Wendy, thanks for posting again today! I'm quite the mess - disappointed with myself for such a display of emotion, I mean, really! Hurling papers at someone? Screaming? Totally out of character. Nice to have friends around me, being so supportive. We leave a week from today. I want to think about what you've said about your boundaries regarding OW and your H. I wonder if a reframe might be in order, since controlling is definitely an issue and your H will at some point probably rebel against it.
Anne, thank you SO much for the very simple reminder: Act As If. Yes! You are so right - acting as if we are NOT, in fact, on fragile ground. Something along the lines of what Betsey and GBO and H2H are telling me, that the therapy is for US as a team, and it is to find ways to communicate and to heal our wounds together, making our bonds stronger, not a forum in which to point fingers and accuse. Us against the world, act as if we are bonded and strong.
Yes, yes, yes. Thank you. I had totally left that one behind.
BTW, to clarify, Anne, I don't think she's pursuing and disrespecting our R now, but she was before, when she knew we were together and he was unhappy. She opened the door wide and put on her best behavior, and called in the middle of the night with a soft voice, and plugged in her nefarious connectors. ~~*
[Ha! Sage, I love this, too. I'm experimenting - which do you like better? This one is like rivers and then a splat.]
Still no word on the therapy, but I did manage to straighten out my healthcare crap and get a physical therapist for my neck-ometriosis. Tomorrow I see a chiro, one for whom I've waited two weeks for an appointment.
I go over to S's in two hours, and if I can get through planning our trip without dissolving into R talk and pelting him with killer banana peels or the like because he didn't call a therapist, then I'll be one-up.
Sigh. I have to admit that I thought, when you were flat on your back and so silent here, "At least she can't get herself into much trouble." Ha!
Anne picked up on something that's been leaping out at me for a while. You also referred to your R as unstable before you left for the holidays. My thought then (and now) is that the R's not unstable, YOU are, you fruit loop!
Yes, S is clueless (as many guys are) in his handling of Swiss Miss. Yes, that needs to be addressed in the context of your stable R. Unfortunately, that's not possible because you go flying off the handle over every skewed cherry.
The message I get from your posts is that nothing S does is good enough. He's not just making that up. It seems to me that he is trying to do the right thing, though sometimes imperfectly, and half of you wants to work it out and the louder half of you is too self absorbed to give S or the R any thought.
It would stink if S doesn't handle his response to OW in the best way. However, your urgency about getting him to a T might better be redirected toward dealing with your own issues. If you don't get a handle on your excessive expectations, big demands and big reactions, I'm very afraid that you might just as well buy him a ticket to Switzerland. If you can't be easy to be with, why should he want to stick around? THAT is why it is so dangerous to have Swiss Miss hovering and THAT is in your power to change.
I really want this to work out for you. Sometimes I can laugh, but mostly I'm wincing as I watch you, repeatedly and with great conviction, shoot yourself in the foot. Cut it out, already!!!
SD- I would love for you to visit my thread if you have a moment. I am not sure I am ready for your brutal honesty, but I want it anyway.
J- I see S trying to do things better, but not always succeeding. I love youradvice, your stories, your point of view. If there is any chance in between your doctor's appts you could visit my thread I would SO appreciate it. There has been glacial movement on H's part, and I think I jsut messed it up royally this am.
Take care! And Chile will be SO much fun. I am jealous. Don't throw any banana peals his way. Remember how all the efforts paid off for you in VT that infamous table weekend when you validated him with the forester and he turned major corners?
Quote: Still no word on the therapy, but I did manage to straighten out my healthcare crap and get a physical therapist for my neck-ometriosis. Tomorrow I see a chiro, one for whom I've waited two weeks for an appointment.
Good! Taking care of yourself is the first thing, even in a sitch that is growing better like yours. It's the taking care of ourselves that helps get the improvements into the R, and to forget about that when things start looking better is to invite trouble back.
Quote: I go over to S's in two hours, and if I can get through planning our trip without dissolving into R talk and pelting him with killer banana peels or the like because he didn't call a therapist, then I'll be one-up.
Sounds like a plan!
BTW, the new smilies look pretty good.
Thanks,
K
My sitch More importantly, Light A Million Candles
Thanks, all – I have literally 5 minutes, and so this is brief. Thanks for all the comments, and thanks for a good guffaw, SD. I know, I’m a train wreck.
Had a 1-1/2-hr.phone session with my T as a preface to our 2-hr session tonight with a new solution-based T found through M/V training center. (Just to set record straight, S. wanted to go to T, thought it was a great idea and said he’d been thinking of it too, made the arrangements himself, and came back a day early from Vt. to go to the appointment. We leave in half an hour.)
I am dealing with heightened anxiety at the moment, which I am trying to assuage with lots of talking to friends and T. Don’t know why the abandonment anxiety stuff has reared its head so markedly in the last month, but as dedicated readers will attest, it sho’ nuff has. So I’m dealing with it, and having some measure of success.
Here are some things I know: 1. S. loves me 2. He wants this R to work out 3. He is willing to talk things through and examine our issues thoroughly 4. He is not running away, in fact, he has been very present 5. He has good intentions, not bad 6. He is a lovely person, and so am I
So there’s where I’m at. Now just to put into practice. Sessions with a new chiro who is tuned into energy-emotion stuff have been incredibly helpful. He said he’s never seen someone twist themselves up as I have, and couldn’t believe I was even vertical, with my tension and the way I’ve clamped down my body and shut it down. So what’s the cause? Certainly not the laptop, though it aggravates it. It’s my own attempts to hold onto destructive beliefs and not let them go.
Hmm.
Anyway, that’s about all I can do now, and sorry I haven’t been around to check on friends, will try to do more this weekend. My best friend’s father died yesterday, and I have been on 24-hour support patrol the last few days. Very hard stuff.
Self-reminders: talk about S’s father’s death and friend’s father’s death tell about SM letter T session with my SBT
Well folks, the T session was a wash. Not because S. and I were arguing, but because the T was a bad, I mean really unfortunate, choice. First of all, she didn't "get" us at all - we both felt that. She kept cutting us off to ask questions, then cutting us off while we were answering them. She was really harsh, and assumed we hadn't done ANY work on our relationship - not picking up on cues like the language we were using belied at LEAST some reading on our parts. Nope - we were green, and she treated us like children.
NOT TO MENTION her little ratty DOG whined and whimpered at her feet for the entire two hours! She kept kicking him to shut him up, then 5 seconds later, he'd start whimpering again.
The good news? S. and I bonded over hating her! And we ran right to a B&N where S. bought John Gottmans' book the Seven Principles (one that was recommended by a T we didn't go to because yappy girl T called him back first). We also, in our post-mortem, bonded because S. felt she was being too harsh with me and wanted to step in and defend me, and I felt she kept cutting him off and I wanted to step in and defend him.
Anyway, we had a nice talk and lots of ML the next morning, so we are feeling closer. Last night he came over and we played Scrabble before passing out, exhausted. This morning he was sweet...
There's so much to tell, but it's all water under the bridge. Things are OK, tenuous but OK, as we hurtle toward our departure date (Tuesday!)... here's hoping we can pull it together for a FUN and RELAXING trip. I think he wants to take the book along (it has exercisees and things in it, which are perefct for keeping us out of the marathon-to-nowhere talks), so I'm just going to go with what he wants to do R-talk-wise, and keep my mouth shut otherwise.
We had an interesting talk re: morning intimacy yesterday, and he said some enlightening things about why sometimes he withdraws from giving me attention in the morning. Things about the WAY we snuggle that were closing off intimacy for him rather than opening it up.
Anyway, I'm exhausted from catching up with everybody (it never pays to be away from the BB!) so I will close.
Dear Jennifer Do have to laugh at your schizophrenia - all calm wisdom and practical advice chez moi and wildcat chez toi. I think you really have to slay the greeneyed monster. It seems to me (and I know I am still dripping behind the ears) that you are making the S.M issue into something far huger than he is. The Swiss are boring so ha ha.
It is not what others say and do but how we react to it.
Chile will be fantastic so put your energy into benefitting from that experience not focusing on negatives. He will follow your lead. I spent 4 months in India with H only two months after our R started. It was heaven for both of us and created the sort of memories that will be happy no matter what. Make sure that the trip enforces you in a positive light - think this is something I got out of 5 love languages - so there is no angst connected with it.
I don't know how long youre going for but it strikes me as a bit selfish when there are people here who need you. - we seem to be lacking the tongue in cheek gremlin as well as the barf one though I do like yours.
Ahhhhhhh... back from some energy work with my extraordinarily gifted neighbor, who works with chakras and oils. When I started with her I thought she was a crackpot and I was only doing it to humor her, because she identified such a dire need in me and wanted me to "have this."
Anyway, my work with her has been incredibly eye-opening, and I'm a believer now... she's helped me enormously. Things that came up (meaning things I've been dealing with, that are now "out" of the body) in our three hours together:
panic exhaustion swallowed emotions isolation unfulfilled letting go
Do I sound like a crackpot with this? I'm usually very reticent about sharing that I do this kind of work, but today I'm feeling like so what?
And I went over to S's afterward and couldn't stop giving him little kisses. It was sweet, and he totally responded with the cutest blushes and affection. I think he was even batting his eyelashes! Huh. So didn't I READ the 5LL fer Pete's sake?
OK, now that I'm all adjusted, and thanks to some really inspirational reading over on Betsey's thread, I'm feelin' good. Good enough to write SD's prescribed mantra (LOL!) on the inside of my eyeballs and live it for the next few weeks while I'm away from my support system. Then I can come back and replenish my duct tape supply at the Stubborn Plumber's Shoppe.
Tonight, a friend is cooking me dinner at MY house, and I went to S's (as I told above) to grab a bottle of wine out of the cellar (wine that belongs to both of us). I gently told him he wasn't invited, cause it was a girl thang. We had a good laugh over it, because he was definitely vying for an invite, and after all those kisses he was clinging to me a little and didn't want me to go. He pressured me to come back later to see him, and made up an excuse of why it had to be tonight (and not tomorrow) that we talk about our trip. It was really sweet. In light of this little success, I guess I'm due for another plow through the old DR...
Bye, everyone! If I don't get a chance to post tomorrow before we leave, this is it until 16 February (unless my life falls apart and I end up spending my vacation in an Internet cafe).
Everyone do a little Spanish-language dance for me... I've been studying but I'm sure it's as rusty as it can be. Everything is set in motion - I have a million things to do, and then off we go, tomorrow afternoon to Miami, then we arrive in Chile Wednesday morning. From Santiago we lollygag our way down for two weeks, soaking at volcanic hot springs, going hiking in the Andes, sampling the wares at the Central Valley wineries, and hacienda-hopping, until we get to Puerto Montt, where we hop a plane for Punta Arenas and then, Parque Nacional Torres del Paine, in Patagonia, where we spend our third and last week hiking and camping through the park, ogling glaciers and fondling guanacos and rheas.
Check it out: http://www.torresdelpaine.com/ingles/secciones/02/c/galeria.asp#
I haven't been excited until... JUST NOW! Good lord, I guess I'd better start packin'!
See you back at the ranch on 16 February. Y'all be GOOD now, y'hear?
~~*
Sounds like a plan!
Very hard stuff. 
the next morning, so we are feeling closer. Last night he came over and we played Scrabble before passing out, exhausted. This morning he was sweet...
Jennifer 
and wanted me to "have this."