Im sorry this has happened. Your hp may be helping you here.   In some ways I wish I had had a wake-up call like this. I spent too many years putting up with crap and minimising and excusing way too much. Surely you deserve to give yourself more?

-- Edited by canadianguy on Friday 28th of June 2013 10:34:15 AM

This has been the worst night of my life. I went home to check on dogs I knew he wouldn't be home but he got their right when i was leaving. and he sped off I followed him to a parking lot of a bar and low and behold I busted him. With the other woman and drinking double whammy. I confronted them both and this woman was their begging for him to take her back. She stated that she was not Going to back off. She has created a mess of problems for him at his work that I was unaware of and he wanted to push everyone away. He is in a whole lot of mess. I'm just so stunned at all that has happened tonight. I did not cry once I'm still in shock I think. He has been drinking for a year and she was the one that got him to drink but I know he is a big boy and he only got himself in these problems. I can't help get sober and I can't help him get rid of the lady. I need to take care if me and set boundaries with him. At this time I have a lot of things to think about and decisions to be made. I can't do everything at once first I must rest I have been up all night.

This has got to be rattling every nerve ending and brain cell you have right now. Yes, decisions do need to be made but not until you are calm and thinking OF YOU and only YOU for now. This is an opportunity for you to save yourself - not your husband. The closer you get to his self-induced crisis, the more you will get sucked into it and not into your own life and what you need to do for you. Now you have new facts but you may not have all the facts and following him to bars can be a potentially hazardous thing for you. Haggling with some woman who thinks that being involved with a married man is A-ok and willing to fight you about it is also a potentially dangerous thing for you to do. She didn't cause problems for him at work - he caused problems for himself at work by getting involved with somebody who is off limits for him as a married man. She is the result of bad decisions he has made and will need to feel all of this in order to hopefully get help for himself. If you see the "other woman" as the reason for all this trouble, you may help to minimize this crisis for him, thereby, minimizing his chances of getting help and you will also keep yourself in tandem with a disease that wants to destroy both of you - your husband and you. Your loyalty can be taken away from him and focused on YOU.
I am so glad you came to this board and have gone to meetings so that you can have support before this all happened. You might want to contact your pastor (I think you said you went to a church) and ask for some help here, too.

Lots of hugs and a reminder that you are worthy of a happy life and one that isn't filled with all this drama and pain and you can start to end some of the drama for yourself by letting him deal with the crisis he has created and not trying to help him figure out the best way to do that. Let him worry about it - not you.

hope the meeting helps newgirl - sounds like you're doing things for yourself

I went to my counsellor last week and she said (repeatedly) 'but how do you feel?' and it's kept ringing in my head all week in a good way

Sounds like a good plan, Newgirl. Hope you have a friend to go with you and a destination that ends in being with people who love and care about you. Much support and encouragement for you.