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Does anyone else have a double standard in their marriage after the affair? My wife and I agreed that she will not be going out after work with coworkers in a mixed setting. If her and some office women want to get together after work that's not a problem but I set a hard boundary on mixed events after hours that do not include spouses.

Not that I am a social butterfly but I don't have such a boundary. When we talked I said I have not done anything to rattle your faith in me but the affair has rattled my faith in you. Her affair, as far as I know, was strictly sexting for validation.

It's a blatant double standard. I think I should feel a bit like a hypocrite but I don't

ETA: In hindsight I wasn't clear. She has said she's okay abiding by it because she understands that since her affair was with a coworker her going out with coworkers would cause problems for us.

[This message edited by WB1340 at 9:57 PM, Sunday, October 13th]

I think it’s perfectly reasonable since your dday was only six months ago.

If you are giving her a second chance and she is not appreciative of what that takes, she has a lot of work to do on herself. Someone who understands the gravity of what they have done needs to realize that trust will take a long time to rebuild.

So ask her what is her priority here?

Reality is she shouldn’t have time for those things right now, she needs to be spending her time learning how and why she could do this and rebuilding her relationship with you.

Do I think she can’t go out ever again, no. But for now and for a long time she needs to be rebuilding trust and showing commitment to bettering herself. What is she doing to accomplish that?

I agree 100% with what H/O has said. She should be showing you that she is your everything! She is willing to do anything to save your marriage and try to restore some sort of faith and trust.

Giving up going out in a social setting that causes you worry should be something she should easily give up. When you are starting to heal and you feel it safe for her to go then she can.

I’ve actually been thinking about this myself recently. I haven’t spoken to my partner about it and he hasn’t brought it up either, but I was thinking about work events I have coming up. I’ve not long started this job and work with a lot of guys, all in relationships themselves, absolutely nothing for my partner to worry about and I’ve never crossed any kind of boundary like that in our relationship, but I have been wondering if he’ll start to look at it like ‘So you can hang out with all these new guy friends but I’m not allowed any new female friends?’

Like I said, he hasn’t brought it up at all, and I know the boundaries are in place for a reason, but it has crossed my mind that it seems like a double standard.

Trying to block those thoughts out though because clearly I know how to stay within my boundaries and he’s proved that he can’t unless they’re spelled out for him as ‘rules’. Trying to look at it as a consequence for his bad actions that I don’t have because my actions have not been bad, if that makes sense.

Not a double standard. She cheated with a coworker, so limiting non-business contact with coworkers makes sense for her. You haven't cheated with coworkers, so limiting contact doesn't make sense for you. The standard seems to me to be the same. The boundary is something like 'behaving in ways that support your monogamous M.'

Not that you’d necessarily want it, but she should be offering to basically turn herself into a prisoner to keep you in the marriage. I can’t imagine R with anyone who wouldn’t be desperate to do anything to keep me around.

Just another example of a cheater who really doesn’t get it.

@The1stWife I don't understand. My wife has not voiced an opposition to the boundary of not going out with co-workers

I treat people in a manner compatible with who they are and their collective pasts.

I do not believe people change that much over time, so if you have proved yourself to be a man/woman of character why should you live under the same suspicions as someone who has proven otherwise?

[This message edited by hardyfool at 9:18 PM, Monday, October 14th]

I worked very hard for 20 years to establish "fairness" in our relationship. The A blew "fair" out of the water.

Do I feel like a hypocrite? Sometimes, yes, I do. But then I think about why things are they way they are, and I don't. If WH has a problem with it, he can reconsider it, or he can GTFO.

I may have made an assumption that may be inaccurate. For that I do apologize if I am incorrect.

It appears that you set the boundary about after work events. She can go out if it’s women only yo a bar.

To me in the first year or so after Dday, if this were me, I would NOT be doing ANYTHING that made the betrayed worry or cause concern.anxiety etc.

It’s been 6 months from your Dday. To me, bars and drinks for her should be off limits for quite sometime.

I can tell you that my H decided, on his own, he only went to after hour dinners he was required to attend. It was dinner and then home. Most of those nights he’d be on an 8 pm train home from the city after dday. Again, his choice.

To me, I hope your CS is doing things proactively and not b/c you are leading the reconciliation. If you are leading Reconciliation and she’s just agreeing to your requests, I would suggest she needs to step up and show you she’s invested and making amends w/out your guidance or direction.

I hope this explains my prior comment.

[This message edited by The1stWife at 12:41 AM, Tuesday, October 15th]

I don’t know…
I think double standards might be fine in the early days, but personally I don’t think they lead to a good, reconciled relationship.

Hear me out...

I wonder at the connection to this requirement to the affair your wife had: It was a work-affair, but it take place when out with coworkers? My understanding is that it was sexting – did they sit at opposite corners at the bar and send saucy messages? You haven’t really given us much info on their work-relationship (OM and WW) and that’s OK – you only need to share what you are comfortable with – so we don’t know if you would expect OM to be at these events or not.
What prevents her from sexting semi-drunk in the corner of a bar even if the coworkers are all women? In fact – what prevents her from sexting sitting on the toilet at home, or waiting for you in the car or whatever? Why do you fear the going-out-with colleagues situation the most?
Do you have a logical and reasonable expectation that if she’s out with work-colleagues the affair will rekindle? Is it possible that your fear for these events might be rooted in your self-admitted uncertainty of the extent of the affair?

Friend – with the kindest of intentions – You are very reluctant to share if her changing workplace has been discussed and/or what their work relationship is/was. Do they interact on a regular basis? Is he in her daily sight/circle? Does he sit in on team-meetings? Would he be likely to be at the events?
I have shared before on your threads how I think her working near OM might remain a trigger for you and wonder if this "no going out with colleagues" rule is some subconscious tool to deal with that trigger. Personally I’m more into removing triggers.

But I did say that double standards are fine in the early days, and six months is definitely early days...
In an ideal world then maybe infidelity recovery has some things in common with recovering alcoholics. Early days (like now with you) it’s recommended they stay away from ALL alcohol and sites that offer alcohol like bars and even restaurants, as well as have a dry house. Of course – an alcoholics spouse might have a bottle of wine at home or when at friends while the recovering alcoholic sips a soda, and that would be in some ways a "double standard". But the spouse isn’t the problem. Maybe your wife should just stay away from all work-events for the next six months while the two of you recover better?

With time the alcoholic learns to be around alcohol without the urge to drink control them. Generally – at this stage – the alcoholic choses and decides to avoid these situations. The key issue here being that they do so on their own initiative. Same with infidelity – with time your wife could be around men that flirt or send signals that they are open for more, but ignores them AND choses to stay away from them. You can’t keep her locked in some harem or maintain a protective shield around her – the problem wasn’t that others had an affair with her but rather that SHE had an affair. You can’t shield her from herself forever.

BTW - the alcoholic/infidelity runs thin in the sense that addiction is a real disease, while infidelity is a choice, but the comparison might be usable in this situation.

They did not work side by side, they worked in the same building. Most mornings I'm told he would travel through all of the offices talking with men and women. He would tell them any relevant news he felt they should know (it's a school).

If her coworkers arranged a get together at a bar after work he could easily show up. If she and he were there and both were drinking things could kick off again so it's best to avoid that setting.

I also found out a few months after D-Day that he would hug all of the women as he was leaving their office. This pissed me off greatly. I asked why did you never mention this and she said I didn't see any reason to because it was innocent, because he hugs all of the women when he leaves their office and none of their husbands have a problem with it. I said you know damn well I would have and you have no idea if those husbands even know about it and it doesn't matter how they feel about it. I also said you consider the hugging innocent even though you were sexting with this man, explain how it is so innocent. Of course she had no logical response.

From what I'm told, there was a fight between some students and my son had a copy of the fight on his phone. The OM is the school resource officer and he wanted a copy of it so my son sent it to my wife who then sent it to him and she said that's how he got her phone number and the communication started between them. Allegedly it started with that outfit looks nice on you so she reciprocated and it grew from there.

I have never been comfortable with coworkers going out drinking without spouses present and you can call me a caveman but to me it just seems like potential for something to start once the inhibitions are lowered. Conversations change from generic work-related to friendlier and when you add alcohol those conversations can lead to problems. Could she be sexting him while out with female coworkers? Absolutely. She could be doing it all day long and I might never find out but right now we agree on the boundary that she not go out after work with coworkers in a mixed setting.

Down the road our relationship may get to the point where I don't have issue with this but given how precarious our relationship is right now we both think it prudent to limit anything that might disturb things.

Could she find another job? Absolutely but that does not prevent an affair from happening. If two people want to have an affair they will find a way to make it happen. Do I like that they are in the same building? Hell no. Thankfully he is off on medical leave for a few months and should he get a promotion he's going after he will not be back at the school. Our youngest will be attending this school next year so between that and the medical insurance it provides and the closeness to home I have to deal with it because it's in the best interest of my family.

I have no illusions that anything we do will 100% prevent another affair from happening. I have learned that I can only control my actions.

Your WW doesn't sound all that sorry, I must say. Why would she even want to be going out in the first place? She should be expressing a lot more gratitude to you for sticking around, and she should be understanding what it was that got her to cheat in the first place i.e., no time to even be going out.

The problem is that at bars, there are men who are hitting on women there, even if your WW goes out only with other women from work. It's not a safe place for a WS.

[This message edited by WontBeFooledAgai at 7:00 PM, Tuesday, October 15th]

What work is she doing to become a safe partner?

Does his wife know about the affair?

I understand where you are in your healing.

Your wife is not doing everything possible to help you. She’s living her life with some modifications.

The hugging thing with a male co-worker would be a huge issue for me too. I think that finding that out when you did was a 🚩and a huge setback for you.

IMO if this guy / colleague can get something in the side, he will take it. And from more than one OW too. I don’t trust him. And neither should you. I’m not saying your wife will do anything w/ him again, I’m saying I recognize his MO and he is shady.

Working in a school and hugging teachers or staff? He’s not only shady but he’s stupid.

I’m sorry you are facing these challenges.

Before Dday women (whom I knew) would flirt w/ my H. Harmless. Until he put a stop to it and realized how disrespectful it really is to me.

@Hellfire She is working with an IC, we are working with an MC, she is reading books that I bring to her, she is listening to Youtube videos from affair recovery, she checks in with me multiple times during the day, she lets me know if she's going to be stopping somewhere on the way home from work, she is for the first time exposing fears and weaknesses and anxiety that she experiences whereas before she kept that all repressed

Yes, I reached out to his wife several weeks ago and brought her up to speed. She said this is not the first time he has done this

So you don’t want her at events because they might hook up, yet you are fine with them working together because if they want to hook up you can’t prevent it…

I never said I was fine with them working together but I have to think of my family before myself. Her moving to a new job would remove one trigger for me but unless the job pays the same and has the same benefits such as great medical insurance which is a rarity my family would be negatively affected. Being a father to three means I have to think of them before myself.

Much easier for something to happen outside of work, in a social setting, plus alcohol, so best to avoid.