Wife in Major MLC...Looking to Vent

[Jack_Three_Beans]

Good morning,

I hope that the way you post here is only here. I am no stranger to sarcasm, and understand its place when venting here. What I hope is that your sarcasm is not flavoring your validations with her. Something to keep in mind while you do this.

It took me a minute to digest this, but then I realized how I broke her heart: by confronting her over her EA several weeks ago. Apparently, expressing my discomfort over her "friendship" was enough to break her heart. Okay, fine. But if that "breaks her heart", doesn't that make it more than a friendship?

Bomb,

You want a classic example of not communicating?

Print the above quote out and paste it somewhere.

Now, point in fact I am only going off of what you wrote. But I can only do that here, right?

You have this perfect opportunity:

Finally, after a long pause, she looks at me straight in the eye and says:

"You broke my heart."
"And I don't know if it can be fixed."

But rather than asking, "How did I do that?"

You make the asssumption of what you did.

Not rising to her bait, I am amazed at your calm, but not so much with the assumptions.

Are you right? Probably, hell man I am not there. But you didn't ask. You really don't know what she is thinking.

You should have asked.

We stare at each other. Finally, she gets noticeably irritated at my refusal to jump into the hole with her and says "TALK!"

Me: "I think these would all be good things to bring up at MC tomorrow."

We say No R talks here. What we should say is YOU don't bring up the R talks.

I made a deal with my wife when we started talking again.

"I'm not going to say anything on purpose to hurt you, if somethiing can be taken the wrong way, please think about it first, and understand that I am trying to talk very carefully and not offensively, maybe we can both do that, and maybe we can both actually hear and listen to what we are saying to each other."


I hope MC goes well for you.

[bombardier50]

Jack,
I hear you...but I'm still glad I didn't feed the beast. Right now, in her fog, talking about the relationship leads to an endlessly circular argument that quickly spirals downward into cesspool of anger. I'm not going there.

MC went very well...OK...maybe not so well for her. But I felt a heck of a lot better after the session.

Last night she came home from work and the first thing she wanted to do was engage me in an argument...again. So I told her that I WILL NOT talk about the relationship tonight. I told her we can talk about her day, the weather, the beautiful sunset I photographed, our grandkids, the price of gas, baseball...anything she wants BUT the relationship.

And it worked. For the first time in months, we spent half an hour just talking to each other about her day and my day. And we both went to bed and said a pleasant goodnight to each other.

[sleeper]

Hi bomb,

If I may ask, what was it about MC that didn't go "well for her?"

If talking about the relationship leads to a downward spiral of anger maybe it would be good to agree to have discussions about the relationship at MC where there is a neutral third party to mediate the sitch. Your MC might help both of you by giving you pointers on how to communicate with one another. Eventually you would be able to have R discussions without mediation.

I can relate to not wanting to talk R at home because shortly after W and I seperated we could not have a conversation without it escalating into WW3, WW4, WW5, etc. (you get the picture). I actually got so tired of the fighting I told her I did not even want to speak to her without a third party (MC) present. This was in part because she was in the anger stage and it was all coming out. MC told us we needed to face the anger and let it be vented, that trying to avoid it would only prolong things. Like a face the wind kinda thing.

Do you think your W needs to vent for a while? Is she the kind of person who holds things in for a long time and now it's coming out? My W is that way. I had no idea how much or how long she had been holding things in.

Also, I'm glad you had a more pleasant evening.

[bombardier50]

Sleep,

First, about the MC. As someone warned me, she might just go into MC and completely unload. Boy...did she ever. It was like watching a garbage truck dump its load in the middle of the freeway. We weren't ten minutes into the session when she described her "frienship" (EA) in vivid detail. I sat there completely amazed at the depth of her revelations.

After several minutes of "spew", the MC gently but firmly informed her that she was, in fact, having an EA and that it was damaging our marriage. And she also gently, but firmly informed her that it is NOT normal to not have sex, or any sort of physical affection, for several months, regardless of how long you've been married.

In other words, we weren't even 20 minutes into the session and the MC had the situation pegged.

At one point, I confessed that I had started this ball rolling by not being as emotionally available as I should have been, and that I had taken our relationship for granted, that I had become lazy and had not made an effort to maintain the emotional connection between us. I believe that to be true.

My wife was quiet and subdued when we left. Later, she told me that right after our session, she called the OM to tell him how it went. Talk about being in a fog...

Sleeper, I did tell her last night that I didn't want to talk about R unless we were in front of the MC. We made "nice" that evening, as described. Then, this morning, before I had even poured my coffee, she launched a merciless attack on me. She is one angry Klingon.

Yes, like your wife, she is a champion at holding grudges.

And now, here I am, talking to you fine people, and she was supposed to be home from work three hours ago.

And so it goes...

[Drew]

Bomb,

Hang in there. You have my FULL support.

Drew

[sleeper]

Bomb,

It's amazing how many similarities there are between many of these mlcers. I have even read some material on people being predispositioned for it by early life experiences (abuse, abandonment, unstable family). My wife experienced all three.

Like yours, My W had no problem or guilt talking about OM to me. It was really weird. I think it reflects their brokeness in a way. It's like they're shattered psychologically, still connected and intimate with us, but at the same time connected to this OM. Their total self-centeredness prevents them from even considering our feelings in the matter, that we might be hurt by them revealing details of their relationship with OM to us. It's another sign that something ain't right with them.(I apologize for my coloquil ideomatic phrasing)

Hang in there man, you're doing great! You will reach a point where instead of an emotional reaction to what is going on, you'll just step back and shake your head at the whole situation. Then one day you'll even be able to laugh at the stuff that happens and the sheer lunacy of it all. I kid you not.

By the way, don't laugh in front of them or on the phone with them. It really p*ss*s them off, almost as bad as calling a Klingon a coward.

You're doing better than I did in the beginning. When I suggested we not talk (at all) unless before a counselor I was reamed and labeled "passive aggressive" by my W.

[junior]

This is my first post but after reading your posts Bombardier I just wanted to wish you the best of luck. I just recently found this site and have been reading many stories trying to find some people who are going thru the same thing as I. While our stories are different I think the pain is similar.

[bombardier50]

Junior, sorry to hear of your pain. This is a good place to come when you hurt. Hang in there buddy.

Drew... Thanks man. You're my hero.

Sleeper, talk about self-centered. With my Klingon, it's all about me, me, me. She does not have any respect for the relationship, and has no regard for how her actions hurt others or reflect on her. Classic MLC.

The Klingon tried to drag me into an argument last night about the MC session. She was attempting to justify her warped behavior, and I noticed that she expressed a certain amount of derision for the MC that she selected. So honestly, I'm not sure how much longer she'll be going. And as far as memory is concerned: I don't know what counseling session SHE attended, but it wasn't the session I was in.

By the way, OM had the balls to write me a lengthy email chastising me for implying that my wife was having an EA with him during MC. It was priceless. I'm saving that one. This guy's a real piece of work. I won't be responding or communicating with him in any way, shape, or form. I'm not swimming in that cesspool...I'm going to rise above.

[Gman3388]

Bomb,
Keep your chin up during this fight.
Keep all power to shields and have extra damage control parties on call.
Your doing great! Watch those Romulan OM bastards....they don't fight fair.
Your in my prayers.
G

[sleeper]

Morning Bomb,

There are two schools of thought on the OM; One is to ignore the OM and the affair, the other is to take all possible action to break up affair.

My C advised taking no action against OM, saying W was the key to the situation, OM was simply a symptom of a greater problem. I took his advice and have done nothing to break them up or interfere. I did read up on affairs and learned that they are creatures of fantasy powered by lust(an unsustainable emotion), usually last from 1-2 years, rarely result in marriage and when they do result in a divorce rate over 85%.

I some times wish I had taken steps to end affair as I never dreamed it would last this long (1 yr and counting). Hindsight is always 20/20. There is a website called marraigebuilders that has resources in detail about ending the affair. Exposure to anyone who would frown on it (spouses, family, employer, pastor) are the main thrust of exposure.

OM's denial is par for the course. My W's OM said he was, "just being a friend," when I confronted him early on. That friend has been boinking my W for over a year now. There is some degree of dysfunction and denial going on in the minds of OM too. W's OM has told his friends he is "not doing anything wrong" and became very upset when a mutual friend of W and me commented that my W left me for him. In his mind our marraige was already over before he came along. I don't know how much of this was from W's convincing and how much was self deception on his part.

How you decide to respond to OM is a very personal call. Take comfort in the fact that he is also screwed up or wouldn't be involved with your W. Healthy people aren't involved in affairs.