Which is worse, an EA or PA?

[taylor]

Hi taylor, thanks for taking the time to respond to my post. Gee, and I didn't think I could possibly feel any worse than I already did!

 

I agree with you here in some ways but in others I do not. Like I said, I have not posted everything here-it is too long and some of it is too personal.

 

I have read in another thread, taylor, where you have talked about the very long (months) process it took for you to get over your EA. In my husband's case, it was not like that. You admitted some real desire to have "gone all the way" with the OM in your situation and how much you missed him once it ended. I guess my H made the terrible mistake of going all the way with "her" early on and then that stopped things right there. There was not this wistfulness for him of "how would it be with her, etc." He made that mistake and didn't need to repeat it.

 

Sunflower,

 

It was not my intention to make you feel worse, but to offer you another view of your husband's affair...an objective view unclouded by emotions. I am very well aware you are still processing the affair and you will take bits and pieces from what all posters here have to tell you, which is good. But, IMO, your husband was involved emotionally with this woman and what I see from my side of the computer is a BS trying to deny this to herself.

 

 

Some posters will say it doesn't matter if he had an EA or not, but I think it does matter. Having been thru an EA, don't tell me it doesn't matter. The EA itself almost destroyed my marriage. The EA has been the focus of many countless hours of MC and IC, therefore, it does matter and needs to be addressed. Does your MC truly believe your husband had a sexual encounter with a friend with NO emotional involvement whatsoever? Does your MC believe then that this was a friends with benefits relationship? Many of those even have some degree of emotional involvement.

 

Yes, there are varying degrees of emotional involvement/attachment. But saying there was just a little emotional involvement is like saying someone is just a little bit pregnant.

 

Involvement is involvement. It's something your husband chose to do. It led to a PA. Again, something your husband chose to do. Neither one was a mistake. A mistake is something you had no intention of doing but it happened anyways by accident. Call it inappropriate. Call it bad judgement. But don't call it a mistake. By doing so, it takes the "blame" off of him.

 

Alot of choices get made by affair partners who choose to cross the line from friendship to EA and from EA to PA. Many choices get made over and over, day after day. These choices are deliberate and calculated and made with very little thought given to the BS.

 

So, no, your husband did not make a mistake. He did what he did because he wanted to.

 

My withdrawal period WAS unusually long, in part, because the EA was never "consummated". Had the physical part actually had a chance to take place..who knows...I may have been like your husband...a ONS with him could have filled me with so much guilt I might have broken it all off with him right then and there and vowed never to do that again. It still does not mean an EA didn't exist.

 

Unlike your husband, what I had to deal with for months after D-day were the fantasies of what could have been, since the PA line was not crossed. When my EA ended, things were very much in the "flowers and rainbow stage", magical, ideallic. Very hard to let go of at that point. While many BS fight mental images of their spouse with an affair partner I, as a WS, was fighting mental images of what could have been between me and the OM.

 

Your husband crossed over into a PA which I will say is a HUGE leap in the progression of an affair. My OM and I held back for months...pulled back for months...trying not to cross that line because we knew what it meant. It's like holding hands and standing at the edge of a cliff and asking yourselves, "Do we jump together or not?"

 

Your husband's PA burst the fantasy bubble of what it would be like to be with the OW. Crossing the line was his passport back to reality. He got that cold water splashed in his face..GUILT. Right after he did the deed he probably said, "What am I doing here?" Or perhaps he thought, "Hey, this wasn't as great as I thought it would be." Sometimes I wonder if crossing into a PA would have done the same for me. A sharp dose of reality may have shortened my withdrawal period.

[taylor]

I never said it wasn't inappropriate, destructive, or whatever considering what my husband did. Yes, there were problems between us. He admitted to checking out of our relationship. But, that doesn't mean he necessarily "checked in" with her. The barriers were simply lowered to make room for a huge mistake on his part. My H and I both know that if things had been better between us, none of this would have happened.

 

And I know that what you said in bold above IS the bottom line.

 

My husband and I still kick ourselves now for letting things get as bad as they did in our marriage. We allowed it to get so weak and vulnerable that an affair was able to permeate it.

 

Like you and your husband, my husband and I are in an on-going process to affair-proof our marriage. I wish you and your husband the best. It is a long road. We've been on it for almost a year now.

 

One thing that many posters here will tell you, as they have told me, and it is so important, is that your husband has absolutely no contact with this OW. It really is not in the best interests of your marriage that he continues to work with her.

 

From what you have written about your husband's actions I am convinced he did check out of your marriage and did check in with her while he was in a vulnerable state. I think guilt took over. That tells me your husband really is a good guy. The fact that he is in counseling with you and wants to work on the marriage is also a good thing.

 

But I would hate to see you or him minimize the affair itself. I know it hurts to look at it in broad daylight. My husband, for the first 6 months after D-day, tried to minimize the affair...shove it under the carpet, pretend it was no big deal, let's kiss and make up, and move on. That was the worst thing we could have ever done. It slowed marital recovery because while we were kissing and making up, the residual effects of the affair continued to fester below the surface...unspoken thoughts, unspoken feelings. We sat on the couch one day miles apart and finally acknowledged there was a huge invisible elephant sitting between us...and that's when I finally broke down and told my husband I thought I fell in love with the OM. IT WAS 6 MONTHS AFTER D-DAY.

 

I am not saying this will happen to you. I want to be clear about that. Your situation is yours. Mine is mine. But I only want to make you aware that what you see and feel on the surface may be entirely different from what's buried deep inside.

 

There have been several talks on these forums about "trickle" truth. BSs hate it. They accuse their WS of not being truthful, honest or forthcoming with information right after D-day. The thing is what lies deep inside a WS is very hard to say sometimes to the BS. Sometimes it's stuff that we have a hard time even admitting to ourselves, let alone voice them to another person. We are still processing, too. So what appears to be "trickle truth" is really just truth that we can't bring ourselves to share until we have processed it and understand ourselves.

 

It's good that you and your husband are talking and talking. Please don't stop asking questions. There may be alot more he needs to tell you. The truth will trickle.

 

 

 

Why he remained friends with her afterward is complicated. It has to do somewhat with him and issues he was facing. That is something I won't discuss here because it is too personal-even for an anonymous site like this. Ironically, the phone calls, texting, emailing afterward bothers me the least about the whole thing. My H literally thought they could continue as friends after the whole PA--until I told him absolutely not. He admits his thinking was clouded, BUT IT DIDN'T MEAN HE LOVED HER.

 

And of course, everyone here respects you for your privacy.

 

The thing is, many WS hope to stay friends with their affair partner after D-day. They don't want to lose that connection. Often, it's the connection, more than the sexual attraction, that is valued most. But this is "affair fog" thinking. There is absolutely no way to stay friends with someone you are sexually attracted to or had an affair with if your goal is marital recovery. The relationship would forever disrupt the marriage.

 

No, it didn't mean he loved her. In fact, I doubt he loved her. But if he missed the emotional connection with her, then I would guess he was "in love" or "infatuated" with her. There were feelings involved.

 

 

The reason I don't think believe it was an EA (beyond friendship) was because he loved me. Thank you for your other rather graphic post where you said something along the lines of "while he was f****** her, he was probably saying, I love my wife." I'm not that stupid--I don't even want to know what thoughts were going through his mind at that time.

 

He can love you and be in love with someone else. It is entirely possible.

 

I apologize for the harsh post. It was not my intention to be deliberately cruel. It was only to open your eyes to the magnitude of this affair. You trivialize it by saying there were no feelings involved and that he made a mistake.

 

I do not think you are stupid at all. I think you are a BS in pain and it is difficult to look at the truth of what happened. You are still processing.

 

No one knows for sure what went thru your husband's mind when he chose to enter into a sexual encounter with the OW. But I will tell you it is a HUGE DECISION..A HUGE LEAP...that you shouldn't minimize.

 

Having been in an affair, I would guess the last thing your husband was thinking about when engaged in his "ONS" was YOU.

 

My only concern is that you will minimize the affair because it hurts to much to look at the full scope of it...that the affair will get glossed over...that issues won't get addressed that need to be...and that you will not fully affair-proof your marriage because of it.

 

IMO, addressing the EA is more important than addressing the PA...the PA was just the icing on the cake he was eating.

[taylor]

duplicate post

[taylor]

Yes, he led her on and when I am feeling more compassionate, I can feel almost sorry for her for how quickly she was dropped as a friend.

 

More evidence that your husband was involved in an EA.

 

Platonic friends don't lead platonic friends on. Platonic friends don't have sex with platonic friends.

 

Your husband led her on because he wanted more than friendship. He had an affair in the name of "friendship."

 

Don't feel sorry for her. She's a big girl. She knew exactly what she was doing. By the same token, your husband is a big boy. He knew exactly what he was doing. They both led each other on and got what they wanted.

 

She wasn't "dropped as a friend" for heaven's sake. Your husband had sex with her. She was dropped as an affair partner...a partner in crime...a lover.

 

If she were just a friend, there would have been no need for your husband to drop her.

 

He dropped her "quickly" because he is MARRIED and knew he was committing ADULTERY. And my guess is he dropped her out of GUILT.

[taylor]

I think I understand what you mean by "withdrawal"-that process where someone has to get over the A. Since there was no real emotional involvement on his part, there was no need for a real "withdrawal." Withdrawing from a work colleague for whom you have no feelings for beyond friendship would not be that difficult.

 

Again, trivializing and minimizing the affair.

 

Be aware that MUCH of the process of withdrawal is done internally, deep inside the WS, for months after an affair and unbeknown to the BS.

 

You could be sitting on the couch wrapped in his arms watching a romantic movie and his thoughts could be drifting to the OW, their "friendship," and the "encounter." You will never know.

 

Your husband had sex with a friend. Unless he is a robot, he will go thru withdrawal.

 

 

 

It is entirely possible for men and women to have sex without emotional attachment. We all know this. As I said in my initial post, sex is sex.

 

Sex with strangers is sex. Sex with people you have some kind of prior relationship is not just sex.

 

 

If my husband had become emotionally attached to her (as in love or a real emotional connection) don't you think he would have been trying to continue the PA while becoming further attached emotionally? After all, he had already violated his marriage to me by participating in the PA the first time, what would stop him from continuing the A, guilty feelings aside? Again, because there was nothing there feelings-wise for him besides friendship!

 

Please don't throw the guilty feelings aside.

 

Guilt is what keeps friendships from turning into EAs and keeps EAs from turning into PAs and is what ends many PAs. Thank goodness for the human conscience.

 

Your husband's feelings of guilt after he had sex with the OW outweighed his desire to continue the affair..so he ended it.

 

He probably also thought with his head (for a change) and realized what he was risking by having an affair...his marriage, his family, his home, etc.....things he didn't think about before the sexual encounter. He realized the affair was not worth the risk of what he would lose if he continued on in the affair.

 

It's also entirely possible he hated the sex with her. Only he would know that.

 

C'mon, there was nothing there feelings-wise but friendship?

Who has sex with their friends?

[taylor]

the Monday after that, H tried to hide away from said colleague and told his buddy to answer his phone, and if it was a woman, to tell her he had gone to England for the week....

 

However, H used his "being bust" by his W to inform the OW that his W found out about them, and he could NO longer be lovers/friends/have any contact.... (he didn't want any more contact with her after he had 'got into her panties' which is why he got his buddy to answer the phone and say he had left the country).

 

 

 

The thing is this OP's husband did not try to hide from the OW after the sexual encounter. He continued to make many calls, texts and e-mails afterwards. And this contact ended only after the OP gave him an ultimatum..it's her friendship or our marriage.

 

That this OP had to give her husband an ultimatum to provoke him to sever all ties with the OW speaks volumes. It tells you just how much this friendship must have meant to him.

 

If it meant nothing, he would have walked away from the OW the second he got in her panties. But he didn't ..not until his wife put her foot down.

[taylor]

But at what point does it cease to be a friendship and turn into an EA?

 

The minute he starts acting in ways toward her that he wouldn't want you to know about...flirting, long eye gazes, touching, innuendoes, body language..anything signalling interest.

 

Also,

 

The minute he starts having thoughts about her he wouldn't share with you.

 

Also,

 

The minute she begins to have an emotional effect on him by what she says or does..the minute she makes him feel good, bad, happy, sad, turned on, rejected.

 

Also,

 

The minute spending time with her becomes important to him.

 

 

If he is investing any time or energy in her physically or emotionally that he wouldn't want you to be aware of, he is in an EA.

 

 

And if you reached a point where you had to give him an ultimatum to make him end the relationship by making him choose between her and you...he was most definately in an EA.

[Snowflower]

Owl, I agree with this because I remember being there myself....

 

Snowflower, an EA doesn't have to be over the top "in love" signed sealed and delivered. There are obvious varying degrees to different EA's and PA's. I remember seeing the warning signs of EA's with colleages and what the borderline friendship to work wife/EA was. They were little things like if your husband heard a funny joke, who would he think to tell first - you or his female colleage? If he had a few minutes of downtime, would he check in on you or call/email the female colleage to see "what's up?" Were there things he talked about with her he would never talk with about you. Doesn't have to be sexual - even past relationships, feelings about family, his self doubts, etc... Did she talk about things with him, he would never tell you? There are lots of things....

 

Just because he wasn't "in love" with her doesn't mean it wasn't an EA. He needed emotional stability from someone because like you said, he checked out of the marriage and you weren't giving it to each other. This is where an EA makes a marriage that is bad worse or an okay marriage bad. He took energy he should have been giving you to her - whether it was just friendly in his eyes or not. She made him feel good, special, she wanted him where you really didn't. That is how he probably saw it. He probably thought it was innocent up until the ONS and THEN realized, wow - this went too far. But it isn't like they were just chums and happen to find each other naked in bed one night. They both made the decision to go forward with a PA and STILL talk afterwards which makes me leary that you don't know the entire truth. And your husband's continued thought that they were "just friends" before and after - telling you and your MC this, concerns me. What does your therapist say? Does he/she honestly not think there was an EA here? Rarely would an OW get emotionally attached to someone who just acted like a "chum." He had to reciprocate on some level but I think he hasn't acknowledged it because most men don't understand what EA's are. Plus, he is still trying to recover from the guilt of the PA so he doesn't want to add another burden on you or him. At least, that is my take on the situation.

 

I recommend this book for you and him to read...

 

Emotional Infidelity: How to Affair-Proof your marriage and 10 Other Secrets to a Great Relationship.

 

It is very eye opening as to what an EA is and how it really does breakdown a marriage without either one of you realizing it. It REALLY helps

 

couples to move forward and how to refocus on your marriage and stop relying on outside sources for your emotional fulfillment.

 

That all said snowflower, it sounds like you are both trying to make it work and good for you! Hopefully with continued therapy and maybe some reading, he might be a little more willing to open up about his feelings/needs during that time. Let him know that it WILL help the recovery process, not hinder it. Good Luck!!

 

travelgirl, I think you have come as close as anybody to identifying the real issues at hand between my husband and me. Some of the stuff you said really hit home...about the jokes that they would email back and forth--you know, those jokes that get forwarded around on the office email--I don't mean private jokes between my H and "her." Honestly, I don't care about stupid jokes. I don't forward every joke I get at work to my husband either. But yes, forwarding jokes on office emails seemed to be the thing for them.

 

But, he rarely mentioned her to me. Even before things, whatever they were, begin happening between them. Once in a while he would mention her in some off-hand way related to their jobs, but nothing else. Like I keep saying, if he was that emotionally involved with her, I think he would have been mentioning her more and more because she was becoming increasingly important him. It would be like my H wouldn't even be aware that he was doing this because it would all seem so innocent.

 

As for our MC, when we first started attending therapy (before his confession, but I could tell something was seriously wrong-he just seemed to have given up on our marriage) our counselor told us that she didn't think my H was having an affair. She simply couldn't detect that type of duplicity in him and said that she would have recognized that type of emotional withdrawal that people speak of here on these threads when the WS are investing their emotions somewhere else. Our MC, like everyone else, was very surprised when he finally confessed.

 

As we continued therapy with the same MC after D-Day, our MC agrees that this "relationship" that my husband was having was not a love interest on his part. As we have been in MC and worked on the "whys" of this A, it has become obvious to me, our MC, and especially my H that what he did was pretty much only due to issues he was having. Again, I will not get too personal here but the problems between my H and me led him to believe our marriage was over, that I didn't love him and that triggered some issues for him. It starts to sound like psychobabble, but I now think therapy has it's place when something like this happens in a marriage. It turns out that his A was less about me and our marriage and more about my H and some things he was facing within himself. Some inner demons, if you will.

 

But yes, travelgirl, you are right on with a lot of your post here. Was my H getting some type of "emotional stability" from her at that time, yes. Good analysis on your part. However, oddly enough, he was still reaching out to ME during this time-the PA had already occurred but I didn't know it yet or even about the OW. Yes, he was saying stuff like he was done with our marriage but then would STILL seek me out as his confidante-because that is exactly what I had been to him all those years. I had been his best friends as well as his wife. So, it doesn't seem like an EA but friendship--all friendships provide some type of emotional connection--or else we wouldn't consider them friendships.

 

He admits now he got so confused during this time--he was still reaching out to me emotionally, despite the fact that he would also try to distance himself (good for him--it shows that he was still emotionally invested in our marriage). But then would also "talk" to the OW for some reason. From what you are all saying here, it shows he had some type of 'attachment' to her. I was telling him all the time, "please don't give up on our marriage. We can fix this." Again, I didn't know about the A yet.

 

The OW would then tell him, "it's never going to work with your wife after what you and I did (the PA). Just file for divorce." She was separated from her H at the time she "pursuing" my H--she then filed for divorce so that she could try to continue this "relationship" with my H. This is, of course, what my H has told me. But, I do know first hand that she was very unhappy in her marriage because the one occasion that I did meet the OW, long before the A, she was complaining about her husband and talking very nasty about him. At the time I thought she was really mean for doing this--trashing her husband--to me, who she didn't even know.

 

So, I guess what I am saying is that how could my H be that emotionally involved when he was still reaching out to me, despite everything he had done (the A) and despite what he thought would happen (he thought that our marriage would end). If he was in an EA-he wouldn't have cared!

[pkn06002]

So, I guess what I am saying is that how could my H be that emotionally involved when he was still reaching out to me, despite everything he had done (the A) and despite what he thought would happen (he thought that our marriage would end). If he was in an EA-he wouldn't have cared!

 

No you still care about your life, you don't go totally blinders on.

 

You sound very competitive and happy that you "won". You need to understand affairs are NOT about competition and who ends up the winner and the loser.

 

You are minimizing this so much, but that is your business.

[Snowflower]

 

 

Some posters will say it doesn't matter if he had an EA or not, but I think it does matter. Having been thru an EA, don't tell me it doesn't matter. The EA itself almost destroyed my marriage. The EA has been the focus of many countless hours of MC and IC, therefore, it does matter and needs to be addressed. Does your MC truly believe your husband had a sexual encounter with a friend with NO emotional involvement whatsoever? Does your MC believe then that this was a friends with benefits relationship? Many of those even have some degree of emotional involvement.

 

Yes, there are varying degrees of emotional involvement/attachment. But saying there was just a little emotional involvement is like saying someone is just a little bit pregnant.

 

 

hi taylor, I genuinely want to thank you for taking so much time to respond to my posts. I really appreciate your feedback. Please read my response to travelgirl because I think she really was "spot on" with a lot of things. But, I also want to reply to you.

 

Ironically, my H and I had another MC session last night after I had posted and responded to this thread here and I used some of what everyone told me as part of our "discussion" last night.

 

I absolutely agree that whether an EA occurred matters because it does require emotional involvement. I, like you, agree that the EA component of an affair cannot be disregarded because of the emotional intensity. That was part of the purpose of my OP, was that no one can disregard the EA component because I think that is where most of the damage is done to a marriage-whether a PA occurs or not. I think you agree?

 

Anyway, back to my situation. My MC has helped both my H and me come to the realization that his A had less to do with me and our marriage than it did with him and issues he had to face. Like all therapy, they want to "dig deep" and find out what are the root issues for the A. When everything came out, it was really no surprise to me--I had felt my H had been avoiding these issues for years. When our marriage finally hit a truly low point--these issues came to the forefront. The A was a symptom of something deeper--in MC we finally all came the conclusion that the OW could have been anybody. There wasn't anything particularly special about this person to my husband--she was a friend he thought he could trust at a difficult time in his life and in his marriage to me. My H found out as time went on that she wasn't the trustworthy friend he thought she was.

 

Later last night, after counseling, I asked my H again (he and I had been over this many, many times) about how he was feeling about the OW before the PA occurred. I asked him if he thought he might be imagining some type of future with her, was developing feelings for her, etc. I asked him to be honest and that I was feeling strong enough to handle the truth. He said again, no-that he thought our marriage was over and made this stupid mistake that he sincerely regrets.

[Snowflower]

 

Your husband's PA burst the fantasy bubble of what it would be like to be with the OW. Crossing the line was his passport back to reality. He got that cold water splashed in his face..GUILT. Right after he did the deed he probably said, "What am I doing here?" Or perhaps he thought, "Hey, this wasn't as great as I thought it would be." Sometimes I wonder if crossing into a PA would have done the same for me. A sharp dose of reality may have shortened my withdrawal period.

 

This is a very good analysis of exactly what my H has said about how he felt afterward. While I still don't think he was living in this fantasy world of wanting to "be" with the OW in any real way. He said that he felt absolutely awful afterward.

[Snowflower]

And I know that what you said in bold above IS the bottom line.

 

My husband and I still kick ourselves now for letting things get as bad as they did in our marriage. We allowed it to get so weak and vulnerable that an affair was able to permeate it.

 

Like you and your husband, my husband and I are in an on-going process to affair-proof our marriage. I wish you and your husband the best. It is a long road. We've been on it for almost a year now.

 

One thing that many posters here will tell you, as they have told me, and it is so important, is that your husband has absolutely no contact with this OW. It really is not in the best interests of your marriage that he continues to work with her.

 

I know exactly what you mean about regretting letting your marriage get into such a bad spot that something like this was able to penetrate it. My H said something to me shortly before he had the PA--that he felt like we weren't connected anymore. I didn't understand at the time what he was talking about-but I tried to fix it. I didn't know how bad (at that time) things had become.

 

Just recently, my H told me how hard that was for him to come and tell me something like that--that he felt things were pretty much beyond salvaging between us.

 

My H has no contact with this woman outside of work and even that is very, very seldom. She lives in another part of the state-not an easy drive from here. We talked about him leaving his job-like you suggested-and my H was willing to do it. He says (and acts) like he would do anything to save our marriage. In the end though, in this economy it would difficult for him to replace his job. We made the mutual decision for him to stay where he is-unless she becomes a problem.

[Snowflower]

Having been in an affair, I would guess the last thing your husband was thinking about when engaged in his "ONS" was YOU.

 

My only concern is that you will minimize the affair because it hurts to much to look at the full scope of it...that the affair will get glossed over...that issues won't get addressed that need to be...and that you will not fully affair-proof your marriage because of it.

 

IMO, addressing the EA is more important than addressing the PA...the PA was just the icing on the cake he was eating.

 

Yes, this just came up in MC last night, the last thing my husband was thinking about when he had his ONS was me. It didn't really have to do with me at all-it had to do with him. It didn't even really have anything to do with "her."

 

I seriously hope I am not minimizing things here.

[Snowflower]

More evidence that your husband was involved in an EA.

 

Platonic friends don't lead platonic friends on. Platonic friends don't have sex with platonic friends.

 

Your husband led her on because he wanted more than friendship. He had an affair in the name of "friendship."

 

Don't feel sorry for her. She's a big girl. She knew exactly what she was doing. By the same token, your husband is a big boy. He knew exactly what he was doing. They both led each other on and got what they wanted.

 

She wasn't "dropped as a friend" for heaven's sake. Your husband had sex with her. She was dropped as an affair partner...a partner in crime...a lover.

 

If she were just a friend, there would have been no need for your husband to drop her.

 

He dropped her "quickly" because he is MARRIED and knew he was committing ADULTERY. And my guess is he dropped her out of GUILT.

 

This is interesting but I'm not sure I agree. My H dropped her because there was NO WAY he could be friends with her and still maintain a marriage to me. It was a sick, twisted, friendship where she wanted a lot more than he did. I told him myself that they had cut up the "friendship card" when they crossed the line with the ONS.

 

Oddly enough, he insisted then and now that she was only a friend. Right after my H confessed the A to me, I had to ask the difficult questions. One of which was, "do you love this person?" He said he had feelings for this person but that she was only a friend. At the time, I thought for sure that he did love her. I was devastated because I knew that this was very likely a deal-breaker for me.

 

When we reconciled about 2 weeks after his confession (a long story there), I asked him again about his feelings for "her." By that point, he had cleared his head enough to be able to say that no, he did not and never had felt more for her than he would for any other friend that he had. Going by what others post here, as time went on he should have been able to identify his feelings more and more clearly. He started being able to see the relationship for what it was--as something very unhealthy. We both think this "friendship" had morphed from something innocent (work friends) to something where the OW really wanted to take it to the next level. He stayed back because he wanted to stay in our marriage.

 

This all brings me back to the original point of my first post--in this case, it was not an EA because my husband's feelings for me were still intact. He simply couldn't go any "further" in the relationship with the OW because he was still connected emotionally to me."

 

And trust me, I don't feel sorry for the OW here. She got what she deserved!

[Snowflower]

No you still care about your life, you don't go totally blinders on.

 

You sound very competitive and happy that you "won". You need to understand affairs are NOT about competition and who ends up the winner and the loser.

 

You are minimizing this so much, but that is your business.

 

Of course I'm happy that I "won." For months, I thought that I was fighting a losing battle against my husband's apparent "willingness" to be done with our marriage. He was very conflicted about things--like I said, this was mostly about him and issues he had to face. I unfortunately got the blunt end in terms of emotional trauma as he worked through what he had done/was continuing to do.

 

And yes, I fought hard for my marriage. If that makes me competitive, okay. It's better than being complacent--being complacent (both my husband and I) got us to a truly bad place in our marriage.

 

However, if I had found out that he had "loved her" all bets would have been off. I'm not sure what I would have done in that case but it would have been much harder to recover!

[pkn06002]

Snowflower:

What I am having a hard time figuring out is why you are posting? Seems like you have it all worked out, you really don't want anyone else option.

 

From your posts I see get the impression of a couple of things.

 

1) You are so happy you "won" that you are sweeping all other issues under the rug. If he was that detached from the marriage(as you have said), you don't magically turn around and recommit in 2 weeks.

 

2) Your husband has you really snowballed into believing that everything is OK and that the affair meant nothing. Hope you are watching him really good because I would not trust him.

 

3) You are minimizing things by saying this all was because of issues he has with himself. So nothing really to worry about since now he knows is issues.

 

But then again maybe you guys are just that special couple where it all was really just a misunderstanding and you are just fine now.

[Owl]

PKN, we really need to stop agreeing like this...it CAN'T be good. :)

 

But I agree with your comments and assessment. I'm at a loss as to any advice to give the OP at this point.

[pkn06002]

PKN, we really need to stop agreeing like this...it CAN'T be good. :)

 

But I agree with your comments and assessment. I'm at a loss as to any advice to give the OP at this point.

 

Hey even a blind squirrel finds a nut sometimes.

[Snowflower]

Snowflower:

What I am having a hard time figuring out is why you are posting? Seems like you have it all worked out, you really don't want anyone else option.

 

From your posts I see get the impression of a couple of things.

 

1) You are so happy you "won" that you are sweeping all other issues under the rug. If he was that detached from the marriage(as you have said), you don't magically turn around and recommit in 2 weeks.

 

2) Your husband has you really snowballed into believing that everything is OK and that the affair meant nothing. Hope you are watching him really good because I would not trust him.

 

3) You are minimizing things by saying this all was because of issues he has with himself. So nothing really to worry about since now he knows is issues.

 

But then again maybe you guys are just that special couple where it all was really just a misunderstanding and you are just fine now.

 

Hi pkn, I'm not sure where I have given the impression that I have it all worked out. If I did, I wouldn't have posted this question. My original post first asked which was worse, the EA or the PA and then I presented my situation. I figured just asking which was worse as a theoretical question was boring. I also wanted to introduce myself and my situation without TJing.

 

I have been trying to respond to taylor and some of the others here who have taken a lot of time to respond. I really appreciate everyone who has taken the time to try to help. I haven't been able to respond to every point that everyone has made-I would be here all day! But, what has been said here has really got me thinking.

 

I based my opinion of what an EA is and isn't based a lot on a book I read shortly after I found out about the A, After the Affair by Janis Abrahms. I'm sure some of you are familiar with this book. Abrahms said that there are 4 stages that a WS goes through from platonic friendship to a full-blown EA. I'm pretty sure my husband made it through the first two stages-including secrecy. Unfortunately, I don't have the book in my possession to refer to now.

 

But, I'm willing to concede that perhaps my H was involved in some type of EA. This is difficult for me because 1. I have to admit things were more than they seemed at first 2. I'm still not sure how I feel about it being an EA because he wasn't planning to commit in anyway to the OW. But we'll leave that for now.

 

To answer your questions in your post above,

 

1. I am trying not to sweep it all under the rug. I'm just trying to put it in perspective. Yes, my husband was able to recommit to me in two weeks exactly because he was NOT completely detached from me or our marriage. Are you saying that he is not sincere because it was only a short time? Trust me, I spent over 4 agonizing months before this waiting for him to figure out what the heck was wrong. His A and confession were only a part of a larger issue.

 

2. I seriously hope my H isn't snowballing me or lying to me! If he is at this point then he wasn't who I thought he was. We both think his A was a very big deal. He has just been able to put it into perspective quicker than I have--after all, he has known about it longer and been able to work through it.

 

I will get blasted for this... as a guy, he is able to compartmentalize his feelings much easier. We were talking about this in counseling last night. It is like he can put this whole A in its proper perspective and then put it out of his mind. He wants to move forward and is trying to help me do the same. I can't obsess about it forever-eventually I will to figure out how to forgive and trust. I'm not there yet!

 

3. Yes, I am saying exactly that it was his issues that came to the forefront after things had gotten to such a low point in our marriage-this led to the A.

[pkn06002]

Sunflower here is the deal, I get the compartmentalize thing, I did that in my affair. There were times I could've walked away from the affair and not really felt anything for the other woman. By walking away I mean TOTALLY walking away. Even though I would've come back to my wife I would not of reconnected to her. Since to cheat it takes a certain level to detachment that is not that quickly reconstructed.

 

Your husband was not fully in love but he did/does care about this woman.

 

Because here is the concern a lot of us keep expressing, he WANTED to stay friends with her. If he was totally done with her he would not of WANTED to do that. So there still is some issue that you maybe over looking that if not addressed leaves a gate open to the world.

[Snowflower]

I have done some thinking about what everyone has said here and have talked more to my husband about how/why things happened-we had already done a lot of talking-but I did more and asked him about his feelings for her. Before and after the PA.

 

I'm not trying to be argumentative-somebody called me competitive and maybe that was how I came across-but didn't intend to.

 

Once I made it clear that there could be NC-he simply stopped everything very easily. This was nearly 4 months ago now. He says she hardly crosses his mind now-unless we talk about it. He says that thinking about her now is a reminder of a huge, stupid impulsive decision that me made (I won't say mistake now) and how it nearly f*****-up his entire life.

 

Anyway, thank you to all who posted here to try to help. This has been the most painful experience of my life and I am still recovering. However, something good is coming out of it-my H and I are building a better marriage than we ever had before. This awful experience has changed my H and me in profound ways-for the better.

[Snowflower]

Sunflower here is the deal, I get the compartmentalize thing, I did that in my affair... Since to cheat it takes a certain level to detachment that is not that quickly reconstructed.

 

Your husband was not fully in love but he did/does care about this woman.

 

Thanks for getting the "compartmentalize thing!" Yes, he was detached but never completely--he tried very quickly (but not perfectly) to reattach/recommit to me once he crossed that line. He knew he had made a bad decision-I won't call it a mistake anymore after reading this thread!

 

I will disagree about how fast it takes to reconstruct feelings or commitment but that is okay-we'll agree to disagree. My husband still loved me, and wanted to save our marriage.

 

Anyway, thanks for your help. Even if I am completely wrong and my H goes off and does the same thing again-I won't be fooled twice. I learned the hard way.

[taylor]

Anyway, thank you to all who posted here to try to help. This has been the most painful experience of my life and I am still recovering. However, something good is coming out of it-my H and I are building a better marriage than we ever had before. This awful experience has changed my H and me in profound ways-for the better.

 

Snowflower,

 

I am glad you are able to see that something good CAN come out of an affair.

 

You and your husband can turn the lemons into lemonade by seeing this affair as a wake-up call to fix the weaknesses in your marriage so that your marriage becomes so strong no affair will ever be able to permeate it again.

 

This is the kind of marital recovery my husband and I are aiming for. It is a long road but progress is being made.

 

Don't ever let anyone make you believe you are weak or are a doormat for forgiving your husband for having an affair. It takes a very STRONG person to forgive and an even stronger person to face marital issues head-on in the wake of something as devastating as an affair.

 

I completely understand it when you say your husband had internal issues that led to the affair. I did as well. It was more about what was going on with me than it was about what was going on between us in our marriage. What was going on inside me spilled over into our marriage. I hope your husband continues with IC as I am. It will go a long way in recovering your marriage.

 

I wish you and your husband all the best in recovery.

 

I don't know if you ever heard of a weekend program called Retrouvaille. It's great for couples who are facing monumental challenges and profound events in their lives that have led to a breakdown in the marriage. It's a wonderful rebuilding tool and a great way to start marital recovery.

 

My husband and I participated in the program early on when emotions were still very raw. The program helped tremendously.

 

Good luck and keep posting...and remember that marital recovery is a long slow process that will take one step forward and two steps back for awhile...but as long as you are making some progress in the right direction you are on your way.

[Snowflower]

Snowflower,

 

I am glad you are able to see that something good CAN come out of an affair.

 

You and your husband can turn the lemons into lemonade by seeing this affair as a wake-up call to fix the weaknesses in your marriage so that your marriage becomes so strong no affair will ever be able to permeate it again.

 

This is the kind of marital recovery my husband and I are aiming for. It is a long road but progress is being made.

 

Don't ever let anyone make you believe you are weak or are a doormat for forgiving your husband for having an affair. It takes a very STRONG person to forgive and an even stronger person to face marital issues head-on in the wake of something as devastating as an affair.

 

I completely understand it when you say your husband had internal issues that led to the affair. I did as well. It was more about what was going on with me than it was about what was going on between us in our marriage. What was going on inside me spilled over into our marriage. I hope your husband continues with IC as I am. It will go a long way in recovering your marriage.

 

I wish you and your husband all the best in recovery.

 

I don't know if you ever heard of a weekend program called Retrouvaille. It's great for couples who are facing monumental challenges and profound events in their lives that have led to a breakdown in the marriage. It's a wonderful rebuilding tool and a great way to start marital recovery.

 

My husband and I participated in the program early on when emotions were still very raw. The program helped tremendously.

 

Good luck and keep posting...and remember that marital recovery is a long slow process that will take one step forward and two steps back for awhile...but as long as you are making some progress in the right direction you are on your way.

 

Thanks for your kind and encouraging reply, taylor.

 

It is a long road to recovery but everyday I think it will be more and more likely that we are going to eventually come out of this in a much better place than before.

 

My husband is trying harder to repair our marriage than he ever worked on anything else in his life. He tries even harder and more earnestly than I do at times. This seems to be different than a lot of WS that I read about here where the BS has to do a lot of the work to save the marriage. He is remorseful and regretful, which is so good to see.

 

I hope you and your husband are doing well in recovery, too. Thanks for sharing the perspective of someone who was involved in an EA. I still think it is easier for a woman to become involved in an EA than a man, but who knows. It was helpful to hear from you that it was internal issues, not just the marriage that led to the affair. MC and IC has helped clarify for both my husband and me that it was not solely our marriage that led to this-somehow this makes me feel a little better. This was why I questioned the whole EA in my husband's case in the first place.

 

Yes, I have heard of Retrovaille but don't know much about it. Perhaps I will have to do some research. We live in a small, remote community so it would not likely be offered near us. I'm so glad you and your husband found it helpful.

 

I'm not sure what to think about the whole EA/PA in my husband's situation now. I guess it doesn't really matter now and might even be harmful to look back at it at this point. What matters is that he loves me and for the first time in a long time, loves our marriage.

[HappyAtLast]

you continually refer to what "he says". He being your husband. Do you really think he would tell you, whilst trying to save your marriage that he was in love with his other woman? Or that he had feelings for her? He successfully had an affair, he is certainly smart enough to do damage control now.

 

Please, be very careful in what you choose to believe, no matter how much you want to believe it.