Lavender, so sorry that this has happened to you.

I think many here will tell you that just because he's been charged or convicted doesn't mean he actually did anything. Even the most innocent intent can crumble easily when you have a team of trained specialists looking at every word trying to find the key phrase that will get you do what they want. Anyone who thinks it would never happen to them has never been the focus of one of these teams. Your husband may have gone looking for trouble, or he may have been dragged into it, I don't know,

I'm not going to tell you your husband is innocent — or that he deserves even a smidge of sympathy. But I will tell you to be very careful in how you speak about him with your son. No matter how hurt you are, no matter how much of a bastard your husband may be, it is very likely that saying anything against his father will just drive a wedge that you don't want or need. Being nonjudgmental is very hard, but it's what your son needs from you. Protect him, but keep the doors of communication as open as you can stand.

Lavender, straight up and right off the bat..... no matter what he tells you or says to you.... YOU are not at fault for this!!! each and every single person has to be accountable and responsible when making their own decisions to do something stupid.

innocent or not, accidentally or not, no one forced him to do anything on craiglist. and YOU did not 'make' him go do any 'screwing around' of any sort on craigslist. that is his own anger biting his butt!!!

so get that thought totally and completely out of your head.

Has your husband been sentenced? I am one that is straight forward so I will say what I am thinking. If your son is a minor then it will be extremely difficult to continue a relationship since your husband can't be around your son. Also, I see a red flag since your husband is blaming you. Maybe it would help to speak to a mutual person, like counselor, minister, etc and help you realize what you want and need to do. Take care and know we are here for you!!

Yes he has been sentence now.

My son is a minor ( very young right now) and his attorney says depending on how he does with his treatment and therapies that they may slow supervised visitation in a few years.

Lavender, I agree with BSMom, you are in no way at fault for this. And I also see a red flag with him blaming you for what has happened, innocent or not. I'm sorry for what you are going through. Only you can make the decision on whether to stay or not.

I also agree with BSMom, you did not do this to him, he did this to himself. You need to do what is best for you and your son. Just remember, you are not alone.

Lavender, I am sorry for your situation. You are not responsible for why your husband made a successive chain of poor decisions with the negative consequences. He did this to himself, you are not to blame.

I agree with ThoughtAsWeak - only you can make the decision about staying. Please don't make this decision hastily.
There is a lot of "re-learning" for your husband. How long will he be away? In other words, what is his sentence.

Please keep coming back. I know you feel betrayed. I feel for you. This is a safe place for you to share.

Lavender...

I piggy back everyone else in saying I am sorry for what you and your family has to go through right now.

I don't have all of the answers and who can know what he was really thinking or who can know what his true intentions were. Just by him saying he was "screwing around" means that he's truly trying to minimize the graveness and gravity of what he's really done. He's is also blatantly lying.

You just don't "screw around" with something like that. I am surprised that he didn't say, "he didn't do it and I am being set up".

You will have to appreciate we here don't have any court documents to look at... we don't know the evidence against him... etc. etc. We just don't know all of the facts... and that's not important. What is important is the truth and the facts as they are presented here.

Just from what you described it sounds like he intentionally knew what he was doing and is now trying to minimize what he did by saying, "I was just screwing around."

I agree with everyone else. It is going to be up to you how you proceed from here. If you decide to completely move on, nobody is going to encourage you to do anything otherwise.

If you decide to stay with him. There has to be a LOT that happens between now and when he gets out.

1. He needs to admit he committed that crime and that he alone is responsible for what he did. He cannot minimize anything. If he still tries to do that he hasn't learned anything.

2. He needs at the very bare minimum intense therapy sessions with a counselor one on one if group therapy is not available.

3. If he calls himself a Christian, he needs to get serious with God and stop messing around and cultivate a TRUE relationship with Jesus Christ.

4. It is worth saying again... pay close attention to what he says. You are the one that knows him the best and can pick out any flim flam that he tries to bamboozle you with.

5. The trust factor. Wow ... that is going to be a hard one. Was he attracted to boys or girls? If he was attracted to boys... most likely he will need to be chaperoned when spending time with your son. Forever? I don't know. That depends. If he is attracted to both genders I dunno.

6. It is a common thing that when one gets incarcerated for something like this 99.99% of the time everyone bails out on you. It happened to me. When I got locked up I had basically nobody. I did have my one best friend that has stuck with me throughout. It wasn't until much later in my incarceration that my dear sweet aunt and uncle were able to be of GREAT support. Now my family and I both do not EVER condone what I did. But it felt nice that I had a shred of rope to hang onto.

My mother still to this day, and I will never forget (see below...lol) what she told me the day I did call her. I finally got up enough courage to call one day. It was when I found out her 2nd husband died of a heart attack. This guy was a nice guy when he wanted to be, however, most of the time he was a true asshole, and even wanted to shoot me literally if I ever showed up on the doorstep based on an unrelated issue and not my incarceration. When I called and explained that I was sorry her husband passed away and tried to share the good things I could share...

that is when she told me she wanted nothing to do with me ever again. Still hurts to this day.

However, I have done my best to truly forgive her and I have peace in my heart. She will have to live with her decision for the rest of her life and will miss out on the son she truly always wanted. But I cannot change her mind. Only she can.

7. Forgiveness is a huge factor. As human beings it's hard for us to forget and you may never forget about this. Only God forgets our sin and casts it aside from the east to the west as it says in His Word. The only way we can do that is if we truly smack that devil back every time he tries to bring it up. Plus it is up to each and every person to forgive. Regardless if you stay together or not. Unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.

In closing... Lavender only you know what's best. We are here to do our best to help you in this journey no matter where it takes you.

Do not be afraid to ask any questions.

- In His Steps

Thanks everyone for your supportive words. My husband was only caught online by undercover cops and his "victims" were female. I know that doesn't change what he has done. I do still love him but at the same time very angry with him.

You have every right to be mad at him. He shouldn't have been "screwing around" by talking to other women online when he was married to you. He was having an emotional affair on you. That in itself, affects the trust you had in him. It now being labeled as a sex crime, hurts even more.

Time will heal all wounds. And if he can see that even "screwing around" was wrong (as emotional affair) then it can help repair the damage, because it will show that he understands how hurtful it was and wrong of him to engage in.

We all know how these online stings work. If he wasn't in a committed relationship, then I can see his point of view. He want looking to solisit a minor - he was looking for an adult woman to corrispond with. I hope he can see the difference between the two (regardless of the charges).

I am sorry for your pain. I too Have a husband recently charged With several sex offenses that I cant even wrap my head around. I do know this however from personal experience when I taught COPE classes that were required for all parents divorcing in Nevada. Don't speak ill or negative about your husband in front of your child, even if you think he is doing other things and not paying attention to your conversation with someone else, he can be, as kids soak in more than you realize. Part of who your son is, is also part of his father. Who he is is directly connected to where he comes from and that is you and your husband, his father. Shame the father and you shame the son. As hard as it is dont allow your anger and pain towards his father to reach his ears. I again am sorry. I know there are not words to comfort you.

Thanks everyone for your supportive words. My husband was only caught online by undercover cops and his "victims" were female. I know that doesn't change what he has done. I do still love him but at the same time very angry with him.

I'm going to say something that many here would disagree with.

I think it does make a difference, a huge difference, that he was only caught online. I know it doesn't matter as far as the law goes, and that many laws about online enticement are actually harsher than attempted rape in the real world. However, over the last year I've been reading study after study on this, and psychologists who have talked to those found guilty of online enticement, and those involved in solicitation in the real world have very, very different profiles.

When your husband says he was just "screwing around" he's certainly being far to flip about a very serious topic, and when he points his finger at someone else (including you) that's really despicable behavior. BUT (and it's a big but) odds are if this started and ended online, it was for him very much indulging a fantasy, not setting out to engage in a physical act.

And... now that I've said it, I feel extremely uncomfortable. Because I don't know your husband, don't know the facts, and don't have any right to mouth off. It's just that... what he did was very close to what my son was accused of doing. I know that in my son's case, he was led step by step from conversation to flirtation to sex talk by people who were cranking his every word past both programs and psychologists to find his hot buttons. Reading his transcripts you can see them prodding, prodding, prodding for weak points over days and weeks and months. In retrospect you can see them working him like the gullible sap he was.

I don't know your husband, and I certainly have no respect for the way he has handled himself in his conversations with you, but I don't believe being caught in an online sting is a good indicator that someone has some kind of deviant desires that make them a danger to children. Naturally you should excersize care, and if the way he is talking to you shows that he is directing some of his anger over what happened toward you or your son... stay far away.

But otherwise, don't let something that happened in a chat room become the defining moment of your lifetime relationship.

He is being charged on "intent". That is the exact same thing that I was in prison for.

in my case the state bungled how the actual arrest went down and lied on the report. But they fixed that and got the Federal Attorney General involved and I was indicted by a Federal grand jury 2 weeks after I was initially jailed at the county jail. I didn't find all this out until after I had gotten out and had seen some documents alluding to the time. I was soooooo angry that Public Pretender lied to me.

My "Public Pretender", I mean Public Defender, allegedly was supposed to not be a "Dump Truck" (a term used for public defenders who do not help their clients in any way and just let the DA have at it.) but he lied to me too. I was honest with him about everything! He strung me along and lied to me for 5 almost 6 months.

My best friend to this day when I explained to him everything thinks I was entrapped. But there is nothing we could have done. I already had admitted my guilt in a way when he came to visit me and we were speaking through the jail communication system when someone comes to visit you. ANYTHING YOU SAY CAN AND WILL BE HELD AGAINST YOU IN A COURT OF LAW. Everyone needs to remember this.

I needed every single day of that prison time. Why do you say? Because I needed to get back to reality. I needed to stop pretending that I had a relationship with Jesus and actually have a relationship with Jesus.

I did indeed cross interstate lines. What happened after I had gotten to the bus station (she the adult was supposed to pick me up without her two minor girls) and had sat down at the bus station, things changed in my mind very quickly. Reality was setting in and I wanted to go home. (that was my conscience and God's Holy Spirit speaking to me) But I was wanting a relationship with this woman and my horrible mistake was that I involved the stupid stuff along with the normal stuff. I sat at the bus station for about 20 minutes. I went back and forth in my mind between wanting a bus ticket home and waiting to see if she was going to pick me up. I really wish I had went to the counter to buy that ticket immediately home. Would that have changed anything? It might have minimized my punishment a little but I was still guilty. I was there. And that's was the point. The criminal investigation team arrested me at the bus station shortly afterwords.

God and Prison rescued me. Yes in the past I was a trusted individual and even worked as a medic on an ambulance and volunteered as a victim's advocate for a local police department. But all of that is now just in my past as a memory.

I was guilty when I was arrested of what I did do. Plain and simple. Regardless of who lied, cheated, or whatever to have the authority to lock me up on other false information to make their case. I have had to forgive each and every one of them. I thankfully had the money to repay my old roommate and friend for rent and for them confiscating his computer.

It has been a LONG road to recovery and it gets better day by day. I work at a very prominent employer that is visible to the public at all times and only God can receive the glory for that. Some not all co-workers adore me. However, there are some that value immensely my work ethic and have given me many compliments over and over again even after they found out of my past even though they haven't told me directly they know. That's the thing I cherish the most.

-In His Steps