Emotional affair "only" or more?

[66Charger]

Why do you think I am nitpicking? I saw it more as him not taking me seriously, and not keeping me in the loop when I was asking him to.

 

Also dipping in the 401K without telling me was pretty low of him.

 

I want to preface my response, noting the EA and everything tied to it is enough reason to divorce. I rarely defend cheaters male or female. Lets put that aside for a moment.

 

Just looking from the outside, you 2 have 5 (6?) Children. I assume you are a sahm. His primary function is to provide. Bring home the bacon, no excuses. If he doesnt, 6 children wont eat. Thats a huge responsibility and if he is accomplishing that, maybe you should cut him a little slack here. (Again, not for the EA)

 

The 401k money was not spent on the OW. It was spent on you. With 8 mouths to feed, he made a command decision that a family vacation (all or the 2 of you) was important.

Would you have vetoed this idea? Maybe.

But why is that low? Did you have fun? I know, I know you will say, but he should have told me, but dang! Low?

He made a decision as man of the house and you made him pay for that.

In my opinion, your reaction was low, not his.

The hardwood floor argument was ridiculous. He worried about your financial resources and you fought him about that? Why?

 

I assume this pattern was repeated many times over the years.

 

Let me offer a guess as to his thinking and difficulty to communicate (speculation)

 

Fear. Absolute fear that if he falters, especially financialy, the world comes crashing down. This you taught him. Instead of fighting, maybe you should have understood and given him a hug. If your H couldnt talk to you, it was probaly fear of your reaction. And not wanting to feel like a failure because even though he was trying his best, you may have seen it as not good enough. He simply didnt trust you to be understanding and by his side.

Women want men to communucate more, but if we do and we get a lashing, then we are not going to do it, no matter what you say.

 

Perhaps 50% of the communication problems lie at your doorstep. You have the EA, so divorce. But your trust issues (outside the EA) seem to be about communication. I assume since you have 6 children, the (ahem)"loving" part wasnt a problem?

 

Communication isnt just about talking. Its about listening.and trying to understand OR ACCEPT, the others point of view.

 

I am not saying your H was a saint, but did he do anything right? Does he feel that you think he hasnt?

I am just a anonymous poster and I may be completely incorrect. But I understand shutting down communication and why we sometimes do it.

Edited November 22, 2015 by 66Charger

[turnera]

66, do you know what a woman's top Emotional Needs usually are? Communication and safety. He apparently has learned from his folks to lie, evade, and withhold information to make his own life more comfortable.

 

Is she perfect? No? Is she typical and seeing the bad in her husband? Yes. Everyone does it. Does she have a valid reason to feel like this is all crazymaking? Absolutely.

[doble]

Lets make one thing clear, we don't know the full story because the OP cheated on her husband to and has only made passing reference to her infidelity as if it doesn't matter. Well from my personal experience it does.

She is spouting fire about trusting him (after baring 5 kids) but why would he trust her?

Both are cheaters yet she is blasting him. Perhaps her cheating caused this domino affect.

Amazing how those who cheated first get super pissed when there spouse does.

How dare them.

[turnera]

Well, you could flip that around, couldn't you? Maybe HIS cheating was more damaging than HER cheating. Yet she's the one here for advice on how to fix things.

[66Charger]

Wait a second, I completely missed that. She cheated? If so, what a hypocrite.

 

Got it now. You had a PA, left your husband for 3 years and you are betochibg over his EA. No wonder you cant accept that it was just a EA, because you did the deed.

 

My suggestion is that he leave you for 3 years, to get his head on straight.

 

I agree, cheaters hate to get cheated on. The only one who is gaslighting here, is you.

 

All your whining about trust is just hypocrisy.

 

For shame.

Edited November 22, 2015 by 66Charger

[EmbraceTheChange]

Hi 66 Charger,

 

I just had a talk with my husband about what you said - if it was fear of my reaction that was keeping him from saying anything. He said no, he just wanted me to be happy so he could be happy, and doing things on the sly so I wouldn't worry about anything (very co-dependent, never heard about it before the A).

 

He was (still is) a very good provider, so he thought he "should" have been good with managing the money, going places, buying everything we wanted. Which is admirable, I don't fault him on that. Expect that his parents never taught him to look after money. They are in the "poverty" mindset. Basically, whenever they have money, they spend it. Not on good, reliable things, but on cheap things. My FIL replaced his car each time it needed new break pads. They rented their tvs (works like phones, you get a brand new one every 2 years). Both of his parents were school teachers. They had good money coming in. Except they were always broke. They still have a mortgage in their 70s. My parents were the exact opposite. We had way less money when I was growing up (dad was a car mechanic + working in a factory), my mom was a SAHM + looking after kids from home. They have 2 rental houses now. All paid for. So our upbringing was slightly different.

 

My FIL was always doom-and-gloom. If something would/could go wrong, it was going to happen to him. My mil is on another planet. Everything is always "fine". When there are problems, she waits for them to go away or bury her head in the sand (she doesn't talk to me or the little kids anymore since Dday since I "over-reacted" when I chucked my husband out). It's always somebody's else fault. Her 2 kids are saints. My husband always wanted to be the Perfect Son to her, especially to make up for his train-wreck brother. She minimizes everything (my h's A was "silly" because it was not a "full blown affair" - God this hurt to hear). So basically, he wanted to be Mr Perfect here at home too. On everything. At home for me, again the opposite. We were put in place, punishments. If we did something wrong, we had to apologize and make things right. So again, we came from a total different place. I know my strengths and my weaknesses. I have no shame not to be perfect.

 

But for a long time the way he was brought up did not matter, because my husband was not like his parents at all. I was always so proud, so proud. He was always pro-active. He was always taking things in charge, for the better. Problems would get resolved. If he didn't like his job, he changed it. We moved to the US thanks to him. He was always passionate about his job, trying and making things better. He always got "exceptional" on his reviews. This guy was a DUDE. And I was so proud to be his wife. We were a top team, him and me. On Dday, we had 5 kids, money in the bank, rental house nearly paid off, new house in a very affluent area, and my husband got promoted to manager. We were the top team. I was so proud of us, so proud of him. I was holding the fort at home, he was doing his part at work. I was looking after the finances, saving loads (2k per month), he was hanging with the top guys from management. We were on top of the wave.

 

But really my husband had started to change, like his dad. He never told me because he didn't want to be like his dad. But I can see now. When our eldest son got his 1st d hall in 6th grade, I called my husband. I expected him to say that Z will have to do chores or something. Instead my husband went on a rant, how our son was screwing his education, wouldn't go to college, etc. So by the time I was talking to the vice-principal about doubling the d-hall hours, I was bawling my eyes out. Other "little" things started to appear, but like my husband told me this morning, he thought it was a "phase" that he didn't like his job anymore, that he should be "fine" sticking with it, even though he started to hate it and did not have any passion anymore. He felt "too old" to change job - the guy is 46. I wish SO MUCH that he would have talked to me instead of thinking the problems would go away, because I would not be so mad because of his A, for a start. The problems we had before were small change compare to now.

 

Now, the problem is I went from seeing my husband as the top guy to being a clown who was texting the AP during meetings, because she wanted distractions. He went to the gym on a Tuesday at 9am because she said it was quieter. He was running around the company's building at 10 because the AP wanted to have lunch with a friend at lunchtime. He was the manager-clown who was waiting every day at 3.45 outside the lab to take the AP back to her car. He was the guy who nearly got hauled in front of HR because somebody saw him hugging the AP in the carpark. He's the guy who was forwarding my pics of the kids to the AP. He's the guy who was sending her turtle pics. He's the guy who lied about early meetings so he could go running with the AP instead of having breakfast with his kids. The fall was pretty steep.

 

Yep, it's hard to not have contempt for the guy, after I was so proud of him. Last year, when it was time to step-up, he started to be the Invisible Man (avoiding me when I was crying), was telling me one lie after the other about his A (events that did not happen), he started fights so he could get drunk in hotels, started drink-driving. His mom told him that he was drinking because he was "bored" and that it was unfair that I was keeping him away from the kids (him totally drunk eating his dinner was a sight). I am still waiting my husband to come home, and start taking charge of things to make things BETTER. Instead I live with this alien who still works in his old company, who still hates his job and who still is a victim of having an affair.

[66Charger]

If you now see him as a clown for his EA, what were you during yours? What was your behaviour like during your PA?

Wow, the way you talk about your husband, wonder if he knows that. Perhaps he should have never forgiven you.

I really didnt mean to be harsh, but your thread now smacks of hypocrisy.

Edited November 22, 2015 by 66Charger

[EmbraceTheChange]

Hi Charger 66

 

Yep I was a slut, with no regards to my family, to my then-boyfriend and certainly not to myself. I was pretty insecure and when the OM started flirting, I was on a roll. As embarrassing and cringing as it is to think of it, when he started giving me attention and compliments, it was fun. Hey, somebody's interested in me! I'm so great! Of course it could not just stop at flirting, I had to push it as much as I could. The guy was pretty happy too. This happened 16 years ago, when I was 23. I was a total dog of course, with no morals. I can say it. There's no pretending, no looking for excuses. It is what it is. I was a dog.

 

But I grew up, you know? It's a shame I didn't have the wisdom then, but now my boundaries are water-tight. Waiters flirt with me in restaurant (I'm French, so I get plenty of "your accent is so cute!"). But for me, now, it's embarrassing. I just say thank you. I don't want anybody to flirt, I just want a quiet life with my husband and kids. I don't put myself in stupid situations, I don't want to embarrass my husband and my kids. I just want to be proud of me, because I am me. A good person, who makes good choices. Sure, I am not perfect by any means, but I don't justify to get away with things.

 

I said it before, but if I find out that my husband's A was a PA after all, it will be absolutely devastating. I don't really understand how me making a horrible choice, and him making the same horrible choice 16 years later would make me feel better. It's not a tit-for-tat marriage. He stole money from the 401K - does it give me the right to do the same? Nope. He lied to my face, can I do the same? Nope. I know how it feels, why should I do the same?

 

I would understand that you call me a hypocrite if I had an A 3 years ago, and would be crying now because my husband had one after that. But I'm not. My A was 16 years ago. I was a slut THEN. But I'm not anymore because I don't have the mindset of a slut, and don't behave like a slut. I have told my husband that he was a clown during his A. Because he was. I told my husband that he was a drunk arsehole. Because he was.

 

I was very very very grateful for my husband to have the capacity and the love to forgive me all these years ago. I worked my butt off for him to be safe. My A was always the biggest reminder of how I did not to be again. So I always tried my best to give my husband reasons to stay with me. And then my "best" was not enough when the AP entered the scene. 2 weeks after Dday I tried to commit suicide, I lost 65 pounds of weight due to stress and started self harming (jamming glass in my arms). But hey, I had an A. I should just accept the crap sandwich, right? It's my ego who's hurt. I can't take what I dished out, right? Right. And also it was my family who exploded AGAIN, through no fault of me this time, even though I tried my hardest for all of us to be happy, in spite of ****ty my behavior 16 years before.

[doble]

66Charger nailed it. You are a hypocrite. Don't matter how long ago, the fact is not only did you have a EA but a PA too. Your husband had the grace to forgive and hear you are spouting fire and brimstone at his EA and wondering wtf? Your husband forgave, but how did that effect him?????? Your cheating, being a slut with another man affected him, and in all probability led him to now. But it happened 16 years ago. So the f what. It happened. Now the shoe is on the other foot, he passed a lie detector and you have the audacity?

My ex left because we both agreed it wasn't working. Less than two weeks later she bedded my boss, a one niter and followed it by hooking up with a separated man. We weren't divorced and she didn't have the decency to wait. Sorry but I laughed when the second guy strung her along for years. That's another story.

She just like you cheated. It effects us, and can change dynamics, your cheating effected him, and here you are whining, and loosing 65 lbs over his EA, what about him. Embracethechange? What change? The new "moral" you??? You can dish it, but can't deal with it.

Hypocrite is to kind Charger.

[Krashi]

Yes, I totally understand. It would make more sense that he would have had sex with her than not. But still, he insists that she was only flirting, that it was only a game, that having sex with her would have been "really cheating", that it was only a fantasy. He says she never told him she wanted to **** him. So asking him to check if her "headlights were on" is not a big come-on? Apparently not. He admits that he was obsessed about hearing from her all the time, but only because he wanted to know if she still liked him. Yes, it sounds dumb to hear something like this, and even more to type it. Still, he sticks with it. And when I spoke to a co-worker of my husband, the guy told me she texted him to say she got hair removal on her "snatch", and if he could send her a picture of his "pecker".

 

I could (with difficulty) forgive him to have sex with her. But not lying about it. This would be the killer. I read enough stories about people finding out that the EA was all along a PA. Total game changer for me. It's one thing to have sex, it's another to lie about it for years.

I have read innumerable stories from betrayed spouses, and a very high % of cheaters deny, forever, having gone physical. They do this in the face of irrefutable evidence to the contrary. My x did ths despite my discovering a journal detailing the cheating.

One thing to understand about cheaters: these are people who are extremely practiced at lying and are very comfortable with it. They are conditioned to hold to their stories even if they look foolish doing so.

You,most likely, will never get an admission from your husband. I never got one from my ex, and never will, i am certain.

[66Charger]

I will not war with you OP. No one called you a slut. You defined yourself as a hypocrite, because the very premise of your thread was about trust.

 

Can you not see that trust is something that you destroyed. You played a HUGE part in this and you villified, spoke contempt, and cast your husband as a clown and you as the innocent SAHM. That was a little shady.

 

What a ridiculos statement, Saying he "stole" money from a 401k. That HE earned. For your vacation. You appear to try to paint your H with the worst brush possible..

 

Question for you. After your PA, you left your husband for 3 years. Did he suffer? Why do you feel you DESERVED a reconciliation and forgiveness? And why doesnt that apply to your H?

 

Oh never mind.

 

Just accept that he had sex outside of marriage(he didnt) the exact amount of times that you did. Then divorce his contemptfull, clownish, lying cheating, lazy, complaining, good for nothing ass of a HUSBAND., Did I get all the adverbs?

 

I have no idea what your thread is about and do not wish to influence so I withdraw all my comments and take my leave.

 

Good day Miss.

Edited November 23, 2015 by 66Charger

[EmbraceTheChange]

Ok, great point. Thanks for your help people!