Glad you found Joe's threads helpful. He is really quite a guy. He and I started on this board about the same time, and I think we really helped pull each other through some very tough times. I know he's formed some really lasting friendships with folks here. He is a very dedicated, faithful man and a real inspiration.
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...but my W took a short-bus to crazy-ville.
I'm assuming that this was clinically diagnosed? Is she receiving any treatment for it? You might want to track down kml (aka Ellie) on the board. She's an MD and has been extremely helpful for folks in this community on medically-related mental health issues.
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The large question is this: How do you talk about "issues" outside of MC without setting off a fire storm? Any tribal elder wisdom here would be much appreciated.
To be blunt, if you are still getting this kind of a reaction, then she's not ready to hear it. So, I'd just flat out stop until she's ready.
I have to admit that H2B was exceptional in this area when we reconciled. Shortly after we reconciled, I found out he'd had a PA. I'd suspected it during R1, but he'd make me feel guilty for accusing him. Once it was out in the open, I think he kinda new he had to "pay the piper" so to speak. I didn't beat him up over it, but we just talked about it so I could understand why it happened. Once he let me process it, it was in the past. Whatever is in the past can stay there. You can't drag it into the present. Now that H2B I are in both in much healthier places, we rarely disagree. And when we do, it's short and much more low key. We've also developed a lexicon for talking about really hard stuff -- it was H2B's idea. If one of us has something touchy to talk about, we ask the other to "put on their armor". This gives the other person a brief moment to detach and get in a good place to listen objectively. While we rarely use this technique these days, we both know we still have it. Also, if the other person isn't ready or can't get to a detached place, then they can say something like, "I'm sorry, H2B, but I sent my armor to the cleaners and it's not back yet. Can this wait till tomorrow when I can pick it up?" It's a way to buy some more time to get to the place of objective listening. This worked really well for us when we both needed to process things in the initial stages of our reconciliation.
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...we both put our wedding rings back on!
Chris, this is HUGE, man! HUGE, I tell you! I can't tell you the number of times I've read on this board, "I just wish H/W/S would put their wedding ring back on...it hurts so much that they won't wear it." Bravo, dude, bravo!!!
Bravo, dude, bravo!!!
