by Norcal1960 » Fri Sep 25, 2009 8:48 am
My wife of twelve years, we have an 11 year old son together, recently (3 weeks ago) moved out into our motorhome. She is also having an affair, with her first boyfriend, who she located on Facebook. The first boyfriend has had drug problems and still uses a little bit, is a recovered alcoholic, doesn't work and lives in a very shabby place. My wife is a successful high-tech sales executive. We have a nice home, motorhome, boat, cars, etc. Nonetheless, my wife feels this deep passionate love when she is with this first boyfriend and she can't let go of it. She says she felt neglected by me and lost the passion she had for me when we first married. I admit, I did a terrible job of being a loving husband. Now, I've read The Secrets of Happily Married Men, and I feel like kicking myself for all the obvious mistakes I've made. We have also been to two counseling sessions, which we both thought were very good, but my wife finds them to be a big effort because its very emotional for her and she cries a lot in them. She says she wishes she could feel the way she did about me 12 years ago, but she can't. She has an anger towards me for not having been the loving husband I should have been. We can talk to each other, we have lunch together as a couple, dinners with our son--but we can't have a "date" i.e. a meal where romance is trying to be built. I love my wife deeply and want to grow old with her. I can forgive the affair--I feel I drove her to it. So, the question is, how can I tear down my wife's wall of anger that separates us and try to re-build our relationship?