Ellie--I think you are wonderful. I think you offer straight advice and help people refocus their energy on themselves. And yes, hope is a good thing but all too often what I see is a fixation that centers on that shred of hope. What difference does it make if they may come back? Or if they regret it later? Or if there are examples of the craziest MLCer coming back to his senses? None of that makes a beans worth of difference in terms of the direction we must head and that is in the direction of self reliance and independence. I am not disagreeing with what you said, just clarifying my position more.
If your spouse is gone and telling you there is no hope and they want a divorce--BELIEVE it and do what you have to do to become independent. Telling someone to only believe half of what they do and none of what they say or whatever that expression is (?) is damaging and, IMO, counterproductive. It prevents us from taking a good hard look at ourselves and puts us in the mindset of a victim. Not only that, we are invalidating their experience. MLC or not, standardized symptoms or not, it is a REAL experience for them and their feeling about us and the marriage are REAL.
Detaching, getting a life and forgiving are the most important things to do in my opinion. Learning techniques for non-violent communication are key and a lot of the people I started with (IamTJ, Xue come to mind) really helped with that. Doing those things in a way that is empathetic to them is fine--if calling it a mid life crisis helps you empathize, fine. Moving forward and allowing for the possibility of things to change in the future is also fine--if that includes dating, I see nothing wrong with it--only if that is what YOU want to do and you are not doing it to get back or make someone jealous. But move forward we must. If the relationship is going to be reincarnated some day then that will happen whether a divorce has taken place, whether new relationships have come and gone and whether years have passed. If it is meant to be it will happen. The important thing is that we get on with our lives.
Listen, you know as well as anyone here I have LOVED making fun of Mitch and the leather clad one. But too much of that turns into an obsession and I know we don't want to breed an atmosphere of obsession here. We are only human. We need to vent, cry, analyze, etc.
I don't think it's about being in the divorced forum Ellie, I think it's about seeing people I started here with still cycling through horrible depression and feeling that the advice they are being offered is only going to help them remain stuck in that place of pain. I know we have to move through this grief at our own pace and in the beginning we really do need to believe there is hope for our marriages but after years of refusing to accept that the marriage is over and refusing to accept that the WAS's reality is indeed their reality (and is just as valid as our "reality) and continuing to wonder if they are "in the tunnel" yet, well, who is the one not living in reality anymore?
I would never post this in Newcomers--that is a differnt animal all together. I found my way to where I did through the help of people like you Ellie. You had a fabulous balance between tough love, humor and hope and I loved that. You are wise and I value your friendship on these boards SO much.
