Can a marriage survive this?

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I can say what I THINK was at the core of this. In October 2003, she quit working to stay home full time with our kids. In January 2005, she started babysitting as well as watching our own children. Of course, all that can “get to” a person, when they have no real contact with other adults. I knew that, that’s why whenever she asked to go do things, I said “go”. October 2006, we wanted a little extra income, so she started working nights and weekends - and we figured it would also be good for her to have adult contact again. January 2007, she went to the company holiday party and sat and talked to him for several hours. After that, things escalated until June 2007. After it happened, she’s told me that their time together always involved drinking, that he’s a great storyteller, that he’s led an interesting life (he’s 60, she’s 32), he flirted with her, he made her feel desirable again. Not that I EVER made her feel that way, I never felt that way, and NEVER told her that. She would even tell you that. She just felt like it was nice to have someone ELSE say it, and that she made a “stupid mistake”.

I also know that along the way, we fell into routines. After the kids went to bed, she’d watch TV that I wasn’t interested in (which pretty much is everything, we have little-to-no similar tastes in entertainment), and I’d go to the basement and play video games. There was a big lack of intimacy for a long time, not that we didn’t have sex, but intimate contact, just being close and talking, it just didn’t happen. She claims my playing video games had nothing to do with our “intimacy gap”, but I can’t help but feel like it did. To that extent, I still play, but I try not to play when there’s a time we could be spending together. I’ve even gotten myself to the point of being interested in watching tv with her.

I know no one on here is a professional counselor, I just needed a place to vent. No one in our families or circle of friends knows about this. There are 4 people in this world that know. Me, her, “him”, and the priest I talked to last summer - as far as I know, he never has told his own wife. (Well, and you all reading this now, but you don’t know me personally)
 
These guys exist in offices all over the world. They prey on married women. They make these women feel attractive and young, the idea of forbidden love makes women fell young. This guy has a trail of broken hearts in that very office. He will not leave your wife alone until he either gets what he wants and she sleeps with him (he will keep that up until he is tired of her) OR until something stops him in his tracks.

Your gut feeling about punching him in the nose is actually not far off… NOT that you should get violent in any way, but, if your wife sees that you are willing to stand up to this guy, tell him to get the h#$$ away from her, it might make her turn around. Women all want our prince to fight for us. She wants to feel special and desired.

Fight for her, with your actions, treat her as if she is your most valued treasure.

Do not listen to the “you do not want me to have friends” she is trying to justify this because it makes her feel young and speical.

Please get to confession and Mass. Pray for your wife, fast for her.
 
Oh, I go to Mass. I feel like dirt that I can’t participate fully.
 
Turn off the video games! Some women will SAY “no I don’t care if you go play games”, then they sit there watching all these romantic stories on TV and feel alone and frumpy.

Catholic book, Matthew Kelly’s “The Seven Levels of Intimacy” - right off the bat, this book says that many couples forget their own story. What brought you together? What did you do when you were dating?

It is sad to stop talking. Keep talking, remind her that you have some great stories too! Ask her opinions, debate politics - something! TALK.
 
I’m telling you, I don’t play unless I have absolutely completely FREE “me time”. Kids in bed, wife at school or doing homework, or her at work. (Which leaves me with VERY little time for it, 1-2 hours per week, tops.) Any time that we can spend together, I most definitely make EVERY effort to be there. And, absolutely, I could walk away from those games without a second thought. I would break the discs right in front of her, delete the games, cancel my accounts, WHATEVER it took.

The thing is, I don’t FEEL like I have any good stories. I go to work, sit in a cubicle all day with very little social interaction outside of one other person, and then I come home, we eat dinner, play with the kids, put them to bed, and then end the day. She works weekends, and I stay home with the kids. There’s not much to tell. I have no life outside of work and home.
 
Sounds like you need to take some risks. Even if your wife was not having this inappropriate relationship, sounds like you need to have some fun.

Is there something in your life that you always wished that you could do that you never have? That’s the sort of stuff you should be talking to your wife about. You need to dream a little, so does she, and you need to work together on supporting each other to see some of those dreams take shape.
 
I have to agree with Kage, he will not leave your wife alone until #1, he gets what he wants or #2, she stops talking to him.

Your wife is telling you the truth in that he has made her feel desirable. See, I’ve done this, had an emotional affair. No, I am not proud of it, my husband knows, and he extended me the graces beyond any imagination. I was suffering from severe depression and no one noticed or care but him, however, he preyed off that. I would quickly assume that things are not well with your wife, she too may be suffering from depression. I went to therapy (which I suggest your wife go, alone) I worked on things that helped me.

My husband reminded me that even he couldn’t be perfect or else he would be doing all of this emotional stuff with his own wife.

And I can talk about this all now, because I made my First Confession and God has forgiven me now. My DH has forgiven me.

Your marriage will survive. You wife needs to see that he’s preying on her for his own needs as well. And that she really should be coming to you will all her needs. Maybe she doesn’t feel like she can because of all the stress in her life. I’m not making excuses, I’m just telling you what all I felt. My life was so hard and stressful, I felt like I couldn’t talk to my husband, because I feared burdening him with my problems, so I went to someone else…stupid!

Let her know that you are team, God has given you the Sacrament of Marriage to protect you from these situations and she should never, ever feel that she can’t talk to you.

Start making a date night once a week, or once a month. Even if it’s at home on Friday night.

I will pray for you.

Oh, is there any way that she can find another job?
 
I doubt they were friend in the first place so they certainly can’t be friends now. Friends help each other. He is tearing her world in half. She doesn’t need friends like that in her life. She needs to hang out where she can meet real friends.
 
strngrnrth
I doubt they were friend in the first place so they certainly can’t be friends now. Friends help each other. He is tearing her world in half. She doesn’t need friends like that in her life. She needs to hang out where she can meet real friends.
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This is absolutely the way I feel.
My husband reminded me that even he couldn’t be perfect or else he would be doing all of this emotional stuff with his own wife.
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Yeah, she’s told me that he has a poor marriage. That they had come close to divorce several times. They sleep in separate rooms, do their own things, etc…
Oh, is there any way that she can find another job?
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She could easily keep the same job just in another location, but doesn’t want to because she “likes her store, and all the other people there”.
 
DJgang said:
I have to agree with Kage, he will not leave your wife alone until #1, he gets what he wants or #2, she stops talking to him.

Your wife is telling you the truth in that he has made her feel desirable. See, I’ve done this, had an emotional affair. No, I am not proud of it, my husband knows, and he extended me the graces beyond any imagination. I was suffering from severe depression and no one noticed or care but him, however, he preyed off that. I would quickly assume that things are not well with your wife, she too may be suffering from depression. I went to therapy (which I suggest your wife go, alone) I worked on things that helped me.

My husband reminded me that even he couldn’t be perfect or else he would be doing all of this emotional stuff with his own wife.

And I can talk about this all now, because I made my First Confession and God has forgiven me now. My DH has forgiven me.

Your marriage will survive. You wife needs to see that he’s preying on her for his own needs as well. And that she really should be coming to you will all her needs. Maybe she doesn’t feel like she can because of all the stress in her life. I’m not making excuses, I’m just telling you what all I felt. My life was so hard and stressful, I felt like I couldn’t talk to my husband, because I feared burdening him with my problems, so I went to someone else…stupid!

Let her know that you are team, God has given you the Sacrament of Marriage to protect you from these situations and she should never, ever feel that she can’t talk to you.

Start making a date night once a week, or once a month. Even if it’s at home on Friday night.

I will pray for you.

Oh, is there any way that she can find another job?
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Brave, honest and wise post from someone who’s been there. The OP’s situation does not call for losing hope, but the circumstances suggest you need to take firm action if you want to save your marriage because 1) your wife is spiritually/morally/emotionally weakened by the affair; 2) she has shown (repeatedly) that she is not capable of being honest and accountable to you for her actions with this man; 3) she has not been able to end the affair and will continue to encounter this man in her workplace.

I would insist on immediate couples/marriage therapy–as well as individual counseling–if for no other reason than to have a neutral 3d party make some of these points to your wife instead of it all coming from you. It would also make her accoutable to someone other than you which might initially be less threatening and more productive. Once you get past the defensiveness, dishonesty and find some ways to limit/end to their contact, you still face the process of rebuilding trust as well as a new relationship between the two of you. It will be a long road–for which you will need support just as much as she will.

Prayers for you in the coming weeks and months.
 
By the way, I’m not big on “dream interpretation”, but this seemed too blunt to ignore.

She told me the other night she had a dream that she was in a city, possibly New York, and that Godzilla was attacking. She said she was scared, but everyone else just acted like it was normal, that he’d been there before, and if she just hid, he would go away.

I can’t help but feel that it’s about the situation we’re in. That Godzilla is our problem, the city is our marriage/family, and that by hiding and not “taking care of business”, that it will keep happening over and over and over again and again. That he’ll never completely go away until everything (our marriage and family) is destroyed.

Does that sound crazy or what?
 
RJ:

Her relationship has become the elephant in the room.

I recommend this site:

www.marriagebuilders.com

it is not Catholic but many Catholics and Christians are on it. You can find a lot of support and encouragement to take a stand.

You have to fight for your marriage if you want to keep it.

Best wishes,Scott
 
RJ, I feel for you. Basically she’s telling you that the only way to make things work is if she can keep rubbing salt in the wounds she inflicted on you.

And you’re in pain and people in pain don’t react intelligently.

You need to heal yourself first. So every action that comes from that will be seated in wisdom and the counsel of the Holy Spirit.

Start by fixing your relationship with God. Increase your prayer life. Take your wife to holy hour with you. Pray together in church. Just the two of you in silence. I promise you she does not have that spiritual intimacy with a man who is cheating on his wife.

Satan will ramp up the attack then. He wants your marriage to fail. He’s attacking it at the weakest point… your wife’s desire to feel “special.” Many of us weren’t made to feel special by our husbands. But we didn’t go become besties with the guy in the office. I just observed a personal acquaintance leave her husband and children over a man in the office.

There is more to you than going to work and eating and sleeping. Marriages go through ups and downs. And there are always birds of prey waiting for the vulnerable.

I’d also question her relationship with her father that she is so interested in someone so close to his age. She is providing him hero worship and he is flattering her. That’s not the basis for anything permanent or valuable.

Keep working at it. It can survive if she comes to her senses. Anything you have to do to keep a marriage going (short of putting up with abuse) is better than enduring the breakup of a family.
 
While it can be ‘ok’ to have friends of the opposite sex…typically, that is not the norm, if one spouse is excluding another spouse from that relationship. I think it’s more appropriate to have relationships, with other couples–or with each other’s friends–but not sidebar relationships with members of the opp sex. It’s not healthy, and sort of like playing with fire. I think that we, as married people, need to focus our attention and energy on our marriages and children. My husband and I do things separately of course–we have our own hobbies, and joint hobbies…but the focus of my life is him and my kids. Not another guy.

Your wife needs to end that relationship, RJ. If she doesn’t…it will naturally take its toll on your marriage, it won’t be a matter of choice. I’ll keep you in my prayers.:o
 
You are kidding right?? Why would you let someone who has cheated on you remain “friends” with the person he/she cheated with? I don’t care WHAT the reason is. It just isn’t right.

Kathy
 
Bluntly, no, your marriage will NOT survive if she insists on ‘being friends’ with someone with whom she has already betrayed you.

You may continue living in the same house, but it will be sheer hell for you.

As to what he’s telling her about poor him, his difficult marriage, 9 times out of 10, it’s all lies, told to get sympathy and convince the other woman it’s okay and that even though he’s cheating on his wife, he’s really a nice guy. I have been through this. I know the things my husband made people think about me that aren’t even remotely true, and I’ve seen it in story after story after story on an infidelity board, where the most awful lies are told about the wife.
 
Well, I talked to her about it last night. Told her that I wanted him out of our life completely. She begged me to not make her quit her job. I then told her that I can’t handle it anymore and I need someone to talk to, that I can’t do it alone anymore. She said she’d go with me.

At least it’s a start.
 
RascalJones said:
Well, I talked to her about it last night. Told her that I wanted him out of our life completely. She begged me to not make her quit her job. I then told her that I can’t handle it anymore and I need someone to talk to, that I can’t do it alone anymore. She said she’d go with me.

At least it’s a start.
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I’m glad you talked with her. 👍 I have a feeling going to counseling/therapy will be good for both of you – having a “neutral” person to help point out areas that need improvement (for both of you) will be good. Again, I haven’t needed it myself, but I’ve heard great things about Retrouvaille.

“She begged me to not make her quit her job.” -----> this is not good. I think you mentioned before that she would probably be able to do the same job at a different location right? Seems like that would be a very sensible and fair compromise – she can keep doing a job she likes but not where that man is going to be around her all the time. I would stick to your guns on this one.

Sending up another prayer for you and your marriage and family. :crossrc:
 
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