Success! WAW isnt gonna walk!

[EnergyAZ]

It has been a very long 6 months with highs and lows. But it would appear W and I are on the road to reconcilliation!

Wife finally seems to have come back around to the idea of saving this marriage, still fairly guarded, however she seems 'back', she is playful, sweet, flirtatious and FUN. She seems very excited and has frequently been discussing the future in very optimistic ways.

I am friggin estatic!!






Now what?

I can only imagine that this phase is going to be another long road with its ups and downs as well.

After going through the past 6 months, I have no desire to lose any ground.

Please share the 'piecing' rules of thumb. From my perspective I feel like its honeymoon all over again, but I do not want to come on too hot & heavy and I think I have been doing that. She seems to be understanding, & is accepting of my blissful joy and affection, however I do not want to irratate her.

My greatest concern is me falling into complacency and reverting into old bad habits.

My 2nd thing is, well, there is quite a lot of hurt I went through over the past 6 months and for the most part, I have had little choice but to supress it. I do feel I have forgiven her because I do honestly believe I understand exactly how/what happened and the roles I played in that. But in the same light, how can I be sure these supressed feelings of hurt do not fester?

When is it 'safe' to discuss these feelings with her? The last 6 months have been so heavy that all I really want to do now is enjoy things. And the last thing I want to do now is turn her off.

So any advice from people that have been 'piecing' for more than say...2 days, is well appreciated!

Thanks!

[saffie]

I think that when you get to piecing it is quite common for all the hurt to start coming to the front. Everyone has to deal with it differently. I read a lot about infidelity and healing from it. There are some great books out there, and some you can share so that your S can understand what you are going through.

Really you need to play this by ear....as each S can react differently. My H was luckily very open about everything and would talk to me about it all....others are so ashamed that they just want to sweep everything under the carpet and forget about it all. There are no firm rights or wrongs.

What ever though, you both need to be open and honest and 100% transparent in your dealings with one another, and others. No walking on eggshells....no changing your true feelings just to suit your S. Obviously that doesn't mean don't be diplomatic and take each other's needs into consideration etc. Focus on the future and always try to have something nice planned for the future.

I think you will find you have this 'honeymoon' period and then things may well backslide. Just remember not to fall back into old bad habits - have a date night once a week or so....do things to keep the R fresh and fun. There will be ups and downs...but that's life.

Good luck. I honestly believe that what you do in piecing is really the template for the rest of your M.

[minkerman]

Saffie is 100% correct. DO NOT come on too strong. Remember the chameleon effect...when things go really well, the next hour or the next day she will pull away. You need to be the confident, happy, CONSISTENT man she originally fell in love with. Even when things are weird. Consistent, that's the key.

There will be times when you're sure she's reconsidering. Times when you're thinking "she's thinking she made a mistake". Shake it off. Be in for the long haul, because that's what it takes from your end.

'Falling back into old patterns' will be her #1 fear, so it should be yours too.

Forget the past, deal with today and get to work!

[Concerned_Listener]

Energy,
Keep working on your happiness. Your happiness is not dependent on your W or your marriage. This means make it a daily effort to cultivate your mind in positive ways. It means to be aware of the ways you hold onto negative thinking. It means to work on having joy in your life and doing something that you love, and where you can lose yourself, and be engaged with life. It means learning to lessen reactivity to the injustices of daily life.

What I'm doing is writing poetry, and dancing. Dancing gives me a skill to connect with others, and to be out in the world. It allows me to work on being less inhibited. Poetry gives me private space to articulate thoughts and feelings.

I've been dancing for three years, and writing for one year. I would not be in Piecing if I wasn't engaged in these activities or something similar.

CL

[DiDi]

Energy,

I read in one of your first posts that you were going to take a dancing class so you could dance with your wife... did you get a chance to do that yet?

Saffie said it brilliantly--
"what you do in piecing is really the template for the rest of your marriage."

Your wife has had a lot of mood swings since New Year's Eve. Make sure you look carefully at what actions may have preceded them and actions/events that made her want to reconcile.

Reread the posts above, they all have seriously valuable information in them. Take it slow, guage your W's readiness to talk and don't sweep it under the rug.

On the other hand, you need to check your anger and resentment and express your feelings in a constructive manner. What I mean is, if you told her you want to work this out and spent these 6 months treating her like your best friend, be careful that you don't suddenly expect her to be able to deal with the fall out all at once. You were DB-ing and treating her like your best friend because it was a change you made for YOU, right?

I also read that you had to stop going to your MC. I seem to remember that you felt it really helped while you were going. At the time you had to quit it seems that your W wasn't into working on your M and MC probably wasn't that necessary but some find that it really helps with piecing. Maybe this would be a safe place to discuss those hurt feelings you are concerned will fester? I guess I'd ask what telling her how hurt you've been would accomplish for you? Is there something she can do to fix this? Are you asking for remorse? You don't have to answer to us, just think about what you say and what you want to accomplish before it comes spewing out in a destructive way.

Best of Luck!

[EnergyAZ]

Hello everyone & thank you for the thoughtful replies!

Without creating a quote-crazy post...here it goes.

1.) As of right now, wife is very sweet and seems to be moving forward in general. Lots of talk of booking a family vacation soon. Quite a bit of talk about resuming the plan to expand our family. Seems very pleased with the improvements I made for myself. (as am I) There is almost NO relationship talk at all, just moving forward as if nothing happened. Obviously there is no denial from either of us about the past 6 months, but she seems more content to talk & plan for the near future for now. The last 6 months have been hard on us both so I dont mind not talking about heavy issues at the moment.

2.) She was having an online EA with an old boyfriend who lives out of state. I believe what most convinced her of my changes/improvements was how I handled myself both towards her as well as in the letter I wrote to OM once I discovered the EA. I really took the high road in my reaction. She seemed to respond especially well as I forgave her almost immediately and was not a jerk at all. Yes, this still hurts me, and we have not discussed it since. But it was a clear turning point for the better IMO.

3.) We have identified a new MC we would like to schedule visits with and I will likely bring up some of my concerns during these sessions.

4.) The only thing she is worried about (from what I can tell) is me falling back into former poor behavior. Otherwise she seems delighted with my personal progress and is very receptive to spending time together and developing new interests.


I noticed I was coming on hot & heavy and while she is being very sweet about it, I could sense it was a little overwhelming for her at times. I have since backed down a little, but I have always been very forward in my desire for her over the years and it would seem odd to her if it stopped completely. She loves my enthousiasm towards her, our relationship, and our plans for the future

For the most part, things are like the 'good ol days' with one exception: she is no where near as forward with her affection for me as she once was. But she is far more affectionate than she has been over the last 6 months. I do believe (hope) this will slowly increase as she becomes more and more confident that my positive changes are permanent. This seems pretty normal to me considering the circumstances and I am not in a huge rush to see things improve here. We actually seem to have a sex life again, and regularly have been sleeping in the same bed, so I am not gonna nit pick here!

Its only been about a week since things started on the ups, but its been very good and I do believe as long as I continue being the person I am now vs. the person that pushed her away - we are gonna be OK.

Dont want to take anything for granted, but things seem very positive right about now

:-)



PS - I thought about what my objective was in sharing my hurt with her, and I came to the conclusion its pretty pointless. Gonna let water pass under the bridge rather than rub each other's noses in the past. There is almost nothing good that would come from it. Just forgive & forget and happily move on.

[sooners7xchamps]

Hey Energy I am going to read your post here, but I have to leave for a bit. I will check it out when I get back, but do me a favor and read my latest post a few min. ago and see what ya think.

[DiDi]

You wrote: "PS - I thought about what my objective was in sharing my hurt with her, and I came to the conclusion its pretty pointless. Gonna let water pass under the bridge rather than rub each other's noses in the past. There is almost nothing good that would come from it. Just forgive & forget and happily move on."

Glad things are going so well!

The thing is-- at some point you will be able to discuss everything if you give yourself the chance. Over time. You'll know. I once teased my husband that I'm going to hit him over the head with my cane when we're in our 90's for all "he put *us* through".

Many times, although I have "questions" -- the whys, etc.-- I just don't want to ruin a great moment by bring the OP into *our* moment. I can't give more power to OP than they ever had by pretending that she was anything more than a symtom of a sickness in our M. It's making sure he doesn't lose the belief in me and our M again that I'm going for.

When I took responsibility for my part in damaging our marriage, I was sincere. I can see you are also. If we can learn from this and never take our M for granted again, I really believe we can be happier than those who never face challenges at all.

[EnergyAZ]

I agree 100% Deauxlie. I dont want to ruin this positive momentum by bringing up the past. We are moving forward so there is no sense in looking behind. In hindsight, this needed to happen. Like you, I am growing pretty confident our marriage has passed this 'test' and we are going to be stronger for it.

I share the same concern; making sure she doesnt lose the belief in me and our marriage. But that seems to be up to us...and what more evidence do we need to see that our efforts have paid off? Its very motivating!

[EnergyAZ]

I think you will find you have this 'honeymoon' period and then things may well backslide.

And things have backslid. We have been having an awesome summer and we booked our family vacation, a cruise along the Mexican Riveria. It was to be a grand celebration - to reconnect & rekindle as well as to celebrate the fact we both got great new jobs. We leave on this cruise in a little over a week. We hosted a pool/BBQ party, we did day trips, family fun days, dates, it was great - it was honeymoon!

2 days ago, she backslid back to where she was last spring...aka no energy to invest in our marriage, no interest in our relationship, ILUBNILWU, you deserve better, etc

And as she backslid, so did I - back into that blubbering clingy fool who cant stop talking about the R and what the hell happened after everything had been progressing so well.

So here we are, 1 week removed from the cruise. She now wants to treat it as a final special memory of our family for our son, rather than the original motive for the trip; the celebration of our new lives together

I had barely begun to heal when these wounds were ripped open again.

I feel like I am back to square 1. I am so frustrated and dont know what to do. So I am back here again, refreshing my mind on the strategies that helped me get this far.

Now I need some suggestions from folks who did have a backslide, and how they handled it. Just treat it like the original bomb and start all over again? Or is there hope this backslide could reverse itself as quickly as it came in?