After I told the adulteress’ husband about the affair, “they” sent us a cease and desist email. And that’s okay because Greg was working on a no contact letter to send to her. But he didn’t end up finishing it because of the cease and desist. I sent her husband an email replying with more info he might want and then agreed I would abide by the cease and desist. We have abided by our part. But, apparently, it seems that the adulteress hasn’t and that she is stalking my Pinterest account.

She doesn’t like my Pinterest account because I have a board about “the adulteress”. I pin things about adultery and homewreckers. I also have one about cheaters/liars with quotes and things pertaining to what my husband did to me. It’s my account. It’s my freedom. Those two did this to me and I am going to do what I need to do to heal and to help others who are walking this same walk. She is an evil, cruel person. My pain will not be in vain. This is my life and my Pinterest account is about my life- my likes and my dislikes. It is none of her business and I will not be controlled by her. And she can’t do anything about this blog. If I choose to reveal her name on here, she cannot do anything. It’s my freedom of speech.

I suspected she was stalking me because she has reported my board about “the adulteress” before. I keep starting another board about “the adulteress” and then it gets reported and removed again. This time she left it alone for awhile but I suspected she was probably stalking me so I found a picture of the place she works and I pinned it with the comment, “This is where the adulteress works”. It drew her out of her rat hole like I knew it would.

The affair has been over for almost 2 years. Why is she so obsessed with me? Why is she so interested in my Pinterest account? Why is she so afraid? I haven’t named her. I have put her initials on there, but MH could mean a lot of people. The people following my board wouldn’t know who she is. They can’t tie it to her. Sure, my friends and coworkers know who it is because my husband and I have been very vocal about it. But it is not harassing or bullying her. She would not even know it existed if she weren’t stalking me. She needs to just own what she did, leave me alone, and move on. People know she is an adulteress and that is HER problem. SHE did that to HERSELF.

She is crazy. I believe her affair with my husband was more about her wanting my life than wanting my husband. I think she was jealous of our perceived marriage. Greg would always speak highly of me in public and he had just done so at a company dinner. Greg said she had told him that she and her husband had gone to marriage counseling several times. She claimed to coworkers that she had children only because her husband wanted them. She was very vocal about that. And she didn’t seem to care much about them. What kind of mother of young children has an affair?

Women who choose to sleep with a married man make the choice to do so. They know that when the affair comes out, because it will, there will be consequences to pay. That’s why most women don’t go around sleeping with married men. Most women are not that gullible, stupid, or weak. This adulteress had her own husband she should have been sleeping with and taking care of and not worrying about what was going on in my marriage. She chose to mess with my marriage and I think she is always looking over her shoulder wondering what I might do. She’s scared because I can out her. That’s a consequence of her sin. Maybe her children will find out one day how terrible their mother is and how she cared nothing about them and their future… Maybe her husband will decide he’s sick of her and leave her…. Maybe he will find someone else and leave her for his adulteress…. And if she keeps backing me into a corner by harassing me on Pinterest, then it could get ugly. I’m sure she doesn’t want her friends and coworkers to know she sleeps with married men. She might sleep with their husbands if they can offer her a better life. She seems to only care about her selfish desires and cares nothing about who might get hurt.

She really needs to stop worrying about what I am doing to heal. She caused this. If she had not been after my husband and whored herself out, I wouldn’t be going through this. Yes, there might have been someone else at some point, but there had not been and she is the one who chose to enter into an affair with him. She could have been someone with morals and integrity who wouldn’t do that. She could have told my husband no and not entered into an affair. But after his inappropriate kiss she is the one who initiated the next kiss the next time she saw him. She made a conscious choice to have an affair with him. So she is equally to blame. It takes two to have an affair.

I pin quotes about adultery into a board labeled with her initials. How is that hurting her? As my husband says, she just doesn’t like it because it is the truth. The truth bothers her. She doesn’t want to see the truth. Oh well. It ANGERS me that she wanted to step into my shoes and pretended to be married to my husband. Yes, she chose to go by “MM” as if she was married to him. She told my husband that she liked that better than her initials from her husband’s name. I told her husband that, but I guess he just ignored it. I really am surprised that has not bothered him. I think that if he really cared about her it would bother him. After talking to him and his reaction to me, I don’t feel empathy for him as I did in the beginning. He was told they might be having an affair but she had explained it away. He trusted her. He didn’t have the decency to come to me and tell me or ask me. It’s ridiculous that he wants to ignore it so easily. She basically said she didn’t like his last name and it doesn’t seem to bother him. Strange. I think I have handled this a lot stronger than him. He seems to be weak. She seems to like weak men and probably because she knows she can manipulate weak men. I know she was manipulating my husband when he was at a very weak point. I reacted differently when I found out. I put my foot down. I didn’t play the “pick me dance”. I just told him it was me or her and if he chose me he had to fire her. If he didn’t choose me, then he needed to leave. Well, that night, he told me that he was going to fight for me and our family and would terminate her position. He didn’t seem attached to her. Yeah, that has kind of bothered me about him that he would use someone like that, but I can see the changes in him and they seem pretty consistent with his story that God just pulled the blinders off and he was just done with her. He says he was just ashamed and sickened by what he had done. But I don’t believe the adulteress has any integrity. I think she would sell herself to anyone for a better lifestyle. She’s just cheap like that.

The adulteress underestimated me. I wasn’t going to just give up all I have worked hard for my whole life and let her have it. This is OUR empire- my husband’s and mine. We built it together. We’ve been together longer than she has been alive. I am the woman behind the man and, if I hadn’t been in his life, he wouldn’t have taken the path I encouraged him to take. He has said that he doesn’t know what he would have done. I was the one who shared the job listing with him and encouraged him to go apply for. It was our teamwork that built this empire. She can’t just take it from me. And she is an idiot to think that she could or that I would just let her have it. Sorry, but she can’t compete with me. She’s not that bright. She is certainly not on the same level as me, and, because she is an adulteress, she’ll never be on my level. Most importantly, I actually have morals and integrity and I bore his three children. They are the greatest blessings to me. While my husband chased after his dreams of “being somebody important”, I treasured being a wife and the mother of our three precious children. I will never regret the attention I gave my children. They were here for me when my husband was not. The adulteress cared nothing about her own children.

Oh, I hate my husband for choosing to put me through this! Many times I think I should just leave. I deserve a man with integrity and faithfulness because that is what I have given him our whole marriage. He truly does not deserve me. And the fact that he did what he did with such trash as the adulteress, well, there aren’t words for me to express my feelings about that. But I do believe that GOD can change people who are truly remorseful and who repent and give their lives to Him. And I have faith that my God loves me and has my best interests at heart. I have stood for His truth in major battles and have not backed down. I prayed for years that He would save my husband. I was at a point where I was begging Him to save him when the affair was going on and I didn’t know. And I believe that God heard my prayers and answered them. Just as God saved Saul and changed him to Paul, I believe that Greg has been changed. The adulteress did not have my husband. She had the terrible monster she called “G”. “G” never really existed. He was a possessed form of Greg and he was a fantasy she tried to create. Her professed love was a lie and he showed his professed love to her was a lie. I am the only one who has given him true love and it hurts that he was possessed by her lies and ruined what we had for them.

I am giving him the opportunity to show me that he has truly changed. I want extraordinary and that is what I expect if he wants me to stay. So far, he has worked hard at rebuilding our marriage and family. I do believe he is a better version of what he used to be before the affair. Time will tell. If he is still fooling me like he did during the affair, then he will answer to God for that. I hope for his sake that he is being honest but, unfortunately, there is no way for me to ever truly know. I’ll never fully believe him ever again. How sad is that? That’s what betrayal does.

All I can do is lean on Jesus/Yeshua and trust in Him. He’s in the business of mending broken hearts and saving people. He is faithful. He will never forsake me. He will lead me.

As far as the adulteress, I know my God will deal with her for what she has done.

It’s true. We never have been able to. At least not since we married. At least not in depth like I want to. And I guess that’s one reason why I spent so much time talking to my best girl friend, my other friend who is like a mother to me, and my Facebook friends. I spent a lot of time on Facebook because I was so starved for real communication. It’s why I even opened up my Facebook account so long ago. I love deep communication. Deep topics. I crave it. And I can’t have that with my husband because he’s not a deep communicator. He likes to talk but it’s all superficial.

I was a stay at home mother and at times I really needed adults to talk to. Greg just wasn’t into what I was and he was a grouch by the time he got home from work. I was growing in my faith and was so curious about learning. I joined a Christian forum about end times prophecy, something that has always really intrigued me. I soaked up all kinds of information and I began to study the Bible in ways I had never studied it before. I had also been in many local Bible study groups off and on. But those were just one day a week. I craved true conversation.

One day, when I was still watching The Today Show, they were talking about Facebook. I was curious and signed up. I found old high school classmates and joined Bible study groups. I met new people. There was never anything inappropriate but I spent a lot of time on there. The more I learned, the more debates I participated in. I loved the “iron sharpening iron.” It was fun for me. I loved how passionate others were of their views. And Greg never seemed to mind…. At least, he never told me…. But I know differently now. If only he would have taken the time to communicate his feelings to me. At times, he would listen to me as if he was interested but he never had anything to contribute to the conversation. He seemed on board but that was part of his lies. He should have been honest with me about his feelings then.

I remember when we began talking about the affair and Greg told me in a very sorrowful tone, “I hate to say this now because it just sounds so bad, but I thought all you wanted to talk about was Jesus. I know how terrible that sounds now and I can’t believe I thought like that.” It crushed my heart. Yes, I wanted to talk about Jesus A LOT. And I did. When you become born again (for real because so many are false converts), you are so passionate about Him and want to learn all you can and you want everyone to know. You want to share what you learn. It’s no different than talking about sports if you are passionate about them or whatever else you are passionate about. You’ve found TRUTH and you want everyone to find it because it is a life or death matter. Those who are not born again cannot understand that. They may go to church and may have said a prayer “asking Jesus into their hearts” but they may not be born again. Jesus did say that truth would divide. His example was that it would divide a family of five….. I know we were divided by my faith. Greg’s actions and attitude revealed he had been a false convert. His remorse over his past feelings seem to show me that God has changed him. I hope I can trust that. Surely he is not faking…..

My side of the story goes like this: Greg would come home from work and I would be in the kitchen cooking dinner. My laptop was at the end of the island. While I was waiting on things to cook, I was on Facebook. He would come home and I would ask him how things had gone at work. He was usually grumpy and wouldn’t want to talk about it. But if he had been to the country club, he would start to tell me all of the gossip. I did not want to hear that. We were growing so far apart. It was as if he was sandpaper to me. I felt like I was losing my very best friend. I just didn’t know that I really was.

Many times I begged him to communicate with me. I begged him to turn off the tv and come be with the kids and me. I just wanted him to spend time with us. He would not. I told him that one day he would regret spending all of that time in front of the tv. Our kids were growing up so fast and they would be gone quickly and he was going to miss that. But he ignored me. The kids and I enjoyed being together and they were hurt by their dad’s lack of presence. I will not regret spending time with my kids.

I remember during the affair that I got really upset with his actions on something and told him how it hurt me. And I think it was meant to hurt me. He seemed so cold and did not care. He just sat in front of his tv with his computer. Of course, he was probably emailing her back and forth. I spent most of my time in the bedroom crying. He cooked dinner on the grill but I couldn’t eat. He sat outside and ate while the kids sat at the kitchen table. He was so distant from all of us. I got my purse and keys and told the kids I was going for a drive. The youngest wanted to come with me but I told her I needed to be alone. I still remember the look on her face.

I was gone for about an hour and a half to two hours. I called my friend and told her what I had done. She was worried but he was not. He never even called to check on me. He had never treated me like that before. I knew then that he no longer cared. My girls were very worried and convinced him to take them to the farm to see if I was there. I never even went there. I just drove all over to places I had never been. I got home and layed outside with my son on a lounge chair looking at the stars. Greg and the girls got home and he was still very cold. He told me they had gone to the farm to look for me. I told him I had not gone there and he said, “Oh,” and then he just walked off to the media room to watch tv again. I stayed with the kids for about thirty minutes until I decided I had had enough of his bad attitude and his lack of attention. I went to the media room and told him I was sick of everything and I was not going to go on our family trip in a week and pretend things were okay anymore. I wanted to go stay with my mother for a while. I told him I felt our marriage was over. He still looked cold. Who was this person? Where was the guy I had fallen in love with? I left the room and went to our bedroom. He followed. He begged me to go on the trip and not leave. Now that I know that he had just come back from being with her for the first time, I cannot believe he begged me like he did. He was so good at playing me. And good at playing her…. I told him then that I would only stay if he would work on our marriage. I told him that he would have to date me again. I felt like I was living with a brother or a friend, not with my husband. Of course, he was more of a stranger at this point than a brother or friend would be. We had to do something to be a couple again. He agreed and we did start having weekly dates. We made love that night. I had hope things were going to be better. And they were on the surface. But I didn’t realize he was so good at compartmentalizing.

We went on our vacation to the beach and had what I thought to be a wonderful time. We even heard our song while we were on our date at the beach and danced to it under the stars when we got back to our rented house. I felt like our marriage was revived that summer. I still struggle with that time and how much he deceived me. I didn’t know that he called her while we were gone. He also deceived her because he wasn’t honest with her about what was going on with us. He played both of us. Of course, she knew that was a possibility because she knew he was lying to me. She deserved to be lied to and used. She chose that. I did not.

We’ve been going to the marriage counselor for eighteen months now. Every week. He made the first appointment on his own and has made every appointment as well. We’ve worked on communication. And we’ve talked about what they talked during the affair about and he claims most of it was work. I’ve come to a point where I think I believe that because that is what he talks about the most. Work consumes him. I’ve even told the marriage counselor that he can be a boring date because he gets to going on and on about work. I’ve been at work with him all day and I’m tired of work. We deal with work issues all day and I just want to think about and talk about something else for a change.

And if I want to talk about something else, then I have to come up with it because he can’t come up with anything. Well, not deep things. He talks a lot and always has, but, after all these months, he still can’t initiate much deep conversation. It’s just not him. And that breaks my heart because I remember the talks we had when we were dating. There were deep talks: hopes and dreams. Faith. I remember laying on the hood of his car talking about God…. We communicated then.

Somewhere along the way, he got consumed with work and quit communicating. He didn’t want me in his business because he thought I wouldn’t agree with what he was doing. And why? Because he knew he was doing things I wouldn’t approve of. That should have been a red flag for him that he was walking away from the path. He began making big decisions without seeking my opinion. He bought other dealerships without discussing them with me. He got on the dealer advisory board and traveled all the time (I stayed home to keep the kids because we had no one else to keep them). It seemed that work and success were the only things he cared about. He built a wall and wouldn’t let me in. He just shut me out. He began assuming what I thought about things and grew resentful but he never asked me.

And then she came along. She began telling him how smart and amazing he was and she wanted him to teach her all about the business. She asked questions all the time. She told him she wanted to help him. She knew how to lay it on thick. After all, her college degree was in Communication…. She also shared that she was having problems with her husband. She claimed he would leave the house and left her alone with their kids at night. Was any of that truth? I believe she had a plan and did it all purposefully.

Part of what I have learned through all of this is that Greg was intimidated by me. He told me that I’m the only person who has ever really intimidated him. He laughed about it because people always talk about how intimidating he is. Some proclaimed you better not “poke the bear” about him. But, of all the people he has dealt with, I intimidated him. I was stunned. He always tells people, “She’s the smart one” because I had a higher GPA. I always tell them at the same time that I studied and he did not. Because I didn’t agree with him on some of his decisions, he thought I thought he was stupid and that I wouldn’t agree with any of his decisions. My faith and relationship with God was a big reason he was intimidated by me. When you are not living with integrity, you don’t want to be around someone who is. Yeah, I’m sure my faith did intimidate him.

He claims he thought I didn’t love him anymore. That ANGERS me so much. It’s how he tried to justify to himself that an affair was okay. It’s the classic cheater reasoning. Instead of being honest and communicating with their spouses about their feelings, they pretend nothing is wrong and choose to spend their time and energy lying and cheating. He treated me so horribly and I stayed by his side and prayed he would change. THAT is love. And now he has changed, but we still cannot communicate the way I crave. And I know some men can because I’ve communicated with them on Facebook (in threads, not private). I do not encourage private communication between married members of the opposite sex.

So now I’m left craving deep communication and intimacy with someone. Years ago, I wanted that to be Greg but I just don’t feel that connection with him. I don’t feel like we have intimacy any longer because he broke my trust and I don’t know how we’ll ever get that back. I don’t want to open up to him because I don’t know that he is fully open with me. I feel like he continues to hide feelings and such, although he swears he is being honest and sharing his feelings. However, he is a proven liar. I don’t know what is true anymore. I just feel like there is a great divide between us and that makes me sad and lonely. We are together almost 24/7 but I still feel so alone. I miss my best friend. I miss feeling that he had my back and that he was a shelter from the storm. He created this storm and he doesn’t know how to deal with the aftermath.

I think about this betrayal so often. Only someone who has been betrayed gets that. It is all-consuming. And no one else cares. It’s like any loss. You bury the dead and then everyone thinks you need to get over it right after the funeral. They don’t care about the process of grief until they go through it. And those who have not been betrayed don’t realize how painful it is and that it is like grieving a death of a loved one only worse. Much worse. It’s the death of a marriage and your past and present. It’s the death of your memories. It’s the death of what you thought was true. It’s the death of the person you thought you were married to. For all you know now, that person never really existed. Your life is suddenly defined by “before the affair” and “after the affair”. And when you were onlies like we were, you have now lost that specialness forever. I treasured that but apparently he didn’t and I will never be able to have that with anyone else. He ruined that for me because of his selfishness and stupidity and I truly hate him for that. It will always be a division that he caused. He may want us to be close now, but I cannot allow that. I just don’t trust him.

I long to talk to other people who have been betrayed. Greg did this to me but he just can’t really understand and he can’t help me. And he is starting to get very frustrated. He doesn’t like talking about it because he is ashamed. He doesn’t want to have to think about it. He wants to just move forward and leave it all behind but I’m stuck in the mire. He can’t pull me out. He can’t fix this like he would like. I’m just so angry because he chose to do this to me and now he wants me to just move on. I can’t rush healing. I can’t mend my broken heart. I can’t forget. I can’t just trust him. And I can’t fix what is broken in him that would cause him to betray me. I refuse to move forward until he can answer “why” and “how”. So we are at a standstill. I need to talk and he doesn’t want to remember. And I would so love for him to not have to remember. But I have to process this to be able to move forward. I can’t bury it until I process it all.

I struggle each day with the lack of true communication, trust, and honesty. I don’t see how we will ever survive. I think most of the couples that do survive adultery are those where  the betrayed overlook it all. They choose to rugsweep. I can’t do that. I want the relationship that so many others have. And I just don’t believe I’ll ever have that with Greg. I see us slipping into the relationship we had before the affair and I can’t live like that ever again. I won’t.

He took me on a picnic today for lunch.

Saturday, he took me to some nearby wineries. He planned it all out. The night before we went to the store and bought things for a picnic. I have the cutest picnic basket that I have had for years and I pulled it out for our little adventure. We didn’t end up eating most of what we packed- chicken salad, gouda cheese, crackers, grapes, strawberries, and Ghirardelli dark chocolate sauce- because they had wood-fired pizza and then we ate dinner at a restaurant at one of the wineries. We had a really nice time enjoying good wine, good food, and each other.

When we were dating, I told him I would love to get engaged on a picnic. And that’s how he asked me only days before my 18^th birthday. It wasn’t quite the picnic I had envisioned, but he listened to me and he tried to give me what I wanted. It was the thought that meant so much to me. Most of all, it was the fact that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me.

As we were leaving work for lunch today, he told me I had two choices of where to go and they weren’t restaurants. It had been raining during the morning so I thought it would be really wet. I asked if he had something to sit on and looked in the back of the truck and saw the picnic basket. Awwww….. He didn’t want the things we bought for our adventure Saturday to go to waste.

Yesterday, it was roses hanging from the shower head and then him wearing rubber gloves cleaning the potties. Saturday, it was a note with the rose in the top of the picnic basket. Friday, it was the rose petals in the shape of a heart with a rose in the center on the floorboard of the truck. Most days, he writes me a letter. Sometimes, it’s something taped to my bathroom mirror or written on it. A year and a half ago, he made the first appointment with the marriage counselor and has made them for each week since. A few weeks ago, it was a leather bracelet with an engraved plate on it with the longitude and latitude of the place where he asked me to be his girlfriend. One night, it was a blow up bed in the bed of the truck with candles and some wine watching the sunset at our farm. Tonight, he is going to make me dinner. I never know what he is going to come up with.

I know he is trying. Hard. But why now and why not then? Why does he want me now? This betrayal healing is ugly. It’s messy. He’s had to comfort me as I lay in the floor in the fetal position crying the ugly cry knowing he did that to me. We’ve had some really ugly conversations. Really ugly. He has to answer my questions over and over again. Consequences. But he is still here and he is trying. And I have to come to a place of forgiveness. I’m just not there yet. And there are certain things I have prayed for that I haven’t seen yet. Time. And….

It’s the little things….. Life is full of small pleasures/happinesses.

Masterpiece- Danny Gokey

“Heartbreaks a bittersweet sound
Know it well
It’s ringing in my ears
And I can’t understand
Why I’m not fixed by now
Begged and I pleaded
Take this pain but I’m still bleeding

Heart trusts you for certain
Head says it’s not working
I’m stuck here still hurting
But you tell me

You’re making a masterpiece
You’re shaping the soul in me
You’re moving where I can’t see
And all I am is in your hands
You’re taking me all apart
Like it was your plan from the start
To finish your work of art for all to see you’re making a masterpiece

Guess I’m your canvas
Beautiful black and blue
Painted in mercy’s hue
I don’t see past this
But you see me now
Who I’ll be then
There at the end
Standing there as

Your Masterpiece
You’re shaping the soul in me
You’re moving where I can’t see
And all I am is in your hands
You’re taking me all apart
Like it was your plan from the start
To finish your work of art for all to see
You’re making a masterpiece
You’re making a masterpiece

Heart trust you for certain
Head says it’s not working

You’re making a masterpiece
You’re shaping the soul in me
You’re moving where I can’t see
And all I am is in your hands
You’re taking me all apart
Like it was your plan from the start
To finish your work of art for all to see you’re making a masterpiece”

I love that song! It is beautiful!

Greg and I went to a Casting Crowns concert a few weeks ago. Unspoken and Danny Gokey opened for them. It really was a great concert and so many of the songs spoke to me about this time of healing. It was a time of worship for me and I also saw my husband singing along….

I’m still so raw about this affair. Apparently it takes 2-5 years to heal and I’ll never be the same. How do people do this to those they love? I’ll say they can’t. Why is sex with someone else so worth risking all you have built with someone else? As Greg says now- it isn’t. He says it all just makes him sick, that he isn’t the same person, that he thought I didn’t love him, and that he would never be with her again.

I’m just wondering when the pain will go away or if it ever will. I have never experienced pain like this. The closest was the death of my dad when his plane crashed in 1993. He was only 49. It was so unexpected and he was so young. My dad- the one who I thought was bigger than life. He had left our family for another woman and they had been married for almost ten years when he died. We had just gotten our relationship on the right track a few years earlier. Then he was suddenly gone. I still miss him yet I find myself angry with him all over again because I now know the pain my mother went through. I was the same age as our youngest was when she found out about her dad (13) and I just didn’t know how to comfort my mother. All the anger I had for him then has resurfaced. Yet when he died, it hurt so badly and it took me a very long time to get over it. Betrayal is similar in that you go through the stages of grief yet it is so different. I’m going through all of this because Greg did it to me. He thought nothing of the pain he was inflicting on me to have his affair. I think it would have been better if I had lost Greg through death. I know it sounds horrible to say, but at least I would have still had respect for him, the feelings of love I had before I found out about the affair, and the hope that he would wake up and be the man I married again unstained by someone else. How can I ever see him as anything other than a cheater now and my betrayer?

My emotions are all over the place. Right now I hate Greg for what he did. I’ll always hate the slut who was such a low life and easy and cared nothing about breaking up my family but I don’t have a relationship with her. And I realize that the other betrayed spouse could have the same feelings for my husband. I feel like cheaters deserve each other. I don’t believe my husband deserves me. We had been together 32 years before he cheated and had been each other’s first and onlies. Now he has ruined that for me and I don’t believe he deserves to be my only. But I’m not a cheater…..

I’m trying hard to focus on Jesus right now while I wait on Greg to work on his issues. I know my healing will only come through Him. I spend a lot of time listening to praise music and singing in worship to Him. And there are songs I have found that I have clung to during this time. The Casting Crowns album “Thrive” is all about infidelity. I came across the album before I found out and I was stunned because it was as if it was made about my family. Several of Danny Gokey’s songs have meant a lot to me (“Tell Your Heart to Beat Again” and “Rise”). Then we went to the concert and I heard “The Comeback” and “Masterpiece”.

Just as “Masterpiece” says, I am stuck here still hurting and I don’t see past this but I know Jesus does and He is working on it. He has my life in His Hands. I can’t see how this will be better. I’ve lost so much. I’ll never get back some things. I am thankful my husband is different than before for the better for him and that is a plus but the affair did not make him this way. He hit rock bottom as result of the affair. He is now horrified by what he did and by who he did it with and I do believe he means that. I believe God is molding him into the man He wants him to be and that’s what I wanted for him all along. It’s what I prayed for so I hope this is not just more deception (if he is deceiving me, that is between him and God). He was really good at deceiving me and pretending that he was on the same page as me as far as my faith was concerned. That has been very difficult for me. I never thought he was lying about his faith. I never expected this cheater baggage because when I married him, he was unstained by another. He had never been with anyone else and I thought I would spend the rest of my life with him that way. This has made me so very angry.

Part of the consequence of what Greg did is that he won’t have the devotion from me that he used to. He won’t have the trust I gave him. We’ll never be what we could have been if he had just communicated with me and worked on problems instead of turning to a trashy slut. If he had just trusted me and listened to me he wouldn’t be here now wishing he had listened. He wouldn’t have to deal with this pain he knows he is putting me through. I believe there will always be a distance between us. I have detached quite a bit for my own protection. I’m becoming a stronger me. I don’t see how I’ll ever get past this. But if it is what God wants, then I know He can help me through that. And if Greg continues to grow in Him, then he will become a safe person for me because I know God will be leading him. Only time will show me that. And a long time at that. I do believe that no matter what, God will make a masterpiece of my life because I have placed my life in His Hands. I want Him to be glorified whatever His Will for my life.

     I want to make it clear that I am not excusing my husband’s behavior as I post about the adulteress. Yes, my husband made vows to me and he broke those. The adulteress made vows to her husband and she broke those. My husband disrespected her husband and her family and the adulteress disrespected my family and me. There is such a thing as human decency and respect for those around us. Just as someone doesn’t have the right to take a package off of my front porch,  you don’t just go around taking spouses! People should respect families and find single men and women who are free to be in a relationship. And if you are married, you are not free to find someone else. What happened to vows? Perhaps if there were legal consequences for those participating in affairs like for theft, there would be less affairs….

What kind of married woman calls another woman’s husband “my man”? What kind of mother tries to take a married man away from his wife and children? How can she claim she knows she has “to share him right now”? What kind of person starts a relationship based on deceit?

The adulteress who had an affair with my husband is an extremely selfish person. She is in a young marriage and is the mother of three very young children (one set of twins). Instead of spending time with her children and husband, she was spending her time emailing my husband and going on trips with him. While on a trip with her own husband, she was busy emailing my husband back and forth about the trip they were planning together. How could she risk her children’s happiness and home like that? And instead of taking care of her own husband’s needs and her children’s needs, she was keeping my husband from taking care of my needs and the needs of our children. If she thinks she needed to take it upon herself to fulfill my husband’s needs because they weren’t getting met by me, then she needs to rethink that. It wasn’t her job to take care of my husband or to judge what went on in our home. She should not have been involved in my marriage at all. She didn’t know what was going on. She didn’t know my side of it. She didn’t know that my husband was so full of ego and had become a complete jerk to me and our children for the past few years. We all struggled walking on eggshells around him. I begged him to work on our marriage. He was just too full of himself and too busy with work and other things that inflated his ego. The adulteress needed to focus on her own troubled marriage instead of trying to steal my husband. If her husband was cheating on her, would she think that it was because she wasn’t fulfilling him? Would she think that her husband’s affair partner had every right to take him? She had a young marriage and that doesn’t speak well for her that they were already having such problems that she felt she needed someone else. And why could my husband not think through all of that?

She is broken and needy. Although she wanted to appear as strong, she is not. If she were strong, she would not have felt the need to go after my husband. She wouldn’t need a man to make her feel she was important. Strong women find their own men. She isn’t intelligent either because intelligent women know that a married man is not really going to be true to them and will end up dumping them when the affair gets outed. Adulterous women have to stay in the dark. They are kept a secret and have to have someone’s left overs. GROSS! If I had known he was having sex with her, I wouldn’t have been having sex with him!!!! But I’m sure she believed that we weren’t having sex. Eye-roll…..  And I am super angry that my husband cared nothing about my health and put it at risk by sleeping with a skank. Adulterous women get the worst parts of a man and inspire him to be his worst form. They have nothing but sex and lies to offer a man. Everything about the affair is a lie. It’s foundation is a lie. And if this particular adulterous woman didn’t offer herself, then it would just be someone else who offered. This adulterous woman was nothing special and could have been anyone. She was ordinary/plain looking. Most who see a picture of her immediately have a comment about one of her features and my kids came up with a nickname for her because of it. She was certainly no beauty inside or out. I thought she was a nice person and that she cared about my family. Since she was married with children, I never felt threatened by her. Of course, now I know how trashy she is and she sure had me deceived. And that is all an adulterous woman is good at- deception.

Again, I will not excuse my husband’s behavior at all. He has a lot of work to do if he wants to reconcile and save this marriage. I will not accept anything but the hard work it will take on his part. There are things that I am working on, but I did not betray him. He has to work on himself and discover how he could do this. He became someone I did not recognize and most times I didn’t even want to be around him. At one point during the affair time, I told him that I was done with the marriage and if he didn’t start working on our marriage, I was going to leave. He BEGGED me to stay and said he would start working on our marriage. We even started dating again. But, unknown to me, she was in the shadows working on him. He was so full of his ego and the adulteress saw he had problems and began to prey on them. In one email to him, she boasted about how competitive she was. There are women who find married men more attractive and think it a challenge to go after a married man and get him to have an affair. They think that makes them something special. Seriously, married men find prostitutes and go to strip clubs yet those women are certainly not special! Perhaps this adulteress enjoys playing with married men and hurting their wives and families, possibly destroying them. I think she is that evil. What kind of game is that anyway? The spouse isn’t even aware of a competition! And while she was putting on her best game, I didn’t know. I was just being me and I still beat her.

I truly believe that she saw him in his weakness and devised a plan to use him in her game. I think she saw how much he cared for me because she heard him share his feelings about me at a company dinner. I think she was jealous and wanted to ruin it for us. She wanted us to be as miserable as she is. After that dinner, she suddenly began hugging her boss. He claimed he thought nothing of it because she seemed to hug everyone. She then began watching his mood and asking him what was wrong. She began confiding in him and told him that her husband would leave the house at night. Oh, poor, poor adulteress…. Go find a TRUE knight in shining armor. Don’t sell yourself for a man who would have to cheat on his wife to be with you. Why would you want a cheater? Perhaps her husband was having an affair and she wanted to use Greg as revenge on her husband. Regardless of why she did it, she is evil. If she had any class at all or ever cared about him, she would not have wanted to ruin his life. Whatever problems she was having at home, she decided to pull my husband and my family into the pit with her. Instead of encouraging my husband to talk to me and work on our marriage, she began to use lies in his ear to inflate his ego, talk “kinky” to him as she called it, and then she snared him with sex. Easy slut. One morning as she was greeted him with her hug, she lingered as if she wanted a kiss and he kissed her. He says he didn’t know what overcame him (yeah, whatever) and he immediately apologized and she told him it was okay. The next morning she saw him, she came in his office and kissed him. I believe this was all part of her plan and my husband was too caught up in his ego that he fell for it. He felt entitled to have an affair. She knew things I didn’t like for him to do like drinking at the country club before coming home but she encouraged him to do so and said it made her smile when he did. She loved when he would get angry with someone and yell at them. She encouraged him to be the worst version of himself while I was trying to get him to wake up and become the man I knew God wanted him to be. She was nothing special and could have been anyone. She was just another person with no integrity or morals. She was just a pawn used by satan to drag my husband down to the pit.

As I examined her emails, I began to put things together. I knew from what my husband had told me, she was a fan of “Fifty Shades of Grey”. Of course, I stood against that book and the movie because it is trash. Well, trashy people like trash….. For some reason, my instincts made me strongly feel there was a connection between her emails and that book. I had not read it but because I felt there must be a connection, I set out to do the research. And I found that things she said in the emails came from the book! She wasn’t even original enough to have an affair! She was like that in a lot of things. I found a logo on the internet that she had claimed she designed for an event for one of the dealerships. It was not an original design. She wasn’t creative. Her online resume was full of lies about her responsibilities at the dealerships and the time she worked there.  She has no problem lying.

After I discovered the affair, Greg told me that after their last trip together, she came to work crying that her husband had told her over dinner that he wanted a divorce and he left that night and she needed an attorney. She was so sad that she didn’t have a ring to wear any longer and asked my husband to buy her one (and of course he did). She picked out a black onyx ring- a perfect match for her black soul. He claimed he thought it would just shut her up (yeah, I’m not buying that). Of course, she kept pushing his buttons even more. The day before I confronted him, she had worn very short shorts to work claiming it was an expensive business suit. She wore this inappropriate outfit to a ribbon cutting. He had told her to go home but she refused. She was beginning to show her true self and true motives to him. But he continued to let himself be manipulated by her. It makes me so sick! I’ve lost the respect I had for him. And I don’t know how you gain respect for someone who betrays you.

Despite the fact that Greg has been very open with family, friends, and employees, her husband did not find out about the affair until I delivered the news to him ten months after I found out. He must have been the last person to find out. He said someone had said something to him one time but it was explained away. He kept asking me if I was sure and how far it had gone. He really did not want to believe it. Unfortunately, I believe he is the type person who will just rug-sweep it all. It obviously doesn’t matter to him that his wife sleeps around behind his back and lies to him all the time. He doesn’t realize how foolish it makes him look. It will probably continue to happen because he’s not making her deal with why she did this and I just don’t think he really cares. Perhaps he is too busy cheating on her to care.

To prove it to him, I got his email address and sent him copies of the emails. He told us that right before their Vegas trip, she had told him at dinner that she wanted a divorce and she made him leave. Greg was truly stunned to hear that. He said she had given this award-winning performance with tears and all of how her husband had left. It was the exact story her husband told but it was reversed. Other employees confirmed she had told them that story. Her husband also said that someone had come to him and said they saw her leaving some place with a man. He asked if it was Greg but was told that they knew Greg and it wasn’t Greg. I think Greg was stunned to hear that as well. I guess cheaters just don’t think the ones they cheat with will lie to them or cheat on them even though they have no problem lying to or cheating on their spouses, the ones they made vows to. I’m stunned at how naive cheaters are. It really is ridiculous!

Of course, her husband was back at home with her at this point and I wonder at what point they got back together. Did she beg him to come back when she got dumped by Greg? I don’t believe her husband has figured out yet that he was her second choice….. It seems to me she thought she and Greg were going to get together soon so she kicked him out to move her plan along. She didn’t consider me finding out and putting my foot down.

Greg apologized to her husband for what he had done. I know that was very hard and I know he sincerely meant it. Although I did not like being the bearer of bad news, I felt as a betrayed spouse I owed it to the other betrayed spouse to tell him what I knew. I had actually tried to tell him by Facebook one time but she had control of his Facebook and blocked me….. It seems he might have already known but did not do the same for me. I just don’t think he has much character. It did give me great power to be the one to tell her husband. She was continuing to lie to him and thought she was getting away with it but she didn’t. He needed to know so he could make decisions based on truth.

It gave me great pleasure to dissolve her position at work. I know she loved her job and she begged to keep it. Seriously? How did she think that would work? But when I told Greg it was her or me, well, he chose me. He asked if he got rid of her if I would work on it and I told him I didn’t know. Knowing that I still might not work on it, he told me he would get rid of her and fight for me and our marriage. So much for her being his “soul mate”…..

The Bible warns of the adulteress. “For a harlot is a deep pit. And an adulterous woman is a narrow well. Surely she lurks as a robber, and increases the faithless among men.” Proverbs 23:27-28. “For the lips of an adulteress drip honey and smoother than oil is her speech; but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. Her feet go down to death, her steps take hold of Sheol. She does not ponder the path of life; her ways are unstable, she does not know it.” Proverbs 5:3-6. “For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching is light; and reproofs for discipline are the way of life to keep you from the evil woman, from the smooth tongue of the adulteress. Do not desire her beauty in your heart, nor let her capture you with her eyelids. For on account of a harlot one is reduced to a loaf of bread, and an adulteress hunts for the precious life.” Proverbs 6:23-26. Very strong words.

I pray that one day she realizes the destruction she caused and is truly remorseful. I won’t hold my breath. Perhaps one day she will have the same thing she did to me done to her. I believe that will be the only thing to wake her up and show her how evil she has become and how much she hurt my children and me. For now, she just seems to carry on as if she did nothing. And she hasn’t had to comfort her children for the evil she did to them. They are young and don’t know. I’ve had to comfort my children and help them through the pain she and their father caused them and I hate her for her part. Perhaps one day her children will hear how awful their mother is.

The last time I saw her, she scurried outside like a rat would do while she waited for her friend to check out. It shows she fears what I could do. I made sure her friend knew she tried to wreck my home. I wonder what lie she made up to her friend. I truly believe she claims she did nothing wrong. Who knows how she spins it in her small brain? I, however, can rightfully hold my head up because I am a child of the Most High and I am not an adulteress. She tried to take my husband and all that we built together throughout our 30+ years together and he ended up dumping her like the trash she is. She got played just like she was playing him. She flattered him with lies and he did the same to her. There was no truth and no true love in their tacky affair. As soon as the light was shed on it, the “love of her life/soul mate” dumped her. And she has been out of the picture since then. She gave him up so easily even though she said she would love him forever.

I could never do to anyone what she and Greg did to me. I have integrity that they did not have. If we stay together, he will not know what it feels like to be betrayed the way he betrayed me. The consequence of his sin is seeing the pain he has caused our children and me and working through the healing process. Only God knows what is in store for the adulteress. I’m not a believer in karma, but I do believe you reap what you sow………………….

For four months after Greg made the choice to fight for our marriage and me, he denied anything physical with the other person (I refuse to call her “woman” because she isn’t). Greg was busy working on our marriage and spending as much time with me as possible. He was stunned when I suggested we should play golf together. I always hated golf. But I felt this was something that I should do so we could spend more time together. When we began to play, he said he had never had so much fun. We really were enjoying each other. He seemed like such a different person from that day before he gave me Psalm 130.

He told me that he had prayed that morning he was given Psalm 130 for God to do in him what he had done in me. He began reading the Bible and wanted me to do Bible study with him so I did. This was so new to me. He had so many questions and seemed to be soaking up everything. I had prayed for so many years that this man would surrender to Jesus and take on the leadership role in our home. It seemed this prayer had been answered. I was so thankful and thought we had come dangerously close to losing everything but we had been spared. I never thought Greg had gotten as low as he had. 

Of course, Greg knew all along the extent of what he had done. He claims that when God pulled him out of that pit, He pulled the blinders off him. Greg said he couldn’t believe what he had done and he was so scared I would find out and leave him so he continued to lie to me. Things didn’t add up to me and I continued to feel in my gut that there was more to the story. Listen to your gut instincts. As I questioned, Greg continued to deny. He never seemed to grieve the loss of his relationship with her as I have read so many do. Some seem to stay in what is called the affair fog and I’ve watched several of my friends’ husbands continue in the affair fog and leave them for the adulteress. The only “affair fog” I saw was when I confronted him about my suspicions and told him he had to fire her. He was so strange looking and seemed so cold. It was a look I had seen in my dad when he had his affair. Greg looked like someone possessed and he actually claims that during that time it felt like he was. He says that was just not him. And I agree. He was a very different person during that time. Our oldest daughter has always had a great relationship with him and she claims that one time during those 5 months she saw him looking as if he was looking right through her. He was very hateful to her during that time. After I found out about the affair, Greg explained to me that he was trying to figure out how to get rid of her and keep me from finding out. She had just started pushing her weight around and he feared she would tell me and I would leave him. The day before I confronted him, she had really disrespected his position as her boss. She was showing her true colors and the real reason for her affair. He said that he was afraid when he dissolved her position that she was going to tell me but he was glad that I was forcing him to deal with it. He told me that when God opened his eyes, he was just done with her and the thought of her and what he had done made him sick. I actually saw how sick it truly made him when I was questioning him after I knew the truth and asked him what if I had done that to him. He jumped out of the truck and threw up. 

On November 13 (D-day/Discovery Day), Greg went to work for an hour or so. This time, he left his computer and I decided to go search his email. I found from one email that the ex-employee had another email account. I searched that email address and up came the proof that Greg had been unfaithful to me. 

No wife should ever have to read the kind of exchanges I read between my husband and this adulteress. I would never wish this on anyone except those who do it to their spouses. I do hope that the adulteress gets betrayed in the manner she betrayed me. Those who choose to do this deserve it happening to them. When I read the exchanges, I felt as if my heart dropped into the pit of my stomach. I screamed out and collapsed. How could he have ever betrayed me like this? Not my Greg. What kind of person does this?

Our kids were home and heard me scream so they came to my aide. I was crying at this time and I told them what I had found. We are very open with our children. The youngest is 13 and I was 13 when my dad did this to my mother. If I could handle knowing everything (within reason) at that age, so could she. I have a close relationship with them and I want to be as transparent as I can. I will not lie to them.

I rushed to the phone and called Greg, told him I knew, and hung up on him. I then called my closest friend and told her. While I was still on the phone with her, Greg arrived home. He continued to deny even with the proof. Apparently, this is common with cheaters. He continued to claim it was not a physical affair. But then I found the evidence of their first trip together. At that point, he told me I would not find proof of the other trip they took but he told me she went to Vegas with him. I was stunned. I just could not wrap my head around this information. The trip to Vegas was the month before her position was terminated. It was when we were trying to work on our marriage. How could he do this to me and claim he loved me? How could she do this to her husband and very young children? If she could do this to her kids, no wonder she cared nothing about what she was doing to me and mine. People who cheat are so very selfish. And that goes for my husband as well. But I believe Jesus is changing that in him. I have seen no remorse from the adulteress. I don’t believe she has morals or a conscious. What she did to my children is inexcusable. And she can live in fear that her children will eventually find out just how selfish she is and how she cared nothing about them and their future.

Greg and I had problems. No marriage is without problems. Healthy people work through them in a healthy manner. Cheaters are broken people. Cheaters avoid dealing with their brokenness and issues and choose to live in a fantasy avoiding as much responsibility they can. Cheaters don’t respect their spouses’ needs. They don’t communicate with their spouses. Cheaters lie to their spouses and they lie to the other partner. There is nothing honest about their relationship. It’s all built on lies. An adulterous relationship is two selfish people using each other to escape their true lives. I’ll never understand how either could ever trust the other to tell them the truth. It is so hard to think that my husband believed the empty lies that she spoke and they made him feel good. How can lies help you feel good? Give me truth. He betrayed our children and me for those empty lies. 

Greg and I began marriage counseling two weeks after D-day and continue going each week. We were blessed to be able to see this counselor. He has told Greg that no matter what he thought about our marriage and me, he was wrong for cheating and he is now in the fight of his life if he wants to save this marriage. 

Since he broke our vows, I no longer feel married. I told him he would have to win my heart again. If he wants me, he has to court me. If we get to that point, he will have to marry me again. And I’m not settling. I told him he must be extraordinary. I will accept nothing less. And there are no guarantees. I always said that if he cheated we were over. We may be. I may not want to continue life with someone who betrayed me so horribly. I know it will take Jesus healing this heart. 

Besides the changes God has made in him, Greg has made many changes in his behavior. Many of the things are things he did when we were dating. He seems more like the guy I fell in love with. He no longer sits in front of a tv in the evening. I used to try to get him to spend time with his family but he just wanted to sit in front of the tv while life passed him by. He would just get angry with me for saying anything. I told him that one day he would regret all the wasted time. He does not go alone to the country club to drink on the way home from work anymore. He also doesn’t drink alone anymore. He is showing respect for me and to prove he was very serious about us, he sold the dealership where the affair began. To keep me from being alone and going into depression during my grieving process, he started taking me to work with him. We work side by side now. And he says he values my input and enjoys me working with him. He said he can’t believe he didn’t want that before. We spend the majority of our time together. We are rarely apart. We go on weekly dates. He learned how to cook breakfast and makes it for me most mornings. He goes outside and cuts roses to put on my plate and also makes sure I always have fresh flowers in our room and bathroom. He picks wildflowers for me when we are at our farm and he sometimes stops the car to pick them on the side of the road. He opens the car door for me and won’t allow me to touch the handle. He pulls out the chair for me when we go to dinner. He blesses our food. He writes me letters most days. He leads prayer as he prays with me. He reads the Bible and studies things I studied. He reads books on how to help me heal. He holds me when I cry. Most importantly, he is learning to communicate with me and answers questions I have. Communication is my love language and he has not been able to show me that love for many years. He bought a motorhome for us to travel in and he loves to plan trips for our family and plan trips just for the two of us. This is after we had a fifth wheel and he hated it. I had talked him into it because we were separated so much because of his travel for work and then our son’s tennis tournaments. It would enable us to be together more. He didn’t tell me he didn’t want to get one. He just bought it and it became another issue in our marriage. He sold the fifth wheel and bought the motorhome because he knew I would enjoy it and now he actually enjoys camping. He keeps trying to plan things to do in it. I’m not sure what man really does all of that and I don’t think one would do it if he wasn’t truly remorseful and truly committed. This is all like a rollercoaster and not many would stick around through it. You have to really want to stay to deal with the aftermath of an affair. Betrayed spouses go through a lot trying to heal and it would not be easy for one to watch the pain he/she put the spouse through. It would be easier to just leave. It is a lot of hard work if a couple really deals with it so it doesn’t happen again. And I’ve read numerous stories of it happening again so I want to make sure I do all to safeguard against that. I have to feel that my husband is safe and can be trusted. And no matter all of the changes he has made and all the sweet things he has done, I’m not sure at this point he can be. That’s the hardest part. 

Since our marriage is dead to me, I don’t celebrate our anniversary any longer. Greg won’t let it go. And this last anniversary, he planned a very romantic private dinner and gave me a promise ring to start over. He worked really hard and was very creative in the way he gave it to me.

What we had is gone forever. I am forever changed by this. I’m still grieving all that I lost due to this betrayal. I will never give Greg blind trust ever again. I should never have before. No spouse should give a spouse blind trust. Everyone is capable of evil. Even if someone plans on being faithful, there are those out there who do not respect boundaries and marriage vows.  I know now that when people have no self worth, they are capable of anything and fall for anything. Even the most honorable man can fall at any given moment when another person is filling his ears with lies. Perhaps he and his wife have been disagreeing lately and another person senses that and begins to play on it and support that man in his position against his wife. An alliance has been formed between these two against the spouse….. Where will it lead? And the spouse doesn’t know this is going on. If anyone thinks his/her marriage is immune to infidelity, he/she better wake up. 85% of affairs start at the workplace….. Affairs don’t normally start because they set out to have an affair. Coworkers are together many hours and begin sharing personal information innocently. Friendships are built and lines are eventually crossed without ever meaning to. One thing just leads to another. And then there are some employees who lack morals and are looking to better their lives so they set out to steal another woman’s husband….. My biggest mistake in my marriage was trusting blindly and not holding my husband accountable. I thought he had morals and boundaries and was protecting our marriage. His position gave him the flexibility to have his affair but I never thought he would do that to me. And I didn’t realize that we had a trashy employee who would do such a thing. I’ve learned that the only One I can trust is Jesus. Every person I come in contact with will fail me at some point. Jesus will not.

Our counselor says most marriages do not make it through this. He says it is much harder to work on and restore the marriage than to divorce. He and other experts say that despite the affair, we can have a better and stronger marriage than we ever had if we do the work necessary. Will we? I don’t know. I know several friends who were not given the opportunity to reconcile because their cheating spouses left them for their cheating partner. I’m not sure that I am thankful that he stayed. There are days I am so angry that he would ever do this to me. Most days at this point. How would I feel to be free to pursue a relationship with someone else? Would I find anyone else any better? And then I would have to deal with the step this and step that and all the ex stuff. And that is why I’m so angry. I don’t have much of a choice but I do have a choice.

God did give me “permission” in His word to divorce if I feel I need to. Yet I fully believe that He has given me a promise if I stay married through Joel 2:25, “Then I will make up to you for the years that the swarming locust has eaten.” Although the promise was originally meant for Israel, I feel it very strongly in my heart that He is in this and He will be glorified in this story whatever the outcome. God always uses the broken stories for greatness. I choose to share my story hoping it will help others going through this or it will help others wake up and protect their marriages. God is a God of miracles and I am going to watch Him heal this broken heart. I trust Him to do so.

Lord, how did this happen to me? I trusted….

I met Greg when I was twelve years old. He was a year older and a grade higher. He asked me to be his girlfriend on September 7, 1982, the first day of my 8th grade year. He quickly became my best friend. I never cared to date anyone else and I didn’t. I knew I wanted him in my life for the rest of it.

On April 12, 1987, just days before my eighteenth birthday, Greg asked me to marry him. We wanted those around us to know we were committed to each other. We planned to finish college before getting married and that is what we did.

I became Mrs. May on December 22, 1990, three days after we graduated from college together. I worked very hard to graduate in 3 1/2 years with an Accounting degree. Greg received a Marketing/Management degree. I was now ready to spend the rest of my life with the love of my life.

After the honeymoon, we had to find jobs. Fresh out of college, that wasn’t easy. It was tax season and I found a job in an electronic tax filing office run by a local CPA. After a month, she moved me to her office and put me on salary. Greg found temporary work as a substitute teacher. A few months later, I found a job for him in the local paper that I felt he should apply for because it was more money than the substitute teacher pay and it was a permanent job. He was not thrilled at my suggestion that he apply for salesman at a car dealership. Of course, he ended up doing so and he started as a salesman in May of 1991.

Fast forward a few years and Greg advanced up the dealership ladder to sales manager. We built a house. I left public accounting and found a job as an assistant controller in private accounting at a convenience store chain. Then we were blessed with a son and after his month long hospital stay, I wanted to stay at home with him. Greg’s position made that possible.

We were enjoying life with our new baby when Greg was offered an opportunity to partner with his current boss and have his own dealership in another town. It would be a dream for him but it was not what I wanted. We ended up moving and Greg began to bring a failing dealership back to life.

I continued staying home with Sam. We eventually sold our house in our hometown and built a house in our new town. When Sam was three, we were blessed with the addition of a baby girl, Savannah, and then four and a half years later, we were blessed with another, Sydney. We found a piece of property and built our dream house. I got involved raising our children. I spent my time while the kids were in school in Bible studies, photography, and scrapbooking.

Greg began collecting dealerships in other towns. His former boss/current business partner began collecting other dealerships with other partners. He got involved on dealer council and also on other boards. He never asked my opinion about the dealerships he was buying nor about the boards he was getting on. He seemed to just do what he wanted. He began traveling a lot. We had no support because our parents still worked and could not come keep the kids. I stayed home while he traveled. And so Greg began leaving me behind. Sam was playing tennis and had tournaments out of town many times. The girls and I traveled with them many times but it seemed the girls were missing out on activities with their friends so I began staying home with them and let the guys go. We were drifting apart.

Greg was stretched so thin and was very stressed. He began stopping at our country club to have a drink before coming home. He didn’t want to discuss work when he came home. He spent a lot of his time in front of the television. The kids noticed how “grouchy” their dad always seemed. The distance was growing between us. And the lonelier I felt, the more I drew closer to my Savior. I could not get enough of Him. I spent a lot of time studying Scripture and I began testing everything I had ever been taught before (that will be another post for another time). The more I grew closer to my Savior, the more it seemed like Greg grew away from me. I couldn’t understand his attitude. He was a professed believer like me. Yet he was not living the life of a true believer….

And as I sit here now, I know somewhat of what was happening to Greg. He didn’t like the conflict between us. He didn’t like the responsibilities at home after working all day. He didn’t like hearing all that he wasn’t getting done…. He thought I didn’t love him…. Although he didn’t talk to me about it….. At this point, a married employee began to boost his huge inflated ego with her words…. Their talks started innocently (at least I believe on his end) yet they became inappropriate as they spoke against their spouses and about their unhappiness. I believe she had an agenda. At some point, she began crossing the line and started hugging him each morning she saw him. Then one day they kissed and began their affair. The affair lasted about 5 months. I approached him several times during the affair because I knew something was very wrong. The week I found out their relationship had crossed the line, I asked him if they were having an affair which he denied. Yet because of her actions with her social media, I could tell he was telling her about my concerns. At a ribbon cutting for a new dealership, I noticed her odd behavior towards me and I confronted Greg the next morning. I told him it was her or me. She could not continue working for him. Her position had to be eliminated. He was afraid of what she would do and would not commit to me until that evening. She had actually started trying to control him and he was not happy with her. During the time of their affair, I had actually told him if he didn’t work on our marriage, I was done. I was about to go spend some time with my mother but he had begged me to stay and work on our marriage. I told him he would have to start dating me again and he agreed to and did. We were growing close (or so I thought). When I figured it out, I could not believe that he had been having an affair with her. Of course, at this time he had not admitted to a full affair. He was only admitting to talking too much to her. I would not find out for a few months later the full extent of what I was dealing with.

The next morning after he committed to me, I was reading my Bible in our room. I was in Psalms and I had just turned back a page and had begun reading a psalm. Greg had been outside. He came into the room and held a small sheet of paper. He walked over to me and said, “I felt led to write this down and bring it to you. I wrote it in my best handwriting.” He laid the paper on my Bible. As I looked at it, I knew that God was in this. No matter what, He was in control and He was letting me know that He was including Greg. I did not speak. I turned my Bible towards him and pointed to the spot I was reading. You see, just moments before, I had turned BACKWARDS in my Bible and began reading the very psalm that Greg had written out on that sheet of paper- Psalm 130. We were now in this pit that Greg had pulled us into.

I’m not sure what God is going to do with this, but stay tuned….