Pages

Search blog and web

Hopeful Success Story - Wife Had Affair

This is my story. It may be a little messy and unorganized, but I wanted to share it. I'm still going through it, but things seem to be going well and I have learned a lot through the experience so far.

I am 25 years old, my wife and I got married almost 4 years ago and had been friends for about 2 years before getting married. About 3 months into our marriage we got pregnant, which wasn't part of the plan. We are both Christians, which I think has been an important factor in our recovery.

D-Day was October 29th. I found out because a brother-in-law had heard through the grapevine that my wife was seen alone with a guy at an ice skating rink. When he told me this, I asked my wife about it later that night, expecting that there was some sort of misunderstanding or some explanation. What followed was like getting punched in the stomach.

She explained that the ice skating was suppose to be a group thing but when she got there it was just the guy, etc. The troubling part was that I could tell she wasn't telling me everything. I began asking her more questions like "Should I be concerned about other guys?" when her response was silence and no eye-contact I felt myself beginning to get sick. After a few moments, I popped the big question "Are you sleeping with someone else?", I felt stupid for even asking. Again, silence… I began grieving in an intense way that was more like shrieking the crying. After several minutes I began asking her more questions, I really wanted to know how long / how many times / with whom. At first she wouldn't answer any of my questions, she sat there in almost complete, cold silence. Then she began telling me that she didn't love me, in fact, she never did, and further that I never loved her; perhaps the worst part, she told me she loved the OM. I honestly can't remember all the details of that night, but that was the general tone. I said several expletives, but never called her any names. I told her I needed space and left.

As soon as I went outside I began to worry she would hurt herself and didn't feel good about leaving her like that. I decided to go back inside and tell her how I felt. When I went back inside, I told her that I was really hurt, but that I still loved her and wanted to make it work. I tried to give her a hug which sent her into a crying fit. She pushed me away telling me "Stop loving me!". We sat mostly silent for a few moments and I told her again that I wanted to work it out, but I needed some space for the night. With that, I left.

I stayed with my parents that night and hardly slept at all. My parents also watched my son for the next two weeks while we started working on things. The next morning I went back home early to find that my wife wasn't home. I wasn't entirely surprised, she needed to be comforted, so she stayed with the only person that would comfort her, the OM. I called her, she didn't answer, but called me back very quickly. I told her I wanted to talk and asked if she would come home, which she did. As I sat there waiting for her, I did a few household projects I had been meaning to do, I couldn't take the stillness of doing nothing. I thought about what I would say when she got back, I had it planned.

I heard her car pull into the driveway and went outside to greet her. When I saw her, an overwhelming compassion for her came over me. Everything I had planned on saying, everything I had been feeling melted away and all I could do was embrace her. I felt like the father in the parable of the prodigal son (with some obvious differences). We went out for coffee and started discussing what had happened. Her attitude was a lot different than it had been the previous night, she was a lot more open about everything.

Now, its been a little over 5 weeks since I found out at the time of writing this. I don't remember every detail of what happened and it seems like it been a lot longer. Every day has felt like a week. I will try to condense everything into the most important parts.

The first week was the hardest on me. I literally lost nearly 10 pounds and over an inch in my waistline in that first week. I spent every possible moment with her when I wasn't at work and spent every waking moment thinking about everything and planning how I should feel and what I should do. We started by discussing what had happened and how she felt. She basically felt like she never loved me, married me out of infatuation, and was unhappy because of our marriage. She felt like I didn't care about her and she felt like she wasn't attracted to me. She wanted adventure and to do something great with her life. Notice I say felt, because these feelings would soon start changing and she would realize that her feelings were clouded.

The affair itself lasted for a couple months. She had dated the OM briefly before dating me and they had remained in occasional contact throughout our marriage. They were only "together" twice, but had been spending lots of time together in their mutually shared activities. From what I understand, they went on a couple of dates during that time span. My wife didn't really work a job though she did have several sources of side work. Most week nights she would either be taking/teaching dance classes, gymnastics, or doing an activity like rock climbing. I work full-time, take some side jobs, and go to school full-time (I was taking 18hrs). This was obviously not an ideal scenario. The OM would see her regularly at some of these activities, which I did not know at the time, and eventually during the day while I was at work.

In the first two weeks of our recovery, we started seeing a marriage counselor and she voluntarily saw an individual counselor. We didn't tell any of her family and only one couple of our close friends. Also, her sister was getting married the week after I found out, so we were trying to keep it quiet for her family's sake. We spent lots of time together over this time and she made vague commitments to "try" to make our marriage work and not to contact the OM. She did contact the OM and even saw him in person once or twice and somewhat tried to hide this from me. Things came to a head one day at lunch when she told me she needed separation. This really upset me because we had agreed to stay together and work it out. I told her if she needed space I would give it to her, but we were going to talk to her parents first. Which we did, right then. Talking to her parents helped. She decided that she was going to stay in the marriage, though she didn't really want to, or want me.

The next day, when she got home from work, the OM was waiting at my house for her. I found out because I saw she was sitting at a park close to my house (through GPS tracking) for a long time. I called her and she didn't answer. When she called back, I played it cool, and she didn't say anything. I asked her directly "So you were at the park by yourself?" She broke down, started crying saying she didn't know what to do, etc. I told her I was very angry and when I got home I was the most angry with her that I was in the whole process. I told her I couldn't believe she lied to me again, a day after making the decision to stay with me. I felt stupid for trusting her and felt like I should kick her out. But, I put the ball in her court, I told her to make a decision, "Me forever, or not". She cried and told me she wanted another chance. I decided to give her another chance, though I knew it was illogical and foolish (but that's love, right?). She asked me if I wanted her to call the OM and breakup with him right then, and I told her to do so if she felt it. She called and prefaced the conversation by saying "My name is here…" which of course made the rest of what she said useless. I may have also lost my temper and grabbed the phone and threatened the OM on the condition of him coming to my house again.

The next day she called me while I was at work to ask if she could call the OM and explain what was going on. I obliged, because in reality I didn't have a choice. It is much better to come off confident than to try to control, especially because controlling doesn't actually work. I don't know exactly what was said, but it was a long conversation, 80 minutes. According to my wife, she basically told the OM how she felt (which I'm sure included that she still loved him) and that she had made a decision to work on our marriage. Later than day, I got a text message from the OM telling me we needed to meet. I obliged, because, again, I didn't really have a choice. This guy knows where I live, so if he wanted to hurt me, he could do so. He also told me that he wanted my wife to be there. I let her decide if she wanted to come or not; she decided to come.

We met outside a Starbucks. I got there first, picked a table outside, and arranged the seating so that my wife would have to sit next to me and the OM would have to sit on the other side of the table. I also had my friend come and watch the conversation from his car (because I wasn't sure exactly what was going to happen). I went straight from work, so my wife had to meet us there. The OM showed up, and a little later my wife showed up. The OM told me he "didn't want to fight me" and that "trying anything would be stupid". He waited to really get into the discussion until my wife showed up. Once she did, he started with a good 5+ min prepared, written speech on our marriage and relationship. When he was done, I said "You've just read us a very carefully crafted lie. Like any good lie, there is some truth in what you said, but it is still a lie." We then preceded to talk about some of the things he had brought up. My attitude throughout the discussion was mostly to force my wife to make the decisions. I told her several times that I wasn't holding her to our marriage and that she could leave if she wanted. I could talk a lot about this meeting because it was really upsetting, but the important part is that my wife left with me.

After that, things settled down a bit. If I remember correctly, for the next week she didn't see or talk to the OM. They were still friends on Facebook and Instagram, but from what I could tell from spying and directly asking, she didn't directly contact him at all. She even ignored several text messages from him. At the end of that week we had a trip to Miami planned for a small gig she had. We made it into a small vacation and genuinely had a good time together. At one point during our drive to Miami, she mentioned separation again. She said she felt like she needed separation to figure out what she wanted, find herself, etc. I told her I didn't want her to feel that way anymore and didn't want to have to talk about it again. I told her if she was determined to work on our marriage then that wasn't appropriate. Separation allows individuals to work on themselves individually and we needed to work on ourselves in the context of being together. I told her as we went through this process that everything in our lives was flexible, everything could change except for our belief in God, our commitment to our child, and our commitment to each other. This seemed to go over decently, and she verbally agreed with me.

We got back late Saturday night from the trip and everything was going well. However, the next morning things hit another low. When we woke up, we were just laying in bed together and started talking about everything. She ended up telling me again that she felt like she needed separation. At this point, I had no choice, I simply told her "Okay". This seemed to shock her. Over the next couple of hours we talked a little more about it and I basically told her that I believed the old adage "If you love something set it free…" I felt like it was time for me to let her go because I loved her. This was said amidst tears and long pauses, but that was the general message. I also told her that part of me letting go was moving on with my life, that when I let go of her I was also letting go of my commitment to her, letting go of that "marital" love that was keeping me going in this fight for her. We decided to go to church together that morning and postpone a final decision until we talked about it just a little more. Once at church, we both broke down, crying separately in different parts of the church. We didn't talk to each other, didn't sit next to each other, no contact. Incidentally, the message that morning was about the bond of a marriage covenant and its importance to God.

She had a photoshoot that afternoon and told me we would talk after she got back. So, I went to my brother-in-laws house and waited. Around 6pm her sister showed up at the house too, her sister was the photographer, so obviously the photoshoot was over (this sister also knew about the affair because my wife had told her). Her sister told me that my wife had gone to Starbucks to talk to her mom and that my wife was going to call one of us to come pick her up after she was done talking. Two hours past and no call from my wife. Her sister called, no answer. I texted and called, no answer. At this point I began to get both suspicious and worried. Her sister called Starbucks to see if she was still there and she wasn't. So, being that she was in downtown and had no transportation, she either decided to walk home, or met the OM. I, being stupid, thought she tried to walk home and started driving through downtown to find her. I couldn't find her so I went home to make sure she wasn't there. Of course she wasn't. I checked her phone records and discovered several calls to the OM from that night. At this point, I was furious, I let her parents know what had happened and that I fully planned on kicking her out, if she came home (which they agreed with). Hours passed as I waited for her to get home, both worried about her (as I wasn't 100% sure she was with him) and furious (because I was pretty sure she was). It was actually kind of hilarious, sitting there, waiting to see her so I could kick her out.

She came home at around 11:30pm and seemed somber and sincere. She told me she was sorry for not coming home and told me she was sorry for everything. She told me she knew she didn't deserve my love or another chance, but that was what she wanted. She told me she had taken that evening to just sort herself out (a little). She didn't want to come home until she felt good about her decision to stay with me and felt like it was what she wanted. She told me she loved me and was going to do whatever it took to make our marriage work and earn my love. So, despite my anger, lack of trust, and obvious illogical nature of the evening, I accepted her back. There were some obvious flaws in her story, I know she spent a good bit of that night with the OM, but her attitude seemed genuinely different. I think that when I "let her go" she realized what she was losing, and didn't want that. She had the opportunity to leave with the OM that night, and I'm sure he tried to convince her, but she chose to stay because that's what she really wanted.

After that night, things were notably better. She still had moments of sadness, and things were/are still uncomfortable; but, the foundation, our commitment to each other seemed/seems strong.

Thanksgiving morning she received a text from the OM, sadly she deleted it and didn't mention it to me. I confronted her and she gave me some lame reason, but I told her I was really upset about it. She said she was really sorry and blocked the OM from her phone, and her social media pages. The rest of Thanksgiving was really awkward, but also pretty fun.

The day after Thanksgiving we went to a rock climbing gym and I was pretty sure the OM was going to be there, he was. She stayed really close to me, hung on me, kissed me, and generally made a point to "be mine". She told me how much she appreciated me going and really liked doing stuff like that with me.

This week (the next week) on Tuesday the OM called her from an unblocked line and they talked for about an hour. She told me about it on her own (though she knows I check the phone records) and said it was basically the same conversation they had before. He was checking in to see if she had changed her mind and told her that he still loved her etc. I told her that I was really upset she talked to him that long. We talked for a while and she gave me some self-pity type comments. It ended with her realizing she was being ungrateful for what she had and self-centered. Things were tense after that, but I think it was a healthy conversation. I'm sure the OM will call again, and we'll see how she handles it.

That is pretty much it, we're up-to-date now. Things are still really hard, but seem to be going in the right direction. I believe her when she says she is committed to me and tells me she loves me. I think she is beginning to understand what love is and figure herself out. I've learned a lot about myself in this process as well. I felt so helpless and powerless when I found out, but now I feel like I will be happy regardless of the outcome (though I really want to make it work).

I'll be posting more and updating my story as it continues, perhaps I'll even go through and clean it up a little. My hope is that this can provide someone with hope that is going through a similar situation. I know I am not out of the woods yet, but I really feel like things are going to work out.

IFTTT

Put the internet to work for you.

via Personal Recipe 2629979

No comments:

Post a Comment