SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Mr. Guy:

Please read again the two posts just before this one.

No matter how anyone interprets the facts you have presented - this situaion just smells very fishy.

SOMETHING is OFF with your wife.

Another thought: Assume no cheating type activity. Well?

Why the "you can't come?" from her?

Something she doesn't like about you being around when she is at meeting/converence/hotel?

Lots of ways to think what is underlying her statement.

She doesn't like you very much.

She thinkgs you will be some kind of drag on what? Just your presence? Or puts a kink in the plans she has for the time there? That one smells fishy.

Perhaps (?!) there is some request by the planners of the get-together for "spouses only" or "Writers only"

I would gamble the guestion of bluntly asking why she doesn't want you there at all.

Also, call the hotel regarding the "1 person" rule she related.

FWIW - my wife didn't come home one night claiming the need to provide medical aid to anoter friend of the family. A male who had an out-patient operation but needed to be watched for ??? bad afterwards effects of the operation. SHE DIDN'T CALL ME TO TELL ME THIS SITUATION!!

I stewed all night and around 0730 still no wife. Well, I can't shoot her. I can't do physical violence. I can't verbally berate her. (words don't mean so much) so ???

She had converted our small dining room into her computer and hobby room.

I threw all of her hobby stuff out our front door. Unplugged all the wiring for her computer stuff (hobby things included) and was tossing the last armfull of stuff into the yard as she finally drove up to our carport.

I was LIVID! I don't remember what I said (no cursing I'm sure) and I was brief. I said something about lack of respect and then went and took a shower and hit the rack as I Had been awake all night fuming.

She said: "I texted you several times!" "You never replied." Well - cell coverage barely works at our house and most often doesn't work at all.

Well, we had a LAND LINE telephone (that's buried copper wire) and it was working fine. ?? why she could not just CALL?

She had cheated once before and I (foolishly?) didn't move on from her. So she chose to do what she did.

Smells to me like what your wife is doing.

Again - wish you luck this doesn't get worse for you.

(side note: She now lets me know her itenerary anythime she is away.)

[This message edited by Hippo16 at 4:51 PM, Sunday, February 8th]

Chiming in as a writer, I wouldn't want my spouse with me at a residency, especially if I'm a guest of honor. Usually for a residency, you're there to have focused writing time, and in between, doing talks/critiques with other writers. You want space and quiet while back in your room, and it's not typical for people to bring family members.

Now, if it's just a conference, people often bring their spouse and/or kids, and it's not a big deal because you're just running around doing panels, readings, and signings. The point isn't to get a lot of writing done, so having people stay with you isn't a big deal.

It does make sense, partially, in a normal situation. Partially because your spouse can stll be with you for the night, and out your way for as long as you need alone time.

I did many events were I was on stage and it was stressful to prepare, write rehearse.
Never disturbed me when my wife was around because she kept away, when I was done, called her and met.

This is not a normal situation since she is a cheater and she seems to be unable to get her story straight.
Her partner is in distress because of her past choices. And she chose to not care about that.

Of course this shows clearly what her priority is between:
- Her marriage and Family
- Her event (devil's advocate, is still fishy)
- Her sexual adventure / affair (likely from previous patterns, lies and current gaslighting)

Even playing devil's advocate, this event matters more than her marriage and husband. Legitimate choice, she can do that.

For the OP nothing changes, 180 or Divorce. She is telling where you stand in her life. She is establishing a new precedent that you Must accept or else... You decide what consequences.

I would serve her divorce papers right away. I can't tolerate bullshit anymore.

I’m trying to be positive, but as you and many others know, for the betrayed that is hard to do. Also, the policy at the hotel is that spouses can come for the last day/night. My wife nixed this. Refuses to give a straight answer. She just feels "better that I just not come".

Bullshit.

Thanks again. I think I will leave the thread to more important ones. One thing I do plan on doing before she goes is to be very present, let her know that I love her very much and send flowers to her room with a nice card before she arrives. As Trdd said, be positive. If I’m wrong or missing something, then I want her to feel that I care deeply.

Pick me dance does not work. Never. This is "please don't have sex with someone else again, because I sent you flowers".

She does not care. At best she really does not want you in her life -> compartmentalization (cheater pattern), and she gives you shaky and fuzzy excuses (read lies) as rationale, which is not very lovely.

At worst rather than flowers she could use condoms. Whic seeing the past betrayal and current bs is likely.

Not confronting this prior to her going will IMO be detrimental to your relationship. You are going to spend every waking moment wondering why she was so adamant that you not be there. Ask her point break if this guy is going to be there and watch her body language VERY closely, maintain eye contact. If she deflects and becomes mad, that is a clear sign of guilt IMO.

Exactly.

If you love her, confront her.
And you will know.
Because chances are she is at it again.

You are enabling it by your hope that she changed.
If someone lies to you they did not change at all.

OK, I said I wasn't coming back to the thread, but I feel one final post...

Rest assured I am strategizing how I will handle this. I strongly suspect there is someone who will be there that she knows I will have a problem with and I am taking steps to ensure I know who it is- if anyone at all.

Why am I sending her flowers there on her first day? My wife, in the last few years, has taken her faith very seriously and understands my trust issues. She is heavily involved in church in ways that demands trust & honesty. I want to lean on that and make it clear I am trusting her in this situation. My hope is that whatever is going on she will feel the weight of any deceit or dishonesty as I will be calling for 100% accountability. And I will get it.

I shut down the makings of an EA 3-5 years ago.

Shut it down, or taught her she needs to take it further underground?

I don't know if that's the case, but just be aware, it wouldn't be the first time someone "shut down" an inappropriate relationship or affair only to find out months, or even years later their spouse just got far better at covering their tracks and hiding their activities.

I also second not doing the pick me dance. That almost never works. I wish you the best. I hope it turns out to be nothing, but there are some red flags here so don't let your guard down.

To me I'd have a P.I. there if there were any way I could afford it. It's clear your wife doesn't want you there even briefly, and I'm sure there is a reason for that other than the residency. I'd bet money on her EA-AP being there. If it was just the residency, she would have thrown you a bone with lunch/dinner etc.

That she lacks the empathy to consider your feelings and concerns given her history is the biggest problem. In a way, I would think you should be proceeding as if she were straying again unless proven otherwise. Detach. Start making plans for dealing with the financials and logistics of separation. I certainly wouldn't be sending flowers.

I have access to her email (which I never use, but will a few weeks surrounding the conference) and now want to access her texts. We both use Google Messaging. I know there’s a way to pair our phones together. But can it be done for me to receive her texts and hers not mine?

Not likely today. Phone companies have learned their lessons from the early days and are unlikely to support anything that does this without ensuring that the user knows about it. That leaves you using apps of questionable providence which may or may not do the job. Best bet would be to try and get something in your presence logged in onto her account, but even that will leave traces (text and emails that a new device logged in).

[This message edited by grubs at 2:26 PM, Monday, February 9th]

Your idea of the flowers making her remember that honesty is a key component of her faith will not work. The lure of an affair will always trump moral standards. If her faith is as important to her as you believe it is she would not be acting the way she is.

What would happen if you were to walk up to your wife and simply say can I see your phone? Would she just hand it over? Would she start asking questions? Or would she just say no?

If she stalls or says no and then an hour later walks up and says okay here you go well then you can probably assume she deleted everything she did not want you to see. Secrets have no place in a marriage. Privacy is reserved for using the bathroom by yourself

Now depending upon someone's job I can see exceptions to just handing over your phone at a moment's notice. Such as you work for the FBI or CIA but doesn't sound like your wife qualifies for any type of exception

The hardest part is facing the reality that something is wrong because if there is then you fear the consequence of the relationship unraveling but it already is. When she gets home can you honestly believe that you won't be obsessing over what happened while she was there alone?

I'm not trying to be antagonistic, I just see her actions as similar to those of a cheater

Hi, BP.

I haven't been on here for a while, but I remember you from a long time ago.

I do vaguely remember your story and do recall how you extricated yourself from that situation and eventually found happiness in a new relationship.

You've walked this path before. I'm sure you're aware of all the red flags. But "no secrets" is a critical boundary that I'm sure you set for yourself, and I would think your current partner should understand.

Now, I understand her need to try to separate her professional life from her personal life. But if you expressed any of these scenarios to her, and she couldn't or wouldn't provide clear, transparent, and logical reasons for her behavior, then that should be your biggest red flag.

Tell her directly what your thoughts/suspicions are. I'm sure she must understand your doubts, given your past relationship. The fact that she had an EA that you discovered puts her automatically at Strike 3, for me.

Don't even try to go underground to get your information. Put it right in her face. If she balks, start the next phase.

There's just no way you should have to tolerate any secrecy. I'm sorry you're back here.

Best of luck, friend.

This is interesting. You're asking advice from a group who has been through an affair before, and yet we each have a different way that we would approach this.

I'd stop confronting. You have straight up asked her why she doesn't want you there and her thoughts on any compromise of any sort. She's not given any satisfactory and logical explanation and may have lied about the single room occupancy. She now knows you might be on to her deception, and spouses cheating or planning to cheat will get better with their lies given the chance. It's survival. The fact that her answers aren't that great may indicate you've been generous and trusting, or that she hasn't cheated before other than her obvious EA. Having a colleague call you "MY little verb" is unprofessional and sounds demeaning to me, but she didn't seem to grasp the inappropriateness at all. Yuck.

I'd be prepared to separate or divorce. I would call the hotel and ask about switching a room your organization reserved from single to double occupancy. That's pretty much all I would need to end the marriage, but I'd probably still want more. If I had a regret after the affair, it was spending energy trying to get answers. I won't go through that again.

I would ask a friend or family member for money to get a PI, or I would tell her that I'm taking out money from the bank for a surprise for her or my own get-away vacation. That wouldn't be my preferred choice, because it might alert her to suspicion. Anything at all after that I found out would likely have me carefully planning my divorce and playing nice to execute it at the optimal time for me or continuing to watch and monitor. I definitely wouldn't be sending flowers. She sounds like the type to be shocked if you initiate a divorce while she's in the middle of another EA. There were no consequences for her last EA. I wouldn't put up with a spouse who's exploring new connections while married to me.

I hate being this suspicious and selfish. It's who I am now after having been through an affair. Honestly, for me, this is a reminder to always keep separate money and intel methods current.

you're making sure you find out who will be there that she is hiding from you, while at the same time you're making it clear you are trusting her in the situation? Help me with this contradiction: Are you saying you are telling her you trust her with the gesture of flowers...as subterfuge for your information seeking, a manipulation tactic, passive-aggressive reminder she is supposed to be honest, just plain cognitive dissonance?? Whatever the explanation is, the flowers are not going to accomplish something that will help you.

Hi BP- long time no see.

I no longer attend things like this because I would want the week to myself. I don’t want to entertain him, appease him in anything, I want to completely be immersive in the retreat. So I don’t think that part it off at all.

I don’t do it now because I now prioritize my marriage and I know this is would cause red flags that I am not willing to raise. However, that is due to my own prior choices. If I had to forgo it due to the wife before me’s choices I might be more rebellious.

Is it a red flag? Maybe. But maybe not. I have read enough from you in the past that I understand it’s triggering but if you have to manage her to keep her faithful that’s sort of pointless. If someone wants to cheat they will, and if someone who is not a cheater is being managed that also has a high potential of causing issues. You may need to think about what the boundaries are - can you stay married to someone who wants to take independent trips? That might not be something that works for you. And it may not work for her not to be able to.

I have read enough from you in the past that I understand it’s triggering but if you have to manage her to keep her faithful that’s sort of pointless. If someone wants to cheat they will, and if someone who is not a cheater is being managed that also has a high potential of causing issues. You may need to think about what the boundaries are - can you stay married to someone who wants to take independent trips?

This is an interesting take on the situation. Are you accusing bpguy of possibly causing issues with his wife by managing her interactions with others? Do you not agree with his position on the email interaction? Do you think his boundaries about what is appropriate in a marriage too much? They seem in line with Not Just Friends. Do you feel he was too triggering?

can you stay married to someone who wants to take independent trips?

It sounds like you are saying thatbpguy has a problem staying married to someone who takes independent trips in any situation. That sounds demeaning and like it denies the reality of the specifics of this situation. It's one thing if a spouse tells an honest story of why they would like an independent trip. If they lie about the details or give a dishonest reason, well that is deception, no? That will naturally lead to my distrust.

Kitchen depth,

I am sorry if that is how you read it.

I simply believe that you can’t control what another person does, you can only decide where your boundaries lie and what your reaction will be. It might be his spidey senses are right, or simply the scenario is triggering him due to his past experiences.

He has told us many times his first wife always will be the love of his life and this marriage is more or less built around friendship and safety. They bonded because she was a bs as well. She could be cheating, if she is bpguy will divorce her immediately I have no doubt and he should because I don’t believe he would have a reconciliation in him this time around. He did that the first time and was burned. I am 100 percent certain his current wife is fully and keenly aware of this.

There is nothing wrong with someone who has been traumatized as deeply as I know he was having triggers that cause these suspicions. And if she isn’t cheating there is nothing wrong with her feeling limited by those triggers. Both things are natural. I think by what I know this is the more likely scenario. My post was meant to ask him to consider other things to ask/assess.

I am not saying that bpguy is the problem. I am asking him to slow down and figure out if this trip is something he can live with because if it’s not he needs to tell his wife that straight up. She will either prioritize his feelings or she won’t. What does he want to do about that if she doesn’t want to prioritize his well being over this trip? Because right now these are the facts we know we are dealing with for sure. I think that’s why she is avoiding the conversation, she does not want to have to be forced to make that choice, she wants them to power through it.

I don’t know why you seem to frequently take issue with my posts? Is it because I am a ws? Or because you really believe I walk around victim blaming? I have been here a long time and when posters return after a long time often I have spoken to them extensively in the past. The context in which I write to them sometimes is shorthand. I think bpguy will understand me fine, but if he doesn’t we can work it out, I assure you. I consider him like an old friend, he helped me immensely to learn about a betrayed mind back when I was new. We joined around the same time and talked for years.

[This message edited by hikingout at 4:42 AM, Wednesday, February 11th]