Melchor Adviento said his wife stabbed him during a heated argument as he was calling her workplace to see whether she really had worked overtime on five days she did not come home.

“;I looked down, and I found out I had blood on my stomach,”; he said.

Adviento said he looked up to see his wife holding knives in both hands. He said he threw the telephone at her, pushed her away and wrestled one of the knives away from her — but not before she stabbed him a few more times, including in his shoulder.

“;I was afraid (for) my life. I thought I was going to die. There was plenty of blood,”; Adviento said.

He said he then started stabbing his wife. He said he does not remember how many times or where on her body he stabbed her.

Adviento, 51, is on trial in Circuit Court for second-degree murder for the Oct. 28, 2007, stabbing death of his wife, Erlinda, 44, in their Kalihi home. He took the witness stand yesterday to claim self-defense.

The prosecution says Adviento killed his wife because he believed she was having an affair with a co-worker and had told him she wanted a divorce.

At one point during the struggle, Adviento said, he fell on the floor and his wife was on top of him trying to stab him. He said he grabbed her right arm, did not let go and stabbed back until she collapsed on top of him and stopped moving.

Shocked and confused, Adviento got up and locked the doors to the home so his children would not see what their parents had done, he said. Then he stabbed himself and waited to die.

“;She wanted me dead,”; he said. “;I would rather be dead than living.”;

When police arrived at the home, he answered the front door and told the officer his wife cheated on him and stabbed him. He said she tried to kill him, and he killed her.

Adviento said the argument started when he overheard his wife calling somebody else “;sweetheart”; on the telephone and confronted her about it. He said she had previously accused him of having an affair and of womanizing when he had visited the Philippines the month before.