I never thought this could happen to us

[Mscott]

My wife and I have been married for 7 years, we have a 3 year old and 2 year old twins. We met freshman year in college, dated for 5 years and then got married when we were 23.

We were always that sickeningly cute and stable couple. We had the kind of relationship that our friends were jealous of. We've had our issues but we've always been best friends and a great team.

I've screwed up financially in major ways throughout our relationship. Credit card debt, poor money management, controlling over finances. I never spent our money on drugs or gambling but I was dishonest about how we were doing financially, telling my wife it was okay to go out to dinner or buy clothes when really we should have been buckling down and eating ramen.

A few months ago I came clean to my wife and told her that I'd been going behind her back and taking money out of savings to make ends meet. She was furious and heartbroken. This is the worst our relationship has ever been. We always slept in the same bed no matter how upset we were with each other. After this came out I slept on the couch for a week.

I'm taking steps to make up for my screw up. I'm presenting her with a written budget every week that we go over together. I'm reading books on financial recovery and I'm getting a second job delivering pizzas to pay back the money I took from savings.

My wife is obviously heartbroken, feels like she can't trust me and honestly if we didn't have kids she wouldn't even be giving me another chance. She's giving me until May to fix things before she decides if she wants to stay in a relationship with me.

This big breach of trust is making her reconsider all of the smaller issues in our marriage that she let slide before. We have always been best friends but now we are wondering if we were just young and really good friends and decided that was a good basis for getting married.

My wife has always entertained crushes on other guys. She has never acted on them and is always very upfront and honest when she has them. With all of our issues in the past few months the appeal of attention from a guy without all of the emotional baggage and pain is really strong for her.

So here is where I'm at.

1) I need to fix the practical financial problems I've created to prove to my wife that I can be trusted and that this pattern of behavior will change. I feel like I'm on the right track here.

2) I need to repair the broken trust and heartbreak. I'm scheduling marriage counseling for this and giving every ounce of strength I have to fight for this.

3) My wife looks at me and feels pain, she looks at other guys and feels a crush. I need to re-ignite that spark, or give my wife reasons to feel excitement, desire and attraction when she looks at me. I never dated anyone before my wife so I have no idea how to do a lot of this. All of the advice I've read online on wooing your wife is honestly pretty cheesy. I take good care of her, constantly complementing her, serving her, putting her needs first and I am an incredibly devoted and involved father.

I know I can't control how someone feels but my family is the most important thing in the world to me and I want to do everything in my power to fight for it and give my wife reason to trust me, forgive me and fall in love with me again. I'm totally lost here and terrified that my family is falling apart.

[chosen]

To be honest the fact that you wife has crushes on other men is far more a serious to the marriage that what you did. I would be devastated if my husband had crushes on other women, and even told me about them???If this isnt stopped and she isnt made aware of the dangers of this, an affair may well result, and the lives of three little children destroyed.
AS for the money, a couple should both be aware of what is happening financially, how much is available and what the budget is. I have never thought it a good idea for one partner to bear the burden of the finances and for the other to live in in ignorance. So what that you had to use some savings, you are lucky to have savings at your age and if you have to use them then you have to use them. Its not the end of the world.

Yes you do need counseling, but you were just doing you best and she needs to be made aware of how dangerous her attention to other men is, she should NEVER entertain such lustful thoughts towards other men or there is disaster ahead. She is cheating on you emotionally and that needs to stop now.

I have a good book called 'Hedges' by Jerry B Jenkins, she needs to read it. She is playing with fire and to be honest, acting like a 15 year old not a married lady with 3 small children .

[ralfgarnett]

The title to your thread says it all, none of us ever thought this could happen to us, yes me and my wife were just the same, always affectionate, always tactile, always telling each other we loved each other all the things at home and in public, we were the couple that other couples wanted to be like, we had a great 19 years together, she even told me how much she loved me the very same day that she walked out of my life and what I thought perfect marriage, good luck to you both you may be in for some turbulence over the coming months, one good thing in your favour that I never got is that your both still under the same roof, use that time wisely, read up on the 180 and try certain aspects of that but don't tell her that you have read it and are implementing any of it because it will then not work for you.