I wanted to ask for thoughts on any successes that worked their way out of extremely complex situations.
My wife lives with me and wears her rings and eats and shops out of our joint checking account. We have two children we raise together. She is in full-blown MLC, including mood swings and an affair. She has completely disconnected from me except for contempt and sarcasm, though with the occasional routine pleasantries and a goodnight kiss in our bed.
She is "in love" with my son's soccer coach, who is divorced and has two sons of his own. He is a classic OM, in that he is underemployed and she feels important helping him, loaning him $, taking care of things he can't do as a single dad. His kids and mine are the same age and my wife no doubt believes she can get an additional dose of "Mommy" love by doting on them. In short, she has two families, neither of them real.
If my wife and I were to reconcile, two kids would lose a "mother figure"; if she takes off with the OM then my kids lose their family and gain a very strange new one: my son's coach and his two kids, with their father alienated. Has anyone ever come out of such a strange soap opera with an intact marriage?
The first thing you should do is be sure to read the Divorce Remedy book by MWD, Divorce Busting is also an excellent book.
Sorry you are here but you will meet some wonderful people here and get some great advice.
You may be on moderation now, post in small frequent replies and stay on this thread until you reach 100 posts (for your thread, you can also post on other peoples threads to give support)
I have read a good deal of books on the subject and can give you some suggestions when you are ready.
Take the parts of this advice that you need and don't worry if I have repeated something that you have already done.
I will give you a bunch of homework assignments to read. This is my ultra brand new and improved list of link
Now you have all the tools to read. Let us know how your doing and if you have any questions.
I suggest that you read the entire thread in the resources. You can also pick out some people and read their whole story.
The stages of MLC as rewritten by HB from Jim Conway are a template which can only be laid over an MLCer's experience retrospectively. It's impossible to see the pattern until it has finished being laid or the crisis is complete.(nickel Cyrena). So do not be too concerned where your MLC'er is in this process. (Although my general guess is that they are in REPLAY)
Depression is the key to the whole thing and it is always present!
Believe none of what she says and 50% of what she does.
I would not ask her anything unless you can have no expectations. Sometimes asking them questions will be thought of as pressure. You do not want to do anything that can be thought of by your W as controlling or pressure.
Lets not worry about her. Lets work on you! Start your homework assignments. Something to DO while you are on moderation. GAL. Eat, sleep and take a deep breath. In general take care of your self first. Detach the single most important thing to DO.
Your W has given you a gift THE GIFT OF TIME use it wisely
If my wife and I were to reconcile, two kids would lose a "mother figure"; if she takes off with the OM then my kids lose their family and gain a very strange new one: my son's coach and his two kids, with their father alienated. Has anyone ever come out of such a strange soap opera with an intact marriage?
1st I am so Sorry your in this situation buddy it is the hardest thing but we are in the ring with you - keep punching !!!
I can tell you one thing I thought I was special - that this was only happening to me - but you will see that we are not that special - this happens to a lot of people. You will see here some sitches are worse than yours and some are not as bad - One thing is true this is much more common than I ever thought !!
The 1st thing I will tell you is you must take care of yourself and your children.
If you are like I am/was it feels like your guts are getting torn out - you might not be eating and not sleeping go well - thinking of your wife making love to someone else is gut wrenching - STOP - BREATH - EAT and SLEEP.
Post here frequently and LISTEN to what the vets tell you !!!
Cadet gave you much essential reading get it done - Knowledge is power - after you read YOU will know what is going on BUT YOUR WIFE WON'T !!!
Cadet says "DETACHMENT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING TO DO - she is right I am going to post something that Peanut originally posted on Detachment it will save you a lot of pain and time if you follow it:
Detachment Detachment is critical to the process of altering and repairing a relationship.
Attached, we take personally all that is said, not said, done and not done. Our ego gets wounded and we say or do things that undermine our goals.
We can NOT control the actions of another. We are, however, responsible for our own actions. We are responsible for our own happiness.
If we are detached from the actions of another, we can meet anger or indifference with love.
Met with love, we are in a position to diffuse the situation and transform it in a way that will be in alignment with our goals. On the flipside, detachment allows us to play it cool when we do get a positive reaction from our spouse. It is a way to break the distance/pursuer cycle.
Detachment is not withdrawal. It is not the mind saying, "I am not getting what I want so I must pull back." It is the natural acceptance of the reality that "I am alone responsible for how I act. I cannot control another person, but I can control how I respond to them."
Best of luck we will all be pulling for you !!
Sunny
If someone decides there is no goodness in you they won't be able to see it. I'll take a BLT over a MLC anyday !!!
No ego....I get it, you feel totally walked all over. Yet you are hanging in there, wanting to find out if you can give DB a shot and there is chance of success.
Read on, my friend. If success if measured by marriages restored, yes, there are a few here. Mine was, and I would say DB really helped. But that is not what we really think of as success. Its really being able to get to that place were YOU are better.... with or without your spouse. Keep on reading and posting.....
About strange situations, yes, there are tons of those. every kind of weirdness.
Me:49 H:45 D:12 M:14 T:18 Bomb: 6/26/10 EA: 9/3/10, fizzled out slowly, now ??? 11/5/11 Retrouvaille Finally piecing.... Its peaceful at last, but we got a looong way to go
