Hi Lee,
I know you're probably getting sick with hearing it over and over, but you're gonna hear it hundreds of times more ... patience ... patience ... patience ... patience ...

Your W is still trying to get comfortable again expressing herself in her own language. Its gonna take some time for her jitters to leave her system. Please try to let things move at her pace for a while. I, too, had thought that now while we are piecing, I can start asking for what I want as Michelle describes in her book. I expressed, my W did some of it because she felt obliged, afterall it part of working on us, but didn't really want to. After a while it turn into another burden of "piecing" which she started doing less and less and then I became more frustrated as I held onto I'm doing for you, but your not doing for me (scorecard) mentallity.

I think its more useful to use the LL's to understand and appreciate how she is expressing herself is one the same level of importance as how you would like to receive her love. lostlove has a few threads where she has struggled with this. A technique that seems to help is write three positive things a day, to help you see the ways in which she is speaking a LL that you may have overlooked before and to recognize her efforts and understand they are just as noble as the ways you are wishing for.

I don't know if this will help, but I'm gonna go back to my puzzle analogy. Generally, the picture on the puzzle has a couple of unique reference points in the midst of a non-descript background. For instance, lets say its a backyard with a gazebo in one part of the picture and a BBQ pit in another and the rest is lawn. The pieces of the puzzle your W is attracted to working on is what she is familar with ... say the gazebo representing her LL. Yours is the BBQ pit. She needs to work on what she is familar with in order to feel like she is making progress in building this puzzle. You have a choice, you sit there and concentrate on your BBQ pit or help contribute some pieces to her gazebo to show you appreciate what she has worked on so far. Then you can find some of those lawn piecs adjacent to her gazebo that head in the direction of your BBQ pit and she will more likely help you with that and fitting your pit into the picture. Get my gist?...

'til later,
KAW