New here - W unwilling to work on it

[30andLost]

I'm the cheater.

Nov 1-22: I had an affair with OW from work. Told my wife I was unhappy and wanted to leave her but was willing to work on it. Affair not revealed. Broke Wife's Heart #1.

Nov 28: Told wife I didn't think it would work and that I was leaving. Before conversation ended, I agreed again to stay and work on it. Affair Still not Revealed. Broke Wife's Heart #2.

Dec 14: Told OW it was over and that I wanted to work on my relationship with my wife and family. Admitted Affair to wife. Broke Wife's Heart #3.

Dec 15-Jan 3: Working in couples therapy, wife staying and working on fixing our relationship. I begin to stray back to OW because I thought I had feelings for her.

Jan 4: Told wife I couldn't commit to counseling because I had feelings for OW. Slept with OW next night and realized I didn't love her, and only loved my wife. Admitted to wife and told her I wanted her more than anything. Broke Wife's Heart #4.

Now I am fully committed to working on me to correct my sex and love addiction through SLAA, working with therapist to correct and address my abandonment issues so that I won't do this again. Wife has said that she wants nothing to do with me except when it comes to the kids. She hasn't filed for a Big-D or said that it is over, just that she needs her space and time to think.

I just want a ray of hope that she can come around to seeing that I am fixing myself for her. I guess I'm just looking for other's experience with how long it took a hurt wife to open up to fixing the relationship. Weeks, Months, Years? It's hard to give her her space when I want her back so badly.

Thanks.

[bit1607]

wow that is a prime example of you want what you can't have. just don't do any of the begging and what not. your w will need sometime to cool down that is for sure. i would give her time and space and just keep working on yourself.

it is amazing how quickly someone can realize there feelings when someone walks away from them.

[Sailors_Girl]

Hi 30

First of all, I'd just like to say that while I dont condone A's, that it is a very admirable step in confronting this the way you seem to be...so I commend you on that...

Second of all, please dont feel judged here...we all make mistakes in life...but the first step is taking ownership of what has happened and giving yourself permission to move on from it...taking your head out of the sand so to speak and realizing what has happened.

Ok, now this may be the surprising bit for you at this point...but I am the W of a man who has had a PA...and is still living with the OW...and I want to save my marriage very much - I have forgiven my H and am wanting very much to move on with my life with him by my side, but for now I am living my life for me - my H's head is firmly in the sand, and he is dealing with things in his own way, so for now I am his friend and am here for him...guess that's the best way to put it...

BUT, what I will do for you, is give you the other side...and I hope it will help, I dont mean at any time to make you feel worse than you probably already do, so do know that ...but I can hopefully give you a little insight into the other side of the coin.

So I'll start from the top...

Nov 1-22: I had an affair with OW from work. Told my wife I was unhappy and wanted to leave her but was willing to work on it. Affair not revealed. Broke Wife's Heart #1.

If your W is anything like me, she probably could sense that there was more to it that you weren't telling her...sometimes in trying to protect the ones we love from something we know is going to hurt them, we actually cause them more pain...for me...and this is purely my own feelings in my own sitch...what hurt more were the words 'I love you, but am not in love with you anymore'...not that he had a PA.

Nov 28: Told wife I didn't think it would work and that I was leaving. Before conversation ended, I agreed again to stay and work on it. Affair Still not Revealed. Broke Wife's Heart #2.

Dec 14: Told OW it was over and that I wanted to work on my relationship with my wife and family. Admitted Affair to wife. Broke Wife's Heart #3.

Dec 15-Jan 3: Working in couples therapy, wife staying and working on fixing our relationship. I begin to stray back to OW because I thought I had feelings for her.

Jan 4: Told wife I couldn't commit to counseling because I had feelings for OW. Slept with OW next night and realized I didn't love her, and only loved my wife. Admitted to wife and told her I wanted her more than anything. Broke Wife's Heart #4.

Like I said, I would almost bet money on that your W knew that something was going on...not necessarily what was going on, but that there was something you weren't telling her...and if she is anything like me (and again I can only share my own personal experience, I am no expert and everyone handles things differently) she blamed herself and just wanted to make you happy again...

The good thing is that you do seem to have some kind of understanding of how hurt your W is...that is great. For alot of people who walk away from their R and M after A's they dont really consider the other persons feelings at all.

Now I am fully committed to working on me to correct my sex and love addiction through SLAA, working with therapist to correct and address my abandonment issues so that I won't do this again. Wife has said that she wants nothing to do with me except when it comes to the kids. She hasn't filed for a Big-D or said that it is over, just that she needs her space and time to think.

It is great that you have made steps towards making positive changes in you...but make sure that what you are doing is solution focussed and is going to help you right now.

And with the space thing...yeah, she will need it...maybe even alot of it - just some of the things I felt were anger (I cleared our house out of all our belongings and his bank account - I'm not proud of this, but I acted in anger), a deep hurt like I wasn't good enough, a sadness that no amount of tears could take away...that was then! not now!

This is alot for your W to take in, and more than anything right now you need to be able to give her this space.

I just want a ray of hope that she can come around to seeing that I am fixing myself for her. I guess I'm just looking for other's experience with how long it took a hurt wife to open up to fixing the relationship. Weeks, Months, Years? It's hard to give her her space when I want her back so badly.

Ok, well firstly with this, you need to want to make these changes for you...not for your W. The reason being, that if you make these changes for your W, they wont be real and permanent changes, you need to find the strength in you to do it for you. Another reason it needs to be for you is because to begin with any changes your W sees in you will just appear like empty promises...like she can't trust them...so if you make the changes for you, they will be lasting changes and eventually (we hope) your W will see that and start to trust in you again.

As for how long...how long is a piece of string? One thing to always keep in mind with this is that you are on your W's time frame...I'm sure your M did not break down overnight and so it is not going to be healed overnight either.

I think a really important thing right now is to show your W a huge amount of respect - she really does need this space.

So where to go from here...have you read DB or DR? If not, I would recommend either of them highly...I have found DR most helpful for my sitch, but either is a good start.

Anyway, if you want to read about my sitch, this is my story so far...

A Sailors heart...

MY SHINING STAR!!!

So I hope that I am able to give you that little ray of hope that you are looking for. For now, I will leave you with something someone dear to me always says to me when I am struggling...

Grant me the strength to accept the things I cannot change
The courage to change the things I can
and the wisdom to know the difference

You may have come across it, it is at least one version of the serenity prayer, but it holds alot of truth. You cannot change what has been, or right now that your W wants her space, but you can make changes in you (for you) and work on things you want to work on...and realize that true happiness is only found within...not through someone else...and realize that right now the only things you can change are things that you have control over...YOU.

I hope I have helped - you have made one positive step already by being here...this is one hell of a rollercoaster ride - so I hope you like thrill rides! but it is worth it if we are able to save our M, and if we can't we will all be better people for having taken this journey...

It is great that you want to make amends and to save your M, just remember this journey starts with YOU.

P.S. Oh and if you haven't already...you need to break ALL contact with the OW

[30andLost]

Thank you so much. I did do the begging thing at first, and that was hard to quit. The questions about what she was doing, who she was doing it with was hard. I found myself checking her cell phone records and e-mail, but what I found hurt more than it helped, plus it is a HUGE invasion of her space, so that is done. Hard to do, but I've got to be strong, for me, her, and the kids. We see each other almost everyday because of the kids and I'm helping to accomodate her work and school schedule so the "going dark" thing that I've read about is hard. Not even sure how to do it correctly. I was telling her ILY and IMY everytime I saw her, but my therapist tells me that I've got to make her miss me. I still try to do nice things for her if I can. Like this morning it is freezing here so I started the car for her and took her things out and put them in for her. No ILY or anything, just "good luck at school"; and not in a condecending way either just to be clear. I also cleaned up the backyard on my weekend at home with the kids, and she did notice and said "the yard looks good." I take that as hope because she DIDN'T say "don't try to help me you F-ing A-hole!"

I am working on me for me, because in the end, if she does leave me or file the Big-D, I will be all I have to make me happy (and the kids of course too, but I view them as almost seperate from our sitch).

Not looking forward to my SLAA meeting tonight, but maybe I'll learn something that can help me deal with my issues.

Another Q: Should I keep helping her, aside from the kids, when she asks? Or do I really force her to do things on her own since she wants to be separated?

Thanks for everything! Please keep helping, this was a huge boost.

[Celestialblue]

You may want to get yourself into therapy to work on why you lied and had the affairs to begin with..What makes you think that you would respond any differently were you back together?? You may think that wouldn't happen again, but I'm pretty sure there was a time when you thought it would never happen in your marriage.

Work on you for you and get to the root of your own behaviour before you try to get your wife back.

For what it is worth, trust takes a long time to get back in a relationship if at all, don't rush things.

[cat03]

Right now, her pain is still white hot, if she allows it validate her when and if she bring up R talk, tell her she is the one you want. Depending how she is dealign w/it, it will take a few months for the anger to subside. I know my anger/hurt would've died down had my H give me any consolation, had he made me feel constantly that I was the one he really wanted to be with.

Are you guys going to couples counceling? there must've been other issues why you distanced yourself from her enough to have an A.

Do keep being helpful, not doing anything will make her feel burdened and unappreciated it. Even if she doesn't say it (again, remember she is very hurt) she will feel taken care of if you do stuff around the house. The fact that she wants to be separated has to do w/her dealing w/the A.

[Sailors_Girl]

Hey 30

I am working on me for me, because in the end, if she does leave me or file the Big-D, I will be all I have to make me happy (and the kids of course too, but I view them as almost seperate from our sitch)

This is good to know...because ultimately your W has to want to work on the M, you can't make her. Re the kids, just remember that however old or young they are really perceptive to EVERYTHING, they see everything, hear everything and feel everything - make sure you are doing things with them too, so they still know you love them - really important.

Another Q: Should I keep helping her, aside from the kids, when she asks? Or do I really force her to do things on her own since she wants to be separated?

I think helping her is a good thing...especially if it is 180 for you (have you read about 180's yet?). As long as you are not grovelling at her feet every 5 seconds, if you know what I mean. BUT again you need to do these things because YOU want to do them, not because you think your W would want you to do them - because right now only your W knows what she is feeling...and well it's going to be a while before she trusts what she is seeing in you...oh and definitely no ILYs, when and if you say this all it is probably saying in your Ws head is "bla bla bla, whatever, if you loved me...", well I think you know where I'm heading with that - it is a reminder kind of thing...right now it just adds pressure on her, to how she is feeling and the way she is dealing with the A - again she needs this space.

I agree with something else that was said, and that is that you work on finding within yourself the reason you went outside your M. IF your W does eventually come around to wanting to work on the M, you will need to know the reasons behind it - not to try to justify it to her - but so that YOU know it wont happen again. And again, agreeing with what someone else said - that obviously there were issues in the M before the A - the M didn't break itself...

Anyway, keep posting and I will be of help to you where I can - perhaps you can give me some insight into my own sitch too...from the flip side of the coin?

[30andLost]

First, thank you for the replies. Everything is helpful.

The history, that a few of you have asked for, and the circumstances leading up to the A, go back 25 years for me. Before I ever loved any girl, except my mom. This is when she left my dad and I. She had an A and left my dad for the OM for good. She was completely out of our lives for anywhere between 3-6 months. I don't remember her being gone, but I remember the day she bent over and kissed me and said "Mommy's gotta go now." like it was yesterday, or early this morning even. So, the abandonment issues begin.

Next, friends at school were always tough for me. My therapist tells me it was probably because I was too needy due to my underlying abandonment issues.

Now at age 20, in love with W and we get married, she's 18 by only a few months and I'm in the Navy. We seem to have a great marriage, few bumps in the road but nothing major. I had always been insecure and jealous throughout the R but nothing too psycho.

Now age 28, my oldest son turns 5. Big emotional hick-up for me. Guess what I'm thinking is going to happen when my son is 5? His mommy is going to leave. I become obsessive to the point where I'm asking her about every guy she talks to and accusing her of not loving me at every other conversation. Constantly demanding sex and affection from her. I can't create a feeling of belonging in myself, and accept that she loves me, so I demand it from her. Throwing gas on the fire, she gets a new job a the hospital working swing shifts 5 nights a week, we never have time together and I continue to spiral into my own self-induced despair. I enter counseling because it is so bad, that I can now see what I am doing. I go to counseling to begin to address some of these issues but the counselor wasn't that good. He did teach me to own my insecurities and not to put them off on my wife. Things got better for just a bit, then she added a night class for nursing one one of our only two nights together. I felt like this was a step on my neck, and began to recoil into myself, and pursue someone who loved me, since my wife obviously (to me) didn't. I couldn't (and still can't- yet) self-soothe and that led me to need the affection of the OW at work.

There are multiple issues involved in the breakdown of our M. The most paramount are, my insecurities with myself, my fear of abandonment, and my need for acceptance from a woman. All of which I recognize, own, and am taking the steps to remedy. I am doing this for me and my boys and because I love my W enough that I don't want her to take the old me back, because I would just hurt her again, and she doesn't deserve that.

My therapist told me to ask my W if my helping while I'm at the house was invading her space. She said No it wasn't invading her space, so I'll continue to do small stuff, so she knows I'm out there, but I won't re-paint or anything so that she thinks I'm acting out of desperation. Also, because she's been asking me to paint the house now for years, and it will be blatently desperate.

Anyone ever read "Facing Love Addiction" by Pia Melody? I'm off to get that now. I can only learn...

Thanks Everyone!

[30andLost]

I can't tell her anything about my feelings now. She has said that she want's her space and not to talk about us. The wound is still too new. So I'm respecting that until she opens that door. I believe I'm trying to 'go dark' to the greatest extent possible.

And yes, if she asks again, the paint will be up the next day!

[30andLost]

I had a pretty tough day. I had to go over to the house at 6AM to take the kids to school because she had an early class and couldn't do it. I took them to school, then did some work from home. I'm working at home until they move me into another building away from the OW. I also did some things around the house, made her bed, did some laundry. I had a hard time seeing her undergarments and knowing that she is wearing the sexy stuff out. So after that my mood went WAY down. Crashing is the best way to describe it. When she came home she asked me to stay with the kids for a little while she went tanning. She's already told me that the tanning is to improve her self esteem, not to attract other men. I believe her, she has never given me a reason not to. My insecurities used to make stuff up in my head all of the time, but I'm getting control of those. They still take hold sometimes and are hard to shake, like today with the undergarments, but I'm working them hard.

So I was finally able to leave. I went on the advice of my therapist, and a sincere need to cheer myself up somehow, and joined a gym. Fitness 19, nice place no contract, and cheap which I need right now. I also need a place to fully exhaust my physical being when I get into a low place, and I really think this will help. This journaling helps too, but sometimes I need to pull in every self-soothing technique I have just to make it to bed time when I can take a Klonopin.

After the gym sign-up. I called the wife to make sure the $78 dollar fee for sign up was ok and asked her to put it on her Visa since our checking account is pretty low and they don't take my Discover. She was very nice and said she would so I believe that she really wants me to get the help I need so that she can feel safe coming back to me. That's my hope anyway.

I then again got extrememly low after talking to her and just fighting back the ILY urge with all of my might. I was able to keep it inside though. After the call I cried most of the way to my SLAA meeting. I really just need a hug too. From anyone it seems.

I was really anxious going into the SLAA meeting and before I opened the door I considered missing it. I went in though, and it turned out to be very good and uplifting. It gave me some perspective that I'm not that messed up, but I do have a disease in a sense and I have to work on curing myself, for the good of myself and my kids, and ultimately my wife. I am addicted to love and or sex. I used to use internet porn a lot and kicked that habit. But like one of the people in my group said, "When I was a coke-head, I kicked it, and picked up heroin." So I guess I kicked the porn habit for the A. Bottom line is I have a severe self-esteem deficiency that no amount of sex partners would ever be able to fill. I have to love myself, and I think I can get there.

I left the meeting with a sponsor phone contact as another source for when I start crashing. I also felt that even though I'm not sure I'm a sex/love addict, I don't want to deny that possibility either. I think I am, more love than sex, but in talking with the group I can see where my past behavior was sex addict like and demeaning to women. I also left the meeting with a strong conviction that I can beat this, and keep it from interfereing in any other R I have in the future. Hopefully a new one with my W, but if that can't happen, I'll be confident in myself so that I don't screw up another persons life that I truly love.

Goodnight all. You've already been a tremendous help!

Keep writing. The personal attention is extremely appreciated.