My wife and I have been married eight years and started dating right about this time in 1995. We met in a club at our university. It seems that she ran after me in the beginning, but that was fine. It didn't take too long to fall in love with her. I thought she was pretty, smart, and sweet. Her parents seemed nice enough and she was kind to animals. I asked her to marry me on Christmas Eve, 1999, in the parlor at the church she attended and she said yes. After some planning, we set a date for May 19, 2001.

Perhaps it's appropriate to mention that we were one of those couples who had sex before we were married. This was a conflict cause we both came from Christian homes. We did it quite often, and, well, it was nice. Nice but wrong. I've since brought that sin before God, but it was hard as it took me awhile to feel regretful and penitent in light of what ended up happening in our marriage.

I would like to say everything was perfect after that, but it wasn't. Not that we weren't happy or anything like that. It was nice in many ways. I enjoyed the whole notion of being grownups making our own way through life and making our own decisions. However, we haven't had much of a normal sexual relationship since we got married. At some point before we got married, like maybe the previous December, we decided to stop having sex. It was convenient in some ways because my wife then revealed that the last few times we'd had sex, it had been painful for her. We thought that this was a result of several stressors she was dealing with all at once, one of which was planning for the wedding. We thought once some of that stopped, that the pain would resolve itself. Well, it didn't. She went to several doctors, therapists, and counselors to find out what was wrong. All they could find was that her pelvic floor muscle had a tendency to spasm, but they were unable to find the root cause of it.

I wish I could say I'd always been the perfect husband. I look back and I see some things I could have done better. I tended to sometimes pull inward, and the sex issue was often part of the reason for that. Other times it was stress. But either way, I became distant more than a few times. But I never thought of leaving her. I never thought of finding someone else. I honestly looked at her as my very best friend and enjoyed her companionship.

Now, I want to fast-forward to the present. I knew things between us weren't always perfect, but I don't believe in that notion. I think you work at it and do the best you can. But what I didn't know was how bad they'd gotten. She still seemed her usual sweet self to me. It was on Sept 18 that I was dealing with the stress from the previous week and the news that an out of town relative had died. I discovered that one of our cats had wet on something on my desk. Nothing was ruined, but it angered me and I yelled at her: "What the hell am I supposed to do about this?" No other swear words, and that was it. She looked at me and said I wasn't supposed to yell, and from that moment everything changed.

She went from being very sweet to very distant, like an impersonal roommate. I had apologized for my outburst, and sent her flowers at her office the following Monday. But the response I got was tepid at best. I asked my parents about it, and they said it appeared that there was some kind of third-party involvement. Not necessarily physical, but someone was telling her things she didn't need to hear. I asked her about it that Tuesday night, and she denied it.

She came home Thursday and seemed very downcast. She apologized for having been mean all week, said she was angry at me about a few things, but that was no excuse for meanness. I said it was ok, but her resolve didn't last. By the next day, Friday Sept. 25, she was back distant.

The whole notion of a third party wouldn't leave my mind. So, when she got home that evening, I checked her phone the first chance I had and that's where I found the emails. She'd been talking to someone at the gym, complaining about me and then as some time went by, arranging a get-together for the two of them. I called my parents, sent some of the messages to myself. Dad came over so he would witness that I didn't lose my temper. I confronted her, she tried to blame it on me. I suggested we go to her parents house to explain it. She packed most of her clothes and we left. I explained my side of the story to her father, and left.

She's been gone since Sept. 25. She's been back a few times to get some more clothes and to pick up the bills. We talk some too, but she's not too happy. She tells me that she can't honestly say she loves me anymore, and that hurts almost as much as finding out she was getting ready to have an affair. I knew she was still in touch with the other man. When I asked her about it, she said that yes, she sometimes saw him at the gym still, and occasionally talked to him on the phone. I was upset about this and asked her why, and she responded that he was her friend. I said that was upsetting and didn't seem sensible. Since then, she says that she no longer calls him and has only briefly spoken to him at the gym. She says that she has made him aware that she's trying to work on our marriage and he's keeping his distance. I feel like I have to believe her on this, but it's not the easiest thing. She also claims that nothing physical or sexual happened with this man nor will it happen. Once again, not the easiest thing to believe, though I'd sure like to.

Another thing is that she just told me that she will be moving into her recently deceased grandmother's house this weekend. Her sister and her family had been living in the house and they've just bought a new one. So, since the family wants to sell the grandmother's house, my wife is moving in there ostensibly to keep the homeowner's insurance active, but something about it seems so final. I also got a notice in the mail today that she was getting her mail forwarded from our address. She says since the house doesn't belong to us, I can't just drop by unless I call first. I of course said that sounded odd, like she was hiding something. She said that she wasn't hiding anything, nor was she doing anything that would upset me. She reminded me that she had limited contact with the other person and was not pursuing a physical relationship with them. She just said it's rude to drop by a house that's not yours unannounced. Maybe so, but it doesn't sound right.

She asked me if I could set up marriage counseling, and we started that last week and have had two sessions thus far. They seem to be helpful, but I can't help but question her level of commitment to it all. And her statements that she no longer loves me and feels uncomfortable when I touch her aren't helping my state of mind. The counselor said that we're not going through anything he hasn't seen before, and in many ways we're a textbook case of the effects of poor communication on a marriage. He's right about the communication. We used to hold back from telling each other certain things cause we were afraid it would hurt the other's feelings, and it snowballed over time. I never told my wife how upsetting the state of our sex life was for that reason. He said you can still be direct without being hurtful.

The romantic/emotive side of me just wishes she'd come home, and the logical side wonders if I really want her back that much after what she did. Both sides are aware it's likely things won't ever be quite the same, and I wonder if she would ever do it again.

Oh, one more thing: she's lost a bunch of weight recently. She started WW back last fall at around 230 lbs and dropped 20lbs, but stalled. We joined the Y in March, and since then she's gone from 210 to around 140 or even less. I wonder what role weight loss played in this. She looks pretty good, but I also loved her when she was a larger woman as well.

I know I need to let go, but it's hard. My granddaddy always said that just about any marital fuss could be fixed as long as a third-party wasn't involved, so I'm not as optimistic as I'd like to be. I feel very broken inside. And, this in some ways just scratches the surface, I think.

I started reading "Love Must Be Tough" on the advice of a friend. It's a very interesting approach that I'd never heard of. But the whole notion of the vulnerable spouse looks just like I did after she left, and to a lesser extent, how I look now. I'm upset and confused. Like I said, I know there are some things I could have done better. I won't accept blame for her desire to have an affair, but I can't help revisiting the past and thinking of if I could have just been a better communicator, or if I'd just not been so quick to retreat even in the face of her love. But I feel like I need to stand up for myself. I'm just a little afraid. She makes almost twice as much money as I do. While I could probably take care of things just on what I make, I know things would be greatly reduced. We don't have any kids, but we do have several pets that she's left in my care.

The counselor advised us to start rebuilding our relationship like we were taking it back to before we got married. We're supposed to go back and do the things we found enjoyable when we were dating. So, as it stands right now, I'm planning a dinner date for us Tuesday night. We usually go to counseling that night, but he can't see us again until Thursday. Wife says the dinner date might give us something to talk about at the counseling session.

I guess my question is, would it be inappropriate to give her the "you are free to go" talk that night after dinner? I'm anxious of course that that could be the catalyst for her final departure. But I can't keep going on the way I'm going.

I start a new job on Monday that I believe God literally brought into my hands. If I keep on in this sad state, I will lose it, and that just can't happen right now. It's very hard though to put all this sadness before God. I feel like in many ways God brought that wonderful woman to me, so I can't understand why it almost looks as though He's taking her from me and thereby causing me so much pain. I thank Him though that I have family who are there for me to lean on. I don't know how I'd cope without them.

My apologies for the length of this post. Any suggestions, advice, and prayers would be appreciated.

Thank you,
-Bill