Quote: Why am I so caught up in wanting more? What have I been doing that keeps her guard up with respect to this?...Still, I really want imput on how to reconcile my need for some kind of resolution with respect to the OM, with my very sincere acknowlegement that my methods for achieving this, short of stuffing it down inside, have really tanked. I also sense that she is willing to throw in the towel over this issue, whenever I go there, I can almost hear a door slamming shut.
John_p, I think we all get caught up in the wanting more. You think maybe we could try and look at this from a different seat on the bus? I say, get up and move two rows back and two seats over and get a different view of the situation. Let's look at it from all sides.
1. you know she had an EA 2. she's apologized for IT hurting you, but not doing IT. 3. you know that she didn't do anything purposefully to hurt you. 4. you know that she was in a lot of pain 5. you know that everyone deals with pain and sadness differently 6. just because she didn't handle it your way doesn't make it wrong 7. the way she handled it disappoints you 8. you know you've disapponted her plenty 9. you hope she'll be able to forgive you for disappointing her 10. you need to forgive her for disapponting you 11. you don't need her to admit she was wrong..you don't even need her to believe it 12. her having an EA could be considered no worse than what she feels you did to her.
John_p, I'll tell you something that I told Betsey a long time ago and I to this day feel it rings true.
"My XH may not have cheated on me (EA or PA), for some reason I feel like he did. The sheer fact that he witheld his emotions and intimacy from me made me feel betrayed in that same way."
So keep this in mind...exactly how you feel about the EA, she could very well be feeling the same about you. The only difference here and I would have you take a good hard look at this, is that her EA could become a PA and I'd venture to guess that's your fear??
O and O
Nickel
"The walls we build around us to keep sadness out also keeps out the joy."
Turns out, from W's perspective, I had been slowly slipping back into my old ways for sometime and my ranting about the e-mails just confirmed for her that I haven't really internalized my changes and she just can't do this anymore.
We're on this trip together and it has been excrutiating to just try to be friends while I'm slowly dying inside. She's definitely back on the D-train and sees this as the only way to stick up for herself.
She read some stuff from her journal to me and I was bowled over with the extent to which she has been repeatedly dissappointed. She really feels she has been telling me this all along the way but, I think I was simply saw her comments (e.g. "I really need your help in resolving X sitation with the son") as separate isolated things that did not affect the M so directly.
How could I be so dense as to not pick up on this stuff? She really thinks I should have picked up on this stuff along the way, that it is not her job to hit me over the head with stuff, and that this just confirms hers need to end the marriage.
Yuck!
I know I just need to own up to my own stuff and move-on but its pretty hard to do in a fancy hotel room. Part of me is just pissed, part of me is worried about the future and this kids, part of me wants to make this better, and part of me is trying to follow my own advice and move on.
I really do love my W, but this WAW stuff is a sickness. I don't know where the self-destructive quality comes from, but for the life of me I cannot figure why someone would feel like they need to tear their life apart in order to make it better.
I can't seem to post to Rich's thread anymore, I'm not sure what is up with that but boy do I feel his pain.
Really sorry to read what's going on with you. This process is tearing us both apart and I feel for you. I may need to start a new thread. Let me check.
Not sure if you are out there, but I'm using you guys to answer questions I know it is best not to ask of my W.
We had a depressing conversation this am, where I told her I had backed off from affection and physical contact out of respect for her decision, but that I still loved her.
She disclosed a literal laundry list of times she's felt like I still wasn't up to speed in the last several months (that's what her journal is for I guess) and what struck me is how clearly the incidents usually involve my precipitating some kind of guilt reaction from her. For instance, discussions about our spending more money on things that are important to her (e.g. the trip we are on), her relationship with the other guy, etc. What's now clear is that she seems to feel challenged pretty easily (and not in a way that is clear to me at the time) and how our recent discussion about the e-mails was just that.
I've really searched my soul this and I don't think I am trying to push her.
So Bets and Nickel, when you both were in WAW mode, did your husbands do stuff that made you feel challenged or especially guilty about your needs? I'm expectedly down about her latest assertion that divorce is our only option, but I think this time I am also just plain confused.
I think what just happened was that I had been walking on eggshells and when I slipped, she was almost relieved to be able to take back control and to say she was not going to let me make her feel bad anymore.
I know I should just try to wait her out on this. I did a rockin' job at Breakfast this morning (with a large group of college friends) being funny, engaged, and acting as if we were as solid as ever. She seems to take great comfort in this facade of normality. She was even letting me hug her and stuff yesterday until I let her know that I didn't want to challenge her decision by being physically close. She indicated that she was fine with the touching but didn't want to mislead me so maybe it was better that we didn't, she is also adamant that she is not going to "cave" and make this better for me like she would have done in the past.
I'm kind of babbling here, but I'm just not sure if I need to go into LRT mode, try to patiently just listen to her, or what. She's off with some of her friends today, while I try to get work done at the hotel which is great, but typically this is the kind of thing I would have made her feel guilty about in the past. Its like the scripts are so strong for us, that I'm still failing her by past association. Am I making sense?
I'm going to keep on journaling and reading and try to distract myself, but I can't help but get over the fact that we planned this weekend as an explicit attempt to undo our old ways (her going without me, and my making her feel guilty) but its like she's so stuck in her notion of who I was before, she can't let go of her dissapointment.
I think this same dynamic characterizes our past couple of months. (following her decision to give it another go). It's like we've been watching TV and even though the show has changed, she's still wants to change the channel(getting a divorce) because some of the same actors in on.
So Betsey and Nickel, when did you realize that the show had changed and how long was your thumb still stuck on the channel down button?
If it weren't for the kids, I'd almost be happy to get a separation right now, I really can't imagine tip-toeing around my W in perpetuity. Its just not fair to either of us for her to automatically assume the worst of me.
Oh and by some crazy cosmic coincidence, we were given tickets to see Othello last night. The play includes a tradgic misunderstanding through which a jealous husband murders his innocent wife. Major themes of trust, infidelity, anger. Again, I think the old script was so strong for her, she saw me in the miguided, vengeful, out of control protagonist. I joked that at least I wasn't as jealous as Othello, and she quipped "What because you didn't kill me?". OUCH. As an aside the play did bring up some very interesting questions about love, jealousy, and anger. Worth a read/look for some of us here.
Blah, blah, blah, I'm just trying to not be a blob.
I realized this thread just appeared out of nowhere so I thought I'd give some brief background.
Me 36 Wife 35 married 11 years. Son 8 Daughter 4.
Went through the WAW thing pretty clumsily from June thru Sept. when I found the book/board. Bomb was precipitated by visit with old h.s. friend who made her realize everything missing in our marriage. Kept up a pretty intense emotional relationship with this guy by e-mail and it was/has been the trigger for most of my non DB-like behavior. Wife was within days of visiting a lawyer when she backed off in late October, decided she loved me and wanted things to work out.
Thought I was doing great with some minor slip-ups untill last week when I noticed her distancing, got suspicious and snooped and found a series of innoncent, but painful for me, e-mails surrounding valentines day. When I brought it up, we quickly fell into our old dynamic and she quickly decided that she wanted a separation/divorce again.
We're on what was to be a nice getaway from the kids visiting some old friends right now and it really sucks to have to put on a good face when we are out and about. At the same time, it does give me an opportunity to DB and act happy etc.
My most recent set back is her announcement to her old friends that we're splitting up which really seemed to hit home for me. After a fit of crying (me) in the hotel, and lot's of very counterproductive talking, we went out and had fun with the group but I opted to return early by myself and to give her space.
She is absolutely determined not to change her mind this time around. She even said, "I'm not going to get reeled back in by you again". You know, when I am really wise, I can get outside of this and see her struggle and the need for me to get out of her way, but when we're together its like I can't help but want to say or do something that stiffens her resolve.
We're in that terrible place where she is able to be really friendly (asking if we could exercise together, attentive to where I sit at dinner) because she is so at peace with her decision. I never understood this during our first go-round. I just can't figure out how you divorce someone you are getting along with so well. I think it just makes her feel less guilty if we're all friendly about this, I don't know.
Sound like a great opportunity to LRT and take care of myself. Still, when I'm alone I feel horrible, and when I'm with her I get all needy.
Well we had a 2 hour delay at the airport and the whole flight to talk and all I can say is, I think I'm done.
I did my best to just listen and validate, but she proceeded to blow me out of the water with the ways in which I have continued to let her down and not change. As recently as a week ago, I though my marriage was saved. It is pretty clear that my adopting the victim role (e.g. "Woo is me for what I have been through") has been, unbeknownst to me, a pretty intense negative guilt reaction for her. She is absolutely, positively sure, that I cannot or will not make the changes she needs (e.g. to not engage in any behaviors she believes serve to blame or threaten her) and that she is done with the relationship, but wants to stay friends etc.
I learned, for instance that when I would say something like that I was proud of myself for sticking through all our stuff this past 8 months, what she was hearing was "you are a horrible bitch for hurting me". When I would say that she hurt my feelings by corresponding with the other guy, she would hear "you are an unfaithful wife".
More recently, since she has confirmed her reestablished desire to divorce, when I say stuff like I'm worried we won't be able to afford two households, she heard "If you divorce me, you won't be able to afford a house". When I said, we'll have to figure out custody for kids, she heard "I'm going to fight you for custody of the kids". And so on.
It's like we are speaking two different languages and I'm speaking through a threat-o-phone. I think I am expressing my feelings, she insisits I am blaming and threatening her.
I'm really trying to be at peace with her decision, and to try and see the bright side in not having to perpetually decode what exactly I've done wrong without even knowing it. We've definitely been here before, but I think my wife's stubborness will guarantee that I won't simply be able to ride this one out.
We did make some progress in that I learned that by simply changing my "You know we'll need to figure out X" to saying "I'm worried about figuring out X" I've changed a threat to a worry.
This still sucks, and I still feel like my life and money are headed down the toilet, but I gotta think that I'm starting to get good at living on the verge of divorce. All it takes is a shattered heart, and battered soul.
Just trying to get through the day today, but feel very much like a slug.
I am wondering how common it may be for a WAW to reconsider, and then go full on WAW again after an extended period of what seemed like sincere reconciliation.
Is this experience common among the DB'ers on the board?
Tough turn of events, although you got a lot of good information about what I said/what you heard.
My answer to your question - yes, I think so. Been there done that with my H. I thought we were making it last summer, and moved here to Piecing. BIG mistake (think Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman when she was shopping ). Since that time period, it's gotten worse, and better, and worse, and better, and worse.........I see a pattern but not the answers.
Live your life while you are still living. Riding the trail less traveled.
I'm feeling so alone today. I scheduled a phone consult for tomorrow am, just to try to reset my PMA, but the feelings of emptiness are the worst.
Intellectually, I think I get this, and honestly believe that I did a good job trying to pull this back together in the past 4 months. It just hurts that what I percieve to be one real slip up and some periods of self-pity put me right back at square 1.
I know I'll feel better someday, but getting through the now is the worst.
). Since that time period, it's gotten worse, and better, and worse, and better, and worse.........I see a pattern but not the answers.