Yet Another Affair (Divorce?) Story

buddyf

I am trying to grow a backbone and divorce my wife of 10 years. She's having an affair. She started the affair last November, probably just EA up to that point. Having already been trying to improve my marriage using online resources, I quickly came up to speed on the NC approach to ending an affair and beginning reconciliation, so I set forth some criteria: NC, open email accounts, weekly date nights, we both make real efforts to meet each others needs, etc. I didn't specify MC or IC. She went into a serious depression and looking back, did not meet any of the criteria. Life got in the way a bit (extended family member health problems, etc, etc - excuses I know) and I didn't continuously confront her on her lack of effort in the marriage. During our occasional discussions, she'd say that perhaps the romantic love and passion were just gone and she didn't know if the passion would come back, and I said that I believed we still had a connection that could be rekindled. Then the next day she'd be very engaged and sexual with me, followed be a couple weeks of anger and bitchiness. Definitely a cake eater - keep me strung along with hope while also boinking the OM.

After the EA and the period of "NC" and reconciliation, I grew suspicious and starting somesecret monitoring and discovered she had began contact again. This time, I could only surmise it was a full blown PA. I was so devastated and hurt. Instead of immediately confronting her, I took my time and gathered more evidence and did more research into infidelity, affairs, narcissism and borderline personality disorders, and I began to lean toward divorce, rather than another attempt at reconciliation. While there are a lot of things I like about my wife, the affair and continuation of the affair and the other historical dynamics of the relationship and her behaviors point to her as being significantly self-absorbed, selfish and narcissistic. This narcissism is well hidden from friends and co-workers and reserved for your truly (and perhaps a bit for her parents as well.)

I finally met with an attorney, but I'm having some doubts and am wondering if I should take one more stab at reconciliation and at laying down the law and leading this relationship back to a healthy place.  The good news is that since I've been a very involved active father, my attorney thinks I'll have little problem getting 50% or more physical custody and should only have to do alimony for 2 to 4 years. So I do see a light at the end of the debt-ridden, toxic tunnel.

The last couple of months, since I rediscovered the affair, have been a journey through hell. For the most part, she is aloof, agitation, and angry.  The good news is that over the last two years, I've practiced not letting her emotions guide my emotions, so I can kind of just laugh off her childish bratty behaviors and go about my business. I learned to do this in response of dealing with the sexless marriage - i.e. not letting her rejections impact me. But the affair and the impact on the kids has torn at my heart. And I am stuck now at the decision point - sh*t or get off the pot, so I turn to this helpful forum for support.

Since I met all of her needs unconditionally and enabled many of her bratty behaviors, she lost respect for me over the years and thus rendered me unable to meet her needs, even though I continually tried harder and harder to meet her needs. I become aware of this dynamic a little over a year ago and have been working on upping my masculinity and alpha (fitness, decisiveness, not letting her rejections impact me, creating my own life etc) but I didn't get any positive responses from her, only contempt and frustration that I wasn't going along with her bratty games. Well, then the affair.  The OM awakened her sexual passion and she chose to go with it.

To outsiders, we have an amazing life and a happy marriage and a tight-knit family, and I thought we had those things too, at least the tight-knit family part. I am so torn between living a possible hell with my wife and tearing up our family. 

I will post the triage in a comment below:

buddyf

Medical: Both of us are athletically fit and sexually fit.

Structural Attraction Issues:

- I have a good job/income, but she's a spender, and we've accumulated debt that significantly impacts our lifestyle

Critical Moments and Neglect

- I've been highly engaged in the marriage and our relationship. I've never neglected, but she's deflect/rejected my efforts to meet her needs. I'm the pursuer and she's the rejecter. I listen, give approval, support. (I'm not saying I'm perfect of course, but I try)

- I did embarrass her in public one time when I alluded to the notion that I, the working parent, did more parenting than her, the SAHM. I've sincerely apologized for that a few times, but she did bring up that moment after the affair.

Outside Sexual Sources

- Ongoing affair

When did the sex go bad

- Steady decline in sex through out the marriage especially after having kids

- Over 10 years time, from 3/week to 1/month.

- Attempts to "get to the bottom" of the sexless marriage always ended the same way: an argument that "I just want to get laid" and she storms out of the room.

Elephant in the Room

- The Elephant is that I've allowed her to be a spoiled brat and get her way.  I suppose the confrontation about the sexless marriage is one example and excessive spending is another example.

- This is true of both time and money. Although I am the bread-winner and she's a SAHM, I do a majority of the parenting, and rarely see my friends. She's a dedicated biking aficionado and spends the weekends training for bike races and competing. She's also clothes shopper who spends and is always pressuring me to agree to additional expenditures that violate our budget. 

- Even during times where I stood my ground and stuck to my values, she'd continue to work away at me, even if it took months, until I caved or compromised.

- Another example of the elephant is that I never instigated MC in the face of the sexless marriage, essentially putting up with it as I continue to try to fix it myself without help.

- When I've really stuck to my guns, I've never observed a side effect of increased respect for me, just contempt, frustration, disappointment and anger and then I get the silent punishment of emotional and sexual withdrawal.

buddyf

Triage (continued)

Who is the Leader in the Marriage

- See "What's the Elephant" as that provides key insight. That being said

- I do instigate and lead many family activities: trips, weekend activities, parenting and discipline issues, etc. I don't sit around playing video games or watching TV. I'm an active person and an active parent.

- But the overall driver in how we spend our time and money is based on her [toxic?] drama of the day. "If we don't resolve or fix this problem today, then I will go crazy and we'll both be miserable." So her drama is higher priority over my agenda. When I tell her what I want to get done, she simply ignores that I said anything. If I bring up my agenda again, she get perturbed and agitated and acts like I am not supporting her and I am sabotaging her agenda. So often I would just stay quiet, and work on my goals at night or when she wasn't around.

- Part of the dynamics is based on our debt expenses. Since she refuses to fully grasp our financial situation and monthly debt expenses, she will instigate expensive activities whereas I will not instigate those activities because I know we can't afford them, so that gives her the "I'm trying to get things done" title while I get the "you say No to everything" title. It wasn't always like this when we had disposable income.

- With respect to communication, we are both conflict avoiders, and the times I've taken lead in talking about issues in our relationship have always gone badly. She interprets any attempt at improving our marriage as an attempt on my part to blame her and she gets defensive and accuses me of being passive aggressive. In her defense, I haven't figured out better communication techniques that don't trigger this defense mechanism. She NEVER talks about our relationship and never has. She has never asked me how things are going with respect to us with respect to the marriage or to sex or anything.

Tell us About the Good Times

- We have had good times. Our courting period was very fun, romantic and we really were connected.

- Pregnancy and raising babies together was always a good time. 

- When hanging out, do have a good time and we can share laughter together and we do share many viewpoints with respect to art, food, politics, travel, music, etc.

- We always have a good time when we attend social functions, concerts, or go on trips together.

- I've always been very attracted to her (although a couple years ago, well pre-affair, she did say a couple times "I don't think you really love me." - at that time, that didn't go unnoticed and that is when I really started researching relationships and starting working on giving her more approval and starting working on the Elephant in the Room.) I do admit that too much of my "work" has been research and not enough concrete action - and that is simply because of me avoiding her painful backlash when I don't do what she wants. 

- We can be very high functioning when it comes to getting things done. As a team, we've often been effective and efficient at parenting, house remodeling, gardening, landscaping, traveling, etc. Lately, not so much, given lack of funds and her focus on biking and bike racing.

Some bad wife points:

- Financial infidelity; is more interested in getting what she wants than working within the budget; make no efforts to reduce growing debts. (I've shown her my Dave Ramsey plan, which she ignores)

- Withholds passion, sex

- Doesn't accept my compliments, messages of approval and acceptance.

- Showed no remorse after getting caught other than a simple "OK, I fucked up."

- Her focus is 95% on herself, with 3% for the kids and 2% for the dog.

- Although we have full time daycare/school, she earns near nothing

- Avoids communication, avoid conflict, deflects issues back on me

- Spends less "quality" time with kids since the affair; easily agitated with the kids

- Boinking another dude

Good wife points:

- hot, attractive (she's an 8; I'm a 7 in looks)

- at times, she is a hard worker (although not since the affair started)

- amazingly fit; competitive bike racer (not much in that for me i guess, but its healthier than prozac)

- loves her kids

- good (and expensive) sense of style

- she can be very enchanting, fun, playful - although I don't get much of this these days

_io

She violated your previously agreed upon no contact order.  She spends too much money while overtly disregarding your budget and disrespecting your position as breadwinner. She'd rather bike than parent.  She blames you for everything that's wrong with the marriage.  And, oh yeah, she's fucking another man.

I'm not a psychiatrist, so I can't diagnose narcissism or borderline personality disorder, but I can call selfish, self-centered bitch when I see it.  Take immediate steps to protect your assets, and call a lawyer immediately to have divorce papers drawn up.  

Serenity

So sorry you're going through this, but I'm glad you found MMSL. People here can help walk you through.

Athol_Kay

Yeah sounds like you need to immediately give her a cold hard sense of reality via divorce papers and the actual finances.

Then head to the gym. Seriously, it's the best thing to do for your mental health and attractiveness. 

buddyf

_io, thanks for your straightforwardness to help me see through the fog.

buddyf

Thanks Athol, that makes 2 for 2 for divorce. I never ever thought I would be going through any of this. What a ride.

DaveBowman

Rip the bandaid off and don't look back. From a guy that's been there every day will get better.

mixnmatch

DaveBowman said:

Rip the bandaid off and don't look back. From a guy that's been there every day will get better.

Years ago when I was in law school and took community property (aka divorce law basically).  I remember the experienced family law professor say "in 30 years he never heard from a client who regretted get divorced right away!  It was always the guy who tried to work things out and accumulated more wealth, pension and group friends who cried at this desk!"  

@DaveBowman has some great advice.  I'm not an attorney nor have I gone through a divorce but I can sure tell you every single friend I know (male or female) that is involved in cycling or triathlons have gotten divorced.  I'm not talking about the guy who goes for a mountain bike saturday morning.  But there is something overwhelmingly selfish about someone who just wants to run, swim or cycle and leave their family behind.

DaveBowman

Thanks @mixnmatch... I guess to expand what I meant, when I went through my divorce I had two kinds of pain:
1. The pain of my marriage ending and being betrayed. This I could do nothing about but go through hard and as fast as I could. This was out of my control and the only thing I could do was get out of limbo and get it over with.
2. The pain of my life sucking. This is something I could work with... Once the decision was made (I let my bitch wife waffle for 6 months stupid me) I could decide to make it better... Day by day.
#1 you can do nothing about but get through it. "When going through hell keep going" kind of thing. The sooner you start, the sooner its done.
#2 is a path you gotta walk to get better. Again, the sooner you start the journey the better off you'll be.

You have a limited # of days on this earth. Use them well. You have as much right to happiness as she does, or anyone else for that matter. Don't let her take more days than you have to give her.

buddyf

@DaveBowman, I'm all for giving to a grateful, reciprocal wife, but I do believe her actions are now "taking" days from me that I won't get back, so I appreciate the illustration. I need to rip the band-aid off. 

DaveBowman

buddyf said:

@DaveBowman, I'm all for giving to a grateful, reciprocal wife, but I do believe her actions are now "taking" days from me that I won't get back, so I appreciate the illustration. I need to rip the band-aid off. 

Then you know what you need to do, so go do it.

One thing that helped me - going to deathclock.com. It will actually help calculate how many days you have left.

Sieze them all!

buddyf

Reminder to self: this is what Athol wrote in @rock 's  911 affair discussion:

"If she isn't genuinely remorseful and actively trying to fix things, it always blows up later on." - @Athol_Kay

Reminds me of this one a bit too:

“The first time someone shows you who they are, believe them.” - May Angelou

no_chump

How are you doing, buddyf? I hope you have blown up her world.

buddyf

@no_chump and and @Athol_Kay, I appreciate your follow up. 

I have not blown up her world.  

Probably a mixture of wimpiness and deliberate planned patience. The last couple of months, she has gone even more underground, so I don't have any recent credible evidence of the affair. Even if she has broken off the affair or cooled it off a bit, I am still going to proceed with my plans since I know true reconciliation is not possible.

But my plan was to include recent credible evidence with the denotation event so she could not argue either privately or publicly that I am wrong and there is no affair, largely for post-separation PR. I do think the PR part is somewhat important so I am not perceived to be the person giving up on the marriage. We live in a small town, and I am really good friends with her Mom, so it is going to be ugly. 

I was also thinking that, even though I am in a no-fault state, definitive, publicly acceptable (legal) proof of an affair could be leveraged to increase my chances of a beneficial custody and financial outcome in the divorce.

So do I wait until I gather new evidence (it will happen, just not sure when), or just stop procrastinating and do it?

_io

If you really want credible evidence, hire a PI.  He will find it much more quickly than you will.

no_chump

buddyf, If you don't have the strength to do this, then you need to consider enlisting reinforcements. Take copies of your evidence to your mother-in-law (I believe you said you were friends) and to the OM's wife. Perhaps you should meet with them together. Stop protecting her privacy. Affairs have consequences, but apparently not yet for her. She can manIpulate and bluff you too well. You are not saving your marriage by inaction, you are letting it slip away. Someone posted this on a thread: http://www.shrink4men.com/2010/10/27/leaving-an-abusive-wife-pre-divorce-checklist/

Changed_Man

@buddyf

I'm at a complete loss why you haven't followed through yet. From your previous posts, you have more than enough evidence to win the PR battle, which IMO is a wasted effort (you will lose family and friends from this, regardless), but YMMV. This is just a rationalization, IMO.

You need to own the fact that you're procrastinating the inevitable out of fear and self doubt. Fear of loss, rejection, of being alone, of the unknown. Doubt in your ability to build a new life and find happiness again. This is absolutely normal, but it's time to push on. You WILL NOT be able to have the life you deserve while you're stuck in your current one.

I speak from personal experience. When the plug was pulled on my marriage and I moved out, the 1st month was very difficult. But day by day, it got better and I started to re-connect to myself, my ability to solve and conquer any problem... I started loving myself again. In the months since, my self esteem and confidence has grown by leaps and bounds. I'm now the happiest I've been in my distant memory. You will be too.

Seriously, It's time. Time to start living again. Become a whole person and your best version. Attract a quality woman who will love and appreciate the man you are, instead of being obsessed with who you're not.

Git 'er done!

buddyf

no_chump said:

buddyf, If you don't have the strength to do this, then you need to consider enlisting reinforcements. Take copies of your evidence to your mother-in-law (I believe you said you were friends) and to the OM's wife. Perhaps you should meet with them together. Stop protecting her privacy. Affairs have consequences, but apparently not yet for her. She can manIpulate and bluff you too well. You are not saving your marriage by inaction, you are letting it slip away. Someone posted this on a thread: http://www.shrink4men.com/2010/10/27/leaving-an-abusive-wife-pre-divorce-checklist/

I wasn't planning on telling the OM's wife or my MIL. I was just planning on telling my wife. You are correct: her affair has not had any consequences for her and she has manipulated and bluffed me. I am not planning on saving my marriage, but I admit, while I am 99% confident in my decision to end the marriage, there is a lot tied up in my integrated, whole family, that I have left 1% wiggle/weannie room.

From observation, I know the facts tell me my wife is selfish and does not love me for who I am. I just wanted one final, definitive, blatant piece of evidence to solidify the truth of my observations. I know I am just hiding behind the lack of such recent, concrete evidence. 

buddyf

@Changed_Man,

I agree - fear of loss, of rejection is there. Not sure why I fear rejection by this narcissist?

I have been using day to day events to procrastinate: mother-in-law coming for a visit, annual important bike ride coming up, friends staying, spring break, easter get-togethers, etc etc etc.

I don't doubt my ability to build a new life and find happiness again, but I'm not saying I am fearless in this endeavor.

I do believe I will not have the life I deserve while I am stuck in this current one, and I think there is some part of my wife that believes this for her self as well, although I think she is a bit delusional in this regard. 

I am a big believer in the institution of marriage and, when possible, the intact family. Kids need a Mommy and a Daddy. I feel horrible and guilty for having to break this up. When I look at a single day which was a good day, I start to doubt my decision, but usually, the next day, met with contempt, anger and withdrawal from her grounds me back to the truth and I again rid myself of the doubt, but still don't take action since I keep finding additional things to do before I take action.

When I read my journal and I read logs describing what actually happened and I stare at those things that really happened, I fully see that I am a chump and she is a cheater and when I examine the path of reconciliation, a path we've gone done once already, I know that is not a feasible path due to lack of remorse, lack of no contact, lack of putting energy into the marriage. 

"Seriously, It's time. Time to start living again. Become a whole person and your best version. Attract a quality woman who will love and appreciate the man you are, instead of being obsessed with who you're not."

I love this. I am obsessed with this fucking affair, with the process of figuring out what to do, and I am obsessed with who I am not.  I know I have a better life in front of me. 

I do appreciate the mmsl forum. I do value the feedback I've received after telling my story. I am pretty wigged out right now, so, in this crazy time, reading responses from those who've been through this before, who are in a more sane place that I is extremely valuable. I just can't seem to pull the trigger.