I normally find seandr a good source of amusing one-liners, but his brief take on this case cuts to the core issue better than I could: "...cheating as a long term solution to not loving your spouse is just selfish and cruel."

Dan is a proponent of ethical non-monogamy, but this case isn't that. There has to be some legitimate effort at communication, or some extremely compelling, strange circumstance to make prolonged lying the least bad option. There's nothing like that here. Dan has just given license to all cheaters, of both sexes, to lie to their spouses simply because they're more attracted to someone else. If you want some sort of hardship exemption, it must be better than, "My current life is comfortable, but I need to lie to and betray my husband/wife, to keep it that way."

@99: Mr. Ven, it's hard to say. On one hand, it seems like the lw was writing to Dan to get just what she got: absolution and permission, or even blessing, to continue cheating. In which case the statement, "I'm committed to trying to make things work with my husband" rings rather hollow.
But I think in that she said she has ended the affair with her coworker, she might truly be sincere.

I think it most likely that while she wants things to work with her husband, she really lacks hope that they will and she's trying to line up her supporters for backup when she either leaves or has another affair and gets caught, leading to the end of her marriage.

Hi Lava @86! Thanks, my holiday was nice and relaxing indeed. Had to come back to cold England, but at least my home has good heating!

Ciods @87: "I find it odd that a group of people who would be the first to say you should never have to have sex with someone when you don't want to (e.g. when you aren't attracted to them) are now saying that this woman should do exactly that--because marriage."

Good point. I will try to elaborate, as I was one of the people who advocated this. Firstly, the position that "you should never have to have sex with someone when you don't want to," while absolutely valid, does not preclude "if you want to make your partner happy, you should sometimes have sex when you don't particularly want to, ie maintenance sex." In other words, I draw a distinction between wanting to NOT have sex and being neutral on the idea. If you're neutral and they're horny, why not be nice to them? You might even enjoy it.

Secondly, "e.g. when you aren't attracted to them": This is her husband. Presumably, at some point she WAS attracted to him, and that attraction was lost in 16 years of child-raising and drudgery. This isn't the same thing as someone you were never attracted to in the first place.

LOST says:
"I don't know if ... the attraction can come back with effort or if it gone forever."
and
"I don't want to split up my family but I also don't see how I can stay in this marriage when I never want to fuck my husband."

She obviously WANTS the attraction and the sex to come back. And she enjoyed the sex when she was fantasising about her lover. I certainly think that strategy is worth a try to see if the desire for the husband will return, as that's the outcome she hopes for.

LateBloomer: Add me to the list of people who have negative attitudes towards cheating because of experience rather than sanctimony. Point well taken that divorce may sometimes be a worse option.

Addendum to @103: Thirdly, "because marriage." The traditional marriage vows include "to have and to hold." I've always interpreted that as "I promise you a sex life." So yes, marriage does up the level of obligation to attend to your partner's sexual needs. She did make this promise and she does owe it to him to try.

Venn; using Bloomsberry as an example of pretty much anything that most humans live thru, is not very fair.
We had our own Artists wild group. They congregated around John and Sunday Reed, patrons. Some amazing work came from that time. A woman called Joy Hester, did such great work.
Mostly male artists, and they are famous Australian one's.

@97: "This LW said she wanted to keep her family together."

Without fucking her husband, though.

Wll said, gueralinda@98!

How many couples do you know who split up the minute the youngest child leaves for college? I'd guess that the vast majority of them were this marriage a decade earlier. It's such a common scenario, it's a cliché. But it's a cliché that is rooted in truth. The sex dies in a marriage. Or one partner stops being attracted to the other. There may be affairs, or there may be depression and slow dying-inside, for either or both partners. But there are also children.

Many people here say things like it's better for the children to have their unhappy parents divorce. Several people here have talked about how relieved they were when their parents finally divorced. But in marriages like this one, children are often unaware of a problem existing between their parents. Their parents may function as a good co-parenting team, and what the kids see is a family, two parents who are committed to them (the kids), parents who don't fight and scream. Beyond that, I don't think most kids care that much about their parents' happiness or fulfillment. Someone once said that a kid would rather have a parent miserable in the next room than a parent happy in a separate household. Kids are selfish, and what they want is stability (both normal and generally as it should be). They don't care about their parents' sexual satisfaction. They don't care about their parents getting their need for love and proof of desirability affirmed. If the parents aren't at each other's throats, if there's no drama, no screaming, no throwing things, no viciousness, no violence, no drinking or acting out, kids are generally just fine with daddy not nuzzling the back of mommy's neck or mom and dad not going into the bedroom to "take a nap" for two hours on a Saturday afternoon. They either don't know that those behaviors exist between couples--at least, between parents--or they'd prefer not to witness evidence of their parents' sexual lives. Perhaps couples who show that kind of affection are indeed modeling such behavior for their kids, but I don't know that kids who only witness civility and cordiality and a child-centric household are really so poorly equipped to deal with their own adult relationships.

Many of those marriages that split up as the youngest kid takes off her high school graduation cap and gown come as unhappy surprises to the children. Often, all but the couple's closest confidantes will be surprised at the breakup. The kids will still be upset; their lives will still be affected. Maybe they won't be as disrupted as they would have been when they were young, but where do they go for Thanksgiving their first break in freshman year? Heck, I know full adults whose parents divorced and who felt bereft and betrayed and lost and sad. I also know adults whose parents divorced the minute the youngest graduated high school and only then was it obvious to the children that their parents had been miserable for years, that they'd been counting down the moment till they could become free for a long time, that they were staying together "for the children," which meant that the children's very existence was sort of an obstacle to the parents' happiness. Those mostly-grown children weren't happy that their parents had stayed together for their sake; they tended to feel angry because they saw their parents as dishonest and because they now feel guilty that their parents stayed unhappily together for so long because of them.

Unless your parents are fighting all the time or the hostility is palpable I don't think anyone ever is happy to have your family unit disintegrate.

So the marriages last for a decade, more or less, longer than the partners in it are happy together, while bitterness and frustration increase, and self-esteem takes a hit, or anxiety-producing affairs are had. And then they break up when the kids launch and the kids don't send a thank you card. And now those two people are in their mid-40 or mid-50s. It's hardly impossible to find a new relationship that is fulfilling at that age, but it's harder than it is in your 20s or 30s. And you simply have that much less time left in our one go-round of this life.

Iwasnocutename @108: Yes.

Another framing: “For the sake of the kids” is not a reason to keep a bad marriage together. It’s a reason to keep a so-so marriage together.

... and if you’re going to be sticking it out for another ten years, better do what you can to make the best of those years. Make an effort to find a way to make sex work. Treat one another with respect and dignity. Say ‘thank you’ for something to everyone in the family every day. Set boundaries. Seek pleasure.

Well said, nocute.

BiDanFan, the problem isn't sanctimony. The problem is that if cheating was good enough for you once upon a time, which it has been for many posters on here, the old "Cheating!? Dan, how could you..." is pretty weak sauce. Yes, you're entitled to learn from your mistakes, and your moral outlook may mature over time. It just won't carry a lot of weight when it does.

(If I can just pre-empt your "If you're not going to learn from the people who've been there..." objection: cheating is not a good option. I get it. The problem is, neither is anything else. And people have their needs. So now what?)

*people, including kids, have their needs...

@106 undead. Funny that, most marriages come with fucking, unless stated otherwise. And I recommended living tog as non sex, with each other, parents.

How is cheating not in the same league as stealing. Would you say stealing is ok, Late?

@Alison Cummins (#s 109, 110): Well, yes, I agree that if you are going to stick it out, you should be kind to the other person--not his/her fault you aren't leaving now. I know what you're saying about finding ways to find pleasure while you wait out the marriage's demise, but I'm advocating more for leaving sooner, rather than later, if you really know, deep down in your secret heart where you may not want to admit it, even to yourself, that once those kids are more grown, once the nest is empty, you're out of there, too.

Of course, I say this from the position of someone who did that and maybe I'm like a guy who doesn't want to drink alone. I also get to say that from the position of having left the marriage on civil terms with my ex, and of us continuing not only to co-parent well, but to have preserved a strong sense of family for our children (this is helped by the fact that my ex and I genuinely like each other for the most part): we attend all performances, ceremonies, etc. that the children are in or that affect our children, including funerals, family celebrations, etc. and we sit together; we often drive together. We are still a family. We do whatever we can to minimize the impact (mostly logistical and plagued by the hassle of often having left what you want or need at your other parent's house) on our kids, who undoubtedly would have preferred and still would prefer that we'd stayed together.

I know my situation isn't typical and that I am lucky.

But I think that part of the reason it is so atypical and works so well is that we ended things when we did. Our marriage's "only" problem was a sexual incompatibility--but over the years that specific incompatibility has seeped beyond the exclusively sexual parts of the marriage. Our interactions were beginning to change. We were growing a bit testy with each other. Our mutual frustration was beginning to creep. Our youngest daughter was 9 when we split. If we'd stayed together for another 9 years, I don't think we would be able to be civil to each other for our kids' sake--both while the marriage lasted and afterward. Children, even grown-ass children, should get to have parents who can be civil with each other even if they're only going to see eachg other at major life events like college graduations and weddings. And that's a bare minimal example of when divorced parents will have to interact over the course of their even-adult children's lives.

So I think that if you acknowledge to yourself that you are just waiting out your kids' childhoods before you leave and if you and your spouse are still relatively cordial with each other, but you can feel the creeping frustration, you should divorce now. Honestly better in the long run for everyone.

Ms Lava - Thank you for that contribution; I had not been aware of such a group in Australia, though assuming it would be highly plausible there should be one.

Options besides cheating takes effort.
Then after the first five minutes cheating takes effort, too. And comes with guilt.
This young woman could tell her man her truth. After 16 years and three children, she owes him that.
Tell him she doesn't feel sexually attracted to him at the moment.
Here, it could get tricky. Because his conscious mind will go to wondering if she's had an affair. He may already know, she thinks he does. It hasn't been spoken of.
Here. If he asks her if she's betrayed him, I'd go the straight out lie. It's done. It was a lesson.
The rest of the conversation is theirs to have, together. With some therapeutic or friend help, they see this issue, this pretty big problem, and they lovingly talk about ways to respond it it.
Cheating, takes all that truth away. Those 16 yrs, those three kids, mean nothing.
And these guys are still young. They could both go and find people who desire the pants offa them.
The children, they are now in the mix. Going off with new people, children tagging along, well, there's more work.
So. What if LW talks to her guy, stuff erupts, they decide to do therapy, try other things; in the meantime, they sleep seperately. No sex.
Jump forward a year. It hasn't worked, yet the distance between the two parents has shifted. Here, the talk of both of them staying living together, and taking other lovers, could fit right in.
The sexual attachment has been broken, so they can see what a benefit it is, working as a team rearing their children.
Yes, it might be a year of no sex, nobody will die. Or it might be a time of reawakened sex, between the two of them.
Any chance of finding out, taken away by cheating.
This young woman has no choice, here I agree with ciods. If she finds him so sexually unappealing, she has to stop fucking him. She has to tell him. Give the two of them a chance to find a way back to each other. Or not. Then that's a further conversation.

Yes Venn. Europe and American barely notice our Art. The work that has been coming from Aboriginal artists, that hasn't been ignored. It's too good.

As a sort of tack-on to Ms Cute (had you mentioned a third Miss Cute before, or is that an Austenian "youngest"?) that makes me think of Thomas Mann, I'll suggest that the amount of effort required to make a sticking-it-out marriage something worthwhile for the supposed beneficiaries isn't that far off the amount of effort required to repair it.

Mr. Ven: I only have two Miss Cutes. I guess by definition the older of the two is my oldest daughter and the younger one is not only my younger daughter, but also my youngest daughter.
I've been told that I'm confusing and wrong with my "est"s before, but I can't seem to remember not to say/write them.

BiDanFan @104: Actually, despite how my original comment might have sounded, I agree that she should try. I do think people owe it to their partners to try to give them a happy sex life. It seems, however, that once that has died, it's often hard to resurrect, and maybe I was projecting (I have never regained a sexual attraction once it was lost) but I found myself thinking after 16 years, she's not gonna get that mojo back. Some posters here have indicated that counseling has helped, even with their attraction, so I may be wrong (and that would be great). But I do think that's rare, to get the sexual attraction back. For this reason I think Dan has got it right when he pushes ethical non-monogamy (which many posters have pointed out, isn't quite what's going on here). I feel like that might save marriages where the only problem is sex. (But you have to try something before the one problem grows out of control and turns into umpteen problems. Domestic problems are like snowflakes, and they accumulate with a magnitude.)

nocute @108, I think you've convinced me. I think we all speak from our (necessarily limited) experience, and since I don't have kids, the dissolution of all my serious relationships was done without endangering the welfare or mental health of anyone but myself and my partner. My ignorance therefore makes me uneasy around claims that divorce is the better option when kids are involved--especially given how much financially harder two households are to maintain than one. However, your description is pretty compelling.

Lava @117 this:
Options besides cheating takes effort. Then after the first five minutes cheating takes effort, too. And comes with guilt.
is the absolute truth, and an excellent point.

An affair isn't the solution here. Even if we set aside the ethics of cheating and dishonesty (which have been rehashed plenty), there's another problem.

The infidelity did nothing to rekindle her sex life with her husband. Despite what the title said ("less sexless during affair"), she said she was only having more sex with her husband because she felt guilty. Guilt sex is not going to improve this situation. It's like Dan ignored what she said about that, and read what he wanted to hear.

She should take some time to determine why her attraction to her husband is waning. Is she just bored? Has he let himself go? Was the relationship based on a heady infatuation that wasn't sustainable? Is the stress of childcare and other responsibilities causing her to seek sex as an escape? A little introspection into the cause will go a long way toward sussing out a solution.

NoCute @108: Thanks for your thoughtful post.

Not disputing the things you've learned from experience, but I was one of those kids whose parents divorced when the youngest left the nest. My parents hadn't had a history of screaming and fighting -- because my mother had vowed to herself she wouldn't have a marriage like her own parents', and therefore just let my dad boss her around -- but we were nevertheless relieved when she left and felt she should have done it a long time ago. She was a homemaker who stuck with my dad because he earned a good living, and I dunno, didn't feel like she'd be entitled to alimony? But I can tell you, we (three girls) would have been much happier living in a small apartment with a mother who felt she could exercise her own autonomy than in a big house ruled by my father. Screaming fights are not the only sign of a toxic relationship, and yes, that was modelled to us. We could tell their relationship was broken, even though they made careful efforts to hide it.

Now, I know this is different to the scenario you're describing, in which everything is fine with the relationship except for the sex. But how likely is that? If the sex has vanished, surely that's either a symptom or a cause of more problems in the relationship, problems that will be obvious to the young people who have to live with them? When "bitterness and frustration increase," mom and dad take that out on each other in visible ways. Anecdata, yes, but I've known quite a few other people who've said they wished their unhappy parents would get a divorce or were relieved when they did.

NoCute @115: I'll rephrase @123 as "This."

Lava @117: Actually, my advice to LOST would be the opposite. Fess up to the affair. Hubby knows their sex life dwindled to barely anything, and then for some reason got a boost. She should sit him down, acknowledge that she had got bored and had an affair, and that the affair kick-started their sex life again. Then propose that they both -- openly and honestly -- continue having sex with other people, both for their own selfish needs and the good of the marital sex life. Which is like option 2 except with more of the honestly-and-directly.

Xiao @122: "The infidelity did nothing to rekindle her sex life with her husband. Despite what the title said ("less sexless during affair"), she said she was only having more sex with her husband because she felt guilty."
Hmm, it's like you ignored what she said, and read what you wanted to hear. What she actually said was:
"I enjoyed it because, physically speaking, my husband knows what I like... I think partly out of a sense of guilt and partly because I was constantly in a state of feeling turned on during the affair."

You'd be braver than me than Fan.
I think her talking about not being sexually attracted to him, would be enough shock. How could they both just start fucking others? They have three children in the home. And he doesn't seem to know, consciously, that there is a problem.
The LW wants to keep her family together, she has to tread carefully to achieve that, or kaboom. Telling him of the affair, I think would close him down and out. Family in splinters, in five minutes.
This was a one off affair, I'd say leave it out. I give her a one off pass.

I don't know Fan. This thread ever gonna end?
I wish this young woman and her family well. Hope they find a way thru.

@115 nocute: "I know my situation isn't typical and that I am lucky."

For whatever it's worth, I don't agree. It sounds like you got very unlucky, and handled it with maturity. You and I don't get along, but that much's always seemed clear to me.

Dan: Monogamy won't kill her marriage, because what the LW is offering is a nonogamous relationship. Remember the difference?
"I won't fuck you, and you can't have a relationship with anyone else" is what she's offering here. I remember what your verdict on that was, back in the days of promoting ethical nonmonogamy.

Lava @125: Well, there's brave in pixels and brave in reality! I never got the chance to find out whether I would have had the guts to fess up to my indiscretion (which was a one-off and didn't involve genital contact, but still counts as "cheating" as it seriously violated the rules of that monogamous relationship) because he found out first by snooping through my e-mails. (Classic example of two wrongs not making a right.) In LOST's case, I have no idea how her husband would take such a confession. Would he, like you, be inclined to forgive her based on the positive outcome of better sex temporarily and an open relationship for him in the long run? We really have no idea.

Eud @127: '"I won't fuck you, and you can't have a relationship with anyone else" is what she's offering here.' Where do you get that? Nowhere in her letter does she say she'd be unwilling to open the relationship for him, too. It doesn't read as if his having other partners has even occurred to her. (Perhaps his spike in sex drive wasn't a result of her affair... but his own? Hmm.)

@128: He's married. If she were comfortable with him getting married to someone else, rather than in wasting his life on someone who doesn't give a shit about him, she'd have made very different life choices by now.

"Open marriage" means something very different to a cheater than to a person who wants to have a sexual relationship with their own spouse. Dan pretends this isn't the case, but almost everyone seems to be pretty much hardwired for monogamy.

"I don't want to fuck you any more, and don't care about your feelings in the slightest, but I also don't want you to be free to go get married to someone you love and who actually loves you" is a really shitty deal to be offering.

BiDanFan, I guess not every kid privileges stability over parental happiness. But my larger point was a pro-divorce one. People are always staying together for the children and I think that sometimes parental happiness needs to be considered, even in absence of abuse or gambling/drinking/rampant cheating/establishment of another family/constant screaming.

LW here - I appreciate the comments, good and bad. I know cheating makes me a CPOS. Option 1 (continue cheating) is not an option for me. Option 2 (open marriage) is a possibility - it's something we have talked about before, though I suspect it is hard to execute (how do you meet people you feel safe with?). Option 3 (leaving), is also a possibility, but I want to use this affair as a catalyst for making a full effort to repair our marriage before deciding on that option.

I am seeing a therapist. My husband is not interested in seeing a therapist. He is a great dad, but he is also a depressed alcoholic (not that that justifies cheating). We both have unresolved resentment towards each other from past issues. We married youngish (24) and I think we are not as compatible now as we were then. I love him but do not feel like I am in love with him anymore. There is a lot more that needs to be fixed beyond the lack of physical attraction.

I take Dan's answer to mean that he thinks there is no chance of regaining that physical attraction. But I intend to continue to work on being a better partner and working with my therapist before I decide whether I agree with him or not.

Yeah, InMyMind. Good luck with it. Well done getting thru all the comments.
And best of luck to the five of you.

@LW well, that puts it into context. It's a shame your husband won't see a therapist. I hope that he's getting at least some sort of treatment for his depression. It's hard enough to be with a depressed person who's getting treatment (I am one so I know what I'm talking about). but with a depressed person who's refusing treatment and is also an alcoholic? That's really tough and unfair and all sorts of shitty.

BTW, I think most "bad" comments were about Dan's advice not the cheating per se. Cheating happens.

Eud @129: "almost everyone seems to be pretty much hardwired for monogamy"

Really?
You read this column regularly and you still think this?
I got nuffin. Moving on.

InMyMind @131: Thanks for checking in. I hope you've found better advice here than Dan gave you. As for your question, "Option 2 (open marriage) is a possibility - it's something we have talked about before, though I suspect it is hard to execute (how do you meet people you feel safe with?)" -- I'd recommend OKCupid or local polyamorous groups. Good luck with it all.

Pity the words depressed alcoholic and he won't do therapy, were in the letter. The responses and advice would have been very different.

Weren't in the letter, is what I meant.

Hi, Inmymind - Thanks for giving more detail. Sounds like this is a lot more complicated than two good partners who have a sexual disconnect.. As far as whether desire can be resurrected, I have known it to happen with some friends, but the people I know who had luck did have a really good connection that had just gotten put on the shelf because of parenting, job issues, illness or the like. In your case, given what you said about him being a depressed alcoholic and the two of you having unresolved resentments, it is way beyond that. I'm not surprised that you have lost your desire for him. That sounds soul-crushing. Good for you for going to see a therapist even though he won't - it can be really good to have that neutral space to figure out what you want to do going forward. I just wanted to add that I was one of those who was outraged by Dan's advice, not by your situation. You had a short affair, and no, it's not anyone's ideal behavior, but it happens. I was upset by Dan's advice that things would be improved if you keep being dishonest. I don't think you have to tell your husband about the short affair, but I think it will be better for everyone to be honest about how you are feeling about things. As for the open marriage thing, my husband and I have permission to fool around within certain guidelines, and for the most part it has worked out really well for both of us for over a decade, but I really think it works best if you already have a solid connection and good communication. Alternatively, I think it can work if two people decide to basically become friendly roommates, with no romantic obligations to one another, for the purpose of raising kids. (Though in my real life experience, people who start off that way really just wind up auditioning for the person they will leave their spouse for in two years or so.) Good luck to you.

@128: "Nowhere in her letter does she say she'd be unwilling to open the relationship for him, too. It doesn't read as if his having other partners has even occurred to her."

The default assumption is monogamy, or else it wouldn't be called cheating. In the absence of proactive measures to the contrary, the default monogamy rules are still in place for the non-cheating partner. If you are already having other partners yourself, but the possibility of your partner breaking the rules in the very same way you already are breaking them hadn't even occurred to you, then you are assuming they are operating under the default rules, which is to say, you are assuming monogamy for them, even while you choose the opposite for yourself. That isn't openness and willingness.

At best, you're an astoundingly self-centered excuse for a human being.

Avast @138: Thank you for the ad hominem with my morning coffee, always a great way to start any day.

I'll point to the follow-up from LOST herself @131, stating that they have discussed opening their relationship, as evidence that you're wrong and I'm right. She HAD in fact discussed opening their relationship, so she is NOT committed to the nonogamous set of rules Eudaemonic and yourself unfairly accuse her of unilaterally forcing on her husband. She discovered -- unethically, yes -- that non-monogamy might just improve their marriage and suggested it as a possibility for them both.

I hope you get over your pissed-in cornflakes and have a lovely day.

131 InMyMind: It's time to break up. Lack of sexual interest alone is death on a marriage, and if you've got other problems (especially the dirty-nuke problem that unresolved resentment is) then it's even worse.

Public service announcement, to anyone and everyone: Don't marry (or stay married to) someone you wouldn't fuck. Anyone who isn't worth two sweaty hours behind closed hotel doors is also not worth two boring decades behind a white picket fence.

@134: "Really?
You read this column regularly and you still think this?
I got nuffin. Moving on."

Yes. There are billions of people who don't write to Dan. My experience with those people almost-universally indicates that they have a freakish, bone-deep orientation toward monogamy and can't really do poly, even if they try very hard. I know a lot of people who used to be poly, or who are now monogamish-in-theory, monogamous-in-practice.

@139: "Thank you for the ad hominem with my morning coffee, always a great way to start any day. "

In fairness to Avast, you missed the word "if."

"She HAD in fact discussed opening their relationship, so she is NOT committed to the nonogamous set of rules Eudaemonic and yourself unfairly accuse her of unilaterally forcing on her husband."

Nope. For clarity: LW, is your husband fucking anyone else? Does he want to fuck anyone else? If the answer to both of these is no--and I think we both know it is--then the deal you're offering, at best, is "I fuck other people and not you; you fuck nobody." That's nonogamy, with a side helping of brutal daily humiliation. No fucking wonder he's depressed.

Time to get a divorce, so both of you can go find someone you actually want to be with. That's not going to happen on its own.

@131: "There is a lot more that needs to be fixed beyond the lack of physical attraction."

You can say that again. Lava Girl at 135 really nailed it for me: depressed alcoholic refusing therapy is a huge factor, the omission of which made it tough to address effectively.

I'm also with Eudaemonic: time to break up.

Depressing and alcoholic is one thing; I could wonder whether the lost attraction contributed to the depression/ alcoholism, vice versa, or if it was a little feedback loop of both.

But refusing therapy is the real deal killer. You cannot unilaterally fix a broken relationship. Perhaps you feel guilty about the affair, and you're trying to take on the burden of making things right all on your own as penance. But it's impossible to help someone who has given up. You can help someone recover, but you can't do it for him. If he's not participating in the fix, the fix isn't going to happen.

Eud @140: Aha, as this
"At best, you're an astoundingly self-centered excuse for a human being"
was a separate paragraph, I took it as directed towards me, not as an extension of his previous hypothetical. I can see the less dickish interpretation now, thanks. (I'd still change "at best" to "at worst", though -- particularly in light of @131's clarification of things. Depressed alcoholic? Unlikely to be having an affair of his own.)

Confirmation bias reigns, it seems. I know dozens of happy ex-monogamous people, and never-monogamous people. Dan rounds the naturally monogamous down to zero, you're rounding them up to 100%, the truth lies somewhere in the middle. I think a significant number of men would be thrilled to have "let's fuck other people" handed to them on a platter. Is LOST's husband among them? Again, we have no idea.

I agree that it's divorce time. Who could be attracted to a depressed alcoholic who won't get counseling? The affair was a sign it's time to end it, not a sign it's time to work harder.

Good points guys.
White picket fence image from Mr E.
Pissed-in cornflakes from Fan.
LW. It's ultimatum time. He needs to do something towards this repair, go with you to couples therapy, or as Gui@141 said so well; what's the point?
He'll just get more depressed and drunk. You'll be hornier for more other men. The kids don't need this. You two don't need this. He should be going to AA as well.
Good luck.

Happy International Women's Day.

I think people write to Dan for one or some combination of these three reasons:
1) affirmation ("is this normal?")
2) confirmation ("I am right to think/do this, aren't I?")
3) permission (can I do this?")

It seems to me that LOST / InMyMind was asking for permission to leave the marriage (and a little confirmation or reassurance that what she'd done in the past wasn't really too bad), and Dan thought she was asking for permission to cheat.

She was turing him down. But Dan tells her to go back to cheating rather than workmon her relationship with her husband. Damn!

She was turing him down, not the other way around. But Dan tells her to go back to cheating rather than work on her relationship with her husband. Damn Savage you suck almost as much as the letter writer.