Is he taking the p*** now?

[Layla17]

I started a thread a few monthe ago when my dp and father of my 2 young dd's told me he wanted to leave. You were all a great help to me. In the end he did not leave and we have been trying to sort thngs out. We have been to Relate and we are getting on really well. He is working away this week and last night i spoke to him about the fact that we are not having sex at the moment. He said he was still not sure about us and that he didn't want sex to confuse things. He said he still cannot give me any guarantees. I was working on the basis that things were going well and we were gettng back on track and now I feel as if all my hopes have been shattered. Worse stll, he is going to his works party on Friday and the OW is gong to be there and I am worried what may happen if alcohol is thrown into the mix.
Has anyone got any advice?

I forgot to put he even brought her back to our family home when i was at dads one night, just shows he never loved me nor did he care about me and i hadn`t got a clue about this.

I am happier on my own and im not so snappy with DD now, when he lived here he didnt help me out at all and this used to wind me up, i am a much calmer person now.

Sorry i know ive rabbled on but i hope you get the picture im setting here

Am I the only one who thinks he shouldn't even be considering going to a partner's only night out where OW will be present?

Seems to me if he is going to this party that he is not understanding what he has put you through Layla.

Of course he shouldnt be going and he does not understand what he has put layla through but what can she do? Is an ultamatum (?SP) really the answer here.

If she insists he not go then he could turn around and say that she stopped him from going and she wants to trust him.

Layla if you think he will stay over at a friends could you find out for sure if that is where he will be?

Tell him your concerns about him staying over without sounding needy if that is possible.

Is there something you could have planned for early on saturday morning? After all it is very close to xmas?

If you are going down that route, there is only one way to do it: "I am your woman, and this is what will happen - No party. I don't do things that upset you and you won't do things that upset me. That is what being a couple is about."

Don't start going "Where will you be staying? Please consider my feelings. Love me. Hold me. I need you. Give me your answer, are you staying or are you going?" etc etc. As women, our instinct is to talk things over and find middle ground, but all of that will want to make him run away.

The risk here is that he says "No" and gets out of your life, but that will happen only if he was going to leave anyway. And better now than many painful months away...

I am having a terrible day. the girls are really playing up and I am very tearful which is not good. He phoned this morning to see how things were and when I said I was having a hard time he said he would phone again this afternoon to see how I am.
I don't think he sees that there is a problem with Friday night. He said that there is nothing between them and so that is it. he does however know that I don't trust him.
THat combined with the lack of sex makes me think he is wanting to leave but then when I try to think logically I do not think he is.
HW - when your h ended his affair did your sex life carry on as normal.
has anyone ever had a P who did not want sex temporarily for any reason? I find it very difficult to accept and in my paranoia it is making me think one of 3 things - he is getting it elsewhare (don't think this is true - he doesn't have time), he has promised OW that he is not having sex with me or he simply does not find me attractive anymore - I don't know which is worse!

(((((Layla))))) What a horrible situation ..

My ex h stopped having sex with me (after telling me he wasn't "sure" whether he still loved me etc and didn't want to confuse things etc etc.) and he had an OW all along and had been promising her he wouldn't sleep with me (something she took great delight in sharing with me at a later date)

I really hope I'm wrong but I would be very suspicious. Could he just be biding his time so that he gets Xmas with the dc's ?

Try just telling him that you want/need sex and won't take it as confirmation that he has definately decided to give things a go..

What a nightmare for you Tilly.
I hope that is not it with my DP. I think I need to confront him but i am worried about it being so close to Xmas.

I can see why you would want to leave it until after Xmas... I think I knew deep down he was going to go but I also put things off until the New Year

I know it doesn't really help, but if he has decided to go (with or without an OW involved) and you have tried counselling etc., then there is nothing much you can do about it and leaving it until after Xmas until you confront him isn't really going to make any difference (other than perhaps give your dc's and therefore probably you a slighty better Xmas ...?). The lack of control over your own life was the most frustrating thing for me ... After years of deciding things together, it f*cked me off that he could be the one to decide to turn out lives upside down and I didn't get a say in it.. I am a bit of a control freak though

On the plus side, he could just genuinely be unsure and not want to lead you on or confuse himself, in which case, in his own way, he's being quite sensible I suppose ??

Our sex life was always ok and in fact i think got better. We had a wonderful holiday during his affair (thats when i first really knew who it was). She also knew he was having a good time and it pissed her off (i think she let her h find out then just to try and ruin our holiday - which it didnt).

I also do not think men leave wives and children unless there is someone else - i know that is only my opionion but it is such a classic pattern.
If she is still on the scence in some way be very careful - remeber she will have all the facts and will know when to back off and when to say the right things to him. This is the thing i hate most about the ow and i think they are usually quite controlling of the situation.

I think you need to say him that there is obviously a problem as you are not entirely happy and he does not seem to 'get it' and he does not want to have sex so you dont 'get it'!!
Surely he knows there is a problem and if he is asking you to make compromises with no sex maybe he should forgo a night out.

There is always the excuse of the children not being well if he needs an excuse surely.

I think you fear that he will say he just wants to leave if you push it too far, and that he will use your 'nagging' as a justification.

You will not be able to make him stay but he is being so unfair on you to make you put your life on hold while he 'makes up his mind'

I know you dont want to think it but i still fear there is more to the ow than he telling you - but i think you know that deep down too. But you have nothing to be afaird of you have done nothing wrong.

Take care

It is a miserable situation for you to be in because no matter what you do, if he decides to leave, he will leave. So in a way it's best to work on being happy in yourself and by yourself while stil being calm and civil to him (because if he does leave you will still have to be civil to him for the DCs sake). One of the biggest and hardest truths in life is that we cannot control other people's behaviour, we can only control our reactions to it.

So is the general consensus that if he is behaving this way then he must still be seeing the OW? Should i confront him?

Layla: unless you have at least some other evidence, don't confront. Meaning no offence to any other MNers - we don't know what he's up to, how could we? We don't know him. ANd if he's not doing anything he shouldn't, being accused of it will make him cross and it will make him think you are being unreasonable (even though your reaction is understandable, no one likes being blamed for stuff they haven't done).

Thank you for being positive madamez. I needed that so that I can sleep tonight. I appreciate everyone's comments and need to be realistic.
One minute I think i am being ridiculous and that nothing can be going on and then the next minute I read something into everything and drive myself mad with paranoia. He is working away this week and I convinced myself today that he was actually staying with her so I drove to his work to check his van was there (he took the works van). It was. Tonight he texted me with his hotel details and phone and room number. So i know that they are not together.
last week I suggested to him that, in light of the problems we had been having and the fact that we were trying to spend time apart with friends as well as together and the fact that we would be together for the full xmas week, we did different things on New Years Eve (he has been invited to a work mates party and m brother is having a party so it would be feasable) and he said there was no way he would do that he wanted us to be together - I would have thought that if he wanted to see the new year in with her he would have jumped at the chance. My paranoid head tells me that that is because he will be with her next year and they do not need new year together!! I am driving myself crazy!!!

((((Layla)))) - I feel awful now. Its so hard when I see threads like this not to bring my own "experience" into it because I had no idea what was going on and think I would have dealt with things better if I had been a tiny bit prepared.

However, your dh is not my ex h and this is not my marriage.. I would be really heartened by the fact that he did not take the option to get out of NYE with you.. I'm assuming that your dc's are probably too young to be up to take part in many of the celebrations and therefore he clearly wants to spend NYE with YOU and that can only be a good thing...

Other than the no sex thing, it doesn't sound as though there is anything else to make you think that he could be up to something so perhaps he is just being really sensible and sensitive by now wanting to "muddy the waters". For the record, my ex also refused to come to counselling, so that's also a major plus imho

It is so difficult and i toatally understand about the paranoia.

The thing that i believe has kept us together more than anything is that he can now see that i am the woman he wants (and that is an understanding independent woman with my own life who has given him a chance). The ow is now seen for what she really is/was a selfish person with no thought of what i was going through or the distruction she was causing (in fact she did have the power to stop it and at least let me know the truth - i asked her outright once and she just laughed and denied it).

If your h is a good man he will eventually see the good in you and if you still want him you will be able to look yourself in the mirror knowing you are not a fool just a good person willing to give him the benifit of the doubt and not try to control him.

Good luck glad you are feeling a bit better now. You insecurities are not silly and you should not feel bad about wanting to be sure. But remeber it is better to be a bit foolish than to go out of your way to hurt someone.

I don't think your husband should go to the party Layla, and if he had one iota of guilt about what he'd done or compassion for how you are feeling he wouldn't even think of going.

He is behaving in a completely callous manner.

I know. Do you think the fact that he is going means that there is somthing going on with OW or do you think he could just be acting like a tw*t.
Can i really give him an ultimatum?
I was planning to go out with a friend on Friday night so I was thinking of getting a baby sitter and telling him I will be in town so we can share a taxi - at least then he would be silly to get up to anything

I dont think it means there is anything going on but he is not thinking about your feelings.

Last year my h was saying he wanted to make us work - we went away for xmas and he swore she was no longer on the scence, but i knew something was not right. So did our councellor and she told him he was being unfair and needed to make a decision about what he wanted. Whilst away he said he did not want to live with me anymore but still said she was not involved (and he even said she probably hated him anyway). He had nothing to lose but he still could not tell the truth at that time. He did move out for a while and she was there but he soon realised that was not want he really wanted. He was having a hard time making the choice but he need to make it as it was making him ill too.

I am telling you this as there is still hope he has not left and i feel that if you 'push' him too early he could go and justify it to himself. However i would still be very careful with regaurds to the ow and do not believe what he says (my h cant explain it but he says it is just like a trap where he was unable to tell the truth- even to himself a lot of the time).

I am not excusing his behaviour what he did was terrible but i am trying to understand and move forward from it.

I know this is a terrible time for you and part of you just wants to tell him to get lost but if you really want to make a go of your marriage hold onto your own believes and do everything you can save it. This is not weak it is supporting him when he is having a crisis.
Good luck we are here for you.

I would also go out for the night and the sharing a taxi sounds like a good plan.

Thanks HW.
If the sex thing was ok then I think I could deal with her being on the scene but the fact that we are not having sex is unsettling me. I keep thinking that the only reson for him not doing it is that he wants her and not me. I suppose he could just be being sensible and not wanted to take advantage while things are still so uncertain.
Also the last thing I want to do is force him into sex!!! but I feel as though I need to push the issue.

Good luck for fri and the party and the weekend i will not be around for a while so i hope it goes well.

"I know. Do you think the fact that he is going means that there is somthing going on with OW or do you think he could just be acting like a tw*t.
Can i really give him an ultimatum?"

I can't tell you whether there is something still going on but he is definitely acting like a complete tosspot by insisting on going to the party.

If you don't want to give him an ultimatum you can still tell him you definitely don't want him to go and if he cares about you or has any regret about what he has put you through this year he'll decide not to go as well. I mean it's only a party, so what's he going to lose if he doesn't go? On the other hand if he does he is going to cause you a lot of pain and hurt - is that really what he wants to do?

I certainly don't think you should give him the OK about it. That is telling him and yourself that you and your feelings don't matter and he should just be allowed to trample all over you.

HELP!!!!!!! I am turning into a bunny boiler.
I have spent the last hour looking up the OW on the net. She has her own website for her business which I have trawled through and she has put a bit on it about the work she has done with DP this summer and goes on to say they are a great creative talent when working together!!!!
I have looked her up on facebook and friends reunited and have looked up her address - I don't know why - it's not like I am going to cruise the area to see her!!! i feel pissed off that she has 88 friends on facebook - don't think I would get any where near that. In her list of friends are a lot of DP's workmates (but not him - he is computer illiterate and would have no interest in facebook) and now I feel as though everyone likes her and are going to be telling him he should be with her and not me.
I am driving myself insane!!!! How do I stop!!

You're not a bunnyboiler, it's understandable to try and find out what's going on Layla.

Really it's up to him to reassure you and he's not doing that. This is down to his behaviour and his callousness.

As for the Facebook thing, I think it's common for people to have a lot of friends on Facebook, it's not quite the same as being popular in RL.

Layla

Hope it all went well. You are perfectly normal to look her up. Some of it is a power thing i think in that you want to have all the information you can. I know i have done that too - and it does not make you feel very good. The facebook thing is probably because of her bussiness and is nothing to do with being popular.

Hope he has helped you feel a bit better about it all and that you can have a good christmas together.
Remember he is with you and your family and if she is on the scence she will hate that - just make sure you have a fantastic time and he really knows what he has.

Thanks HW

Well he went to the party and as far as I know all was ok. he told me that he had spoken to her and had told her omce again that he is going to try to make it work with me. I think i believe him.

We have had a fab christmas. He bought me a really thoughtful present and we have been making plans for next year. It has been a really happy time.

We have just been down to visit his dad and all was well then I used his phone to call my mum and i asked if I could look at his pictures. The upshot was that he had 3 pictures of the OW on his phone. Not sexual ones but ones that she has sent him in text messages. In each of them she is posing (with clothes!!!) but looking sexy. GHe said that they were from a while ago and that he had just kept them for memories!!! Can you belive that!!! What do I do now? It just seems to get worse and worse and I seem to be letting him get away with it all. When he explains things he always makes me feel as though I am being unreasonable. What do you guys think?