when all he's really doing is stringing you along. Since you continually make excuses for his behavior, he's gonna keep being a happy man with two women at his beck and call.

 

How do you make a person choose, Donna? That is a very naive way to look at the world. You can make the choice for him, but you can't make him choose.

 

Also, all MM are not cake eaters and happy. Some of them suffer from not being able to choose.

[donnamaybe]

How do you make a person choose, Donna? That is a very naive way to look at the world. You can make the choice for him, but you can't make him choose.

 

Also, all MM are not cake eaters and happy. Some of them suffer from not being able to choose.

 

Me naive? Now THAT'S funny! You make YOU choose. You think you're the love of his life and he's just caught in some decision making process? If you truly are, he'll choose you. After 4 years, he ought to know. Unless, of course, he's perfectly happy with the status quo.

 

He may appear to be suffering, but it could just be a good act.

 

The thing is, you don't even entertain the idea that he could just be a master manipulator. You'll never know either.

[JustJoe]

Jennie, sometimes your situation, seems to be a mirror image of my own. It was about 4 years, that I finally realized that my MW prefered the status quo, and that there would never be any progress for "us", until I forced her to make a decision. Your MM has had ample time to make arrangements for an amicable divorce, that would not be harmful to his kids, and would allow his wife her freedom. IMO, he is in a comfortable position, and will not willingly change what, to him, must seem tthe best of both worlds. He may tell you, that he's troubled, but what does he say to his W?

[jennie-jennie]

Well, just for the sake of argument, what would he choose if you refused to see him until he made a choice? Would he stay, would he leave? (Just for the sake of argument, as I know you have tried NC before.)

 

This is an interesting scenario. First of all I know myself well enough that I know I am not ready to let him go, so any trial of NC from me is doomed to fail. But let's imagine for a moment that I actually would be capable of going NC. I can hardly imagine it, because if I went NC with the determination that it might be for good, then it would be for good and my MM would not stand a chance of getting me back.

 

Okay, I will give the imaginary scenario one more try. I have gone NC. My MM would still be exactly where he is now: not being able to choose, so he would be staying with his family trying to resurrect our relationship. Once he would realize that I am firm in my decision not to let him back in, he would give up being respectful to my decision.

 

What happens to his marriage now? According to what I have read, if the decision to end the affair is not made by the MM himself, there is a chance for him to reconcile and get a good marriage once again. If however he himself had made the decision to end the affair because of altruistic reasons, still being in love with his OW, his marriage is doomed to be an empty-shell marriage.

 

So, as I see it, I have two options:

- making the choice for him by going NC and thus ending our affair

or

- staying in the extramarital relationship and thus forcing him to either remain torn or progressing to being able to make a decision.

[JustJoe]

Jennie, you do have a third choice. Inform him that you need to see proof of progress, or you will disclose the Affair to his wife. Time's up.

[jennie-jennie]

Me naive? Now THAT'S funny! You make YOU choose. You think you're the love of his life and he's just caught in some decision making process? If you truly are, he'll choose you. After 4 years, he ought to know. Unless, of course, he's perfectly happy with the status quo.

 

He may appear to be suffering, but it could just be a good act.

 

The thing is, you don't even entertain the idea that he could just be a master manipulator. You'll never know either.

 

I am choosing every day whether or not to remain with my MM. I know my pattern with men. I am very loyal until one day I have had enough and then I walk. With no regrets and my head held high.

[jennie-jennie]

Jennie, sometimes your situation, seems to be a mirror image of my own. It was about 4 years, that I finally realized that my MW prefered the status quo, and that there would never be any progress for "us", until I forced her to make a decision. Your MM has had ample time to make arrangements for an amicable divorce, that would not be harmful to his kids, and would allow his wife her freedom. IMO, he is in a comfortable position, and will not willingly change what, to him, must seem tthe best of both worlds. He may tell you, that he's troubled, but what does he say to his W?

 

Ahh, but Joe, has your MW really made any progress? You are the one who has made a decision as I see it. You are not letting her back in. She still wants you both.

 

Jennie, you do have a third choice. Inform him that you need to see proof of progress, or you will disclose the Affair to his wife. Time's up.

 

My MM knows that I am capable of telling his wife if I decide that is in my best interest. I might even do it out of revenge. Hey, if I can't have him, at least you two should pay the price just like I had to pay the price of being secret. I can be that dark. I have it in me.

 

My MM values an intact home for his children. I don't think he is willing to give that up for me. So then it is up to me to decide if I want to stay with him under those conditions.

 

Joe, perhaps that is what your MW was telling you as well. She valued the financial security of her husband. She was not prepared to give that up.