I'm insane, this is just nuts.

[Groove]

I feel like we belong on the Jerry Springer show, and I'm not entirely sure how it got this weird. Sorry if this sounds disjointed, my head is a mess right now.

We've been married for 11 years, lived together for 15, and I've known her since the 1st grade. Things got rough when my son was born and we moved into a big expensive house out in the woods, renovated the basement into an apartment for my mother-in-law to move into and moved her in. Two years later I lost my job and our house to foreclosure, we moved into a rental house and I was under a ton of stress after filing for bankruptcy and starting a new job (too late to save the house).

 

From 2006 until 2010 I was a very angry person and my wife found me very hard to live with, I was very resentful and quick to anger. We'd go months without sex, which didn't help things. One day I got suspicious of her computer activity and noticed a local "discreet dating" site in the browser history, so I installed a keystroke logger to spy on her. It revealed that she'd been chatting with several men about possible one-night-stand type dates. I thought my head was going to explode after reading through the dialogues, my chest felt tight and I'd never taken so many deep breaths in a row. I felt like it was my fault for being so miserable to be with, so I confronted her when she got home and she told me that she was just chatting with these guys to get her libido ramped up, to spice things up and get her in the mood. She assured me she wasn't actually going to meet up with anyone. We had great sex that night.

 

 

 

I put a GPS tracker in her car a day later, and on the very next day I caught her leaving work at noon and driving out to meet one of these guys. When she got home I told her that I knew she wasn't at work and that she was out screwing around on me. I thought maybe she was doing this to grab my attention, to make me see that she was sick of my attitude. We had great sex right then and there. A pattern was forming. She'd do something dastardly and it would make us both hot for each other.

 

 

 

We discussed the idea of "swinging" and thought it might be fun to meet other couples and be naughty together, we framed it as a possible way to strengthen our marriage. After several months of meeting other attractive couples and making new friends we decided to attend a regional "swingers event", which was a three-day hotel takeover where everyone was in the same mindset, it was kinda' cool.

 

 

She continued talking to the guys she met on the dating site, and asked if she could go meet some of them for one-on-one sex. she enjoyed pretending to be someone else, someone she couldn't be around her family and co-workers. I foolishly agreed and tried to act like none of this phased me because I was petrified that she'd just up and leave if I made things difficult. Over time, I told her that I was uncomfortable with the whole thing, the one-on-one meetups really messed with me. She said she'd stop, but a few months later I found that she'd been returning to one of the guys on a bi-weekly basis. That night I kicked her out of the house for a night, I was so angry and fed up...but I was also scared that this woman who I've known my whole life, the mother of my child, would eventually be out of my life for good.

 

 

She stopped! For the last six months I've been watching, it's become an obsession, and I can see that she's done. We had a few great weeks where I felt my trust slowly restarting to build, my outlook was hopeful, It was just a phase.

 

 

Just last week I decided I'd look into her email for a periodic check and I noticed some extremely flirty messages to one of her co-workers. I confronted her and she says she's just messing with the guy because he's so uptight and professional all the time, his responses to her emails are always very polite and she says she's just having a little fun. I asked her to stop and she said she would, but looking again at her email shows that she's only ramped up the level of flirtation with this guy. She's since changed her password and won't let me look at her email.

 

 

She says she wants a trial separation, she says she can't live like this, which absolutely devastated me. I said we should seek counseling before jumping straight into a separation and she has agreed to go with me.

 

 

Part of me wants to run away screaming, the other part wants to save this and rewind back to before it all went so bad. I need help.

[TaraMaiden]

Trust

Communication

Respect (both for self and partner).

 

if any of these is missing, it's damn nigh impossible to sustain a relationship.

 

Trust is the worst one to repair.

But it will never be the same as new, even if you manage to make progress....

 

Trial separation is just a term for 'pre-divorce period'.

A Trial separation just makes it easier for a person to put distance between themselves and that which stops them being 'themselves'.

go for the counselling, and agree, right from the word go that there will be honesty, candour, openness and frankness.

 

Counselling is not there to keep people together.

Please understand that.

It's there to level the playing field and to put people on the same page, with equal opportunity to talk, express, confess, and discuss, with no fear, no-holds-barred and a healthy line of communication.

It's scary to admit certain things, even to those with whom we should be most intimate (in every way) particularly if we haven't been entirely honest up to now.

so it gives people the chance to be honest, without being judged or condemned.

 

It takes two to be responsible for a marriage.

you both have to step up to the plate, and be 100% committed to getting it out of the hole.

together.

[jackmartin199030]

I'm sorry you're having such a hard time. Menopause for some of us can be a real challenge!

When I was in the midst of perimenopause, I developed fibromyalgia, plus I began to have constant tingling feet and legs, and sometimes even my intestines felt like they were buzzing! My muscles and joints hurt sooooo bad. Even my hip joints hurt so bad I couldn't get out of bed or turn in bed! It very well could be the hormone changes in you. One thing that could help is trying B12 sublingual tabs, 1000 mcg a day (at least), and some other B vitamins. Are you taking a multivitamin daily?

I can't believe all the tests I had during perimenopause! ....and they were all normal. How's your nutrition? I would try to cut back on caffeine, sugar and refined carbs, and avoid aspartame. Some of us with fibromyalgia have alot more pain with sugar and carbs. Try to get gentle excercise. Gentle stretching is good. Some people really benefit from water physiotherapy (in a pool).