SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Kindren... excellent point!!! You ought to find out the reason for this over-the-top reaction.

From what I have read, it looks like the two of them got their stories straight together, and then gave you and his wife a whitewashed version... a PG version.

[This message edited by lrpprl at 6:38 PM, Wednesday, November 30th]

Putting myself into the OM shoes (which is hard because Im with that group who will never fall in the WS crowd) I can see why he a wreck. Even if they didnt meet, in his mind he knew what he wanted out of seeing OP's wife and it wasn't just for a drink. He knew he overstepped,he knew he flirted, he knew it was essentially an EA, he also knew what would happen if his wife found out.
Even without going over the cliff, in this case which would be actually having sex with the WS, coming as close as they did (and they did come close) and with RoverGuy guy finding out, knowing there might come a day when his wife says "Honey we need to talk" yeah I can see him being a basket case. That stress will build up each day, day after day after day. He was exactly as I would expect a POS to be, knowing the cats out of the bag.

Rover, what gut-wrenching, potential marriage ending, deal breaker type detail(s) has she volunteered on her own that you would not, could not know? Those sorts of things (that you didn't ask for either - again, volunteered) are the types of actions that demonstrate a willingness to be honest and transparent. And make no mistake, those details exist. These are some of the ways a wayward can begin to rebuild trust and show they are becoming a safe partner. Those are also the sorts of things your lizard brain will begin to piece together years down the road, and eat a hole in your soul, once you have the vantage point of distance.

RoverGuy, you said repeatedly in your last post how much you know your wife and how certain you are she wouldn't have done certain things. If so, then why did her EA come as such a shock to you? For that matter, why are you contemplating divorce if your wife was just being overly friendly with an ex-beau? Why was Dickhead having a breakdown at the idea of you talking to his wife if all he did was send your wife some cheeky messages before ultimately rejecting her?

To repeat what Bigger has asked in his posts several times, how are you going to be exempt from alimony without any evidence of a physical affair? A high volume of phone calls, merely "flirtatious messages", and allegedly innocuous memes do not fit the legal definition of adultery anywhere. If your lawyer told you otherwise, then you should fire him or her.

The reason your wife is currently being so agreeable to your current "terms" is because she knows from her lawyer that you have no proof of a sexual relationship that can be used to contest alimony or support the enforcement of a postnup/reconciliation agreement. She's deleted all the evidence from her phone and doesn't think you're willing or able to do anything to recover them. She's able to swallow her pride and take the polygraph because she knows that a failed polygraph is inadmissible in court.

edit;add: I strongly advise you to read the thread from HurtHalo, which has just been updated in JFO. I think you could learn a lot from his experience.

[This message edited by BluerThanBlue at 7:53 PM, Wednesday, November 30th]

A high volume of phone calls, merely "flirtatious messages", and allegedly innocuous memes do not fit the legal definition of adultery anywhere. If your lawyer told you otherwise, then you should fire him or her.

This is 100% incorrect. In my state, Marital Misconduct is a bar to alimony. To prove marital misconduct, you need to show "intent" and "opportunity". Not just my current attorney. But the other 2 I interview, AND my WW's attorney all agree that 30k+ texts, 1500 pictures defines "intent". Going to the beach by herself which happens to be where OM lives is "opportunity".

This keeps coming up and I am telling y'all I have enough. WW knows it too which is why she is willing to sign a "Reconciliation Agreement" to forfeit alimony if we reconcile and divorce later. FFS, I have the best attorney anywhere near me. I took the advice of this forum and consulted 3 attorneys before I chose one.

Dont take it too harshly, sometimes things get pounded by the hammer when it just needs gentle nudge at most.

Everything you are doing to me sounds spot on.

The one thing you’re missing, and it’s huge, is your continued insistence that you have the truth. You only have the truth once it’s verified as such. If you’re hanging your hat on knowing this person for 28 years, and that you listened to 2 hours of honest conversation, I’m sorry but that’s not the truth.

Can you say with 100 percent surety you have the truth? On the other hand, you have 100 percent surety that your WW cheated, lied, hid it, became defensive after D day, refused to take responsibility after D day, refused to "grovel" in her own words after D day, told u not to contact OM’s wife after D day, has gently nudged you not to do a poly due to "cost", mistrusted your kids along the way, should I continue?

This is not about a 2x4, it’s about a naïveté on your part that you think you have the truth.

I would schedule the poly immediately. Then go from there.

Which state are you in? I vaguely recall you said North Carolina and looked up the statute (NCGS 50-16.1A), which defines marital misconduct as "acts of sexual or deviate sexual intercourse, deviate sexual acts, or sexual acts defined in G.S. 14‑27.1(4), voluntarily engaged in by a spouse with someone other than the other spouse."

Obviously your lawyers know more than I do, so I won't belabor the point, but if they're correct that seems like such an overly broad definition that it would be used by all and sundry to get out of paying alimony.

I've known my WW for 32 years, married 30. I thought I knew her. I didn't think she was a liar. Nearly everything out of her mouth since DDay is a lie, even little things that don't matter.

From RoverBoy's 1st post

Tens of thousands of texts (that's how I found out) and thousands of pictures. She was smart and deleted all of them so no idea what they said.

From RoverBoy's posts today

She has told me about the texts. They were 95% stupid crap, every day back and forth shit. The other 5% were them reminiscing. Sometimes that really crossed the line, but I believe her. Me seeing the content of all that banter will serve no purpose but to confuse me even more and make me focus on the small shit and not the big picture. I honestly don't want to read 10 months of texts.

I believe she never met him at the beach. I believe that she never sent him any sexual pictures (after 28 years I have gotten 1 -no way she would do that with an ex). What I WANT to believe is that she never INTENDED to have sex with him at the beach. So she is 100% on board for a poly to prove that they only intended to have a drink and she would never cross the "physical" line.

Roverboy, how can you line this up in your head? Your wife has acted way out of character for many months, and is 100% in self preservation and marriage preservation mode now.
Thousands of pictures were not just memes. There were personal, private offerings to entice him. The messages, although you want to label these things as "small shit", almost certainly got to the point of straight up offers to revisit and rekindle the passions of their relationship, including doing things now that she wouldn't do then.
Ask yourself why the OM would melt down and be terrified if he was rebuffing and "keeping it legal" to his marriage vows.
I strongly advise you to recover those texts if you can and at least do word searches on the results as others have advised. She blew through every boundary to proper judgement like she was on a cannonball run.
And I suspect as soon as you have the wherewithal to move decisively to polygraph her you will shortly find "how to beat a polygraph" in her search history.
There's been so many stories like yours, super common to reconnect and find that *SPARK* again and then to act on it. I don't want you to get anonymous pics of your naked wife sent to you following the OMs divorce finalization. There's scripts that all the people involved are following whether they recognize it or not, including you. Your showing her trust right now that comes awful close to rugsweeping. Knowledge is power Roverboy.

... and if after recovering all your wife's thousands of text and pictures you find nothing of a sexual nature, then congratulations. You will have the honor of being the first BS in the history of SI--and perhaps the world-- to have been told the complete truth by your cheating spouse on Dday.

@RoverGuy - gently - no way in hell you have the truth.

Firstly: Even if your wife spilled "everything" including sex, you will never have the whole truth. Believe that. Because it isn't in the nature of liars to tell all the things they have kept secret.

***

Secondly: your wife has been getting Botox and decided to start a "physical fitness business" (Hobby) where several years ago, she entered into a highly inappropriate relationship with a male client where she "helped him get through his divorce" after his wife left him.

A relationship you knew nothing about - for years, until after your wife recently went off and had dinner with this same guy and went back to his house to "talk" for 6 hours or something like that.

***

Thirdly, the story your wife is telling you about her unrequited cheating attempt is so suspect and implausible that it is ridiculous.

***

Fourthly, you should find it very interesting that both of other side of these highly inappropriate relationships are corroborating her stories EXACTLY... After she has had her chance to catch up with them and get the stories straight.

***

Fifthly, she didn't want you to look at her phone without her being there to snatch it away from you.

***

Let me alert you - your wife has been lying to you. She continues to lie.

One of the clues that she is still lying is that her stories match the other actors so exactly. Unless you think she went from lying and obstructing to being completely truthful at a coin flip. And that never happens.

And then those guys just happen to be perfectly honest and forthcoming as well. Very convenient.

She has manipulated you in all the classic ways, she even got you to be the one worried about her with her suicide hints.

***

Now hear this: You will never get the whole truth from her. You will never get the truth from her boyfriends.

You might get some truth from the gym boyfriend's ex-wife.

You will get some truth from actual data that she has not manipulated: recovered information from her phone (Which is now very difficult to recover, particularly from iPhones), her phone and computers trash/recycle bin, phone backups to the cloud, her email (check sent items and drafts as well), polygraph verification, web search history, autocompletes on her web browsers - both desktop and mobile, Voice-Activated Recorders, and so on.

You might be able to find the pictures she sent even if you do not find the messages she sent them to. Don't be surprised if you find a trove of sexy/nude photos someplace, photos that you have never seen before... she'll tell you that the photos were for you, but she got embarrassed to send them - some shit like that.

I'll bet you can find some incriminating info at her studio or wherever she runs her business from.

I know of a couple of ways to get pure, unadulterated truth from her mouth/keyboard directly. Ask me if you are willing to go that extra mile.

***

But the feeling I get is that you want your marriage over everything, and are not willing to push to learn the full truth. That is certainly a course you may want to take. It's called rug-sweeping and generally results in years of pain, sadness, and anger for the betrayed partner.

And if you get mad at your wife, there is a good chance that people will eventually accuse you of being the abuser! just check out some stories on the other forums right here!

So, I advise you to "get a little crazy" finding out the actual truth. And when you do, you can make a truly informed decision. All your wife and her boyfriends (Plural) have done has been to manipulate you. You don't want to be their mark, do you?

Or, if you have seen enough, you can decide you want to decide you want to keep a wife who has almost certainly crossed way more boundaries than she has admitted to, or you can choose to divorce her.

Up to you.

Best of luck to you.

[This message edited by faithfulman at 3:14 AM, Thursday, December 1st]

Do you really think they were sending thousands of texts (as you put it) only to "chitchat"? All day, everyday? Don't you think two adults would have something more important to do than spend countless hours doing that? Boring don't you think?

And then:

If that wasn't crushing enough, she is showing no remorse and is blaming me for everything.

If there is nothing to really blame for (95% inofensive stuff you say) what was she blaming you for then? "Everything" seems a pretty hard word when there is only "chitchat" sentences and inofensive pictures involved in the thousands of texts and pictures sent don't you think?

Why do you think your WW did not let you look at her phone by yourself? Why do you think the OM freaked the hell out in front of her wife when he knew she knew about the affair? If he had done nothing wrong I bet you he would not be anywhere near that concerned with the situation.

I get it, that sometimes a person makes a choice. And they prefer the marriage above all truth. Or at least, when not knowing all truth people have the option to believe they have it from the cheaters mounth. They want to believe it so badly. They want to rugsweep. And that is personal choice if one goes that path.

But you can't deny that what people are saying does have "RED FLAG" written all over it. Think about it. How do you answer the above questions? Really dwelve into them and you will get it.

Otherwise, I'm afraid you may be heading into a train wreck in the future. And you do seem to be a nice person. Take care of you.

And never forget, people around here do not talk the talk just 'because". We do talk the talk because we certainly have walked the walk.

[This message edited by justanotherperson at 12:15 PM, Thursday, December 1st]

Rover -

Trust your attorney.

I also agree you’re on the precipice of rugsweeping this because you just want to move on. I understand that compulsion. But I think it would be a mistake. You‘re saying contradictory things, and this isn’t atypical of a newer BS. On one hand she sent thousands of texts and deleted them all, guarded her phone, and wouldn’t let you look through her phone without being present. In the next breath 95% of the texts were chit chat & 5% maybe inappropriate. Reason & logic dictates your wife would be clamoring to recover the texts to prove to you 95% was harmless. Reason & logic dictates the AP wouldn’t be shitting bricks if 95% of their communication was harmless. Reason & logic dictates all those photos weren’t just memes. Two things you said that are wholly untrue, that you know your wife, and you know she would never send nudes. You don’t know your wife, you thought you did, but now you’re dealing with a woman who would cheat on you. She also hid that other "friendship". As far as what she wouldn’t do, I recommend you read the threads of a lot of these guys whose wives refused to do anything but missionary with them, but did the entire Karma Sutra with their APs. Read the threads of remorseful cheaters of both sexes who admit they did sexual and other things for their APs they had never and wouldn’t do with their spouses. Your wife had to keep him interested to continue the thrill of the affair, she wasn’t using Spongebob memes to do that. You have to break out of this idea that you know your wife through & through. Your wife is highly manipulative, and guess what, as much as you swear you know her, she knows you too. She knows exactly what to do & say to finesse you, she’s been less successful because adultery is a whole other level & because you’ve been counseled by the battle worn who are desperately trying to keep you from making the same mistakes they did. I’m sorry for coming across hard, I don’t have the brain energy to try and soften this. You’ve done amazingly well overall in dealing with this deception, but every few pages I feel like you have a moment of true understanding, take 3 steps forward, and then your next post sounds like you’ve taken 2 steps back. The silent treatment, threats of suicide, "woe is me" routine, agreeing to leave & packing a bag all the while having no intention to leave is ALL emotional manipulation. And to reiterate, has she really told you anything that you didn’t already know? Has she really told you anything that was catastrophic? Nope. She didn’t delete all those thousands of texts over what she’s admitted to. Lastly, did she go to the beach with the intention to screw him? Assuming they didn’t, cheaters are liars, the biggest lies they tell is to themselves. She may even be able to pass a poly that she technically didn’t intend to go there to sleep with him, but deep in the back of her mind it was always a possibility. Did your wife admit to sexting? This is why you should recover the texts, if they were sexting, hard to believe once physically in each other’s presence with their spouses absent and blissfully unaware, they were meeting just for a drink. If it was just two old friends meeting for a drink, why’d he have so much guilt that he bailed? Had he showed up and shown interest, she absolutely would have slept with him. What do you think all those months of texts were? FOREPLAY. And the fact that she can’t admit to that, even though it didn’t even happen, is another indication she’s still lying to you.

Rover, as my favorite band would say…"what a long strange trip it’s been." I hope you are heading for a long stretch of peace in whatever you decide. Although all our stories have similarities only you have lived through your particulars and wishing you clarity and wisdom as you continue on your path.

Your wife certainly had a pretty intense EA and maybe more (I hope you are right but it seems to be against statistical odds) and that will take a lot of courage for you to work through. If you do decide to R, i hope you can eventually truly forgive her and be your best caring husband.

If you decide to D, that is by no means the easier path. I was very lonely for a while as I learned to become single again. It was also hard for me to get over the feeling that I failed. Even after 30 happy years I still get triggered, and I’m compelled to dwell in infidelity.

I have to admit I left because of pride. I could not accept the disrespect. The infidelity had a spectrum and for me it crossed lines that I could not accept…I chose not to accept and on purpose emptied myself of love for her and moved on. But for your particulars, providing something heavy comes up…I think I could have made it work…depending on how much she groveled for me….but I’d have to be pretty freakin sure I got the story.

Rover, back in the day when I was dating my future wife if someone told me she slept with another man I would call them crazy! I would have bet my balls that they were mistaken. She was true blue and kissed my ass. There was no way that could have possibly happened. Well there wasnt one guy she screwed, it was six! I almost got taken to a hospital after disclosure 23 yrs ago and Im still on this site.I dont blame you for not wanting the truth because it destroys you but you're stronger than you know, seek it out like Columbo.

Rover, as my favorite band would say…"what a long strange trip it’s been." I hope you are heading for a long stretch of peace in whatever you decide.

I'm still walking, so I'm sure that I can dance.

Rover, as my favorite band would say…"what a long strange trip it’s been." I hope you are heading for a long stretch of peace in whatever you decide.

I'm still walking, so I'm sure that I can dance.

Rover, you have been given great advice and are still being challenged by the vast experience on this board. I'll ask you this as a follow up, as Weir likes to ask

"just exactly what you gonna do now"?

"just exactly what you gonna do now"?

That I can't answer. I just don't have the answer right now. Over a month since d-day and it's still too emotional. I'm still on this Rollercoaster and so is WW.

Lots of thoughts in my head...I believe I have all I'm going to get as far as the truth. I know someone will say make her do a poly! Send her phone out to get all her texts back! Keep talking to OMW to verify locations/ stories!

I honestly don't have the energy for all that and frankly I just don't fucking care anymore. Yea, I want the truth, and she swears I have it. She will sign a postnup, or a reconciliation agreement. She either gives up alimony or her half of marital assets. That's huge. So do I accept her truth and give her the opportunity to build back trust, fix herself, and prove she is sincere? Or do I just say fuck it and throw away 25 years? I don't think I can make that decision right now.

You're missing the point. You shouldn't have to just "accept her truth."

You're entitled to nothing less than The Truth. And if she's remorseful, then she will mountains to provide it to you.

[This message edited by BluerThanBlue at 4:39 PM, Thursday, December 1st]