I appreciate that you want your wife to understand how you feel.
Let her read SSM, not shortchanged' posts. That will only make it worse. She needs to read about solutions, not complaints right now. It is no wonder that she feels like she will never measure up.
Go and ask her to forgive your bad sense of timing with the print out, and then offer SSM for her to read. It is written by a 'low drive' woman - and she happens to know what she is talking about.
As for the emotional affair. You need to find out what the appeal was for your wife. That information will contain a need that she has that YOU ARE NOT MEETING. You both need to sit down and discuss that affair at length. You simply must put the elephant out of the bedroom. She very likely still has fond feelings for this guy.
An affair is the embodiment of entitlement, fueled by resentment and lack of respect. Find out what is fueling her entitlement.
You fix your sex starved marriage by fixing your marriage.
All the best, -NOPkins-
I will ferret out an affair at any opportunity.
-An affair is the embodiment of entitlement, fueled by resentment and lack of respect. -An infidel will remain unreachable so long as their sense of entitlement exceeds their ability to reason.
Quote: . Most of this meanness has revolved around this. To me, she has made a mountain out of a mole hill. To an extent, I think the counselor thinks so as well.
You need to reconsider your position here. I can tell you that until NOP acknowledged the possibility that my "molehills" might actually be mountains, we had very limited progress.
NOP, You are right, bad timing on my part. I had offered SSM in the past, also at a bad time. I may need to do more work before offering it again. Now I feel I am being selfish.
She does feel that she will never meet my expectations, but that's not true. I still love her very much and would love to see things work.
Mrs. NOP, I have been critical of her in the past and this has made her feel like she could never please me, that nothing was good enough (in everyday life, not intimately although I now think she applies this to our love life as well). She has helped me see how my criticism has been hurtful and I understand that now. It is just hard for me to understand how she can't forgive me and try to move on. She says this could take a long time, if ever.
Please consider offering the apology and the book. Waiting to solve a marital problem is very often, not a good idea.
Quote: ---------- Now I feel I am being selfish. ----------
That is what people normally do when they realize that their sense of entitlement might have run over the edges a bit. It is called guilt.
quote: ----------- She says this could take a long time, if ever. -----------
This is the part that concerns me, and tells me that there is a chance that their is another person in your relationship. She does NOT feel guilt for her entitlement, that has also run over the edge.
You need to stop feeling sorry for yourself, and talk to your wife. Find out what the affair was all about. Find out why she feels she will never be able to forgive you. These are things that you need to know.
It is normal to make mistakes when working out a relationship. The mistakes that you do NOT want to make, is the mistake of giving up, or 'waiting for just the right moment'.
If you have any idea that you are going to be able to work out your marital issues without conflict, then you have two choices. Lose the idea, or go ahead and divorce. Anything else, and you are just wasting your time.
All the best, -NOPkins-
I will ferret out an affair at any opportunity.
-An affair is the embodiment of entitlement, fueled by resentment and lack of respect. -An infidel will remain unreachable so long as their sense of entitlement exceeds their ability to reason.
NOP, As MrsNOP said, I have to fix my marriage before I can work on my SL. I apologized to my W. She said she wasn't offended, had already known that I am a HD person, and that it was ok to share that again. She did mention that pushing sex right now is like putting the cart before the horse, but that she understands how important the cart is to me. I want her to read SSM, but shouldn't I wait and see if we can fix the marriage first?
Tell me more about entitlement. I don't think she feels guilt about her relationship with OM, but I think she feels that it was/is innocent. To me it was/is an affair, even if only emotional. We have discussed it, and she says it was just a friendship that developed. She was to talk to him about the death of his brothers and his concerns about his health and he eventually became a confident for her to discuss our relationship. She has always denied that there was any physical relationship. The opportunity for that was definitely there though. I am just not sure about that and if it did happen, I am not sure she would ever level with me since when we first started with all this, I proclaimed that a PA would never be acceptable to me and that it would be grounds for D. Perhaps she is afraid to admit that to me thinking that it would lead to an immediate D. Maybe I should readdress this whole thing, and tell her that I would be willing to forgive even a PA if she just laid it all on the line. For me there is an issue of trust that needs to be rebuilt. I just don't really know what happened I guess.
Another thing I am realizing is that I think we have different levels of interest/committment to making this work. I have been intensely interested in making things work and pushing for things to get resolved. I now know that my W did not like the pushing and pressure. She says she has always been slow to forgive and forget and that she has felt hurt for a long time and thus she doesn't know if she can forgive and move on with me right now. I have a hard time accepting this. Maybe she is not as committed to making it work? Or maybe she has honestly fallen out of love with me but is reluctant to admit it because there is a lot at stake when facing the alternative. I know that she wants to keep things together for the kids and has said this time and time again. I do as well, but have empahsized that it is not a reason to stay together.
Quote: Mrs. NOP, I have been critical of her in the past and this has made her feel like she could never please me, that nothing was good enough (in everyday life, not intimately although I now think she applies this to our love life as well). She has helped me see how my criticism has been hurtful and I understand that now. It is just hard for me to understand how she can't forgive me and try to move on. She says this could take a long time, if ever.
I can understand her having to deal with the residual resentments, but I don't understand the unwillingness to forgive either. My concern and the reason for my comment was what appeared to be a minimization (molehill) of her issues.
Not every broken sex life is a result of a broken relationship. Sometimes it is a result of a broken partner. But if your current problems are a result of relational problems, I didn't want you to make the mistake of thinking that her problems in the marriage were minor compared to yours.
Reconciliation really does take both partners to succeed.
Forgiveness is a choice.
It isn't a feeling.
That's where many of us make a mistake - waiting for warm fuzzy feelings to overcome us and sweep us into the land of reconciliation.
Are you and your wife of any particular religious leaning?
MrsNOP, I don't understand her lack of wanting to forgive either. As you say this is a choice and as someone else pointed out, forgetting it may take time.
Our broken SL is the result of problems with our M. I have always been HD and W is LD (except for when we first met). I always initiated, and although I would have loved increased frequency, I had no complaints at all when we did ML. So if our R were on track, I would want to work on frequency. But the current situation has resulted from difficulties in our R.
We are Catholic, but are kind of like Catholic-lite if you know what I mean.
Indespair wrote: --------------------- I want her to read SSM, but shouldn't I wait and see if we can fix the marriage first? ---------------------
Reading that book is a good start to fixing your marriage.
As for the other parts, there are a couple of books that you need to read.
"Not Just Friends" by Shirley Glass and "Surviving An Affair" by Willard Harley.
You keep "Surviving An Affair" to yourself, and read "Not Just Friends" in front of her.
Let her read it too if she wants, either way, leave it lying about so that she can read it on the sly if she likes. You read "Surviving An Affair" on your own for now. Don't let her know you have it as best as you can. Yes, that is a secret, and you shouldn't have any in your marriage, in this case, it contains a strategy that you don't want to give away.
I am not going to push you hard on this issue, but my first reaction is that your wife is involved with someone. Whether or not that is true, you still have to deal with the issues in your marriage.
Please consider following my 'prescription' closely to start.
There are some other books you will need to read a bit later.
As you have time, do a search on this forum for "csw NOPkins". Read from the oldest to the latest. That will get you a lot of knowledge about affairs and spouses pretty quick. Some of it will be applicable to your situation.
You are right that an inappropriate relationship is an affair. You have a lot of learning to do. Be quiet and demand little from your wife other than asking her to read SSM. Get busy educating yourself in the mean time.
If your wife is not wayward, then you will gain a lot of useful knowledge, if she is, you will soon discover it.
On your computer, keep the history cleaned out and change your passwords on all your accounts.
How are your finances setup?
All the best, -NOPkins-
I will ferret out an affair at any opportunity.
-An affair is the embodiment of entitlement, fueled by resentment and lack of respect. -An infidel will remain unreachable so long as their sense of entitlement exceeds their ability to reason.
