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DifRent and Matt,

I feel the advise from my DB coach was a bit opposite of what everyone was advising on here, so I often felt conflicted on the best course of action. The advise I was getting from my coach, even with active A, is to start by rebuilding friendship. Because of that, I think one if the hardest parts of DB is for me knowing how to best interact with H, so I have a bit of paralysis by wealth of opinions. With my coach the focus has been on reattracting versus GAL as well. also think living with WAS also offers challenges, especially with detaching.

I also think this is why my H thinks I have been a bit all over the board. I need to stick with one set of advice I guess. It is easy to get off track when you speak to coach once every 1-2 weeks but can get insta advice on here daily. If those don't jive then you lose consistency.

BW

Matt, I think your prioritization is the right way to do things, absolutely. And I probably do have it backwards, at least sometimes. I know detachment from the outcome is the ideal. But feelings are what they are. I'd like to be the DB hero here, but sometimes, I'm just a mess. Like Fogg in his thread, I'm always looking for some sign of progress, of hope - really hard to see with the OW in the way, and yet, there are glimmers here and there. But yes, if I don't see those signs, I get down.

Thanks for your insights. Definitely things for me to work on.

Not saying I'm actually doing it that way (on a subconscious level). Or that you aren't. Just something Ive observed in your recounts. I think/hope as your life settles down some now, you'll be able to treat your interactions with your W more like a science experiment and take some of the pressure and expectation and hope off.

This morning is so beautiful on the porch here at Mom's... drinking coffee and feeling melancholic and nostalgic for our vacation in the mountains of Albania last year... how we'd just wake up and have our coffee, enjoy the cool breezes and each other's company in a place far, far from the rest of the world. I didn't think I was taking that time for granted then, but now, I feel as if I did.

Today I'm probably heading back home... could stay at Mom's another night - or heck, another week - if I wanted to. But I have my divorce support group tonight and feel like I really need it. I miss my bed too, but I'm dreading going back to that house. A friend of ours is away on vacation and she's kindly allowing the boys to use the place while they wait for the internet to be turned on at their apartment, and she's offered for me to stay at her house as well. I might spend some time there - but I know I need to face my W at some point.

She did text yesterday and asked if I was in town because she hadn't seen me all weekend. I commented on a photo of her in FB that is particularly attractive with a gentle comment about how smitten I remain with her smile - she wrote back quickly that she likes that photo, too. I'm not at all looking forward to the next month or so, where we address the details of moving out. Such a paradox - I don't want to be there, it's hard to spend time with her. But I don't want to move, and I want my old W back. I suppose GALing and focusing on me will be easier once we get through this part.

I do have a question for whomever might be inclined to answer: I'm a minimalist, and 90% of the "things" in our home are hers - antiques and collectibles and artifacts from around the world. My goal is to buy some land and build a tiny house, and probably just rent a room from an acquaintance in the neighborhood until I get it built. So I just plan to take the bed, bedroom furniture, a chair, maybe put a sofa in storage. Aside from my clothes and books and a few kitchen appliances, that's about it. My move should take an hour.

I am not at all inclined to help my W with her move and all her stuff - which will take days. It would feel tantamount to digging my own grave, because I did not ask for this, do not want this, and feel as if she should bear the burden and feel the pressure of this decision in the form of having to do it all herself.

Am I being unreasonable here by not offering to help, or declining to help if she asks? Would helping her be something that might move me closer to my goal of R, or would standing my ground make her feel the weight of her decision even more? I'm not trying to be calculating in terms of eliciting a certain outcome here, I know I've been struggling with that a bit. Nor is this about "punishing" her. It's a consequence of her decision, as I see it... moving all that stuff. As for me and my PMA, it will just flat out feel better for me to take my own stuff and let her deal with hers, but I don't want to do something that hampers the ultimate goal of reconciliation.

Diff,

You might want to read up on the story that MWD posted about H deciding to be his W's best friend. He helped his W move her stuff out of the house. The moral of the story is to set aside your pride and be your W's best friend (remember your W's LL is PT and QT). In that story, that couple eventually reconciled.

I need to find the story and post it here.

new title

While I know I'm not supposed to think about the OW, I've yet again read her words and confirmed she is a scheming manipulator who is steering my W's decisions about everything... and I just don't know if I can ever compete as they get deeper and deeper into things.

Since the boys are both off Friday evening, I suggested we get together for dinner at their apartment - and although I figured the W would decline the invitation, I said it would be polite for them to invite her, too. No pressure. Just a nice gesture of thanks for helping with the move and shopping for them last week. They did so by email... and you know I can't help reading those...

W forwards the email to the OW saying, "Ugh... (Dif's) hand is all over this. I want to spend the day with you on Friday, but I think it wouldn't be nice not to accept the offer."

The OW writes back: "Ugh is right! Let’s both chew on this a little bit before you answer. It would be helpful if you could see Dif before you answer so you know what frame of mind she is in after her retreat. If she has come back with a renewed vigor to win you back, a 'family' dinner could be horrible. You do need to maintain a civil relationship with your tenants and them wanting to thank you is nice, but I know you don’t want to do it and I kind of doubt the boys do either."

Wow... the way the OW frames things... quotes around the word "family." Renewed vigor to win her back? A horrible dinner? Calling the boys "tenants" and mentioning a civil relationship with them? She isn't just a homewrecker - this woman is out to destroy any remnant of our family, and any remnant of our relationship.

I guess I'm not surprised, as no doubt this happens in person and in texts I never see. Considering how increasingly resolute my W is that we are over, I just know she is being coached.

Here's the kicker though: they no longer consider their relationship an affair - now THEIRS is the real relationship, and I'm just the stupid ex who still wears her ring and won't get it through her head that we're done. (Although, despite what I confess on this board, I actually have been clear that I don't want her back - not "this" her, anyway, and in her presence, I've practiced friendly-neighbor detachment for a week with great precision.)

Under these circumstances, how is it possible, no matter how much I become the best "me" I can be, to draw her back to me? Does anyone see this another way? Is the OW feeling threatened by me? Is it really necessary for her to discredit me like this when my W is so clearly "in love" with her?

By DBing, am I just tilting at windmills here? I have plans to continue with my GAL activities and move on with my life, but with all of this, I'm just fishing for a little hope that I haven't already lost her for good to this sociopath.

Gad - that's a hard read. I am so sorry.

Yes, the OW is something and she is obviously very jealous of you. I would ignore her and the drama. Get off the roller coaster, let your W find out what the OW is really like.

The OW seems like the classic affair down type who controls the AP. The need to control is based on fear.

Hi difRent

I know I don't post on your threads but this resonated with me....



My WW also sees our R as dead and the R with the OM is the real deal. I've had more than a few vets posting on my thread about this. Yea, right now your W believes that to be true and the level of selfishness is unabated but what can you do? You can stick with the plan like I am or you can abandon all and move on. The fact that you are still here and still posting shows to me you still care. So if you stick to the plan you become a better person and you may, just may rebuild a better R with your W. Win win either way. Stay the course and don't pay too much attention to the email.

I stopped snooping a long time ago and trust me, with my skills I could find out A LOT. It didn't help. Made it worse so best leave that alone.

And one poster GB said to me once. Forget OM. He's not a part of your family. Good advice.

Heavy, nobody knows better than you how important it is to avoid the drama. Went to my divorce support group tonight, and one woman there... 60 years old, mind you, married 42 years when her husband dropped the bomb and took up with a woman their children's age, God bless her... spoke of how she felt God calling her to surrender the whole thing to Him this week. I will be meditating and praying about that... maybe trying to get back to the better place I was in a week ago. Surrender is so hard... but really, it's all we can do.

Agreed - surrender the situation to God is all any of us can really do. We just have to trust in His plan and for us to have the strength to do His will.

Heavy