Finding DB late in the game #4

[cw68]

You have to stop thinking what would happen if the positions were reversed. They aren't and they won't be. Should have warned you that a 2x4 was coming, sorry! But you have to stop imagining him thinking the way you think he should be thinking. He's not thinking that way and all the wishing in the world won't change that. You have to play by a different set of rules. It's wrong, it's cruel and unjust, but it IS. Trust me when I say you'll feel better once you grasp this for real. It doesn't make it hurt less, but it does make you feel better.

H and I just got off of the phone. Good conversation and I know I really am detaching. My email was a good move. I felt very relieved after sending it and H was receptive. He specifically mentioned an analogy that I wrote. H is very in shape and treats his body very well. Here is what I wrote that spoke to him:

"After having some mental breathing room the last month or so, our situation is once again pervading every thought of mine and it’s exhausting. As I undress to get into the shower, I look at my “new” body, toned and getting tight and with my movements I feel the results of yesterday’s yoga. Then my mind turns that into relationship thinking and comparing the two. I treated my relationship like I used to treat my body. My body before was OK. Naturally on the slimmer side, I was OK with it, inherently comfortable with it, but definitely not proactive in making it the best it could be. Like my body, for better or worse, I just assumed my relationship would always be there. I didn’t abuse my body, but I didn’t exactly treat it well. Then I decided that I didn’t like it mostly because I knew that wasn’t my body’s potential.

Now I make the effort to treat it well and work it, making it become all it can be. The workouts are sometimes boring, sometimes tough, sometimes painful and difficult and at first I didn’t really want to do it. Now that I see the efforts and like what I see, how I feel, I look forward to exercising. The soreness doesn’t bother me, instead it’s a reminder of the muscle growth going on in this old body of mine. It’s a small badge of honor that I can do this and I can look like this in the face of turning forty years old. Now I can take a simple act of bending over and make it work my muscles, that the little things like lifting my kneecaps works my thighs, making them stronger, making me stronger. Now I look forward to whatever it is that I’ve decided to do and my options just keep expanding, each and every one improving me in the process. And the body that I didn’t really like before but just accepted, I now LOVE. All of this can be relevant to a relationship, too."

Then he said as much as part of him really doesn't want to be back in our marriage, another part understood where I was coming from in terms of the kids and that he is especially sad when thinking about where our relationship is right now, how low we are. That he's really been thinking a lot in the past couple of days.

I brought up creating more space between us, letting him experience the void of losing me and our family, told him I wondered if he needed to experience that. If he needed to see how his kids would act in the face of not seeing both of their parents often, what exactly that would do to them. He said that he didn't, that he's been trying to be more independent the past few weeks because of this and because of his travel. I found this interesting because I'm not seeing him being more independent, in fact I would say the opposite. In the end he said that, no, he didn't need to see that.

Here's where I really got to db well. I told him that I understood his fears about coming back to our marriage, but that that marriage was dead. That even though I wasn't unhappy like him, I don't want that marriage back either. That we could have a much different, much better marriage. Looking at how well we still get along, and as he had just said a few minutes before, and neither one of us hates the other or anything, that I believe it is possible for us to make a successful marriage.

Then here's where I didn't db quite as well. I asked him what his biggest fear was about returning. He avoided the question with things like, "I don't know if I can say any one thing bothers me the most." and I changed it to be one thing that really worries him and he finally said that he was worried that he'd be unhappy with how the two of us relate. I told him I understood and that I just proved his point a little with browbeating him to answer. He laughed and said it wasn't that bad.

In the end it was a good conversation and I didn't cry one single time. Importantly, I didn't feel like crying one single time. In the interest of assuring him, I told him it wasn't like I was expecting him to give me an answer right now, that I know this road we are one is still going to be longer, regardless of where it brings us. But I did say that if we could both treat our relationship like I've been treating my body, we could have a successful marriage.

This is good stuff. I feel a million times better and I'm glad that the letter that kept me from going off the edge didn't put him over it. I'm seeing changes in his thinking from "we are broken and not worth fixing" to "There's a small fleeting chance for us" to "I don't know if I can come back to this marriage" to this response. For the very first time he verbalized that he completely understood my viewpoint and agreed with parts of it.

Will he be able to be in the place that allows him to come back? Who knows, but I know I'm in a much better place. I'm calm, I'm cool and I really am OK. Things eight months ago, heck four months ago, I never would have thought I could be.