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At least that's the message I got from our MC last night. My wife brought up that I asked her to take a polygraph and the therapist asked why and I said I have read that it's a tool that can help restore Trust. I said I used to think I would know if my wife was lying to me but right now I don't have that confidence so an independent objective third party would help put some questions to rest

There was some more back and forth and then our therapist said let's say I desired another man, my husband asks me do you desire that man, I would look at my husband and say no honey, I am happy with you. She said I would answer this way if I thought my husband was looking for reassurance and I said you just lied to your husband's face and she said no, I reassured him

I said you just told us that you desire this other man, your husband asks you that very question, your response was no even though the correct answer was yes, and you are telling me that you didn't lie to him, you reassured him? And she said yes

I said okay, let's say you are talking to this other man, your husband doesn't know that, he asks you if you are talking to this other man, would you tell him no and she said no, that would be a felony lie. I said what's the difference? You are lying to your husband on purpose and you are justifying it as reassuring him. Why stop there?

She said there are white lies and there are felony lies. She said let me ask you this, your wife asks does my butt look big in these jeans or does this dress look good on you and I said I would give her my honest opinion. I would not be cruel I would just be honest because if you don't have honesty in your marriage what do you have?

Am I so far out of touch with reality? Am I the outlier? If you are lying to your spouse to avoid an uncomfortable conversation or situation and you justify it as sparing his or her feelings you are lying to yourself, at least that's how I see it

At this point I think the therapist was getting a bit frustrated with me. She asked do you tell your wife every single time you see another woman as attractive and I said no but if my wife asked me is that woman attractive I would say yes or no.

Is my moral compass this far out of whack with today's society?

I’d FIRE that MC *immediately*.

word comes to mind: "Diplomacy"

So you need to say something that is a big negative. Well, most languages on this minuscule planet have the words to convey anything in a way to minimize pain and the attendant embarrassment of being told the truth.

Side note: If you don't lie - you DON"T have to remember what you said in your lie!

Can't find the words to tell the truth? Then do as Grandma said: "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all."

words can cut worse than any sword -

I don’t think there is a universal answer. To me this is a values question. What does the person value more? And how does that align with thier spouses values?

In your case, you value honesty over not hurting someone’s feelings. Another person could choose "avoid hurting feelings" in situations that are seemingly benign. Neither seem harmful to me, why tell someone their pants make their ass look big? There is little to be gained there unless you see it as a bigger conversation that you think your spouse might be depressed and not taking care of themselves, for example.

I too have come to value honesty to the largest extent over many other options so no I don’t think you are alone on that. But, I also am not someone who asks her husband if her ass looks big in her pants. (Not that there is anything wrong with that, I have just gotten to the age that I don’t care)

When these things come up, and we get deadlocked on something I try and go to a broader picture. Do our values match up on this issue? And if not, can we work towards matching up? Can we get closer to agreement if one of us or both of us make something more important because it’s important to our spouse?

Sometimes the genuine answer is no. Then it brings you either to an agree to disagree thing or it’s a dealbreaker.

In my eyes, honesty, respect, love, etc. are fundamental aspects of a healthy and happy relationship. For me, honesty has become one of the most important litmus tests. How can I feel
respected if you only tell me what you think I want to hear? How can I feel loved if you can’t give me truths that allow me to make the best decisions for myself? How can we have good communication, trust, connection, etc without authenticity ? Truth is a fundamental ingredient for all these things.

Do I ever tell white lies? Not to my husband. Do I think there could be good use cases for white lies? Yes, there are things I could look at that I do that can qualify. I have called off from work sick and not be sick. I am not one who would call in sick to go do something fun. But if I need rest, I might take a day now and again with no fever or sniffles or whatever.

For the most part though, my default is typically to look at a way to avoid lies and still be tactful or careful with someone’s feelings. But, I know great people with great morals who have good intentions with a white lie. And I am okay with that for the most part. I just think after infidelity one has to be more careful because it’s a years long process to rebuild trust, and that’s impossible if you are still catching them in lies. A ws who tells 10 hard truths and fudges something seemingly small in comparison will wipe out all the faith that was built over those 10 truths.

I think maybe shop for a new MC.

[This message edited by hikingout at 6:01 AM, Wednesday, November 6th]

Are you only asking on the poly "do u desire another man?" I think the questions for a poly are usually more cut and dry and have bigger ramifications. "Did u perform oral sex for that man". "Did that man see your breasts or vagina" "did he perform oral sex on you" "did you have vaginal intercourse with him"

Yes you might ask if she's attracted to someone. But there are levels of attraction from a man walking down the street she never met to one she works with every day.

And most importantly if she has had an affair that you already know about, then she has a history of lying and deceiving that she didn't have before the affair and your therapist may not have with her husband.

I read your post shortly after you published it and have been trying to construct an answer that makes sense... There is so much to address...

First of all: A very wise man once said, "let him without sin cast the first stone". That quote came to mind when contemplating your MC’s comparison to questioning a wandering eye to the possible actual act of following through the acts of a wandering eye...
It’s like arguing that because you took a cheap pen from the local bank then you are at the same level as the guy that robbed the same bank with a gun. After all – technically it’s all stealing.

Comparing the THOUGHT of thinking somebody might be hot or a possible "good lay" or whatever to the ACTION of possibly having had a real, physical and/or emotional affair... That goes beyond the white lie/black lie test. Just because you haven’t shared with your wife that you stopped by the BMW dealer and are thinking of leasing a new vehicle does not make you as dishonest as if you had actually signed the papers without discussing it with her.

Wife and I have a very honest marriage. We tend to share our thoughts and needs. For example: neither of us would make a major purchase without at least checking with the other. Yet that "honesty" doesn’t mean that I have to share before heading to the local angling store and returning with 100 worth of flies or tippet. It does however mean that I would have to share that I want to buy that expensive fly-rod, and that we are in agreement about it. That I had been contemplating it for months without sharing with her... is that a lie that would "equal" if she had an affair?

I would have entered that argument if any with the MC:
Are you equating a thought – even a fleeting thought – to possible actual, long-term decisions and actions?
Followed with the possible theoretical question: IF I desired another woman – at what point would it become imperative for me to share that with my partner so that it didn’t negatively impact our relationship? Keep in mind that even I would have to accept that my wife might have the hots for George Clooney, but that might be because I have a hall-pass on Hale Berry. There is a vast world from fantasy to reality... I guess I would chicken out if I did get a friend-request from a Ms. Berry...

I guess we could reword that quote for the MC; "let him that is stoned argue everything is equal"...

Second: Someone and/or everyone in the equation isn’t understanding the poly, and I fear that might include you...
I shared about polys on another thread of yours and I don’t think you read, understood or agreed to what I shared. I do however think I can claim to have MORE experience with the practical aspects of polygraphs than most posters here.
They measure HONESTY and not the truth. Although the both tend to go hand-in-hand.
They work best on factual truths – actions rather than thoughts.
Like... "Did you love OM" is a question any semi-competent operator would warn against, and any good operator refuse to ask. "Did you have sexual– as we defined "sex" earlier on – with OM" would definitely pass the operators check-list. Of course, having first defined what "sex" is (as in, oral, touching of genital areas, manual stimulation, etc.).
You would never and should never ask "that man we saw in the parking-lot outside – was he hot?"

Third:
It was some time ago when you shared that the poly was scheduled and your wife agreed to it.
Why is it still only a possibility?
Why is your wife questioning it?
Why does she still see this as a threat? Remember the poly is not a threat – it’s a step where she can confirm she’s honest, and if she passes then it sort-of demands you accept she’s being honest. At the same time a failure should tell you there is little hope...

I suggest you revisit the thread about the poly.

Fourth:
I want to elaborate a bit about how you could construct your list of questions, and how you and the operator could the extract the key 3-4 questions you actually get:

For the sake of argument then lets say that your wife has insisted this was never physical and only digital (as in sexting), and let’s imagine that this is a key-fear factor for you.
Your list of questions might include:
Have you ever physically touched the OM in any way?
Did OM ever physically touch you?
Were OM and you ever alone in a private area?
Were you and OM ever alone in a vehicle?
Were you and OM ever alone outside of the work-environment?
Were you and OM ever alone in a work-environment?
Have you ever touched the OM in the genital-area with or without him being clothed?
Have you ever touched OM in the genital area with him being undressed in that area?
Has the OM ever touched your genital area dressed or undressed?
Have you ever given the OM sexual gratification with direct physical touch?
Has the OM ever given you sexual gratification with or without direct physical touch?

And so on and so on...
You basically lay out like 20-30 yes-and-no questions on the physical/sexual aspects, and from them you might get some answers. Those answers then might establish the level the operator bases his question on.
Like at the moment she might be insisting there was never any physical contact. The questions might establish that there was some hugging and maybe even some making out with breast- and ass fondling, but she still insists there was no "sex" or sexual gratification.
The operator would then probably spend some time defining sex with her: "When I ask you about sexual relations I am referring to any action such as you placing your hand on his penis, him touching your genital area, grinding, actions aimed at sexual stimulation, oral sex (giving and receiving), mutual masturbation, PIV sex... (and whatever else he might include). I am excluding the actions you describe when you hugged, he fondled your breasts and grabbed your behind.
At that point she might share with the operator that yes – she DID give OM a BJ, so he might reword the question he had in mind:
Other than WB have you had sexual relations with any man since xx.xx.xx as we defined that term earlier on
To
Other than the oral sex you gave OM, have you had sexual relations with any man since xx.xx.xx as we defined that term earlier on

In either case – if she passes then at least you know she’s being honest. Well... a 95% or better chance of her being honest.

WB – I truly believe that the sex-or-no-sex issue is not the make-or-break issue for possible reconciliation. Based on what you have shared I give it at least an equal chance that she IS being honest as-is. What I truly 100% believe will hinder your hopes of reconciling is the DOUBT you have AND/OR the possible lie she carries.
IF you constantly have doubts and/or if she is hiding that they made out and had sex like rabbits... that will hinder both or either of you from healing. In infidelity the old adage "The truth will set you free" is king.

Based on your MC's definition of "felony lies" and Bigger's explanation of the types of question a polygrapher will approve, it seems that a polygraph will only expose the lies that your MC herself concedes are a trust violation. "White lies," being lies about thought rather than deed, would not make it onto the agenda.

I realize that this doesn't answer your question about absolute honesty, but it suggests your MC ought to learn more about how polys work before giving an opinion on whether they are appropriate.

If my W wanted sex with someone else, I think I'd know it now, after d-day. I would not be reassured by her denying it.

Before d-day, I certainly accepted some lies from my W - I asked if she was having an A; she denied it; I believed her denial. After d-day, I want truth. Diplomacy is good. Tact is good. But I want the truth, even when it's ephemeral.

My reco, too, is to fire this MC. Maybe her approach is right for some people; that's possible, though I doubt it. It's flat out wrong, IMO, for partners impacted by infidelity.

*****

BTW, IMO your MC's hypothetical was worthless. I find lots of women to be attractive. Before talking about M with W2b, I made my choice - I much preferred a deep connection with W2b than more superficial connections with multiple women. It was one or the other for me, because connecting takes time. I had no doubt that I could forge a deeper connection when my time was focused on one partner than if I had to split my time between multiples. Attractiveness and sexiness do not necessarily translate into conscious desire for sex with the attractive/sexy person.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 5:12 PM, Thursday, November 7th]

I’d bet real money that therapist cheated on their spouse in the past.
Fire them yesterday. You’re the aggrieved partner. Whatever it takes within reason to feel more secure in your relationship, your therapist should wholeheartedly support. Not argue with you on the value of it!

Lots of people think lying to save face is fine.

I think it's not that hard to be tactful in dodging a question when the honest answer is difficult or harsh.

"Do these pants make my butt look big?" "I think they are/are not flattering" the question isn't really about the butt and the answer makes a statement about something she can change (the pants) not something she can't (her butt). The alternative rude/walking into a landmine answer is "No your butt is big, those are just pants".

As for attraction, I've never expected my wife or myself to be exclusive in terms of attraction. I get some people have this thought, but I can't really imagine this framework. So both my wife and I have no problem stating when we find other people attractive.

She asked do you tell your wife every single time you see another woman as attractive

When we see someone particularly attractive we say a code word to each other. It's more a matter of practicality that it doesn't make sense to point out every person that is over the threshold of "reasonably attractive".

Hypothetically if I was less comfortable with this type of discussion and my wife asked "Do you desire this woman?" I would answer perhaps "I find her attractive, but I'm devoted to you."

It's not that difficult to understand that "don't lie" doesn't mean "you must divulge your every inner thought and impulse".

I see attractive women every day. If my wife asked if some women was attractive I would say yes or no. If my wife had a suspicion that I was interested in some woman and asked me and I am interested but I look my wife in the face and answer no I am not interested in that woman then I just lied to my wife's face just so I didn't have to have an uncomfortable conversation. Telling myself I was okay lying because it spared my wife's feelings is BS.

Now my wife believes, falsely, that our relationship is just fine. Had I manned up and confessed that yes I am interested maybe we could head off a potentially huge problem and save the marriage.

I do feel the same way about honesty as what you are expressing. I don’t think there is room for lying in a healthy marriage, especially when infidelity has happened.

You made me realize something I never thought of from this angle. WS are often avoidant type people, I know I was. And I look at all I held back in communication over the years and I now think of that as the most dangerous lying I have done outside the affair. None of it with malicious intentions towards him. But not talking to him more about how I was feeling was lying by omission. I am just now realizing that was the way I was a liar. I never went around saying things that weren’t true. I just held a lot in because I needed to be pleasing.

It was all so I wasn’t a burden on him. I didn’t trust anyone to stay if I made too many demands. To go from that to where I am today was a journey.

So why am I telling you this? Because what you are seeing goes deeper than you probably realize. it does take a lot of steps to get from a person comfortable with grey to become more black and white. Even if for someone who really wants to save their marriage. I don’t think it’s ever instantaneous. I personally believe people who make it seem that way are people who are good at faking it (maybe with the intention of faking it until making it, maybe with intentions of just doing enough to put you at ease) I think there are periods of time when most ws fake it to make it. I mean that in the way in I knew what behavior was better or expected but I didn’t feel the strong motivation towards those decisions for myself. I mean yes I wanted the relationship for me, but I didn’t want to do some of the harder things at first for me. It takes getting to the place that the pain of not changing is worse than the pain of trying to be a better person.

So my advice as you sort through these things is understand what you require, make sure that she understands said requirements. But know that for some period of time, meeting them is complying, not a change of character. Character building is possible but it takes a lot of working on self awareness, and someone dedicated to that will stumble across many epiphanies over time to get where they are going.

It’s possible to force the truth with a poly. My husband and I both took them. And it helped put to bed some key questions. The number one thing we both wanted to know is there weren’t any other affairs.

But long term I don’t feel it was character building, and while we got answers that were needed it is only a small drop of water in an ocean of actions that rebuilt trust.

So I am not trying to talk you out of the poly, I am stating have realistic expectations of what it will do for you. Your wife will have to work hard for a long time before she is able to be fully honest all the time about everything. It’s not that he went around lying to me, moreso a ws lies to themselves and for some time you are getting shit they believe to be true. Their understanding evolves over time as they work on themselves, if they do it . That can be as disorienting to a bs as someone who was standing and lying to your face about facts they know they are lying about.

Your values here are not the same at this time. It’s possible for her to choose the relationship over her tendencies for some period of time while she explores why this value isn’t strong, why she wants to change it, find where the patterns came from, so she can resist her natural tendencies enough times she figures out she likes the results better by living more wholesomely. There will be failures in the process because she doesn’t have the same operating system as you do. There won’t always be black and white things like a poly to navigate that.

Just food for thought.

[This message edited by hikingout at 4:22 AM, Thursday, November 7th]

WB1340,

I agree with what you said about lying, and I don't think you're an outlier. Your MC clearly knew that answering no was not telling the truth, and not telling the truth is a lie.

I have difficulty with the concept of "lying to yourself" that you and hikingout mentioned. I don't understand how it's possible to knowingly tell yourself a lie.

In the case of the MC, I would say that the MC has different values than you. She knows the statement is a lie and believes it is in the best interest of herself, the other marriage partner, and the marriage to lie. And then, I'm assuming that the MC believes that the partner being lied to knows they are being lied to and also agrees passively that it is best for them to be lied to by their partner. I have a strong disagreement to that idea, and you seem to disagree with it also. With infidelity, there are so many lies, and you truly aren't aware that your partner is lying to you. It makes sense to me to insist on full truth.

Back to the topic of self deception and lying to yourself. You wrote this:

If you are lying to your spouse to avoid an uncomfortable conversation or situation and you justify it as sparing his or her feelings you are lying to yourself, at least that's how I see it

You are aware that you lying in that case, so you are not deceiving yourself or lying to yourself. You are justifying it, but you aren't personally fooling yourself about what you have actual done in terms of telling the lie or truth. If you truly believe what you are telling yourself of why you did it, you either have different values or you are not aware of the actual truth. It seems possible to me that a WS could tell themselves that everyone would act the same and cheat in the conditions they were in or that cheating wouldn't really hurt their spouse. The WS would know if they truly believed those things, or they were lying. It's the not knowing part that makes it a lie.

I would fire that MC. She is showing bias. she is minimizing the impact of your Ws A on you. She is not on your side and she is not helping anyone with this line of thought. She is reinforcing your W belief that she did nothing wrong.

I think MC can work, but most MC are not equipped to handle infidelity. Our MC sessions were disasters. We never got to more than a few sessions. We both did IC which was much more helpful early on.

As someone who was a BH and has happily reconciled. . . what your MC recommends is exactly how the environment ripe for an A is created. I can't believe this MC. Find another one or table MC and do IC instead.

To get to the point my W and I are at we had to have a lot of painful and extremely uncomfortable conversations. I needed honesty, even when it hurt either of us. No more white lies either. That was a consequence of us going through R. White lies work in the pre-A naviete, but that naviete cannot exist in a truly reconciled marriage. No room for resentment building in my new M.

If you've had to have a conversation with your WS that involves them having sex (virtually or otherwise) with someone other than you then, "Do I look fat in these jeans," barely registers. I answer honestly, but not in a hurtful way. I detest lying of any kind in my M. My w does too.

How can I trust my W if I know that she is lying to me about anything? We both get hurt with that policy sometimes, but we can work through it because the respect and trust was restored over many years by being honest, even when it hurts. I will posit my W's A might not have happened if she felt comfortable talking to me like she is now. At a minimum lying and creating barriers to intimate communication is the opposite of the stated goal of MC.

Lies are fucking lies. Doesn't matter if they are big or small or what color they are. They are still dishonest. Now this MC appears to be encouraging you to lie to one another. . . Wow.

Run away from this MC like your ass is on fire.

Speaking as a fWS, I get why you're skeptical, but I was an expert at lying to myself. It's a form of cognitive dissonance, which is a well researched psychological phenomenon. When people hold two powerful but inconsistent beliefs, they adjust their internal reality to relieve the stress of trying to choose between them. That only works if they successfully deceive themselves, because logically, it's not possible to reconcile conflicting absolutes. Cognitive dissonance manifests in infidelity as either vilifying the spouse or compartmentalizing life into separate and "unrelated" categories.

BraveSirRobin,

I still don't understand it and can't seem to find an example for myself in my real life.

I would say that based on what I saw, my WS did vilify me before/during his affair. He focused on any negative aspect of me and our marriage. I would also say that he truly felt that way at the time and wasn't lying or deceiving himself. That maybe led to feeling entitled. Then, he made a calculated decision at one point that he didn't care enough about our marriage and me not to cheat. Maybe he underestimated what the fallout would be if I found out, but I don't think that is considered lying to yourself.

The only thing that comes close to an example in my life is something like being tempted and cheating on a diet or procrastinating on a task. I mean I can excuse it away, but I still know the consequence. I know myself well enough to know putting temptations in front of me will make it more likely to happen. I'm not lying to myself if I do that. At some point, I still make a judgement based on my understanding and reason and take action. Maybe I think I won't regret it as much as I actually did later.

Of course, it's possible I don't think like my WS. There have been times in the past where he is more impulsive and less likely to calculate risk. He seems better able to focus on potential reward. Can you give me an example of where you actually knowingly lied to yourself?

For a non-infidelity example, there was the time I mentally rewrote the details of childhood sexual abuse to be more "understandable" in my own mind. For years, I had remembered it as something that happened when I was quite small, four or five years old. Within the last few years, something came up that made me realize I was much older, maybe ten or eleven. My reaction was shock, followed by an inner voice that said, "No, you've always known that." And I realized that it was true, I did know it, but I wasn't able to handle it because I blamed myself for feeling validated by my abuser. I looked at myself in a way that I would never look at any other victim of CSA, as having consented to my own abuse because my nascent sexuality made the adult's interest feel intriguing and forbidden. A four year old wouldn't think that way, so I made myself four in my memory. But when I challenged the memory head on, I realized that it was a lie.

The infidelity self-deception wasn't so different. I wanted to believe I wasn't the type of person who could do what I did, but clearly I was; I had done it. That was so uncomfortable for me to face that I rewrote what had happened in my own mind to a level where I believed it if I didn't look too closely. It's stunning what the human brain can achieve in an effort to defend itself.

Thank you! That is easier for me to understand. And it must be very painful for you to recall. So again, thank you.

I can envision my WS hating/vilifying me and then minutes or hours later also missing me when he's with his AP, which he described. Back and forth and eventually making a decision. I suppose that might be familiar to me with a job or some other situation. The simultaneously holding both ideas in my head doesn't work for me. Again, thank you for that.

Whenever my wife asks me a question, no.matter how insignificant the subject might be, I check myself if I find myself tempted to give a massaged reply, and I expect the same of her. One of the criteria we agreed on to seek reconciliation wss that would hew to a strict policy of only sharing the absolute radical truth in all.matters in every aspect of our life together. So far, I believe it has worked out quite well for us. It has meant hearing things about her affairs that honestly took away my breath, and a few things about myself that are unflattering in the honest appraisal of my own behaviours but IMO that is the what is required as we try to create a new relationship together.

BSR -- Thank you for your contribution. You wrote;

For a non-infidelity example, there was the time I mentally rewrote the details of childhood sexual abuse to be more "understandable" in my own mind. For years, I had remembered it as something that happened when I was quite small, four or five years old. Within the last few years, something came up that made me realize I was much older, maybe ten or eleven. My reaction was shock, followed by an inner voice that said, "No, you've always known that." And I realized that it was true, I did know it, but I wasn't able to handle it because I blamed myself for feeling validated by my abuser. I looked at myself in a way that I would never look at any other victim of CSA, as having consented to my own abuse because my nascent sexuality made the adult's interest feel intriguing and forbidden. A four year old wouldn't think that way, so I made myself four in my memory. But when I challenged the memory head on, I realized that it was a lie.

The infidelity self-deception wasn't so different. I wanted to believe I wasn't the type of person who could do what I did, but clearly I was; I had done it. That was so uncomfortable for me to face that I rewrote what had happened in my own mind to a level where I believed it if I didn't look too closely. It's stunning what the human brain can achieve in an effort to defend itself.

That gives me pause. Is there any difference in your mind between the two? In one you were not the main actor and in the other you were the main actor. Meaning in one scenario you were the one having an act committed to/on you and in the other you were the one committing the act. Sort of a hula hoop exercise -- what is in and out of your control.