You want her to be supportive but when she tries in a way she can you push her away.
Hi saffie, thanks for your post. Now, let me give you some feedback from a 'seasoned' DBer who has been through the entire experience once before. Hopefully this will be enlightening.
She's in an EA, she's shut ME out, TOLD me she doesn't want to be my wife, but expects me to be there for her and to let her have her cake and eat it too. She can do 'nice' things for me and I will just be her friend and it will all go the way she has planned. She's 'free', I get my strength back and all is peachy keen.
Been there, done that. I 'endured' a physical 'he is my soulmate' affair 2 years ago and was 'nice nice' and allowed her to have me be her 'friend' and he was her 'lover'. She even wrote him an E_mail saying "This is weird, I have a lover named (OM) and an soon to be ex husband who is trying to be my friend. Who would have thought..."
Maybe you might get some more insight from this post of mine from 2 years ago, after I had done all the 'nice' stuff: Pushing the Baby Bird from the nest
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As for the dance classes I agree with Sara - too many of my friends who are married have gone alone and have been swept of their feet by others at their dance classes and it has destroyed their M's.
My marriage is already 'destroyed'. She is having an EA with a married man whom she met on a trip that I TRUSTED her to go on.
I tolerated / endured that 2 years ago while she was planning her escape from me. I had no idea if she would come back to the marriage and suffered to save HER from her bad decisions. Even though at the time it was the right thing to do, it was not healthy for ME.
She hasn't done anything about the dance class so far, and if she does I will not participate. Life is not 'normal' any more. She has to face the consequences of this decision to leave the marriage.
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Having said that, I think you seem to be doing a pretty good job of doing that to your own M by yourself Frank. I am sorry to hit you with a 2x4 but to me you sound like a petulant child enjoying being difficult.
Do I? I don't think so. I'm a MAN who has chosen not to allow his soon to be ex wife (her words) to do things that relieve her guilt for "Not being able to make her marriage work" and "not being able to keep her vows". I will not 'enable' her.
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I know you are hurting but you really don't help yourself. Why not tell her to get out now and save yourself the pain and aggro of the next few months?
I would, except that it would be financially worse right now, and the kids lives would be disrupted much more than they are now. I need more time to build up my financial and emotional strength. I think about it a lot though, it would be a lot easier if I didn't have to see her every day and be reminded about her ability to run away instead of fight FOR ME, her ability to only run away when she sees there might be someone else she can run to.
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You go from massive ego to self pity in the same breath.
There's no ego or self pity in that post. It's ME taking care of MYSELF. You're off base.
Here's a quote from AmyC 3/7/06
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You need to get your focus OFF of HER and back ONTO your GROWTH. You can't help her, really.
You are THE consummate "fixer". Rein it back in, Frank.
You can do this.
and the actual series of posts is HERE I 'forgot' the lesson. I got lost in my crap because I did NOT listen to AmyC and others and KEPT FIXING.
This is DETACHMENT. That means I live my life for me, and I shut her OUT so she can FEEL what life without me is like, which includes rejecting her attempts to 'act normal' with me. Our life is no longer 'normal'. She has chosen to leave the marriage and also to pursue a married man who 'loves his wife'. That's code for "He won't leave her for me". But that won't stop him from having a mistress, and it won't stop her from trying.
I will not reward that kind of behavior. I will take care of myself.
