Divorcebusting.com Forums Open Forums For Newcomers Some DB tips may drive you closer to divorce

Hey knittedscarff..

Thanks for coming back to share your insight. It's always good to see things from a different perspective.

I think there's always a difference between the dumper and the dumpee whether it's in marriage, a relationship, friendship, employer/employee. Maybe initiator and recipient are better terms.

The initiator's decision is never easy to make. It's never made lightly either. And it's usually a long time coming. But once it's made there's a new mindset and direction. Of course, the recipient is confused, surprised, shocked.

The initiator (who could be either spouse) makes a choice, a decision.. and the recipient has no choice but to catch up. The recipient is caught half dressed and shoelaces untied when the fire alarm goes off. Like you said.. someone might ask you what car you're buying and the answer is 3:30.

Two completely different perspectives.

In the end it comes down to acceptance.

Getting married is a mutual decision. I think a divorce should be too.

I wanted to post a quick update. My stbx-h is dragging his feet on the D, especially on financial and custodial issues. We had our first mediation at the end of Feb, and it looks like we will need another one (or two) in the next couple of weeks to make sure our children will have a solid trust set up for them. I had hoped for an April D, but it may be June before everything is completed.

We've been able to communicate a little more freely over the past month, but I'm afraid that when I talk to him, he takes this as a sign that I have doubts about the D or that I want to come back, which I don't. According to his mom, he's supposed to be going to counseling, but she said that he seems still as depressed as ever. I feel so sorry for him, and it's just awful to witness.

One thing I wanted to mention that might help other people, esp men going through this, is to look closely at tip 25, it's a doozy. We were talking about time schedules with the kids and what will happen as they get older and more independent of us. He gave some snarky remark about if I'll have "time" for the kids since I'm going to be working more and that women think they can "have it all."

Anyway, that just opened up a floodgate in him, total rant ridiculousness, which I realized have nothing to do with me. He kept saying how he had been reading these books about what women want and talking to his buddies who tell him that women want a "strong man" and that he should just stop the divorce cold, blah blah blah.

He just went on this long tirade, and finally, after telling me all the things that he should have done, since "that's what you women want" I took a deep breath and told him: he was wrong.

I tried to explain to him that if he wanted to know what a woman wanted, he should ASK a woman. No man has insight to what women want.

Because they are not women.

How would they know?

And for a moment, I saw a flash of my old husband, the one who didn't buy into these prescribed ideas about how men and women should act. It was such a good moment because it shows that there's something feisty and good still in him.

And he gave a truly good laugh, because it totally hit him like some kind of Vulcan Spock logic...that's right...how would someone like Dr. Phil know what makes women tick...he's no broad. Completely logical.

And if he asked now that he understands that, was it enough to stop the divorce. It's not, but I think it will help both of us as we grieve the loss of our marriage but able to make peace with the new life we are moving to as co-parents.

Well in your initial post you talk about faking faking faking. If you fully understood the principles you would know that most people on this board don't think you should FAKE anything. You should make changes to yourself, genuine changes, because it's good for you whether or not you save your marriage or get divorced. And they stress that it has to be for YOU and it has to be genuine and permanent. The people who DB'ing doesn't work for are the ones who actually are not getting a life and faking everything. You talk about your husband faking it. It's because he was the one with the infidelity. They lie and fake EVERYTHING.

Just sayin'

I disagree.

"Fake it till you make it" and "Act as if" are core DB principles.

But I do agree that these principles don't work very well in most cases.

Gypsy-I agree with you on this

In the end it comes down to acceptance.

Getting married is a mutual decision. I think a divorce should be too.[/quote]

Since 2001, 4 out of 10 of my co-workers have gotten divorces. 2 out of those 4 wanted it, 2 did not! It was far easier on the ones that initiated it! They had planned for a long time! There was also a 5th person that was 'running around" on her H!!! That is 50%! One of them, had she Db'd, may have been able to save her M...am pretty sure her H was in MLC. A couple of years ago I joked about our workplace being cursed...well, here I am...should have gotten outta there a long time ago!

D'oh. I stand corrected. That is in the book. I have generally followed the principles recommended in the forums though that faking change is bad and that's where my thinking was coming from. I have to agree with the original poster, faking is bad. Anything you do has to be real.

when I have been terrified to listen to WH as he talked about divorce, when I wanted to bash his head in when I saw him, when I hated GALing, I pretended to be brave, pretended I had control over my emotions, pretended to enjoy getting out. And low and behold, I actually became braver, in control of my emotions and like doing new things!

So to me, Fake it til you make it isn't saying to be a PERMANENT faker- it is a just a mind trick you play on yourself to get the nerve to really do it!