IMP - In all honesty, my mother waited and prayed. I would love to tell you that she GAL and DBed and detached. But she waited and prayed. And she kept her mouth shut. Even when he returned - she only talked about it if he did.
I remember thinking how could she do that...how could she wait around for some man while he was out running around on her. Didn't she have any pride?
It just seems that everything I have learned from these boards seems to be in question lately.
Mrs H, you gorgeous thing - it's not the advice that's changing - it's you.
You are growing and getting stronger. You are at a stage where you are ready to really SEE what is being posted.
In the early stages, when we are in great trauma, we take from the postings what we need - which is generally "If I leave him alone and make myself appear pretty and happy, he might realise what he's missing and come home". As the journey progresses, we become stronger and better able to understand that there is so much complexity to this whole thing.
You should be very proud of yourself. You are getting stronger and wiser.
V
Never make someone a priority, who makes you an option.
Mrs - you are changing. We all do: I think one of the debates is how much we try and'force' the process. I have both a therapist, and a spiritual director [within the Christian Church] They both see life as a journey. There is a great early 20th century theologian called Charles Raven who wrote some amazing things Here are two
'Most people have, at some time or another, to stand alone and to suffer, and their final shape is determined by their response to their probation: they emerge either the slaves of circumstances or in some sense the captain of their soul' He also wrote
'I do not want to approach the subject in any morbid or sentimental mood, but it is my full conviction that until men and women individually have been into hell they arent mature'
While we should not wallow in misery, we all need to make this journey fully and in our own time. If we try and rush it we too may have neglected a vital lesson.
I have learned that I can live alone, and like it. My h, who thought he didn't need people has discovered that he is much more dependent on others than his previous self image. I can see him growing up, away from me. With me I don't think he ever would, beecause I 'enabled' him. What a hard lesson, and what a necessary one.
I don't believe [and I have NO stats to quote] that starting, or even finishing divorce proceedings is any bar to getting back together in the future. In fact I can almost see that it can be drawing a line under the old r, and re-building a truly new one, based on choosing to be together. I agree that hope is what lies within us. This is not to say that it will happen, of course!
If we try and rush it we too may have neglected a vital lesson.
There is a huge difference between rushing and helping someone get through the journey as quickly as possible. There were times when I tried to rush. That was me. But there were also many people who by being there and making suggestions helped me to get through things more quickly.
The other part of your posts (mainly to me) is an underlying intimation that only the person going through hell can't be helped by the experience of others. You treat it as saving others from themselves. Of course, we can never save someone from themselves if they aren't interested in doing so. But this is an attitude in you, I just don't and can't understand. If you saw someone about to walk off a cliff, the underlying assumption is that they can see what they are doing, they are on their own. While this is an extreme example, the notion hold.
My frame of mind is that if I see someone walking off a cliff, I am going to shout, "hey,crazy legs, you are going to walk off that cliff." Isn't that part of the reason for coming here? When we learn geometry, do we try to replicate the experience of Pythagoras in developing his Theorem or do we read a geometry book? And don't get me wrong, I am fascinated by a good train wreck, but I prefer to prevent it if at all possible.
Yes, our journey is our own, but the human race survived by working with others and learning from others. I am glad that is my world, even though I screw up from time to time. Fortunately, I had wisdom from those before me who at times kept me from walking off that cliff.
