We survived an affair

2011-04-20T16:56:00.001-04:00

It has been nearly 10 years now since I discovered my wife's affair, which she ended immediately. I've tried to be an ambassador for hope and what God can do in the direst of circumstances. I remain glad that we decided not to divorce after the affair, and that God helped us follow through on that commitment.

Honestly, though, sometimes I think it would have been easier if we had not stayed together. Not better, mind you, but easier. The affair still rears its ugly head on occasion. I still, after this much time, bear the scars. I have friends who split up after an affair and moved on to new marriages. I'm not saying that the affairs were not tough on them, but I have a feeling that it may be easier for those guys to put it behind them, as much as is possible. When both parties choose to salvage the marriage, the affair just doesn't go away. Something triggers a memory. A minor slight has greater significance. No matter how much time has passed, you know she has done it once and could do it again. Of course, anyone is capable of cheating, but going through it once provides irrefutable proof.

I don't know -- recent spats that ought to be forgotten as quickly as they come up seem to have bothered me more than they should. I still struggle with insecurity, with trust, with daily forgiveness. At the moment, I am a little depressed that a ten-year-old affair is still such a part of our lives. It is only a small fraction of what it once was, but still there nonetheless.

I just have to remind myself that I made a commitment -- not only when we first married, but again when we decided to stick together after the affair. It was the right decision for us, and I'm glad we made it. Of course it's hard -- marriage is hard, period, even without contending with an affair. If I thought that surviving an affair would bring us so close that we would never have problems, that I could develop selective amnesia, that she would be so greatful for my forgiveness that she would never disrespect me, or that all our problems (including those unrelated to the affair) would suddenly be over . . . well, that was rather deluded of me.

You go to school when your partner has an affair. You learn a lot, but you never, ever graduate.

Update

2010-03-03T12:56:00.003-05:00

Wow. It's been almost 3 years since I blogged, 8 years since the affair.

Every once in a while, a link gets passed along, and lots of new folks read the blog. It breaks my heart to think of all the people learning every day that their world has been turned upside down by infidelity.

I'm just checking back in to say, all is well. We have problems, but they are the same problems everyone has. I still have an occasional nightmare, and maybe I will until I die. I still cringe when I see a movie or hear a song that centers around a cheating spouse. I would not say it is over, because I don't think things like this are ever completely over, but now we are only dealing with scar tissue and not open wounds.

Good luck to you all, and God bless.

Chapter 23 - Pop-up Ads

2007-07-07T17:55:00.000-04:00

Here we are, nearly 6 years into recovery. It is rare that I think about the affair. Somethimes, though, something happens or comes up and it is a real struggle to take control of my thoughts, even this far into the battle.

Sometimes it is good to think about the affair. Say you find yourself in a situation where a person of the opposite sex is flirting with you, and you are married and have survived an affair. That would be a very good time to remember the affair as a reminder that no good, and a lot of pain, can result from a bad decision.

Or, like something we are going through right now, when you have friends who are going through marriage problems and you can see the train wreck coming. Someone says they just aren't happy with their spouse, he/she loves her/him but is not "in love" anymore (what the heck does that mean, anyway?), and so forth. That's a good time to think about the affair, because our experience can help someone. We can tell them that we've been there; they aren't alone; they are in a very dangerous spot and need to pay attention to the warning signs; but that with hard work, counseling, and faith, they can get back on track.

But most of the time, it just isn't helpful to think about the affair. It robs you of your joy and keeps you from seeing the good things about your wife, your marriage, your life.

When those thoughts come up, I call them "pop-up ads." Those blasted ads come up all the time on my computer. Buy this; get a loan; find your classmates. Is anything more annoying? When those pop-up adds come up, I immediately close them. Click - no thank you. Click - no thank you. Click - no thank you.

I do the same thing when thoughts of the affair come up. "She's going back to work -- she'll cheat again." Click - no thank you. I don't need that. "Your bad day at work happened because you aren't good enough - you're worthless and that's why she cheated." Click - no thank you.

You get the picture. With unwanted thoughts, like unwanted ads, it takes an act of the will to say, "That's not true - I don't need that thought and I'm not going to feed it or let it in." It is so much easier now than it was at first, and to this day some unwanted thoughts are stubborn and persistent.

I had what you might call a setback this week. My wife is late, as in she might be pregnant. We've sort of let nature take its course, not really trying to get pregnant and not really trying not to get pregnant. We have one child, and my wife's post-partem depression after his birth was a key event that led up to our marriage problems and the affair (that wasn't the only reason, mind you, and I contributed mightily to the marriage problems that made it too easy for one of us to decide to have an affair).

When she told me that she was late, I felt panicky inside. It was a "here we go again" feeling, and I'm having trouble shaking it. It may be more accurate to say that I became aware of my feelings, but they've actually been lingering for a while. They were lingering to the point, I realize now, that I was probably avoiding sex -- not completely, obviously, but I think part of me has been pulling away because (1) no sex means no pregnancy, and in my unacknowledged, flawed logic, no pregnancy meant no affair; and (2) if you put walls around your heart, you don't get hurt.

Once I became aware of these feelings, I could begin knocking them down. I knock them down by reminding myself of the truth: We want another baby. If she gets pregnant again, that does not mean she will have an affair. We're stronger now, and history is not going to repeat itself. And avoiding intimacy, and putting up the walls, is not the way to avoid pain. It causes its own kind of pain and cheats you of the joy of a good relationship. I repeat these truths to myself, sometimes even writing them down, and fight my bad logic with good logic. Fight lies with truth. Click, no thank you.

I'll keep at it for a while, making these unwanted thoughts a matter of prayer. If the pop-up ads just won't go away, I'll make an appointment with our counselor (the equivalent of running a virus scan?).

The point is this: Even after a long time, and even when things are going really well, I still have to be vigilant against hurt, anger, and resentment. I have to remind myself occasionally that I have forgiven my wife, and certain thoughts are no longer welcome. Over time, I have learned to deal with these in what I think is a healthy way, but it is a skill that I had to develop. You can control your thoughts and you can choose not to be weighed down by the past.

Soon it will be time to take a pregnancy test. Those pop-ups may come up again, but I choose not to let the distant past rob me of happiness today. Maybe, just maybe, we are about to enter another great chapter of our lives, and I absolutely refuse to miss it.

EDIT: Nope, not pregnant. Maybe next time.

Ch. 22 -- Who cares what people think?

2007-06-19T11:12:00.000-04:00

I’m still surprised every time someone asks me for advice. I’m the last person who should give advice. All I’m really qualified to do is to tell my story, and people should go to counselors for advice. Still, some of the exchanges I have had may interest others.

Here is an interesting exchange from a person whose feelings really resonated with me. She decided to try to reconcile after her husband had an affair, and now she is concerned about what other people will think about her decision:

--------------------------------
“I am a betrayed wife. My husband had an affair with a woman and decided to leave me for her. I fought. After a lot of back and forth, leaving, coming back, leaving, coming back, etc. I'll spare you all the details, but it has been horrible. Also, there were others before this one, although not “meaningful” to the extent this one was. We too had our problems before the affairs began, but I thought they were worked out and we were happy. He seemed absolutely thrilled and in love with me right up until he told me he wanted a divorce. Anyway, through it all, I confided in a couple of friends at work for support. They knew the gory details (I wouldn't do it again if I could go back) and they shared some of this with others at work. Now, I have lost one friend and seemingly everyone's respect by my choice to work on my marriage and save it. I loved my job before this and have the opportunity to move into a leadership position there in the next month. I fear I won't get the job or if I do, no one will respond to me as a leader. Do you have any advice
for me?”
---------------------------

I responded as follows:

-------------------------------

“Hi ___________,

Don't you sometimes feel wishy-washy about the decision to work on the marriage? Coming at it as a man, there were times earlier in recovery when I felt like an absolute weakling to have even entertained the idea of forgiving my wife. A real man, I thought, would have thrown her clothes out on the driveway.

But I know that isn't true. The easiest path by far would have been to walk away. What I did -- and what you did -- took tremendous courage. We gave our marriages a chance and proved that we were willing to work for what we wanted. I had a willing partner, and that made all the difference, but you are no less courageous because of a different outcome (I have no criticism for a betrayed spouse who decides to part ways with a cheating spouse – that is their right – my whole point in this blog though is to tell people that it is possible for a marriage to recover and that it is an option they should weigh carefully, as you did).

I don't know what to tell you about work, I really don't. In fact, I am not qualified to offer advice, and you should speak to a counselor about your questions. But I think that if a person thinks less of you because of how you responded when your spouse had an affair, tell them to jump in a lake. Nobody knows how they would react to infedility until they are faced with it.

If I was in charge of making the appointment and if I knew about your situation, I would count your experiences as a positive. You have demonstrated that you don't crumble in the face of a challenge, but instead are decisive, willing to do what is right whether or not it is popular, and can follow through.

No one much knew about our affair, but the lesson I learned is that even those people spent a lot less time thinking about me than I thought. Maybe that is true with your co-workers too. After an affair, you feel like the whole world is out to get you and that the rejection spreads far beyond your marriage. Some of the perceptions that you fear may not be as widespread as it seems. You may get into the new leadership position and learn that it is not an issue at all.

Whatever you decide, good luck!”
---------------------------------

Bottom line? Who gives a shit what people think. What is the right thing to do? I know every situation is different, but with all the affairs that are happening at this very moment, many are in marriages where there is a good foundation on which to build a recovery, and where the cheating spouse will repent and want to work with the betrayed spouse. If you are fortunate enough to have those circumstances and you decide to try to reconcile, I think that is just about the bravest thing you could do. I know deep down that it is the “manliest” decision I ever made. That said, I get it – I understand why someone might be afraid that people will think they are a wuss for taking the so-and-so back. I’ve felt that way too, but every single time those thoughts have crept in, I have remembered that (1) it doesn’t matter what they think, and (2) I am not, in any way, a “wuss” for loving a lovable woman who was willing to do what it took to recover. She was pretty darn brave herself.

Why Bother?

2007-01-13T10:43:00.000-05:00

Earlier I wrote that in my opinion, a person never completely recovers from an affair. In the same way, I think that a person never completely recovers from a death in the family or a divorce. You can heal and grow, and maybe even become stronger; the pain will subside and the event no longer defines you as a person and is not something that you continuously dwell upon; however, you never completely recover: A part of you is always different and the scars remain.

Someone commented, “If you never get to the same point that you would be had the event never happened....why would you bother?”

That’s a great question that I had to think about it for a while. Here is what I think:

1. Just because you may never get back to square one does not mean that your efforts to recover from an affair are fruitless. Whether or not your marriage survives, you as a person can grow well beyond the brokenness you feel when you first learn of the affair. The despair, the depression, the paranoia, all get better.

2. Maybe you can be, in some ways, even better than you were before. It is amazing how a trauma can make you a stronger person than you were before. You have scars, yes, but you can learn valuable life lessons if you choose to do so. I’m a better, stronger person because of what I have been through. That does not mean that I would choose to do it all again, but I can look back and see good that has come out of our situation.

3. What is the alternative? Spending the rest of your life in a fetal position? Always being a victim? I am not a leaf blown in the wind with no control over my life. Events will happen that I cannot change, but I can choose how to respond. The next time something bad happens to me (and there will be a "next time") I will give myself time to hurt and grieve. But then I will come to accept those circumstances and with God, I will get back up and move forward. If it is something someone has done to me, I will forgive. If it is something that is no person’s fault, just one of those times that life craps on you, I will not become bitter.

I don’t know if this will make any sense, but I will give it a shot. I would give anything for the affair to have never happened, but I would not trade the lessons I have learned from the experience for anything in the world.

A clarification

2007-01-09T09:46:00.000-05:00

I don't want to confuse anyone, for heaven's sake. A couple of people have mentioned "anger" and "disrespect" in my early posts directed toward my wife and the other man. It concerned them because, if I still feel such anger and disrespect after 5 years, then our marriage hasn't really recovered very much, has it?

When I sat down to write, particularly when I was writing about the initial year or so after discovery, I took a journey in time and some of those early feelings cropped up. When you first find out, of course you are angry. Of course you use heated language. Of course you lash out. That came through in my writing not because I live with those emotions any more, but rather I was simply recording, for my own benefit (and later, I hope, for others' benefit), my journey from A to B. I went back to A so I could better appreciate B.

I'm not angry with my wife about the affair. I was -- very, very angry, and rightfully so -- but I am not anymore. I forgave her and no longer hold it over her head. She owes me nothing. As for the other guy, he is not in our life and is not on our mind. I have forgiven him, too (I did not tell him so, but forgave him all the same), and he owes me nothing.

So please do not think I am angry or disrespectful to my wife. She made a mistake. A big one, yes, but it is history. I love her so much and I don't think of her as a cheater or an adultress. I can look back at the way she responded to this ordeal and see many admirable qualities. It takes guts to say, "I was wrong, and I'm going to change." She is a loving and courageous person with whom it will be my honor to spend the rest of my life.

In the immediate aftermath, I did not feel that way. Duh. And that comes through in the posts. Just remember, please, as you go with me back to A, that we are now happily at B. And if you are stuck in A, let us be proof to you that if you are both committed and if you trust God to breathe life into your marriage, you can get to B too.

2006-12-12T15:11:00.000-05:00

This is my story. It is rambling, sometimes crude, always poorly written. But it is mine.

My wife had an affair. I found out almost 5 years ago. With God's help, we made it.

I started writing all this down to help me work some things out. I hope others can benefit from it. This is particularly for the people who are wondering if it is possible to heal a marriage rocked by an affair. Anything is possible for God.

If you want the story, the posts are listed below in order.

I must warn you now: In going back through the story and my feelings, I tend to be fairly blunt in my writings. Sometimes the hurt and anger comes through. I use adult language and images to discuss a very adult situation. But while I was able to tap into the anger I felt at various times in the story, you should always remember that my wife is a brave woman. She is good. She is pure. She made a mistake, but the woman that I will kiss goodnight this evening is not the same person that she was in the times discussed in this blog.:

First post
Chapter 1 - D-day
Chapter 2 - D-day part 2
Intermission - How things are now
Chapter 3 - D-day part 3
Chapter 4 - Sunday, D-day +1
Chapter 5 - Q&A - Learning the details
Chapter 6
Chapter 7 - her job
Chapter 8 - talking to the other guy
Chapter 9 - Rings and things
Chapter 10 - How things change
Chapter 11 - Sex - The Ups and Downs
Chapter 12 - The Revenge Affair
My email address
Chapter 13 - The residue
Chapter 14 - False memories
Chapter 15 - Spiritual Roller Coaster
Chapter 16- Rediculous things I have done
Chapter 17 - 4 years and counting
Intermission / Feedback and comments
Chapter 18 - Passing it On
Chapter 19 - You can't fix each other
Chapter 20 -- Commitment and Withdrawal
Chapter 21 -- Permanent (?) rewiring
A clarification
Why Bother?
Chapter 22 -- Who cares what people think?
Chapter 23 - Pop-up Ads -- Dealing with unwanted thoughts

Chapter 21 -- Permanent (?) rewiring

2006-08-07T17:36:00.000-04:00

There is little more to be said about all this, but something recently struck me as curious. I've had occasions in recent weeks to see my wife interact with male friends. There was nothing inappropriate about the way she did so, but that did not stop this jealous beast from rising up inside of me.

Why? It's been so many years since the affair now that I have to stop and think about how long we have been dealing with this. An innocent conversation between my wife and another man did not bother me once upon a time. Now it does -- immensely. I wonder if the affair was such a dramatic event that while the pain has subsided, I have forgiven her, and we have healed in many ways, there are some areas of my hardwiring that are forever changed.

I may have already said this, but it is my theory that you never completely heal from something like this (just like you never completely heal from a death in the family.) You grow; you deal with the pain; things get better; but you never get to the same point you would be if the event never happened.

I dunno. But I do think that parts of my brain do not work the same way that they did before the affair. Some of the changes are good. Some are not. I don't want to go through life being jealous and paranoid without cause, and it seems much more difficult now to keep a check on those emotions than it did before. Whether it is permanent or will continue to ebb over time remains to be seen.

Chapter 20 -- Commitment and Withdrawal

2006-05-20T11:05:00.000-04:00

Another great question:

In one of your earlier posts you said that you have now found out that your
wife has had other men in her life pretty much throughout the marriage. Has your
wife now come to terms with the fact that this is probably one of the reasons
that your marriage was in trouble? I am sure that you were able to sense that
there was not a full commitment and you probably reacted accordingly. Do you
think this caused you to pull back from the marriage? Have you ever discussed
this?

I did sense that our commitments were not the same. My own parents divorced (after the kids were grown), and my attitude was marriage is for life no matter what. Only the four A's -- adultery, abuse, addiction, abandonment -- justified ending the marriage. I was determined not to follow in the footsteps of my father, who had a string of affairs, so I put guards up to keep from putting myself in a situation where an affair might develop.

My wife did not have that history and I think she had different attitudes about divorce. That's had, past tense. It was an option if things got bad or uncomfortable. She was not as guarded about opposite-sex friendships.

The tension showed itself in a variety of ways. I became resentful about her jobs because of the role I thought they played in her life. The work was not something she did to support the family or to develop herself as an individual. Rather, it seemed to me that work was an escape from the family for her, and in the battle between work and family, work would win every time.

Again, that's the way it seemed to me. Maybe those attitudes made her more likely to decide to have an affair, maybe not. Maybe I read her correctly about the role work played in her life, maybe I didn't.

I think my wife has a different attitude about divorce now than she did before we worked through the affair. I am certain she has a different attitude about boundaries with men, appropriate language, etc. I see it in her behavior.

Rightly or wrongly, the difference in her commitment, whether real or perceived, caused me to withdraw. But here's a question for you -- was the resulting damage to our relationship caused by her commitment level, or was it caused by my withdrawal? Had I not withdrawn, would her commitment level have continued to deteriorate?

I'm on the hook for my share in all this. She is no more responsible for my own failings than I am for hers.

Chapter 19 - You can't fix each other

2006-05-09T15:41:00.000-04:00

Someone asked this question in a comment:

How did your wife go about addressing the pain of the affair so that you would feel better in the end?

That's a great question, and difficult to answer.

You see, if I had just said, "You cheated, I'm hurting, and it's your job to make it better," I'd still be waiting. She couldn't make it stop hurting (no one could), no matter what she did or how hard she tried.

Now there were things she could -- and did -- do to help, but I "feel better" because of what I did, not because of what she did.

Let me explain. Before I was willing to re-engage and remain committed to the marriage, I had to believe that the affair was over and that she wanted it to stay over. By far, the most important factor in that was that I needed to be convinced that she understood how badly her decisions hurt me. For that, I needed her to apologize (she did) and I needed to see her remorse (I did). I saw her almost throw up from sobbing in agony over what she had done. It was real.

She tried to make it better by being loving to me, by changing behavior patterns (less flirty, conservative dress). While I appreciated these gestures, they didn't stop the pain.

Stopping the pain took time. A lot of time. And, I had to grow for the pain to stop. I had to stop playing the victim. I had to stop letting what other people think of me determine what I thought of me. These were things that my wife could not do. It was solely between me and God.

That isn't to say that if someone cheats, they are not responsible for the pain that they cause. They surely are and should do all they can to redress it. The pain is so awful, though, that you can't make up for it completely, you just can't. But if they want to try, they should apologize and express sincere remorse. They should change their behavior, stop the affair, cut off all contact with the affair partner, and be accountable for their time to earn trust.

But again, it won't be enough. At some point, the other party to the marriage has to let it go and just forgive. The pain gets better when you stop looking back and start looking forward, when you can again see the things in your spouse that attracted you to her in the first place and stop seeing her just as a cheater.

When I forgave my wife, it did much more for me than for her. I thought I was doing her a big favor, but the real benefactor was me. I didn't realize how heavy that grudge was until I stopped carrying it.

Don't look to your spouse to fix the pain. Give yourself time to hurt and to grieve, then let it go. It won't be immediate, or at least it wasn't for me. I let go little bits at a time, and as the pain decreased I was able to let go of more and more.

The affair does not control me and does not define me any more (nor does it her). I'll never forget it, but now when I'm reminded of the affair it doesn't bum me out for days on end. I think, "Wow, that was painful." And that's it.

Chapter 18 - Passing it On

2006-05-07T18:42:00.000-04:00

In 2 Corinthians, Paul writes that when we are comforted by God, we are able to pass that comfort on to others.

Maybe I just notice it more because of what we have been through, but after the affair it seemed like I was surrounded by infidelity. People everywhere were cheating and being cheated on, and I was in a position to give advice and comfort.

Sometimes I had to keep silent because of our decision to be as discrete as possible about our own situation. But when I could, I talked about what we had learned.

I got an email from a woman who had read this blog. I can't repeat it in its entirety because it was sent in confidence. My reply does not give away any of her personal information, so I copy it here as an example of what I would tell anyone who found out their spouse was cheating and who wanted to make a go of putting it back together:

Dear _______,

Thank you for sharing your story. My heart goes out to you and your family in this very difficult and tumultuous time.

I am not a counselor or a professional and I cannot tell anyone what they should do when they discover an affair. I only know what helped me during a similar situation.

I understand how difficult it is to decide whether to stay in your marriage, and that is not a question that anyone else can answer for you. If you are anything like me, then in the immediate aftermath of discovering the affair you are not in the best frame of mind to make life-changing decisions. Give it some time. Commit to yourself that you will stay for 3 months, or 6 months, or whatever, and then re-evaluate. You may be calmer then and able to see things more clearly.

There were many encouraging things about your email. From what you have said it appears that your husband is sincere in his effort to rebuild. He is opening up his life to you, being honest about what has happened, and has grasped the concept of complete separation from his affair partner (even if that may not be possible in the immediate future). He has made a step toward counseling by participating in your teleconference. None of these things is a guarantee that your marriage will survive (nobody has a guarantee), but these are signs of a commitment without which it would hardly be possible.

It sounds like you gave him a choice, he made it, AND HE CHOSE YOU. I hope you can find a way to see past the pain and appreciate that fact.

When my wife and I were in this situation, these are the things that in my opinion enabled us to repair our marriage:

1. Counseling. She and I both had individual counseling and we went together to marital counseling. Neither you nor your husband can go through this process alone.

2. The book titled Torn Assunder. It helped us both understand very early in the process that what we wanted to do would be exteremely difficult, but it was possible, and it gave us hope. It helped my wife understand the pain she had caused and it helped me understand that I would have to get out of the victim mode at some point if we were going to make it.

3. Knowing that I could survive even if my marriage didn't. I had a good life before I met my wife. I will have a good life if we stop being married. I would miss her terribly if my marriage ended either by death or divorce, but I would be OK. Once I figured that out, I wasn't desparate. I was hopeful and I was willing to work hard to meet my goals, but my life did not depend on my marriage working.

4. Open communication. We talked a lot about the affair, about how it made me feel, about what I needed to re-develop trust, and about the pain she was going through when she made those decisions. We later were able to talk about what the weaknesses were in our marriage that made it more likely to have an affair. Do you need him to call you from work everyday and tell you that he loves you, so that you will be reassured and you are guaranteed that you will be on his mind? Tell him. Do you need him to call you 5 times a day? Tell him. We men don't figure that stuff out by ourselves.

5. Discretion. We opened up completely to our counsellor and to each other, but to no one else except our pastor and one or two very close same-sex friends (we agreed not to talk about our relationship with people of the opposite sex, and I bet you see the importance of that!). That way we did not have to deal with the judgment and gossip that often goes along with a situation like this. I had to fight the initial urge to go tell her family so that I could enjoy their sympathy and have the satisfation of getting the world on my side. I think If I had done that it would have made things a lot harder for us.

6. Faith. Quite frankly, if we had both not been Christians, I do not see how we possibly could have gotten past the situation. We may have survived, we might even have stayed together, but as it is God used the situation to create a more wonderful marriage than I would have ever thought possible. We haven't just kept our marriage alive; it is truly more wonderful than ever before. In other words, we are not just "surviving." Like the miracle when Jesus turned water into wine, he took something in our lives that wasn't much at all and turned it into something extraordinary.

These are some things that helped us. I hope you and your husband will find what will work for you. I do not know what to tell you about getting through the days ahead until the end of the school year. They will not be easy. But you and your husband are on the same team again. Talk it through together. Talk it through with a counsellor.

On counsellors, I would urge you and your husband again to go to counselling and to do some research first. Make sure the counsellor you choose is pro-marriage. There are (I have heard) counsellors who will tell you that the best thing to do is just get a divorce and go your separate ways, or that you each should do whatever makes you happy. Find one that will support the decision you each have made to do your best to rebuild your relationship, and one who will help you work toward that goal.

I will pray for you and your husband. God bless you both.

Intermission / Feedback and comments

2006-05-05T10:47:00.000-04:00

Some people have raised some great comments and questions, through comments on this blog and privately via email. I thought I would address some of them here.

There's the woman who wrote:

thank you for writing this although we did not survive. it does clarify things. When I told my husband who I thought loved me very much (I still do believe that!) that I had feelings for someone else he basically just let me go. if he would have put up the slightest bit of resistance and offered to try to work it out I would still be there with my family intact. I give you kudos for being a man!

Well. I might misunderstand, but it seems to me that this woman had an affair and is blaming her husband for the divorce because he didn't beg her to stay when she said she was leaving. Thanks for the compliment on my undeniable manliness, but I don't think there is anything un-manly about the way this woman's husband reacted. If my wife had said she was leaving, I would probably have asked her to stay and commit with me to at least try to keep it together. But if she refused, I would not have stood in her way. She said instead that she wanted to stay, so we both put our efforts toward recovery. I'm not saying that a couple is without hope when the cheating spouse is determined to leave -- something can always change -- but a condition I set for working on the marriage after the affair was that the affair be over -- completely and immediately over -- and that she agree to work with me by going to counseling and in other ways.

Got another interesting comment from a woman whose husband cheated. She said that the Winnie-the-Pooh characters were big triggers for her. Now that's a story I want to here. Ma'am, if you're out there, more, please.

Here's a good one from someone who wants to disclose her husband's affair:

have not been in touch with the other woman but I so badly want to. Part of me wants to rip her apart , another wants to comfront her woman to woman. I don't know why but I just do. I have an email ready to send out to her e-friends, her pastor , her employer you name it. She and He would exchange office email jokes. I am in the anger phase and don't want to leave it.

I wonder what she decided. If she stayed in that anger phase, they probably haven't recovered much. If she disclosed the affair like she wanted to do, my bet is they are divorcing. I'm not criticizing her -- and she would be within her rights to get a divorce -- but this kind of disclosure is not compatible with putting the marriage back together. We kept it to ourselves, for the most part. We each had a Christian friend (of our own gender) to confide in; our counselor knew; our pastor knew; and that's it. Over time, we have shared our story with a very few other people, because they were going through things in their lives and were in situations where we could help them by sharing.

Right after D-day, I was pissed at our counselor. We had been in counseling the whole time the affair was going on. The counselor knew my wife was cheating, but I didn't, and I felt betrayed. Here's a question I got about that:

When you found out that the counselor knew about the affair and still concentrated on your issues for the previous year did you think about finding another counselor? I know that I would have been pissed.

Yeah, initially I thought about getting another counselor. Ultimately I realized that this guy couldn't have told me, because my wife had told him about the affair in confidence. We would see him together sometimes and separately sometimes, and he couldn't tell her what happened in our private sessions, or the other way around. He told me all that he could. I was angry at everybody in the world at first, the counselor included, but he was just doing his job. And in fact, he was doing it very well and was a tremendous help to us. The affair was a big thing that we were dealing with, quite obviously, but there were other issues in our marriage too, and he was right to focus on those. In hindsight, he did us a great service just by keeping a dialogue going, even if it wasn't about the affair that, at the time, I did not know about. I had no grounds to be angry with a counselor because he protected his client's confidences.

Thanks for these questions and comments, and I'm so glad that my story is helping other people.

Chapter 17 - 4 years and counting

2006-02-08T10:31:00.000-05:00

Last month was the 4-year anniversary of d-day, the day I discovered my wife was having an affair. The previous 3 anniversaries were alike. I would spend the day somber and moody and depressed, seeing if she would bring it up. I hoped she would, so I could know that my suffering was important to her. At the same time, I hoped she wouldn't, so I could have a great excuse to get pissed off. Really mature, I know.

This year was different. On February 1, I realized that the anniversary had passed several weeks ago and that it had never once crossed my mind. Now that's progress.

The affair is still a prominent presence in our lives, but not directly and we don't often think about it. But you don't go through something like this without being permanently changed.

I don't trust people like I used to. That isn't to say that I am distrustful of everyone or that I assume everyone is out to hurt me. With my wife, it is not that I think it likely she will hook up whenever she leaves the house. It's just a recognition that it could happen, just like it could happen with me or with anyone else. When you least suspect it, each and every person could make a couple of bad choices and bam -- he or she is betraying everyone they love and everything they once stood for.

It made me more assertive. I'm much more likely to speak up when something is bugging me than I used to. She's a little less likely to do so. For a while, those trends were probably the result of righteous superiority on my part and guilt on her part, but trends become patterns and patterns become habit, so we do not relate to each other in the same way.

A shrink could find other ways we changed. Some changes are improvements, some aren't.

On trust -- someone emailed me and said she was having difficulty learning to trust her husband after he had an affair, and that a counselor had said that she just needed to just move on and trust him.

That's bullshit. You have to earn my trust. It isn't something I just make up mind to do and give it away.

With my wife, trust grew over time. As the evidence stacked up that she wanted to be faithful and that she was structuring her life to make it less likely that she would repeat the same mistakes, I would trust her more.

At some point, the evidence in favor of trust is such that is no longer rational to doubt the other person. It no longer makes sense to assume that they would jump at any opportunity to cheat on you. At that point, yes, a person does need to move on. But that takes time, and lots of it. So while trust is in a part a decision and a matter of will, it is a decision based on evidence of good behavior, not unverifiable promises.

Chapter 16- Rediculous things I have done

2005-12-28T15:50:00.000-05:00

I was so lost after learning of my wife's affair. The ground was pulled out from under me and I felt like I was thrashing about in the water looking for any safehold. At the same time, I lost all self esteem I ever had. Obviously, if she had an affair, I must be a terrible lover and have no sex appeal.

I wanted to feel better about myself. I wanted to feel sexy. In my mind, the way to do this was to be completely different from who I was, because who I was must not be sexy at all.

It seemed so very sane at the time.

I considered several activities and changes that would be out of character for me. A lurid affair of my own was considered and quickly rejected (see previous post). I thought of sky diving, but there was nowhere near my home that offered lessons and the cost was too great. I next thought of a tattoo. It would definitely be out of character, but it had a quality of permanance that, even in my haze of self-pity, I knew I would one day regret. I could dye my hair, but that was too abrupt an outward change for me.

So I made the logical choice and had my nipple pierced (God, I'm so embarrassed as I write this). It was outlandish, cheap, private, and reversible. Also pathetic, looking back, but it actually felt really good to live on the wild side.

Of course I couldn't show anyone. I was grounded enough to be embarrassed about it, and it would require explanations that I wasn't ready to give (remember, no one else knew what we were going through).

Anyway, I kept it for about a week. Then I took it out, everything grew back the way it was, no harm done.

Obviously, there were better ways I could have handled this. In hindsight, what I needed to do was to realize that my wife made a terrible decision that was not reflective of my merits as a husband or a lover. She didn't cheat because of who I was, and therefore it did not mean I was ugly or lousy in bed. I might be both, but that's not why affairs happened. Had I realized these things, I wouldn't have been so desparate to feel good about myself.

Actually, it is just this kind of desparation that leads some people to have affairs. For whatever reason, a person is desparate to feel special and loved, or simply gets caught up with the excitement of the moment, and they do something stupid and out of character. It took a nipple ring for me to get some insight into my wife's mind and make me realize how a good person could do such a foolish thing.

By the way, getting your nipple pierced hurts like a son of a bitch.

Chapter 15 - Spiritual Roller Coaster

2005-12-02T12:01:00.000-05:00

I became a Christian at the age of 9. Young, yes, but it was real. Like everyone else, I have at times done much better than others in my spiritual journey. There have been times when I just felt closer to God than others, and that was always when I was doing a better job of spending time regularly in prayer and Bible study.

In the months before I learned about the affair, but when I realized my wife was thinking of leaving me, I was as close to God as I have ever been in my entire life. I needed Him and He sustained me during that time. In fact, I got to a critical point in my journey, which is the realization that if my marriage fails, I will be OK. If any other disaster strikes, I will be OK. If all I have left is God, that is enough.

But then I learned about the affair, and without realizing it I turned my back completely on God. I was pissed off. All those months of seeking Him and this is the thanks I get? Looking back, it was a lot of feelings that led to the distance. Part of me may have thought that it's the spouse who remains faithful who is the fool -- I was doing my job and keeping the faith while my wife was out having the time of her life, and then . . . .

after all that . . .

God is going to forgive her. She's going to get off scott free. It wasn't fair!

If I had remained close to God in the months after D-day, things would have gone alot better, and our recovery would probably not have been as long. I likely could have sooner reached a point of forgiveness. As it was, I did not even realize how far I had drifted for a couple of years. When I distanced myself from God, I lost sight of the fact that my value comes from being in Christ, and being with Him is the only place where I will always be accepted, where I will always be whole. When you lose sight of that, and you try to find your self-worth in your job or your marriage, then you don't know how to handle it when your job or your marriage fall apart.

Being distanced from God, forgiveness was next to impossible. I wanted justice! But in Him, I can remember that I have been forgiven so much, and I have no right to look down on any other person.

You would think that I would learn. When I take something out of God's hands and try to handle it myself, I muck it up. The recovery was no different. It was not until I remembered my place in Him and leaned on his power, not my own, that we made real progress.

Chapter 14 - False memories

2005-11-17T21:39:00.000-05:00

I recall one reaction immediately after the affair was a profound sense of insecurity. The world shakes under your feet and you feel as if there is no safe place to stand. The person you trusted the most has betrayed you, so you doubt everyone.

One factor that increases the feelings of insecurity is that you don't even know whether you can trust your memories of your prior relationship. When you learn that things are not as they really seem, you wonder about all of the feelings you've had toward your spouse and all of the things you did together. When we went to that new restaurant, was her heart really in it, or was she thinking of him? When the family went to the zoo, did she call him on her cell phone when she went to the bathroom? You think nothing was as it seems.

There is a little bit of truth to it -- it wasn't as it seems -- but that does not mean that it was all bad. But you tend to throw out all the good memories, just in case. As a result, it is like you lose entire years of your life in one moment. It is so unsettling. If our experiences are part of our makeup, and if I no longer trust that those were what I thought they were, then who am I?

Chapter 13 - The residue

2005-11-17T21:27:00.000-05:00

I've thought a lot about how I'm different now after what we've gone through. Some of the changes are good. I'm more sensitive now to my wife's moods and feelings. I have a better sense of what can happen. I have a more realistic view of what people are capable of doing.

Before, I was pretty naive. I trusted blindly. I haven't lost all trust like some say they do, but guess I've gained a healthy sense that any person, under the right circumstances, is capable of anything.

Some of the changes have not been good. I'm working on those now. After the affair, I walled myself off from everyone. I felt so isolated. In a way, I was, because of the need to keep our privacy. But I made it worse. I was never a very open person to begin with, but after the affair I quit reaching out entirely. I lost friends, and now I've lost a job. At work, I kept to myself so much that every single relationship I had suffered. I'm in a job that requires teamwork, but I stopped being a team player. I was so mad at the world, and so lonely, that my career suffered greatly.

These reactions on my part were a result of the affair, but they are not my wife's fault. I made choices to live only for myself, and I'm reaping the consequences. Although the affair was not my fault, my reactions to it are my fault and no one elses. It's taken me a very long time to recognize that.

I'm doing much better about reaching out to my wife now, but I have a long way to go with everyone else. There are a lot of fences to mend, and I worry about being up to the challenge. But, if we can make it through the aftermath of an affair, and come out better for it, I can do this.

My email address

2005-11-12T22:03:00.000-05:00

Wow. People are actually reading this thing.

Someone said they can't get to my first few posts. I don't know how that works. But if you want them, you can email me at we_made_it_blog@yahoo.com and I'll be happy to send them to you.

Or, if you want to comment or ask questions, I would like that. I don't want to go through this hell if I can't help somebody.

I can't tell you if you should get divorced or not. I can't tell you if your spouse is cheating or if they're still cheating. All I can do is tell you what happened to us and what worked for us.

Good luck to all of you

Chapter 12 - The Revenge Affair

2005-11-12T21:35:00.000-05:00

No, I didn't have one. But I thought about it. A lot.

This was very early on. The whole thing made me so sick, I started thinking that the only way to get past it was for her to feel what I felt, for her to see how terrible it is to go through. She deserves it, I told myself. I deserve it, I told myself.

I never took one single step in that direction. But if I had known a woman who would have been a likely affair partner, it would have been too, too easy to slip down that slide.

I think this is pretty common. Not just the abstract desire to get even, but the specific desire to get even by having your own affair after your spouse does. I don't think I was ever really serious about it, it was just a revenge fantasy. A very unhealthy one.

I have a pretty good idea what would have happened if I had cheated. I would have gotten caught, because I'm careless and a terrible liar. And we would have gotten divorced. Not that she's less forgiving than I am, but because we already had enough stress to be going on with.

Eventually I realized how rediculous the idea was. I didn't want to be a cheater. I didn't want to get divorced. And I know it isn't noble, but I didn't want to give up the advantage I had by being the "victim."

Whatever the reason I didn't act on it, thank God I didn't. Now, I could not bear the thought of hurting my wife in that way.

I've redoubled my efforts to be faithful. If a woman is walking in front of me, I look at the ground. When I travel, I do not travel with a woman. I don't talk to women about their relationships or mine.

Nine commandments are fair game for me. I don't make a habit of killing or stealing, but I do not deny that I have enough evil in me that under the right circumstances, I could do it. But cheating? That one's off the table.

So if anyone is out there, and if you're thinking about a revenge affair, for God's sake don't do it. You're better than that. Chances are, your spouse had no idea the hell it would put you through. Now, you know exactly the hell it would put your spouse through, and you could say that would make you more guilty than they were. Don't do it.

Chapter 11 - Sex - The Ups and Downs

2005-11-12T20:22:00.000-05:00

I guess I had to get to this part sooner or later. How does an affair change your sex life?

Even before the affair started, this wasn't exactly the highlight of our marriage. I'm a guy. I wanted/needed sex more than she did. It caused tension at times. That's the story of most couples I know, at least as far as I know.

But there were some pretty long dry spells. As a conflict avoider, I wasn't good at being up front about my feelings and needs and would withdraw. When I withdrew, she was even less interested in sex, and I withdrew more, and so on.

Around the time the affair started, we slacked off. A lot. But we had done that before, so it didn't necessarily raise any red flags.

Immediately after the affair, I couldn't even undress in front of my wife. Honestly, I was repulsed at the thought of sleeping with her. All I could think of was what she had done with him. She seemed dirty to me.

We tried for the first time a couple of months after disclosure. It was a heat of the moment kind of thing, and as long as I was just acting on hormones I was fine. But then my mind set in, and the images started flowing. Uh-oh -- I'm not as good as he was. She's comparing us. I bet they did this and it will remind her . . . .

And so much for that erection.

So it was a race. Whenever we tried to have sex, I knew I had to orgasm quickly, or I would start thinking about the affair and the evening would end in disappointment. Of course, on the rare occasions that I succeeded in the sprint, her evening would end in disappointment.

Another problem was the antidepressants. I started on Celexa soon after disclosure, and eventually switched to Effexor. One side-effect of these drugs is "delayed ejaculation," at least for some men. So even if I succeeded in focusing on the moment, eventually one of us would start looking at the clock. For one reason or another, every episode seemed to end with a whimper, not a bang, because of my performance anxiety.

Truth is, she wasn't thinking about the affair or the other person nearly as much as I was, or even as much as I thought she was. A lot of it was just in my head.

Like everything else, it took time for our sex life to improve. It did not get better until both of us got better. For me, that meant forgiveness, in stages, and becoming comfortable that I didn't have competition any more. She chose me, I would remind myself.

I think this is a way men and women react differently. I remember my wife asking me, Why have you never asked if we loved each other? There were two reasons. One was that I knew it wasn't really love, regardless of whether they thought it was. Second, I was too freaked out about their sleeping together to care about the feelings that may have been present.

I think it must be easy to have great sex in an affair. There's the newness and excitement of a relationship. And you're only giving your best to each other. Anybody can get along if you never see each other with bed-head and morning breath, and you don't have to deal with kids and mortgages and fixing dinner and mowing grass. What kind of relationship is that? I just don't think it can be love if your only giving someone a little part of your life. So I guess I came to realize, it doesn't matter whether or not the sex seemed better to her. To this day, I don't know if it did or not, and now I don't care. It is better with me -- even if it's sometimes clumsy or too short or too long - because I love her.

So after the affair, my ego was blown, and as a result our sex life was too for a while. I guess good sex can improve a bad relationship sometimes, but for us the relationship had to come first.

Chapter 10 - How things change

2005-11-11T13:24:00.001-05:00

To present day. I haven't added to the blog in over a month, and it is just because my marriage is going well. My wife and I are very, very happy, and I haven't been in the mood to talk about what we went through.

I'm having a bad time at work -- just normal career problems that have escalated to the point that I may make a change. I want to write more about those problems and how I have handled them (and mishandled them), because they relate to the affair experience. (The short version: I got used to playing the victim, and it affected my work relationships. Even though they had no idea about the affair, I let my marital problems -- and the pity party I let go on too long -- get in the way at work, and I'm paying the price).

Here is what I have to say about it today. Even though some of my problems at work are a direct result of the affair, I do not blame my wife. And, in dealing with the uncertainty of a career change, my wife and I are a team.

Think about what this means. For my perspective to be this way, I had to forgive, and it demonstrates to me that I have forgiven her completely. It also means that, while it is not my fault that she decided to have an affair, the affair was really only one component of our problems, and I have shared responsibility for the overall problems. You can only see that after a lot of growth and the perspective of several years of hindsight.

Plus, we see our lives and our futures as being linked together. We're a team. We are truly husband and wife, not just two individuals who share a kid and an address. I'm not sure that was true before she had an affair.

In other words, we are better now than ever before.

Chapter 9 - Rings and things

2005-10-10T09:39:00.000-05:00

It was pretty random, what would send me off. A lot of people call them "triggers" -- things that reminded me of the affair. Obviously her work was a trigger, because the other guy was there. But the less obvious could be a trigger too. Bluegrass music, of all things (they went to a Nickel Creek concert together). Hiking (one of their dates -- the one that resulted in photos -- was to a nearby state partk). Massages (don't ask).

Some of the things made sense, some did not. Our wedding rings was a trigger and I don't know which category I would place it in. To her, the rings were just a symbol with lots of good memories, and she could not understand why I would associate any bad feelings with them. To me, I hated our rings. Mine was a symbol of promises she did not keep, and I'm not sure she meant them when she made them. Hers, she either took them off to have sex with another guy, or she wore them when having sex with another guy, and either way they were spoiled.

We compromised. She got me a new ring which I now wear, proudly. It symbolizes our new commitment. For her, her original rings reminded her of her commitment to me and held special meaning to her. She did not associate her old rings with anyone other than me. If they were meaningful to her, then I could focus on that. We each gave a little.

I went through a phase where I just wanted to purge our lives of anything that had any negative association. We moved to another neighborhood. I asked -- and she agreed -- that we get rid of the dresser where I found the souveniers. One non-negotiable for me -- any intimate apparel she wore with him had to go. It went.

Did it help? I don't know how much difference it made, but I'd do it again.

Chapter 8 - talking to the other guy

2005-10-08T18:38:00.000-05:00

After d-day, I thought long and hard about whether to make contact with the other guy. There was so much I wanted to say, not a bit of it that would have been helpful to anyone. I actually went to their workplace a couple of times to see him, but he either was not there or there were too many people around. My goal was to let him know how much pain he had caused and how wrong his actions were. As if he didn’t know. I believe God was at work and that it would have been very destructive if we had met then.

Eventually, my goals changed. I still wanted to talk to him, but not to make him feel bad. I wanted to hear from him, man to man, if he intended to honor our commitment to reconcile and if he would agree never to contact my wife again. I prayed that God would lead me and would guide me to say only what was constructive.

I caught him in his office after hours one evening and asked if he had a minute. He recognized me, politely invited me in his office, and said “I guess we better shut the door.” I sat down, he sat down, and he looked nervous and miserable. I said, “I am not here to talk about the past. There is a lot I want to say, but I don’t think it would be helpful and my guess is you already know how I feel about what went on. What I hope to do is talk about the future. You already know that we want to move forward and we hope to reconcile. I need to know what your intentions are toward my wife and if I have your commitment to never contact us again.”

He said that he had gotten my wife’s letter that I had nothing to worry about from him – he said “I am out of the picture.” He also said that he had respect for me for wanting to reconcile in spite of what happened and for what I wasn’t saying in the present conversation. He started to apologize, but I was getting pissed off. Who the hell was he to compliment me? I could only guess what they were saying about me when they were involved in the affair, and I was not going to listen to him now. I had what I came for and stopped him. “If you are trying to apologize,” I said, “don’t bother – I am nowhere close to being ready to accept it. I think this is a good time for us to part ways.”

And we did.

Chapter 7 - her job

2005-10-08T18:37:00.000-05:00

The other guy was worked at the same place as my wife. They were in different departments but their offices were just a few doors down from each other. In my view, there was no way we could recover unless she quit that job.

I brought that up at our first counseling session after D-day. She said she was not willing to quit but would agree not to talk to him or be alone with him. I agreed to those terms and that is the decision I regret more than any other in the discovery process.

There was over a month after D-day before the spring term started. During that month I began to have second thoughts about her work. I finally told her that I know what I had agreed to, but I could not do it. She very reluctantly agreed to arrange for her office to be moved to another building and for her meetings to be in that building, although I do not believe she thought (at the time) that it was necessary. In her mind, the affair was over. She had written a letter to the other guy saying that their relationship was over, that what they had done was wrong, and that her energies would now be directed toward repairing our marriage. He had not tried to contact her since then (she claimed, and I guess I believe her), so according to her there was no risk.

Every day she went to work was a day of misery for me. Whether they spoke or not, I knew they probably would see each other. Even if they did not see each other, it was just too close. Just having to consciously avoid each other kept everyone on each others’ mind. This went on for 1 ½ or 2 years after d-day. Finally, I could not stand this any more and gave an ultimatum.

To me, her continuing to work so closely to him was dangerous and foolish, not to mention disrespectful toward me. I still believe it was. Our recovery went to a new level once she stopped working there and it was no coincidence.

There just can be no recovery if there is ongoing contact between affair partners. In our case, I do not believe they were talking to each other, but they were still part of each others’ work life. If you are so close that it takes work to avoid each other, you’re too close. I would not recommend a compromise on this important point.

Chapter 6

2005-10-07T15:54:00.000-05:00

In the 2 or 3 months immediately after D-day, I was two people. One was at peace that however this turned out, I was doing the right thing. The other was full of doubt. One was determined to get her to love me and find me attractive, the other could not care less what she thought of me or anything else. One didn't want to see her again, the other -- the one I've thought about today -- obsessed over her every word and deed. I wanted to know where she was at all times. Who was she talking to? Who did she see? Did she talk about me? Is she going to bail?

It's Friday today, and that was the day they usually saw each other. For a long time after the affair, Friday's sucked -- it was all I could think about. If I tried to call her on a Friday and could not reach her, I panicked.

I spent a lot of time checking phone bills, caller ID, and just generally checking up on her. I didn't trust her. It took a very long time before I did, and even today my trust is not what it was before. Now, I believe my wife hates what she did and would rather die than have another affair. But I don't have blind trust any more. There's a chink in her armor. It means she has to be even more careful than the average person to keep proper boundaries and guard herself against dangerous situations.

Plus, until recently, she was never truly faithful to me. I had not realized it, but there was almost always someone else she was turning to for kicks (it was sexual with only one guy). What blame do I have for that? Sure I dropped the ball here and there, just as she did, but if she felt like something was missing from the marriage, she would try to get it somewhere else. It was a recurrent, almost continuous pattern. Unless someone convinces me otherwise, I'm going to assume she has a serious weakness with commitment, or faithfulness, or whatever it is. That does not mean she is not committed to me or that she will cheat again. It just means, in my opinion, that she is more vulnerable than some to the temptation that we all face. It has nothing to do with her intentions, which are good and right.

Part of the problem was a flirtatiousness that was attractive in the beginning, but which wore on me during our marriage. She was always a guy's girl who enjoyed hanging out with my friends, and there was always a lot of playful banter. As the years went on, I got more and more uncomfortable with it. I told her so, but she got pissed off, said it was just who she was and she wasn't changing for anybody. I saw the flirting as annoying, but I now see it was dangerous.

Flirting says you are available. Do it enough, even joking, there's a chance you will start to believe it. Plus, it was completely disrespectful of my feelings. Nonetheless, she was always good for a double-entendre, a dirty joke, or inappropriate comment when she was around guys.

Her dress also changed. She dressed more and more provacatively leading up to and during the affair. She looked good, she really did, and is a very sexy woman. Once she bitched at me for not saying more about it, and I told her it was difficult to say it when I thought she was crossing the lines of what was appropriate in the work place and when I knew it wasn't for me. She left the house looking like a million bucks, but when I got home from work it was sweat pants if I was lucky.

I remember telling her, "When you dress to go out, your clothes say 'fuck me.' Whenever I'm around, your clothes say 'fuck you.'" That's the way I felt.

Now I had my faults, and they were plenty, both before and after the affair. But I'm not writing about that now, because this is about the affair and the aftermath. Whatever my failings were, she is responsible for the decision she made to go ouside the marriage. It's just a different issue.

Chapter 5 - Q&A - Learning the details

2005-10-06T09:46:00.000-05:00

This is my blog about how our marriage survived my wife's affair. Please start with "First Post" below.

On Monday morning, 2 days after D-day, we had a counseling session. I started out angry with the counselor. My wife and I had both visited with him individually over the past year and we had seen him together. Largely, at least it seemed to me, the sessions were about what I could do to help my wife be satisfied. Now, I learned that the counselor had known my wife was having an affair.

My anger was misplaced. I am now quite certain that he was very blunt with her during their individual sessions, and he was ethically prohibited from telling me. He had encouraged her to tell me, but that was all he could do. Still, I felt like I had been played a fool, spinning my wheels and jumping through hoops for a year, when if I had known the truth we could have been addressing a different issue.

I got those feelings off my chest and we were then steered to the matter at hand. The counselor began by assuring us that we could get past this, with a lot of help and very hard work. Then I got to vent. He said -- to both of us -- that it was important that my wife understand the pain she had caused and that the affair would dominate our thoughts and therapy in the short run, and I had to understand that in due time we would need to return to issues in our marriage where we shared fault and that helped create an environment where an affair was more likely to take place. He also said that I needed the truth, the whole truth.

We made a deal. Wife agreed to answer my questions about the affair truthfully, however painful. I agreed that I would have limited time -- so many days -- to raise such questions, and after that time I would not ask her any more sordid details.

Two things were mose shocking. One was that there had been other relationships. None of those had been sexual, but she admitted that she had gotten closer to a couple of other guys than was proper. She wasn't ready yet to categorize them as emotional affairs, but they were.

Second, in the only detail about sexual practices I wanted to know, it had included oral. That bothered me on a completely different level. It just seemed more intimate, violative.

I learned the whens and wheres, their routines. When it started, how long it had gone on, that sort of thing.

I would not have been able to go on without getting these answers, but getting into the dirty details made me just disgusted with my wife. For a while I saw her as dirty and could hardly bear to look at her. I started wondering if this was huge mistake and if I could ever have any respect for her again. Those feelings faded over time, but it still affects me. I do not see my wife as spoiled any more -- on the contrary, she is pure. She has repented and has been forgiven by God and by me. But, our sex life today has a lid on it. Just an example, I would not want her to talk dirty in bed because it would remind me too much of who she used to be.

For the next few weeks, I bounced back and forth between fury and self-loathing. I was so angry at her, at the other guy, at God, at the world, at myself -- it consumed me. Then I would feel not angry, but almost understanding. That thought process went like this -- She cheated, so I must be a loser. And if I'm such a loser, no wonder she cheated. I just don't have what it takes.

I've never been a big guy. Since college I've bounced between 140 and 150 pounds. Over the next 8 weeks I dropped to 125 pounds and a 29 inch waist. My frailty only increased my conviction that I was not sexy, not attractive, not loved, and not a man.

Chapter 4 - Sunday, D-day +1

2005-10-06T00:01:00.000-05:00

Ah, the next day. Two nights without sleep, and I was scheduled to teach Sunday School that morning. I could have called in sick, but I taught the lesson to our young couples' class. I don't remember what it was about, but I do know that I never taught with more passion or more love for God.

I didn't feel much love for anybody when I got home. Wife had not gone to church. I don't remember how we spent the afternoon except that our son got back from his grandparents somehow. He was 3 or so at the time.

This, I don't recommend to anyone. My wife was getting beligerant, defensive. She told me a youth counselor had abused her as a teenager. That made me furious that she would bring it up at the time. What an awful, traumatic thing for her to go through, but she had never told me before, and all I could think was that she was trying to draw attention away from what she had done. She was also telling me what a crappy husband I had been all these years. She was trying to change the subject.

Enough, I thought, and let her have it with a continuous flow of lovebusters (if you don't know what that is, see Dr. Harley's web site, marriagebuilders.com). I asked her if she realized I would have to be treated for STD's. I asked her where our son was when she was (insert inappropriate graphic description of what I was imagining they had done, which pretty much turned out to be correct). What did she think I was doing at work when she was (ditto). Etc., etc. She cried for the first time.

I don't claim that I did the right thing, but during and after that conversation she seemed to realize what she had done and what it had cost, what she had let herself become. I later learned that she had to deal with guilt and self-doubt all during the affair, but soon after she was confronted her walls went up. Coming face-to-face with it, hearing me use words I had never used before, opened her eyes.

One other thing I remember about that day. We rode together to the post-office. I had said I wanted the crap I had found out of our house. She said we should return them to the other guy. I was in the process of telling her that it was out of the question, when I had an idea. I put it in an envelope and addressed to the other guy at his workplace, and put my son's name on the post mark. It wouldn't give anything away, but it would sure as hell send a message to him. Not smart, I know, but it felt good. I had to pay a lot and for a long time for these things I did that felt good at the time.

Chapter 3 - D-day part 3

2005-10-05T15:47:00.000-05:00

This is all such a blur - and that's a good thing.

That afternoon, we went together to a book store and bought copies of Torn Assunder, a book our counselor had mentioned on the phone that morning. It was all so up and down that day. On that trip, I was full of optimism. I was relieved to know what was going on. I was hurt and devastated too, and still in shock. I felt every emotion you can feel.

As soon as we got home, I was furious. I was so mad at her I could hardly speak. She asked if she should leave me alone for a while and I remember telling her, "I'm so angry about all this we probably shouldn't be together for a little while, but I don't know what I want. I don't want to look at you and I don't want you out of my sight either." We actually laughed.

She went over to a friend's house who had really been encouraging to my wife when she was thinking of leaving the marriage. By that I mean this friend encouraged my wife to stick it out. My wife did not confide in this friend about the affair, I trusted the friend and her husband to give Godly counsel and my trust was well placed. (The irony? This friend just filed for divorce and is having an affair. Just goes to show . . . )

She came back, I moved into a spare room in the basement, and went to sleep.

That day was awful, just terrible. But the funny thing is, it was better than not knowing. I knew things were wrong and couldn't figure it out. No matter what I did in the year before D-day, I couldn't get through to her. Nothing made sense. But from the moment I knew, yeah it sucked, but at least I knew, and that was better.

I had a gut impulse to tell everyone I knew. I thought that shame might keep her from renewing the relationship, if it was really over, or ending it once and for all it was not. I don't know if this is the right answer for anyone else, but I'm so glad I didn't. I confided in a family member -- just one -- my counselor and my pastor. This was really God working in me, my desire to talk was so great. But, it would have been so much harder if we had been in the spotlight.

And that's just one of the ways God was working in the situation. If I had discovered the affair a few months earlier, I don't think I would have been strong enough to attempt reconciliation. I even had a counseling session scheduled for first thing Monday morning (D day was a Saturday), so we wouldn't have to wait long to get help. He was so, so good to us.

So as of the end of D-day, I knew and she knew that I knew. She had told the other guy that she wasn't going to see him any more, but I did not know if she meant it. We had bought Torn Assunder to start working through stuff, so I thought the chances of it being real were much greater than not.

Thus marked the beginning of a roller coaster ride from hell that I wouldn't wish on anybody, but -- given the choices that we had -- I thank God that he worked a miracle in our marriage and that we did not take the easy road and simply walk away.

Intermission - How things are now

2005-10-05T15:23:00.000-05:00

Before I talk more about D-day ("discovery day"), I need to remind myself of where we are. I still have emotions I haven't completely dealt with from back then, and going through it in detail has kind of bummed me out.

But that was then, this is now.

Today, we have a good life together and love each other very much. I would not say we are healed, but -- I'm not psychologist -- I don't think you ever completely heal from something like this. You can put more and more time behind you and let go of more and more each day, but there will never be a time that I do not bear scars from what we went through. Hearing about someone having an affair, for example, will always affect me differently having faced it personally. I will never, ever desire to be friends, or even see, the other guy. So some change is permanent.

But I don't obsess about the affair. I don't wonder where my wife is every minute of every day. I don't feel like there's a third person in our relationship -- not anymore. These feelings ebbed over time until now it is a bad memory. It doesn't seem so personal anymore, like it is something that somebody did to me. It feels more like we went through a bad storm or car accident that was scarey and painful, but we went through it together and survived it together.

We're different people than we were a few years ago, and almost all the changes are good ones. Our relationship is stronger than ever. Want proof? We're talking about a second child. She's gone of the pill and has bought maternity clothes. You don't do that if you are not planning on sticking around.

Chapter 2 - D-day part 2

2005-10-04T17:53:00.000-05:00

So she walks in the door, sees me sitting in the living room (obviously not sick) and her eyes start cutting around the room, like she's looking for something. I ask her to sit down, say I'm not sick, and that I had to get her home alone so we could talk about something. She sits down next to me, very uncomfortable.

I tell her that I want to begin by assuring her that in my opinion there was nothing that we could not work through or forgive if we really wanted to, but that she absolutely had to tell me the truth about some things I needed to ask her. "I need you to tell me, once and for all, if there is someone else."

She said, "I will admit that there is an inappropriate relationship." Now that my radar was up, I recognized the double-talk, the half-truths, that I had been getting for so long. Plus, I had the notes I had found, which were not graphic but left no doubt that the relationship had become sexual. I asked her again to tell me the truth; same answer. Then I pulled out the enelope I had put under the couch cushion and started reading the notes to her. She finally said, "OK! It was sexual! What do you want me to say?"

"How about the truth?"

"That is the truth."

Here the blur starts -- there was a 5 or 10 minute conversation, a little about who it was (I already knew), how long it had gone on, just some of the bare basics. She asked what I was doing looking in her stuff; I said other people's honesty did not concern her at the moment. We both probably said some pointed things, but it did not get too heated or out of hand. My prayers for keeping my temper were being answered.

Then I remember telling her, without being sure that I meant it, and without knowing what I hoped she would say, that she had to decide whether or not to stay in this marriage, and the only condition on which I was willing to work on the marriage was if there was a complete end to any relationship she had to the other guy.

She paused. I had no earthly idea what she was going to say. I just knew her decision would have a lot to do with how the rest of my life would turn out. She looked at me and said, "I want to give us a shot."

"Then you have to end it."

"I want to see him to say good-bye."

"No, it won't be in person. If we are going to have a chance, then you have already had your last meeting with him."

So she calls him. She picks up the phone and dials the number I've already memorized. I'm in the next room, and I can't hear everything, but I can hear the tone. It was hushed, business-like, like "I've-got-to-tell-you-something-important-and-have-to-make-it-quick."

After they hung up she came in the room and sat across from me. She said, "I did it. Now what?"

Now what indeed.

Chapter 1 - D-day

2005-10-03T14:19:00.000-05:00

January 2002. My wife and our son had gone to her parents for the weekend. After work on Friday night, I went to see Lord of the Rings. Near the end of the movie, I suddenly came to the realization that my wife was cheating on me. I don't think it was anything on screen that made me see what I had not yet seen, but there was just a moment when all of the clues came together in my subconscious mind, and I was as sure of it as anything.

We had been having serious trouble for over a year. Really, longer than that, but I had only been clued into the situtation for a little over a year.

After our son was born, my wife suffered post-partem depression and had a bugger of a time. I didn't know what it was or how to support her and did a piss-poor job of whatever feeble attempts I mustered up. We started drifting, and while I felt it, I didn't realize the extent of the problem. So one day she tells me she is not sure that she wants to stay married, but she denies being involved with anyone. We start marriage counseling and individual counseling, and all of 2001 was up and down. I would think things would be getting better, then it was clear that it was not. There was so much I didn't know, but I knew my marriage was in trouble and in very real danger of collapsing. I just didn't know why.

In that theater, watching Lord of the Rings, all the snide comments, the missing time, the avoidance, the evasiveness, all came together. I had been in denial, when the truth had been staring me right in the face. I went home and tore the house apart, because I knew with her packrat instincts there would be evidence. I found it - a large envelope with cards, notes, ticket stubs, and photos. She was so busted.

I just sat there on the side of the bed, shaking and crying, looking at the mementos. It may have been a minute, it may have been a half-hour. It was near midnight by then I think. I put everything back in the envelope and stomped down to the basement to get a suitcase. I was going to pack her stuff, I guess, which is rediculous because her shoes alone would require a U-Haul.

About half-way down the stairs, I realized that my family's future depended on how we handled these next few hours and days. God spoke to me that night, although I did not recognize it as his voice. While I believe that adultery is a legitimate reason for divorce in God's eyes, that doesn't mean it has to be. My focus immediately turned from kicking her out, to fighting for my family.

I had to handle this right, but with strength. No begging.

I knew I needed the goods. The first thing I did was figure out who it was. The photos, taken during a hike, told me nothing - I didn't recognize the guy, and there was no one I knew about in her life that made me suspicious. So I found cell phone records, got on the web site for a list of names of people in her department at work, and went through the white pages until I found a match. The other man has been identified.

Next, thinking like the lawyer I am, I prepared for the worst case scenario. I can ask her to end it with dickwad and give us a chance, but she might not want to. I needed evidence if I was going to prove adultery in court. Now it's 2 or 3 in the morning, I know I'm not thinking straight, but I thought what I really needed was to copy all the crap I had found. So I went to the office and copied every scrap.

Back home, and now I wait until morning so I can call her. The plan is to tell her I was sick, to see if she could leave our son at her parents for the day and come home to give me a hand. The goal was to get her alone but not to raise her suspicions until she got home. I started praying that I would be level headed, that I could contain my anger, and that she would agree to end the affair and work toward reconciliation. I prayed the rest of the night, begging God to help me not blow it. I wanted to hit her, to scream, to call her a whore, but I knew she had to see that very morning that reconciliation was possible, that forgiveness was possible.

Seven o'clock, I call, tell her what I had planned, and she sounds concerned. Says she will leave as soon as she got dressed. So I knew I had about an hour to wait.

I found our counselor's number at home, called him and told him my plan, which was to tell her that I knew about the affair, that I wanted to work it out, but that she had to end it right then, that very minute. The counselor convinced me that, while an ultimatum was perfectly appropriate, there was nothing wrong with a little more time, so 24 hours.

I got a shower, got dressed, hid the spare car keys (don't ask why, I don't know -- it made sense to me at the time), and wait for her to drive up.

First post

2005-10-03T10:46:00.000-05:00

It's been almost 4 years since I learned that my wife was having an affair. I will never forget that moment, and at that moment I never would have thought we would be married -- happily married -- 4 years later. [edit -- now almost 6 years later]

We've healed a great deal since then, but I still want to tell my story, even if nobody hears it. We were smart and kept our private lives private, so I don't have anyone to talk to. So, I started a blog. It's a chance to do a little self-checkup. Plus, maybe there's a couple out there whose world has just been rocked and they're wondering if a happy ending is possible. It is, but it's been a hard road. Worth it, but hard.

So here's to us, for surviving. And here's to the anonymity of the web.

[Edit - By the way, sometimes I get a little steamed when I'm writing, and the language may be a little raw. Sorry about that. Taking myself back to difficult times raises old emotions, but they are old and it is not in any way what I'm feeling now.]