Hey Brian,

I'm glad things seem to be going well for you (except for the phone contacts with the OM, of course). I can identify with every one of the issues you wrote. Congratulations on keeping your confrontation about the cell phone calm and mostly positive.

You know if you want to work on some of those things you can start counseling without your W. Try to find a SBT trained counselor in your area to talk to. In my sitch, it really helped with self-respect and obsessive thoughts of the OM issues. If you find one that is familiar with the DB principles, you can also bounce your DBing strategies off of the MC before applying them to your R.

Try to set some concrete goals for each of your issues. Ask yourself how you will know if there is any improvement in a given area. For example, how will you know that anything your W says is true? Much of trust is obviously a faith issue, but there are smaller, measurable steps that can help. For example, if your W tells you she will be home at a certain time of day, then follows through on time, do you notice that?

You and your W have apparently negotiated a withdrawal program for contact with the OM. Assuming that she follows through on her end of the bargain, are you ready to hear about each of the calls without punishing her for each and every disclosure? You seem to be doing a great job of not being controlling, but it is still an issue for her since she mentions it to you and it won't bode well for your DB efforts if you're negative about the disclosures. Make sure you thank her for telling you each time she does.

Good luck,

dcr


Don