Walking on egg shells! My husband thinks I am cheating!

[coloradogirl]

Hi all. I am new here and just wanting to vent and ask a couple of questions. Hoping for some suggestions.

 

My problem is. I have been with the same man for 15 years, married 10 of that. Two years into our marriage I did have a affair with another man. Which lasted 2 weeks. I guess I wasn't feeling like my husband even noticed that I was around 99 percent of the time. So I went elsewhere to get the feelings that I thought my husband should be giving me. We have worked through it all and My husband forgave me and took me back.

 

My husband travels alot do to his work. I know that he is a very busy person, and he works hard for our family, but I guess I am complaining about the emotional needs that I as his wife need from him. Like a phone call out of the blue, just to say I love you, or like, honey you sleep in, I will take the kids to school, that type of things. The little things in a marriage mean more to me the the bigger things.

 

Recently I started talking to another man a couple of years younger then me. He lives in a completely different state then I do. We have conversed over email's, IM's and voice chat. We get along great. He has sent me several pictures of himself and I the same. Have a wonderful time when we do talk. At first I thought nothing of it, but then I started feeling like I did when I first fell in love with my husband. The anxiousness, the pounding heart the entire 9 yards. This person is a person that I could see myself with, if I wasn't already married and In love with my husband.

 

Toward the end of last year, my husband found the picture of this man, and the s**t hit the fan, sort of speak. He thought I had been cheating on him, and was going to file for a divorce. Well that isn't really what we wanted so we agreed to marriage counseling.

 

Counseling went well for awhile, and then it just started to seem like he didn't have time to go, or that it just wasn't that important to him anymore. But now I find that if I go somewhere when he is out of town on business and I don't answer my cell phone, or the phone at the office, that when I do return his call, his first question is " Where have you been" and then calling around to check up on me. Most of the time when we do talk on the phone when he is out of town, his last words to me are " Be Good." My gosh, I am 31 and a mother of 1. The man that I would have a affair with lives thousands of miles away....I don't think I could make it there in 2 hours...lol Sorry had to throw that in there.

 

I just feel like I am walking on egg shells all the time. I just don't know what to do about any of this. I know the more he does it the more I resent him, and I don't even want to talk to him. He will throw back in my face the affair that I had 8 years ago. To me that was forgiven, he choose to take me back, so it should stay in the past.

 

All I want is my marriage to be happy again and to be able to have a conversation with whom I choice to have one with. Man or Women, without my spouse thinking I am cheating on him.

 

So confused!

[dyermaker]

Originally posted by coloradogirl

All I want is my marriage to be happy again and to be able to have a conversation with whom I choice to have one with. Man or Women, without my spouse thinking I am cheating on him.

 

Fact: I would consider your relationship with this new internet guy an emotional affair, and I would think most would as well.

 

Reality: When you've cheated before, you tend to lose the benefit of the doubt forever--especially in this case because a transgression, in my opinion--and likely his if you were honest to him about it--has occured. Don't go investing your romantic emotions into other people, and DELUDING yourself into thinking that if there's no penetration, there's no infidelity--EA's hurt, often times more than physical affairs.

 

Solution: NO more contact with this guy. NO more pursuits of other guys. NO more justifying your actions with technicalities. NO more dishonesty. NO more ignoring marital problems--if something's wrong with the marriage, either fix it, through communication or counselling--or leave.

 

You are not a victim of your husband's jealousy.

[dixiepix]

Unfortunately, I must agree. When there is not trust in the marriage due to past infidelity, the jealousy issue will continue to linger until the hurt party feels emotionally healed which unfortunately takes a long time to heal. You mentioned missing cell phone calls. If you have one and your husband wants to reach you, you should be available to answer his call and put his mind at ease. Maybe that is why you don't get more "I love you phone calls." If I were your husband, I probably wouldn't call much either for fear you wouldn't answer, then my mind would go crazy wondering. Once a couple have been down that path, and infidelity was involved, it is very,very hard to regain that trust. Stop waiting on him to act. You are the one that strayed. You should take the initiative to call him with I love you's and whatever else it takes to put his mind at ease. And age and children have nothing to do with infidelity if that is your intent. "Pick up you boots" and do things to show him how important he is in your life. Turn things around on him. Tell him to be good when you make those unexpected calls to him. You are the only person who can show him how important he is to you. granted, it would be a lot easier if infidelity had not been involved, but the ball is in your court and will be until your husband does feel that you are true.

[Bronzepen]

Originally posted by coloradogirl

Recently I started talking to another man a couple of years younger then me. He lives in a completely different state then I do. We have conversed over email's, IM's and voice chat. We get along great. He has sent me several pictures of himself and I the same. Have a wonderful time when we do talk. At first I thought nothing of it, but then I started feeling like I did when I first fell in love with my husband. The anxiousness, the pounding heart the entire 9 yards. This person is a person that I could see myself with, if I wasn't already married and In love with my husband.

 

Toward the end of last year, my husband found the picture of this man, and the s**t hit the fan, sort of speak. He thought I had been cheating on him, and was going to file for a divorce. Well that isn't really what we wanted so we agreed to marriage counseling.

 

 

 

Well, you were cheating on him. An emotional affair is cheating. That's twice you have cheated on him.

 

Your husband has agreed twice to make your marriage work. IMO you should be trying just as hard, if not harder, to make it work too.

 

Learn from your mistakes. Think of a way(s) to prevent this from happening again. Include your husband on the brainstorming session. Show him that your making the effort to change. Tell him that you both still need to go to marriage counseling.

 

If all this is too much or there is no solution then it's safe to say the marriage is over.

 

You have alot of work ahead of you. Good luck.

[dixiepix]

Having a long talk with your husband will help your marriage, if you can relay to him the type of things that you need from him. Many times women do look elsewhere for attention they are not getting from home. You must also find out from him exactly what he needs from you to feel more secure that you are not looking for someone else. I beleive that a firm understanding of what the other needs will benefit the both of you considerably. Communication is the key.

[tattoomytoe]

so does your hubby want you to have anal sex to make up for your friendship? or was that your idea?

[Dug]

Men who marry, probabyl aren't interested in sharing their wife with some other guy....emotionally or physically. Cut the crap and either be married or be a swinger. Your husband deserves to know that "he" is the one really in bed with you, and that your head isn't 2,000miles away when you're intimate with him. The respect you've taken away from the relationship will be difficult if not impossible to replace....people forgive, but they never forget. Your "beloved" now has demons of insecurity to live with.

[coloradogirl]

OK, so me talking to another gentlemen makes me having and emotional affair. It just amazes me that in 8 years, I have been a devoted wife to my spouse. I met someone that I have common interest with, and enjoying talking to and all of a sudden I am the bad guy. So he is entitled to have friends that are female, but I am not entitled to have male friends?

 

As for the cell phone, yes, actually I have 2 of them. 99.9% of the time I do answer my cell phone no matter who it is. If I happen not to answer it, it is because I am either on the other one or the office phone with a vendor or a client, ran into the store to get something quickly, etc. The only time my cell phone is not on me, because I can't hear it in there anyway, is on my night out with the girls, which happens to be in the middle of the week. and it is bowling. Therefore he calls the alley #. So shouldn't that go both ways? If I call him for whatever reason it happens to be for he should answer, correct?? I fax him poems, hide things in his suitcase for him to find, I write him sexual stories, I call him, say " I love you" and then hang up right away. So hmm!

 

Not sure what else I can do to show him how important he is in my life. I don't go anywhere. I take my son to school, pick him up and maybe stop at the store. If I happen to go anywhere else, the babysitter usually goes, just because I like some conversation along the way. I know you are probably saying, Gee big deal. but with him thinking that I am out "swinging" all the time, who would want to go anywhere?

 

Since we ended our counseling, I have tried to talk with him, and it seems that whatever I say is wrong. That is how is makes me feel, when he replies to my comments.

 

I understand that he forgave me, and that he hasn't forgotten any of it. He has demons, and the counseling was going to help him deal with them, and then he stopped going. So in the mean time, he throws it all back in my face, and now I get to sit here and take it?

 

As for the anal sex, I posted that because yes, my husband and I were curious about it. Mind you our sex life isn't dead. It is actually wonderful!

[sumdude]

Recently I started talking to another man a couple of years younger then me. He lives in a completely different state then I do. We have conversed over email's, IM's and voice chat. We get along great. He has sent me several pictures of himself and I the same. Have a wonderful time when we do talk. At first I thought nothing of it, but then I started feeling like I did when I first fell in love with my husband. The anxiousness, the pounding heart the entire 9 yards. This person is a person that I could see myself with, if I wasn't already married and In love with my husband.

 

You're telling us right here that this is more than just a freindship feeling. This is an emotional attachment, hence even an affair. Sounds like you and hubby are in a vicous cycle. He doesn't give you what you need, you get some of it somewhere else, maybe not sex but still you're making the same mistakes again. He can't trust you again. Round and round. Plus, methinks thou dost protest too much.

[reservoirdog1]

OK, so me talking to another gentlemen makes me having and emotional affair. It just amazes me that in 8 years, I have been a devoted wife to my spouse. I met someone that I have common interest with, and enjoying talking to and all of a sudden I am the bad guy. So he is entitled to have friends that are female, but I am not entitled to have male friends?

 

By your own admission, this guy gets your heart pounding and you'd want to be with him if you weren't married. Sorry sweetie, but that's an emotional affair. No wonder your husband doesn't trust you.

 

The fact that he was able to put your earlier (sexual!) cheating behind him and learn to trust you again says a lot about his love for you and his strength of character. You have no idea, however much you think you understand, of how difficult it was for him to once again place his trust in somebody who demonstrated that they didn't deserve it. And to have that trust shattered again? I wouldn't trust you again. He gave you a second chance and you blew it.

 

If you actually want to save your marriage, you're going to have to learn to communicate your needs to the person you swore vows of fidelity to, rather than seeking fulfillment of those needs through somebody else. That's Marriage 101. Learn the lesson, already.

[Moose]

I'm new here, but I have a similar situation that is eating at me.

 

I've been Married to the same woman for 16 years. She is a devoted Christian and Mother of our five beautiful children. She has never been one that's shows PDA on a regular basis and I have gotten used to that. We have been trying to grow closer together and it was working for a while. We started, "Spooning" when we sleep and for a while she couldn't sleep unless we did. She started showing more PDA and things where going great.

But now all of a sudden, she's gone all day while I'm at work, I'll call here cell phone and 9 times out of 10 she'll tell me she's at her Brother's watching his kids for his wife. ( She's a new Mother and well, she hasn't learned how to handle her kids yet.) Today she got real defensive and asked if I needed to know where she's at 24/7.....I lost my licence, ( Too many points taken off ), so she takes me to work and drops me off so she knows where I'm at 24/7. I get jealous when the only three places I go is Work, Church and Home, with the occasional stop at the bank so I can cash my check. So when she said that, I told her that she knows where I'm at 24/7 so why can't I know where she's at?

I've noticed other things too. She's very quite when we are alone, short with her answers, she hardly looks into my eyes anymore. I work in my office during the week and then weld out in the field on the weekends so night time is the only time we really get to spend time together. But she's been withdrawn and in our room reading when it comes time that we can use with eachother. Oh, the sex is still there and I have always had to be the one to instigate, I gave up because now she comes off like she doesn't want to have anything to do with me.

I also need to mention that she is one of the hottest women in the area and we live out in the country where noone can be seen coming or going.

Now I don't know if she's cheating or not, but I'm very insecure to begin with, ( Had a drunk step-dad beat submission and doubt into me during my childhood), so naturally I believe I don't deserve someone like her and since she can live without having sex with me leads my to think that she's getting it from another source.

Am I being stupid? I know I can talk to her like I have done a thousand times in the past, but it will eventually drift off to where I'm at now. Any advice anyone????

Thanks in Advance

The Moose

[KentuckyGirl]

Well, personally I think, if he said that he forgave you for having your affair, he needs to get over, and go on, if he wasn't going to forgive you then he needed to had filed for divorce. As far as talking to other men, your husband working out of town and gone for no telling how long how do you even know what he is doing while he is away, I mean they always say the one that does the accusing is usually guilty of something themselves

[dyermaker]

I can assure you that this will not fix itself if you don't end your emotional affair, let alone continue to justify your actions as harmless conversation.